Radagost the Green

A most curious name pops up in Adam of Bremen’s “History of the Archbishops of Hamburg-Bremen” – the name of an alleged Suavic Deity of the Redarii tribe – Redigast.

As Adam seemed to be describing the same area as that previously described earlier by Thietmar where the Redarii’s’ chief Deity’s name is Zuarazici but this Zuarazici is worshipped in a town named Riedegost, a fight immediately broke out among various Suavic scholars whether the Deity’s name was really Svarozic or Redagost/Radagost.

The German scholar Alexander Brückner famously quipped that Adam got himself mixed up and Redagost/Radagost was the name of the local tavern and the name Svarozic was the right one. He translated Radagost as “Rady Gość” that is essentially meaning “Happy guest.” From there it was a simple path to conclude that Adam mistook the name of an inn or tavern for a Suavic cultic place. Most academics are not exactly Mensa stars and so they largely went along with the mocking conclusions of Brückner’s faux erudition. Some clung on by ascribing to Radagost the celestial portfolio of hospitality. That last bit certainly seems to have been a stretch but whatever one may say about the Deity Name, it seems to me that they were wrong to adopt the tavern explanation.

The answer may be in the word gwozd, gozd or gozdawa, that is a “forest” or, perhaps, a “tree”. Today the name continues in Polish in the word for “nail” (gwóźdź) and for a carnation (goździk, that is a “little tree”). As discussed, the same word appears in the Suavic (and Baltic) word for “star” – gwiazda suggesting that the ancient Suavs looked at the night sky as basically a heavenly wood. Curiously, the Breton (Armorican Venetic?) word for “trees” is, similarly, gwez. Since we do know that ancient Suavs (like “Germans”) worshipped trees and groves, Redagost/Radagost would simply mean a “Happy Grove” – perhaps a place of worship – a sacred grove. Thus, Rethra was the name of the town in this telling, the Sacred Forest was called by its Suavic appellation – Radagast – and the Deity worshipped there could have been, among others, Svarozic.

That the “tavern” etymology is doubtful is indicated by the fact that the name is quite widespread. It appears throughout Central Europe.

Poland

• Radogoszcz on the Złota (Golden) River near Łódź
• Radogoszcz on Lake Kałęba (German Radegast)
• Redgoszcz near a lake of the same name between Poznań and Bydgoszcz
• Radgoszcz near Tarnów (incidentally just west of Radomyśl, a name which is also very popular)
• Radgoszcz between Łomża and Ostrołęka
• Radgoszcz near Międzychód
• Radgoszcz (Wünschendorf) Near Luban, Lower Silesia

Czech Republic

• Radhošť near the town of Vysoké Mýto
• Radhošť a mountain (curiously a chapel and a sculpture of Saints Cyril and Methodius are located on the summit; southeast of that there is also a statute of Radegast)

Germany

• Radagost a river that starts south of Gadebusch, passes through the Radegasttal/Rehna and enters the River Stepenitz just below Börzow (also written as Radegast, Radegost, Rodogost)
• Radegast NNE of Leipzig
• Radegast southwest of Rostock just past Satow
• Radegast east of Lüneburg
• Radegast west of Lützow

Ukraine

• Mala Radohoshch at Khmelnytskyi Oblast near Ostroh
• Velyka Radohoshch at Khmelnytskyi Oblast near Ostroh
• Radohoshcha at Zhytomyr Oblast
• Radohoshch near Chernihiv*

* exact location uncertain – this could have been in Belarus.

Belarus

• Radohoszcz(a) (Rahodoszcz) near Ivanava (interestingly nearby just west of Kobryn you have Vandalin)
• Radohoszcza a river near Grodna (Grodno)*
• Radohoszcza on the river Nevda south of Navahrudak (Nowogródek)

* exact location uncertain

Italy 

• Radigosa – a place near Bologna with a similar name (aka Raigosole, Ragigosa, Rigosa am Lavino).

Here is a map of all of these places (some are an approximation).

These names can rather easily be linked to forest that previously covered vast swaths of these countries or to local worship groves but linking them to roadside inns seems a much tougher goal to achieve.

That all these place names have a Suavic etymology no one seriously doubts. With the exception of the Bologna reference, every place they appear is a place where Suavs have lived or are living still (sometimes, in Germania Suavica, Suavs qua Germans).

But then we come to a puzzle. There is also a much earlier (half a millennium) mention of a Goth, a “true Scythian” who threatened Rome and its senators in the very early 5th century – his name was Radagaisus. This brings up the question of what language the admittedly multi-ethnic Goths really spoke and, as the vast throngs of humanity poured into the Roman Empire how much Goth was there really in the Goths? More on Radagaisus and the sources that mention him soon.

PS That Tolkien took the name of Radagast the Brown from the above ancient European histories is obvious. What some people do not know is that the Tolkien name is likely Old Prussian, derived from the village of Tołkiny (the Old Prussian Tolkyn) in the former East Prussia and today’s north Poland.

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