#tbc # Plague/Illness/Healing [[milizia2015]] - [Hittite Prayer](https://lrc.la.utexas.edu/eieol/hitol/80?fbclid=IwAR2vHBBgEqKPI0YA4C61XX5cu-umopVfu8gP-PfwWkiWc7CG5pmYzEUYuc4) - PIE *Rudlós* (Vedic and Slavic evidence) - Skt. Rudra - Slavic Rъglъ or Rъgъlь - Grk Apollo (Apollo Eripes/Erythius) - T. Manasatarangini writes about this: In the Greek, Apollo is the cognate deity of Rudra. He is called both Loimios, i.e. the bringer of plague and Paion i.e. the healer. He is also invoked as Apotropaios meaning one who is called upon to avert the harm that he can inflict. This is reminiscent of the Vedic mantra: “rudrasyahetiḥparivovṛṇaktu | (May Rudra’s missile be averted)”. Apollo is a fierce god who is the slayer of many demonic entities even as Rudra is the slayer of many Dānava-s and Daitya-s. Finally, in the Homeric hymn to Apollo he is explicitly mentioned as being feared by the other gods as he approaches Olympos (the Greek svarga) with his bow and shining weapons – a clear parallel to the Vedic situation with Rudra: I will remember and not be forgetful of the archer Apollo, who by the god, is dreaded within Zeus’ house as he enters. Straightaway all of them leap to their feet as he nearer approaches, Out of their seats, so soon as his shining weapons he levels. (Homeric hymn to Apollo 1-4; translated by WC Lawton) - Baltic: Giltine is a sister of Laima, and is Baltic. Her name is the basis for geltona - yellow - the colour of bone. Also from gilti which means to either stab or insert. As she has a lolling tongue which she stabs the dead. Much was also written by Prane Dundaliene & Gintaras Bersenavicius. #### Doina Dragaica's view Plague Gods It is not possible to reconstruct a PIE plague God but we can see that the indo-European plague Gods have in common that they are named for the colors that humans turn as they die. For biological reasons this is a limited palette made up of red, black, yellow and white. Rudra ‘red’ is a god of plague and disease as well as healing in the Rig Veda. He is the father of the Maruts — because plague and war gods go together. This is mentioned in Gamkrelidze and Ivanov pp. 449-450. Kali ‘black’ is a goddess associated with plague originally. She seems to be associated with bubonic plague which went through India in about 400 CE, the same time that many temples to Kali were built. Bubonic plague is characterized by black bruises from heavy internal bleeding. Apollo Eripes ‘red’ with Artemis brings plague by shooting people with their arrows. Paeans are used for healing, a type of flute music. Apollo ‘white, shining’ was mainly a sun god in Greece and a plague god in Rome. He may be associated with polio, a disease that comes in the spring. Robigia ‘red’ is a Roman God of wheat rust, not a human disease. However people knew that when they saw wheat rust in the fields, famine would follow. Ovid gives prayers for him for the date April 25. Carmine is a goddess mentioned in Irish texts as bringing destruction to the grain fields. Carmine may be borrowed from Latin and it may mean either ‘poem, charm’ or ‘red’. Giltine is a goddess known from Slavic or Baltic sources and described rather imaginatively by Marija Gimbutas in Living goddesses, pp. 204-205. Giltine is related to words for yellow and is associated with jaundice. Cholera is known by names of the God Yama in the Caucasus mountains in Ossetic (IE) and Georgian (not IE). These names are not color names. Nobody likes most of these gods or demons, however people are very polite so as not to offend them. The Rig Veda shows that people make them offerings but they never sing their praises. However on the theory that “he that wounds shall make whole” they are also thought to be able to heal or prevent plague. Other healing Gods include Aesculapius and Hygeia and even Chiron, a centaur. This information was cobbled together from various sources, among them. The Mole in Folk Medicine by Jaan Puhvel Deutsche mythology by Jacob Grimm, vol. 3, p. 1185. Indo-European culture by Gamkrelidze and Ivanov pp. 449-450. Golden Bough by James Frazer which discusses the color names of the Gods. There is also a list of epidemics in ancient times on Wikipedia. Some of these can be identified to particular plagues and to particular Gods. However the Wikipedia page is not very informative. #### Lutz Struckmeier's Response to Doina Dragaica Hope you guys don't consider me or the following in any way patronising, but what I've found may help in unscrambling what you, dear Mrs Dragaica, may have mixed up a bit. First, the most common word for the colour "red" in (Ancient) Greek is ἐρυθρός, ie /e.riˈθros/, and that word indeed is related to Sanskrit रुधिर, /ˈɽu.d̪ʱi.ɽɐ/, meaning the same, and most obviously being related to, among others, English "red", German "rot", etc., seemingly at the root of the name of god Rudra, namely possibly in the sense of being "red with scorn", also called "the roarer", who beside other things, was believed to cure diseases and to have healing remedies and to be the best physician of physicians. That of course links him to Apollo, who beside being a god of healing also is a master archer whose arrows spread the plague, and that notion is also an aspect of Rudra. So far, so good. Second, above you wrote "Apollo Eripes". Yet, "erip-" rather looks Latin than Greek, namely like "eripio" from ex- (“out of, from”) +‎ rapiō (“grab, sieze”). The interesting thing is that, if that epitheton existed, more likely among Romans, it would have been very appropriate for a deity with the ambivalent quality of being both a god who spreads disease, with its possible lethal effects, and a god of healing. While one translation of "eripio" reads "I snatch away", most apropriate in terms of a god related to the realm of the dead, think of Hades "snatching away" young Persephone from among her companions, "eripio" may also mean "I rescue". As for the latter meaning, I guess here you mixed something up, provided of course it's not me who is wholly mistaken. 😉 There is a temple dedicated to Apollo Epikourios, "Apollo the helper", situated in in Oichalia, a municipality in the northeastern part of Messenia, Greece, in classical antiquity part of Arcadia, with the archaeological site being called Bassae. Bassae lies near the village of Skliros, northeast of Figaleia, south of Andritsaina and west of Megalopolis. The etymology of the epitheton of Apollo Epikourios reads: ἐπίκουρος, from ἐπι- (epi-, “upon”) + an unattested word, meaning, among other things, 1. assisting, aiding 2. defending 3. (masculine substantive) helper, ally, assister Writes Pausanias in the 2nd century CE: "Phigalia is surrounded by mountains, on the left by the mountain called Kotilios . . . [...] On the mountain is a place called Bassai, and the temple of Apollon Epikourios (the Helper), which, including the roof, is of stone. [...] Apollon received his name from the help he gave in time of plague, just as the Athenians gave him the name of Alexikakos (Averter of Evil) for turning the plague away from them." So in other words Apollo Epikourios "rescued" the people of that place from the plague and that is how your possible mixing up of things came about. Hope I could be of some help.