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A place for Aryan (European) Folkish Pagans
According to the belief of local Ukrainian peasants, there are two types of witches. The first type got their mystical power from birth, the second one gets it from the former through teaching or sell their souls to chorts to get power.
The first type is somewhat amicable towards regular people. They help with illnesses or protect from the malicious attacks of their evil sisters, the taught witches.
P.Ivanov "Folk tales about witches and ghouls"
Art: Witch by volkhv Velemir (Speranski)
Can you believe that there are people who believe that since Europe was nominally christian for a while we can’t return to paganism in any shape or form and should mix the two in this cringe?
There’s a lot of alt right who think so.
Trumps not only start, but also end the same way Nine Princes did with the hero imprisoned. But again, compared to his father Merlin’s conditions are much less dire. He wasn’t blinded, thrown in a tiny cell and emaciated. He has his eyesight, plenty of room and food. He’s also a wizard. Most won’t doubt that Merlin will get out of his confinement, even if it takes some time.
The twist with Rinaldo was decent at least and got some foreshadowing.
Right off the bat (and the ending only confirms it) one can see that Zelazny tried to recapture the first book of the last cycle. This is not an inherently bad idea, but can’t say it was a success.
When Corwin woke up in a hospital bed he knew nothing of himself and the world of Amber which made him a perfect protagonist.
Amnesia is an old, tired trope, but it was popular because it usually worked well. When the hero is a fish out of water there’s reason for him to ask things and receive explanations which makes even the most expository dialogue justified and natural.
Should we blame Corwin for using his unsheathed sword on a chaos demon Dara secretly was? I wouldn’t. After all, other princes did so too (some even knowingly). And if their father Oberon held back in such matters and chose his consorts with the big head Amber’s royal family would be much smaller.
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In Corwin’s circle magic was mostly limited to the use of a single magical jewel. The latter basically came down to advanced weather control because Oberon didn’t bother to teach his kids magic and their use of it looks like kids playing with daddy’s toy. Brand and Fiona were the only real wizards in the family and the most advanced thing they did was fast teleportation.
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I’ll just rip the bandaid off right away. The Trumps of Doom was a disappointing start for a new cycle. And from what little memory I have it won’t get much better. If Corwin’s adventures were a memory, though a very distant one, Merlin’s shenanigans are mostly a complete blank with just a few exceptional scenes I vaguely remember. And all 10 books were read in chronological order, so Merlin’s cycle should be at least somewhat fresher. Yet it’s not. Is it an old man’s memory acting up or was it that forgettable? Let’s find out.
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I’ll post a review of Zelazny’s Trumps of Doom tomorrow. Better re-read the ones I wrote for the previous 5 books in the Amber Chronicles if you are interested.
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When Olga (Helga) offered her son to convert like she did Sviatoslav famously said that his warriors would laugh if he did so. It’s also theorized that his opposition to christianity and Byzantium were the main reasons Sviatoslav was betrayed by voivode Sveneld and died in an ambush. Personally I think Sviatoslav’s loyalty to Paganism and aggressive foreign policy definitely played their role in the king’s untimely demise and the eventual cultural downfall of Rus under his bastard son Vladimir who was raised by christian Olga and eventually baptized.
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During the anti-religious campaign, the Soviet government massively banished the images of saints from the visible space of a private dwelling, yet, making use of the sacred essence and moral significance of the shrines location, it produced manipulations for changing the meaning: “red corners” are an indispensable attribute of administrative and public interiors and hostels. The phrase “red corner” is filled with a new ideological meaning, whereas the meaning of this memorial space remains its moral and spiritual education connotations.
Vestnik slavianskikh kul’tur. 2020. Vol. 58
Another interesting thing to note about the red corner is that when a person was dying and after he/she died they were always placed with the head to the red corner. It was also believed that the deceased's soul stayed at the red corner for the first 40 days after death.
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Red used to mean not only a specific color, but also beautiful e.g. red girl (красна девица) should be translated as beautiful.
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A pal asked me about household worship of ancient Slavs. I have already written on that a bit before. Some brushing up on the topic and I’ll write again.
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These fragments from Denis Kozak’s monograph "Wends" provide an example of a small, local temple. It was most likely used by a settlement of Zubrycka culture (won’t find much on it in English, but here’s a map). Kozak suggests that it was a place of ancestor worship, but I am doubtful, especially considering the three godpoles around the altar (only one is drawn in the pic and has a cattle skull on top of it which is not found in the text).
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The walls and the bottom of the pit are covered by burnt clay. The pit is filled with coal, ash, small burned bones and pieces of ceramic. There were three poles in the Northern and Western parts of the altar. Maybe, they had some role to play in the sacrifice.
The short, North-Western wall of the room, opposite the altar has a round recess, the bottom of which is fixed to the floor level.
At the bottom of the recess is a subtriangular, sandstone, anthropomorphic portrait, a bust of an old man with long hair, thick beard and brows. The portrait is placed in the circle and resembles a coin obverse. A head is cut roughly and the shoulders are outlined.
D.Kozak
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I think that’s a good enough place to end the review. Overall, Trumps of Doom is not the weakest in the book series, but is nevertheless far from the best. Worth reading if you like Zelazny’s style and want to have some more of Amber.
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With Merlin there was no longer any reason for us to learn the basics after reading the previous books, but despite this the plot starts with a mystery. Merlin’s life is regularly threatened every year on the same date. He sees it as a personal issue and says nothing to his relatives until his girlfriend is murdered by a monster summoned from another world and Merlin meets an occultist who tries to sacrifice him to get powers promised by an unknown party.
Also Corwin is absent and no one knows where he is.
Ultimately, the real culprit here is the author. I think Zelazny wanted to up the ante by making the hero a powerful mage, but to me this cheapened the story. We came from a witty warrior to a hacker wizard cheating reality on the fly.
Corwin’s cycle had Highlander vibes, while Merlin’s is more of a generic fantasy with spells flying left and right.
But I don’t hate Merlin as some fans do. He’s an amicable kid who doesn’t let power and heritage inflate his ego. It just sucks that his adventures are not as fan to read as his dad’s.
Merlin’s powers give him such an advantage he barely uses a sword. Corwin had to rely on his skill and wit, as well as the inborn strength and regeneration of Amberites.
But Merlin can just think for a second and conjure almost anything from thin air.
Sure, there’s an in-universe explanation for the increased role of magic in the new cycle. Merlin is a son of a princess of Chaos and hence has more affinity towards magic. But the plot is now full of over the top sorcery and stakes feel lower. Also, it’s harder to relate to a half chaos-monster Merlin is, even though he takes more after his father.
My biggest issue with Trumps comes down to the protagonist. Despite being a power fantasy Corwin’s story managed to keep the hero grounded. Sure, compared to a regular human he is a superman, but Corwin was average when it comes to the princes of Amber. Half of his brothers are as good, while Benedict and Gerard could easily beat Corwin.
Meanwhile his son Merlin (Merle) is rather overpowered. Won’t say he’s a Gary Stu, but the guy has the best mix of genetics possible being a part of both Amber and Chaos royalty. He’s also a genius programmer and one of the strongest sorcerers in the world.
Trumps of Doom is the first novel in the second cycle of The Chronicles of Amber. It’s focused on the son of the original hero and was written in 1985. I dislike plot summaries since they are boring and redundant to anyone who has read the book himself, but I will quote specific events and lines to analyze the work so the review is NOT spoiler free.
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Despite his rather short rule Sviatoslav the Brave managed to impact the history and became an inspirational figure, especially to modern Pagans.
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Sviatoslav the Brave burns a bible and answers a christian monk
A scene from The Legend Of Princess Olga in my translation
Editing by @Pagan_Revivalism
Also, communists managed to semi-successfully use the red corner tradition. The line of subversion came far by then. From Ancestors to jewish gods to jewish politicians.
You can still see it in modern ex-USSR countries, but at offices of government officials, not just regular households like it used to be.
At the start and end of the harvest, even though the idols were replaced by icons, people still upheld an ancient tradition of bringing the first and last hay sheaf to the red corner.
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In Slavic tradition, even after christianization, there was a special place in every household. It was a south-eastern corner of the house where ancestral idols and later christians icons stood. Similar to Greek household hearth or Roman shrine to the Lar Familiaris it was a sacred place of the house educated to the ancestral cult. Most modern Slavic Pagans continue this tradition also adding idols of the Gods to the corner as well as photos of the dead family members.
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It seems more likely to me that the temple was dedicated to 4 distinct deities, 3 of them represented by the godpoles and one by the stone bust.
Won’t speculate which deities people of Zubrycka culture worshipped, but it’s reasonable to assume that the stone one was the most important. Or maybe, the small settlement just had to make do with what little they had. As stated by D.Kozak an average settlement of Zubrycka culture had a population ranging from 80 to 210 people. Obviously, the majority were not carvers. Also, keep in mind that sandstone is notoriously hard to cut.
Two lower jaw bones are found by the altar. One of them belonged to a 35 y.o. man, another to a 25 y.o. woman.
A clay, female figurine with broken off legs and head was found on the other side of the altar. There were fragments of ceramic and animal bones on the floor. Obviously, those things are to be interpreted as offerings to the deity depicted on the stone.
D.Kozak
Examination of Slavic temples of VI-XIII c. shows that Slavs had pretty developed tradition of cult architecture and paraphernalia.
An example of this is a small temple found in the settlement of Zubra culture dating to the end of I - mid II c. AD near the Zagai village of the Volhynia region.
The temple is located in the center of the settlement. It’s shape resembles a human torso and is almost 1ft deeper than the surrounding earth.
An oval sacrificial altar was placed in the centre of the room and was 2.6x3.9ft long and 1ft deeper than the level of the floor.
D.Kozak