*Dyēus

*Dyḗus (lit. 'daylight'), also *Dyḗus ph₂tḗr (lit. 'father daylight'), is the reconstructed name of the daylight-sky god in Proto-Indo-European mythology. He was thought of as the bright sky during the day and the home of the gods, called the *deywṓs. People believed *Dyēus was linked to the wide blue sky and the rains that helped plants grow. He was often thought of together with *Dʰéǵʰōm, the Earth Mother, showing a balance between the sky and the earth.

Even though we do not have direct proof of *Dyēus from old writings or artifacts, scholars think he is the most certain god in the Indo-European religion. This is because similar ideas and words about him appear in many later Indo-European languages and stories from groups like the Vedic Indo-Aryans, Latins, Greeks, Phrygians, Messapians, Thracians, Illyrians, Albanians, and Hittites.

Name

Etymology

The name Dyēus comes from an ancient word that means "bright sky" or "daylight". It is linked to words in many languages that talk about the day, the sky, and gods. For example, in Sanskrit, a word meaning "heavenly" or "shining" comes from the same root.

Epithets

One common way people called Dyēus was "Father". This idea of a father god appears in many ancient cultures. For example, in Vedic traditions, Dyáuṣ Pitṛ́ means "Sky Father", and in Greek, Zeus Patēr also means "Father Zeus". Similar ideas appear in other ancient languages and traditions.

Role

*Dyēus was seen as the bright sky and the home of the gods, often called the "Heaven." He was thought to be the father of important figures like the Divine Twins and the goddess of the Dawn. Though important, he was not the ruler of the gods like Zeus or Jupiter.

*Dyēus was linked to the wide, bright sky and to rain that helps plants grow. Some versions of him, like Zeus and Jupiter, are storm gods, but this idea probably came later from mixing with other cultures. In stories, *Dyēus was described as "all-seeing" with "wide vision." People thought of the sun as the "lamp of Dyēus" or the "eye of Dyēus," which shows up in many old stories from different places.

*Dyēus is often paired with *Dʰéǵʰōm, the Earth goddess. Together, they were seen as working to help life on Earth grow — the rain from the sky makes the earth fertile. The Earth was also seen as a dark place where people live, below the bright home of the gods. Some stories suggest that *Dyēus might have had a wife, but this is not certain and comes mostly from Greek and Vedic traditions.

Evidence

Words that come from the root *dyeu- meaning "daylight" or "bright sky" are found in many Indo-European languages. These words include ideas about the sky, gods, and heaven.

Descendants

• PIE: *d(e)i-, meaning 'to shine, be bright',
  • PIE: *dyēus, the daylight-sky god,
    • Indo-Iranian: *dyauš,
      • Sanskrit: Dyáuṣ, the god of Heaven, and dyú, the common word for "heaven",
      • Old Avestan: dyaoš, "heaven", mentioned in a single verse of the Avesta; Young Avestan: diaoš, "hell", as a result of the Zoroastrian religious reformation,
    • Mycenaean Greek: di-we, dative case of an otherwise scarcely attested name,
      • Cypriot Syllabary: ti-wo, interpreted as pertaining to Zeus, and the possible genitive Diwoi,
        • Greek: Zeus, the god of the Sky; also Boeotian Lac., Corinth., Rhod. dialects: Deús,
    • Italic: *d(i)jous,
      • Old Latin: Dioue (or loue), Dijovis (diovis),
        • Latin: Jove, the god of the Sky;
        • Latin: Diūs, the god of oaths

Ritual and formulaic expressions from the form *Dyēus Ph₂ter ("Father Dyēus") were inherited in liturgic and poetic traditions:

• PIE: *dyēus ph₂tḗr, 'Father Sky' (voc. *dyeu ph₂ter, "O Father Sky"),
  • Greek: Zeus Patēr,
  • Indo-Iranian: *Dyauš-pHtar,
    • Vedic: Dyáuṣ-pitā́ (voc. Dyáuṣ-pitṛ́),
  • Italic: *Djous-patēr > *Dijēs-patēr (voc. *Djow-patēr),
    • Old Latin: Dies Pater,
      • Latin: Diespiter; Iūpiter (from *Djow-patēr), archaic Iovispater, later Iuppiter,
    • Oscan: Dípatír, Umbrian: Iupater (dat. Iuve patre), South Picene: dipater (gen. dipoteres),
  • Illyrian: Deipaturos, recorded by Hesychius as Δειπάτυροϛ (Deipáturos), a god worshiped in Tymphaea.

Other reflexes are variants that have retained both linguistic descendants of the stem *dyeu- ("sky") alongside the original structure "Father God". Some traditions have replaced the epithet *ph₂ter with the nursery word papa ("dad, daddy"):

• Luwian: Tātis tiwaz, "Daddy Tiwaz", the Sun-god,
• Palaic: Tiyaz papaz, "Papa Tiyaz", the Sun-god,
• Scythian: Papaios (Papa Zios), "father Zeus", the god of the Sky,
• Old Irish: in Dagdae Oll-athair, "Great Father the Dagda" (from the Proto-Celtic formula *sindos dago-dēwos ollo fātir, "Great Father the Good God").

Other variants are less secured:

• Hittite: attas Isanus, "Father Sun-god"; the name of the sky-god was replaced with a Hattic sun-god loan, but the original structure of the formula left intact,
• Latvian: Debess tēvs, "Father of Heaven",
• Old Norse: Óðinn Alföðr, "Odin, All-Father" or "Odin Father of All",
• Russian: Stribogŭ, "Father God",
• Albanian: Zot, "lord" or "God", epithet of Zojz, the sky-father (generally thought to be derived from Proto-Albanian *dźie̅u ̊ a(t)t-, "heavenly father"; although the etymology *w(i)tš- pati-, "lord of the house", has also been proposed),
• Tokharian B: kauṃ-ñäkte, 'sun, sun-god'.

"Celestial" derivations

Words that come from *deiwós, a form of *dyēus (the sky-god), are found in the following traditions:

• PIE: *deiwós (lit. skyling, pl. *deywṓs), meaning "celestial, heavenly one", hence a "god",
  • Indo-Iranian: *daivá (daiua), a "god",
    • Sanskrit: devá, meaning "heavenly, divine, anything of excellence", and devi, female title meaning "goddess";
    • Avestan: daēva, a term for "demons" in Zoroastrianism, as a result of a religious reformation that degraded the status of prior deities,
      • Old Persian: daiva meaning "false deities, demons",
  • Balto-Slavic: *deiwas,
    • Baltic: *deivas,
      • Old Lithuanian: Deivas,
        • Lithuanian: Diēvas, supreme god of the sky,
      • Old Prussian: Dìews (or Deywis), Latvian: Dievs, and the Baltic Dievaitis ("Little God" or "Prince"), a name used to refer to the Thunder God Perkūnas, or to the Moon God Mėnuo.
  • Germanic: *tīwaz (pl. *tīwōz), a word for "god" that probably also served as a title (*Tīwaz, "God") that came to be associated with a specific deity whose original name is now lost,
    • Late Proto-Germanic *Tiwasdag, a calque of Latin dies Martis which gave the word for 'Tuesday' in Old Norse Týs-dagr, Old English Tīwes-dæg, Old Frisian Tīesdi, and Old High German Zies-tag; interpreted as a remnant of the sky and war functions of *Tīwaz by G. Kroonen, although M. L. West views it as unlikely,
      • Old Norse: Týr, associated with justice; the plural tívar survived as a poetic word for 'the gods', and týr appears in kennings for Odin and Thor, such as in the Odin's names Sigtýr ("victory-god"), Gautatýr ("god of the Geats"), Fimbultýr ("powerful god"), or Hertýr ("army-god"),
      • Old English: Tīw (or Tīg), Old High German: Zio (or *Ziu), a god,
      • Gothic: *Teiws, a deity reconstructed from the associated rune ᛏ (Tyz),
  • Italic: *deiwos, a "god, a deity",
    • Old Latin: deivos (deiuos), the "gods",
      • Latin: deus, common name for a "god, a deity"; and Dea ("goddess"), a title assigned to various Roman goddesses like Dea Tacita, Bona Dea or Dea Dia ("Goddess of the Daylight" or "Bright Goddess").
        • Vulgar Latin: Deus, the god of Christianity in the Vetus Latina and the Vulgate,
    • Oscan: deivas, Venetic: deivos, "gods",
    • Volscian: deue Decluna, attested in an inscription from Velitrae, possibly from the 3rd century BC.
  • Celtic: *dēwos, a "god, a deity", and *dago-dēwos, the "good god", old name of the Dagda,
    • Celtiberian: teiuo, a "god",
    • Gaulish: dēuos, a "god",
      • Gaulish: Devona (/deuona/) or Divona, a deity of sacred waters, springs, and rivers whose name means "Divine",
    • Old Welsh: Dubr Duiu ("Water of the Divinity"), evolving into Mod. Welsh Dyfrdwy (River Dee, Wales). The form deva, diva ("goddess") likewise appears in Celtic river names throughout Western Europe, such as in the Scottish rivers Dēoúa (modern-day Dee, Galloway), and Dēouana (Δηουανα; modern-day Don, Aberdeenshire),
    • Old Irish: día, a "god", and An Dag-da, the druid-god of wisdom,
      • Irish: Dhe ("god"), attested in the modern Sùil Dhé mhóir prayer ("The eye of the great God", in reference to the Sun), featured in Carmina Gadelica.
  • Messapic: deiva, dīva, "goddess",
  • Phrygian: devos.

Other cognates are less secured:

• Slavic: *diva (> *dîvo), perhaps a word for a "good deity" which progressively took the meaning of "miracle", hence "evil being",
  • Old Church Slavonic: divo, Old Polish: dziwo, Russian: dívo, Serbo-Croatian: dîvo, "miracle(s)",
  • OCS: divŭ, "demon", South Slavic: div, "giant, demonic being", Czech: divo-žena, "sorceress, witch", Slovak: divo, "monster", although the Proto-Slavic root *divŭ(jĭ) ("wild") has also been proposed,
  • Polish: Dziewanna, Sorbian: Dživica, Slavic equivalent of Diana, however, other etymologies have been proposed.
• Lusitanian: Reo, an unknown deity.
  • Lusitanian: Deiba and Deibo, attested in votive inscriptions of altars; taken to mean the "local" or "indigenous" pronunciations of Deae and Deo.

"Divine" derivations

Other words that come from the adjective *diwyós (*dyeu "sky" + yós, a thematic suffix) are found in the following traditions:

• PIE: *diwyós, meaning "divine, heavenly, godlike",
  • Mycenaean Greek: di-wi-jo (/diwjos/), di-wi-ja (/diwja/),
    • Greek: dîos (δῖος), "belonging to heaven, godlike", also "belonging to Zeus" in tragedies; feminine Día (Δῖα dīvus_ via the intermediate form *dīw-(o)t- or *dīw-(e)t- ("who is like the gods, protected by the gods"), with contraction *īwi_- > î_. According to de Vaan, "the occurrence of the deity Dīs together with pater may be due to association with Di(e)spiter."
    • Latin: dīus, dīā, another adjective with the same meaning, probably based on *dīwī > dī_ (dat.abl.pl. dīs),
      • Latin: Diāna (from an older Dīāna), goddess of the moon and the countryside.

Other cognates are less secured:

• Paleo-Balkan:
  • Albanian: zana "nymph, goddess".
  • Romanian: zână "fairy, goddess".

Legacy

As the stories and beliefs from Proto-Indo-European religion developed, the ideas about Dyēus changed and were shared with other gods. In Greek and Roman stories, Dyēus was seen as the main god. In Vedic mythology, the idea of Dyēus became more abstract, and he was no longer as important as other gods.

In Albanian tradition

When the ancestors of the Albanians first learned about Christianity, the word they used for Sky-Father – Zot – came to mean God, the Father, and the Son (Christ). In Albanian folk beliefs, the top of the highest mountains, like Tomorr in central Albania, was linked to the sky-god Zojz. The mountain is still considered sacred, and people make pilgrimages there each year. They also hold a special ceremony where they sacrifice a white bull, showing that the old worship of the sky-god on Mount Tomorr has continued through many years, even with changes in politics and religion.

In Slavic tradition

At one time, early Slavs, like some Iranian peoples after the Zoroastrian changes in their religion, began to see the Slavic version of Dyēus in a bad light. They stopped using the word for "heaven" and replaced many old god names with new Slavic or Iranian names. Because of this, Dyēus came to be linked with strange or demon-like ideas, such as divo ("strange, odd thing") and divъ ("demon"). This may have led to Pan-Slavic demons, like in Polish and Czech stories called dziwożona, or Div in The Tale of Igor's Campaign.

Some researchers think that some of Dyēus's qualities might have passed to Svarog. Helmold wrote that the Slavs believed in a god in heaven who only dealt with heavenly matters and guided the other gods.

In non-Indo-European traditions

Some words from the ancient language related to the sky were used in languages that are not from the same family. For example, the word for "sky" in Estonian, taevas, and in Finnish, taivas, came from an older language called Proto-Indo-Iranian. These languages belong to a different group called Uralic languages.