Organized Pagan Cult in Kievan Rus'. The invention of foreign elite or Evolution of local tradition?

Article // Studia Mythologica Slavica Vol. II, Ljubljana, 1999. - p. 47-76The article attempts to address the common notion in the English speaking world that the pre-Christian Slavic religion was basically animalistic. And, that personified and anthropomorphic Slavonic deities, known from medieval sources, were a foreign invention. In particular this article focuses on the pagan Kievan cult of the late 10th century as institutionalized by Vladimir the Great. As the Eastern Slavic religion did not evolved in the vacuum, the article analyzes it within the broader Slavic and Indo-European context.