Bogovo Gumno - God's threshing floor

On mountain Devica we have a Sun circle called Bogovo Gumno, which was built for determining the day of the summer solstice. So what? We have these types of circles all over Europe. Why is this one so significant? The answer to this quesiton is: because of its name and what its name means. 

The meaning of the name "Bogovo Gumno" means God's Threshing floor.There is a local legend which says that the Circle is called God's Threshing floor because in the ancient times god came from heaven with his horses and he threshed grain there.

This directly links Sun circles with Sun worship and grain agriculture. 

In 1950, Serbian ethnographer Nenad Janković published a book on folk astronomy called "Astronomija u predanjima, obicajima i umotvorinama Srba" (Astronomy in legends, customs and oral and written tradition of the Serbs). In it he expressed his great surprise at the ability of ordinary illiterate peasants to tell exact date and time without calendars and clocks. Professor Jankovic states that one of the main instruments used for these calendar and time calculations was the threshing floor. By looking at the shadow cast by the stožer, the central pole at sunrise, they were able to tell the date. And by looking at the shadow cast by the stožer, the central pole during the day they were able to tell the time. Threshing floor is a universal solar observatory, which at the same time can tell the date and the time.

Were the original henges threshing floors as well as a sun circles, solar observatories? 

The threshing process is the final part of the harvest. It is the moment when the months of hard work finally turn into food. This is the moment when the people will find out whether they will feast or whether they will starve through the winter. But it is not just the months of hard work that were put into producing the grain that is being threshed at the threshing floor. These months were also months of prayers to the Sun, the god of Grain.

First there were spring prayers to the young god of Grain Jarilo. These prayers were performed during plowing and sawing season, to insure that the grain sprouts. The prayers were asking the young god of fertility to help insure that the land gets impregnated with the wheat seeds and that the wheat sprouts.

Second there were prayers to the mature god of Grain Vid. These prayers were performed during the growing of the grain, when sun is needed to grow the wheat seeds and fill them with goodness.

Third there were prayers to the old god of Thunder and Rain, Perun, Ilios. These prayers were performed during the ripening of the grain just before the harvest, when light rain is needed to ensure that the wheat is not destroyed by the drought.

But all these three gods are just three faces, three ages of one god, the god of grain, Dabog, the God that gives also known as Hromi Daba, Triglav, Thundering sun Ilios.

The threshing time is the time of truth. All the wheat is gathered on the threshing floor and the final, most important prayer to the god of Grain is uttered during the threshing process: "Please god give us enough grain so that we can survive through the winter". The threshing floor becomes the place where every year the relationship between the people and their god is being tested. If the harvest was bountiful, the god heard our prayers and has delivered. If the harvest was poor, the god did not hear our prayers or heard them and decided to ignore them. Why? What did we do wrong? What if we didn't do anything wrong, what if we were praying to the wrong god? 

Were threshing floors, sun circles, the first temples dedicated to the Sun, the god of grain farmers?

You can read more here


Edited by dublin - 15-Aug-2014 at 15:17