#Navka

[vyvilha]

Can you tell me more about mavka and what her deal is? She reminds me of Scandinavian huldra from thr little I've heard and I'd love to learn more about her!:D

hello friend. a mavka, navka or nyavka is an undead forest spirit, one of type which ukrainians call the covered dead (заложні мерці) — spirits of people that died of unclean, improper death, and therefore couldn't finish the transition and weren't allowed to the orherworld. the name covered undead comes from the fact that in old times they weren't properly buried, and were left in forests covered by leaves and twigs.

generally mavky are envisioned as beautiful girls, although in some regions there are beliefs about male mavky (sometimes called didky). mavka looks perfectly human except for the fact that their backs lack skin and muscle, exposing their innards and spine. they aren't malicious, but are obliviously playful and can hurt people during their plays — tickle or dance you to death, drown, ward you off your tray. in some western regions it's also believed that time goes faster when encountering them — what is felt like several hours could actually be several hundred years.

navky live in forests and mountain caves, and they like to dance, weave, play and prank wanderers, especially young men. to ward off mavky valeriana, garlic and wormwood are used, as well as wearing your shirt inside out. like most undead spirits in ukrainian mythology, navky are most active during the green festival/rusalka week.

there is a ukrainian holiday called navsky velykden, or undead easter, celebrated at the first thursday after easter. in this day all mavky, rusalky, upyri and all the other unclean forces celebrate easter. at night during the holiday it was prohibited to visit churches, since celebrating undead could dismember you if spotted.

[zarya-zaryanitsa]

Hi! I'm trying to research slavic mythology, especially the afterlife, and I've come across a place called Prav but i haven't found much information on it as a whole, i was wondering if you had any information on it

Hello!

To the best of my knowledge the idea that the cosmos separates into Prav, Yav and Nav comes from The Book of Veles, a famous forgery pretending to describe pre-Christian Slavic history and religious customs.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen Prav (or Yav) discussed more broadly outside of that context. However the word Nav/Navia does have real cultural background as a term used for to describe spirits of the dead.

Linguistic evidence implies that the early medieval Slavs may have shared a belief in some form of spirit or soul. In discussing these notions, various scholars point towards the word nav/nawie. This term is sometimes seen as being of pre-Slavic origin, and it is derived from Pre-Indo-European cultural heritage and refers to ‘death’ or ‘corpse’. It holds similar meaning in some of the contemporary Slavic languages, although in various (but not all) languages of the Slavs one may observe a shift in its meaning, whereby it refers to the sphere of demonology. For example, in eastern Polish dialects there are various names for rusałki, forest or water demons: mawki, mauki, nawki, miawki, mauki, mavky, niavky, majki. Another term for the spirits of the ancestors, which is also attributed an ancient origin, is lalka (lelka, łątka). It is noteworthy that after death the human soul went to the land of the dead, whose name is reconstructed as Nawia or Lala. (…) We know very little about the Slavic land of the dead. I have already mentioned that the words nav/nawie, known from textual accounts, referred to dead people or their ghosts and occasionally (in later times) malevolent spirits. The late medieval textual accounts from the Czech area confirm that Navia was the name of the land of the dead among the Western Slavs. ‘To go to Navia’ meant to die and ‘to prepare someone for Nav’, meant to kill

- Slavic Journeys to the Otherworld. Remarks on the Eschatology of Early Medieval Pomeranians by Kamil Kajkowski

A mention of navias can even be found in the Tale of Bygone years, where they serve as a personification of the plague that fell on the town of Polotsk in 1092.

Something very strange occurred in Polotsk, a hallucination: there was a noise during the night: demons were running through the street like people. If anyone came out of their house to look, they were immediately and invisibly wounded by the demons, and died of it, and they did not dare leave their houses. Then they began to appear during the day on horseback, and they themselves could not be seen, but only their horses’ hooves were visible. And this is how they wounded the people of Polotsk and of the region. And this is why the people said: “Navias (навие) are slaying the people of Polotsk”.

- Tale of Bygone Years as found in Sources of Slavic Pre-Christian Religion, red. Juan Antonio Álvarez-Pedrosa

Andrzej Szyjewski in Religia Słowian explores some more cases of navias appearing as malevolent spirits in Slavic folklore, citing bulgarian „twelve nawi”, evil spirits that suck the blood of lying-in women and bring diseases as well as broader Southern Slavic belief in navije/navje, bird-shaped spirits harassing women during pregnancy and in childbirth.

Overall, as you probably can guess I highly recommend reading „Slavic Journeys to the Otherworld. Remarks on the Eschatology of Early Medieval Pomeranians” and then continuing your search from there.

[rin-rin-winter]

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The spirits known by this term represented the souls of girls who had died unnatural tragic or premature deaths, particularly unchristened babies. Mavkas often appeared in the form of beautiful young girls who enticed and lured young men into the woods, where they "tickled" them to death. Mavkas had no reflection in water, did not cast shadows, and had "no back", meaning that their insides could be seen.In some accounts, they were also said to help farmers by looking after cattle and driving out wild animals.

They were believed to live in groups in forests, mountain caves, or sheds, which they decorated with rugs. They made thread of stolen flax and wove thin transparent cloth for making clothes for themselves. They loved flowers, which they wore in their hair. In the spring they planted flowers in the mountains, to which they enticed young men, whom they tickled to death. On Pentecost (known as Navka's Easter, Ukrainian: На́вський Вели́кдень)they held games, dances, and orgies. A demon accompanied them on a flute or pipes.

[dozydawn]

skater tatiana navka liked to get up close & touchy with the blades of her & her partner’s skates. so many lifts where she grips onto the blades or rests her head on his boot. she could not stop touching them. even badly cut her hand once during competition

[arcxnumvitae]

All he does is grin. “Everyone assumes my target was Lord Abbadon, who says my interest didn’t lie in his lady?”

[desiderium-eden]

It's her birth month!!

[andrigyn]

warm up sketch of my favorite girl in the world (Florence Tule <3) who was created by @looseleaflettuce

[saiwola]

[figureskatingcostumes]

Tatiana Navka and Roman Kostomarov skating their free dance to In The Closet by Michael Jackson and The Masquerade by George Benson at the 2002 European Championships.

(Photos by Barry Mittan)

[olivia2010kroth]

Сплетник: ледовое шоу "Вечера на хуторе" / Gossip: ice show “Evenings on the Farm”

Сплетник: ледовое шоу “Вечера на хуторе” / Gossip: ice show “Evenings on the Farm” Сплетник:Татьяна Навка представила в Москве своё новое мультимедийное ледовое шоу “Вечера на хуторе” по мотивам произведений Николая Гоголя. Премьера прошла во дворце спорта “Мегаспорт”. Шоу будет идти до 7 января (2024). Gossip:Tatyana Navka presented in Moscow her new multimedia ice show “Evenings on the Farm”,…

[shipshinaa]

Okay but

Black Pearl as mavka!

Mavkas are spirits in ukrainian folklore, yall can read some more about them under the cut

The spirits known by this term represented the souls of girls who had died unnatural, tragic or premature deaths, particularly unchristened babies. Mavkas often appear in the form of beautiful young girls who entice and lure young men into the woods, where they "tickle" them to death. Mavkas have no reflection in water, nor do they cast shadows. In some accounts, they were also said to help farmers by looking after cattle and driving out wild animals.

A subtype of the Mavkas are the Nyavkas, which behave the same except for having "no back", meaning that their spine and some other insides can be seen; the most defining feature between determining Mavkas and Nyavkas is whether or not the insides are visible from the back.

Mavkas and Nyavkas were believed to live in groups in forests, mountain caves, or sheds, which they decorated with rugs. They made thread of stolen flax and wove thin transparent cloth for making clothes for themselves. They loved flowers, which they wore in their hair. In the spring, they planted flowers in the mountains, to which they enticed young men, whom they tickled to death. On Pentecost (known as Navka's Easter, Ukrainian: На́вський Вели́кдень), they held games, dances, and orgies. A demon accompanied them on a flute or pipes.

[vyvilha]

what is a navje? I cant find it on Google

hello friend. navje (нави) or more common nav' (навь) in ukrainian folklore is a general word that describes undead spirits. it comes from the proto-slavic *navь meaning "dead". archaic ukrainian words for coffin (nava) and dead (navk), as well as the name of a very popular ukrainian mythological character navka are derived from it as well

[sansloii]

Though not quite as packed as it would be when the festivities officially begin, the streets of Alluka were still teeming with life and lights and noise. The citizens of the capital rushing about in a force of organized chaos. Last minute preparations to welcome visitors once more to the land of fairy tales. The people, seemingly running about recklessly (blindly even), manage to weave around the Exulan king. Quite used to navigating thick crowds of people. Some even manage to give Roderick a quick bow of the head in greeting before scurrying off with crates and boxes of who knew what. Some did bump into him though. A few kids. A couple drunk but harmless older men. And an unassuming woman. The hood of her cloak pulled up, not unlike some of the other passersby, as she muttered a rushed and quiet "Sorry" before getting lost among the people once more... And there it was. Light and floral, a scent of faint nostalgia. Of days long, long ago. Then there they were. A bit of pink peeking out between some stones off the main road. Flowers. To find any flowers at all in Navka was unheard of. But these ones were even stranger, if possible. The small stems growing in his direction as if reaching for him. Bluebells. Pink bluebells...

He fully expected Alluka to be brimming with activity in the hours leading up to the hunt, and he was not disappointed. People around him rushed about — putting up decorations and signage and hauling crates of supplies into storefronts — all hurrying to prepare themselves for imminent influx of travelers from all parts of the realm. Those that recognized him gave him a brief nod ( which he returned ), but most barely acknowledged him — which he didn't mind at all. A couple children brushed by, followed by some inebriated older men, but he regarded them with the same nonchalance that they offered him.

The very last passerby… is a little different, though.

The scent that hits his nose is very brief but — and maybe it's just a trick of the mind or something akin to that — it seems to last much longer than that. It's light, floral, and carries the memories of a moment that has long passed. He turns with the smell, saying almost nothing as he watches the hooded figure retreat quickly, and he's tempted to reach forward after her. Before the thought to do so becomes an action, she's gone and it's as though she was never there in the first place…

…and in her place are small, but quickly growing flowers that have pushed their way through the cobbled street. The stems and petals are unharmed, the little clusters of pink blooms opening up all at once.

Roderick has half a mind to rub at his eyes ( thinking he must be dreaming ), when the flowers seem to lean towards him. They straighten up when he closes the gap between he and the bluebells, but they resume their tipping and tilting the instant he bends down to pick one out of the stones. The rest gravitate towards his hand as he selects one from the middle, and he brings that bloom near to eye level. Carefully, as if he fears he may crush the stem, he turns the bloom in hand...focusing intently.

For a moment… just a moment… he pictures himself at home, in the open air. He has just the one flower — just the one bluebell — but that's all he needs.

The king extends an arm to offer it… and receives a touched smile in return.

Navkan Hunt | @desiderium-eden

[dozydawn]

Tatiana Navka and Samvel Gezalian Original Dance “Rhumba” 1994. Photographed by Bob Thomas.

[arcxnumvitae]

Leo: How much training do you think I’d have to do before I could take a tree to the chest?

Annali: Do you really want me to answer that?

Embla: Why do you both keep going on about trees and muscles?

Jan: Oh you missed it, little sister.

[desiderium-eden]

"If the pay wasn't so good, I would've moved back to the Plains."