Vodyanoy
male water spirit or fairy-tale character from Slavic mythology, tutelary deity
In Slavic mythology, vodyanoy (Russian: водяной, IPA: [vədʲɪˈnoj]; lit. '[he] from the water' or 'watery') is a water spirit. In Czech and Slovak fairy tales, he is called vodník (or in Germanized form: Hastrman), and often referred to as Wassermann in German sources. In Ukrainian fairy tales, he is called “водяник“ (vodyanyk).
He may appear to be a naked man with a pot belly (and bald-headed) wearing a hat and belt of reeds and rushes, conflicting with other accounts ascribing him green hair and a long green beard, while many depictions restore him as an anthropormophic frog. The varying look has been attributed in commentary to his shape-shifting ability. When angered, the vodyanoy breaks dams, washes down water mills, and drowns people and animals. Consequently, fishermen, millers, and also bee-keepers make sacrifices to appease him. The vodyanoy would sometimes drag people down to his underwater dwelling to serve him as slaves.
The vodník in Czechia or Slovakia were said to use colored ribbons (sometimes impersonating peddlers, but also tying them to grass, etc., as lures in the landscape) to attract humans near water in order to snatch them.
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This entry incorporates text from “Vodyanoy” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.