Cult of Gods

Mokosh

Slavic tradition. See the whole pantheon.

Domains
women's work, fate (inferred)
Symbols and attributes
Spinning
Ivan Bilibin, Baba Yaga, an illustration for a Russian fairy tale (1900s).
Ivan Bilibin, Baba Yaga, an illustration for a Russian fairy tale (1900s).

Key myth

Listed among the idols of Kyiv, the only goddess in that list. Folk traditions of Mokosh or Paraskeva Friday, connected with spinning and wells, survive in East Slavic villages.

Where sources differ or caution applies. Her older role is reconstructed from folklore.

Primary sources

  • Primary Chronicle (980)

All sources for the Slavic pantheon

Place in the family graph

Choose a deity to see where it comes from. Dashed lines are links the sources describe that are not parent and child.

SvarogDazhbogPerunVeles / VolosMokoshStribogKhorsSimarglSvantevitChernobogMarzanna / Morana

More traditions

Odin rides to Hel, W. G. Collingwood, after the Poetic Edda.NorsePapyrus of Ani, British Museum (New Kingdom), a Book of the Dead.EgyptianA chaos monster and a sun god, drawn by L. Gruner for A. H. Layard's Monuments of Nineveh.MesopotamianVishvarupa Vishnu, Kashmir or Himachal, in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art collection.Hindu

Elsewhere in the world

Deities in other traditions who share a theme with Mokosh: earth, harvest and fertility. This is overlap in one area only.

Norse

Sif

golden hair, grain (by later reading)

Norse

Freyr

peace, fertility, sunshine

Egyptian

Geb

earth

Egyptian

Osiris

afterlife, resurrection, fertility of the flood

Egyptian

Sobek

Nile, fertility, kingship

Mesopotamian

Ninlil

grain, wind (as Enlil's wife)

Compare across cultures