Also called Radogost, Redigast, Riedegost, Radigast.
Their story
Thietmar of Merseburg, around 1015, describes a sanctuary called Riedegost among the Redarii whose chief god was Zuarasici. Adam of Bremen, writing later, turns this around and calls the temple Rethra and the god Redigast, and Helmold names Radigast as the god of the Obotrite land. Scholars still argue whether Radegast was a god at all or a place name that later writers mistook for one. The site of Rethra has never been securely found, and the "Prillwitz idols" once shown as its relics are eighteenth-century forgeries.
Best times to give to them
- when welcoming guests
- Koliada
- harvest
What they like being given
- bread and salt offered to a guest
- mead or juice
- a shared meal
How to honour them
- Welcome guests with bread and salt in his name.
- Honour him through generous hospitality rather than grand ritual.
How they can help you
- hospitality
- alliances and friendship
- honourable conduct
Symbols
- a temple on a lake
- war banners
- a horse
- a boar in legend
It is genuinely uncertain whether Radegast was a god or the name of a sanctuary.
Sources
- Thietmar of Merseburg, Chronicon, Book VI
- Adam of Bremen, Gesta Hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum
- Helmold, Chronica Slavorum
More Slavic gods
- Perun The thunder god of oak and axe
- Veles Lord of cattle, wealth and the underworld
- Dazhbog The giving god, the sun
- Svarog The heavenly smith, father of fire and sun
- Jarilo The youthful god of spring and growth
- Rod The god of kin, birth and fate
- Stribog Grandfather of the winds
- Khors The bright disc of the sun