Vesna and a Slavic Spring

Vesna is the Slavic goddess of spring and she is currently busy making her presence felt with signs of her arrival all around. Yet, Morana, the winter goddess is proving more difficult to dispel this year it seems.

For the three winter moons, I meditated on and invoked Morana. I called her the snow queen for that is how I saw her. On the spring equinox, I too an efficgy I had made of Morana at the beginning of winter and burned and drowned her in the Slavic tradition. Now, for the 3 spring moons, I meditate and invoke Vesna.

While Morana was an ice cold bringer of withdrawal, sleep and death, Vesna is the warm bringer of renewal, rebirth and vitality. She constantly gives me a feeling of pushing out – the pushing out of life and energy. I cannot help but think of breathing when I think of these two polar goddesses – breathe in, breathe out. Vesna also brings a little eroticism lacking in Morana (for me anyway) – she is fertility and fecundity. She is the spark of potential that brings forth life. She is often depicted Venus-like, naked or clothed in the valleys and flora of the land. She is usually shown heavily breasted rather like the very ancient goddess forms found in Moravia. Not only is she potential but also she provides the succulence for life to get started. But she is also shown as a younger woman.

Vesna and Živa are often said to be synonymous along with other Slavic goddesses but I have a sense that Živa is more representative of summer. She is to me life itself (indeed Živa means life) and represented by a more mature woman. It is tempting to see a trio of goddesses here – Vesna, Živa and Morana and Maiden, Mother and Crone. However, I do not find anything described like that in the literature. But, the funny thing about the Slavic pagan hierarchy is that it is not well described. The Slavs didn’t record anything and worshipped outdoors so much is word of mouth, myth, legend and plain stories.