Pagan clergy (Krivis, žyniai, vaidilutės)¶

Overview¶

[Historical record] Little is certain. Długosz describes the Vilnius sacred fire, grove and snakes destroyed in Feb-Mar 1387. Peter of Dusburg describes a Prussian high priest, the Criwe at Romuva. Whether Lithuania had a single Krivis is debated; the title Krivių Krivaitis is mostly 16th-century and later. Lizdeika, Gediminas’s dream-reader, is a chronicle legend. Žynys and vaidilutė survive as folk terms, and the Palanga amber-priestess is shaped by 19th-century Romanticism.

Pagan clergy (Krivis, žyniai, vaidilutės)


Type	faction
Note	Krivis, žyniai, and vaidilutės: keepers of sacred groves, altars, and ancient rites.

Wants (by book)¶

Book	Goal	Leverage	Red line
VI	Bind the brothers to the gods (the Pact, 1345; VI ch. 3)	Oath ceremonies	Kin-blood
I	Keep the flames and the Pact; punish kin-killing	Eglė’s prophecy (prologue); the Krivis at Šventaragis	Extinguishing a flame (Feb 1387; I ch. 29)
II-III	Hold the Hidden Groves	Galminas’s bog bridge (III ch. 19); the Medvėgalis žynys (III ch. 17)	Felled groves
IV	Survive the baptism	Quiet žyniai in the villages	Constance’s missionaries
V	Pass the words on	The beekeeper-žynys gives them away in 1433 (V ch. 11); dies Sep 1448 (V ch. 27)	The Pact sung wrong

Patron Force¶

[The saga’s invention] The gods themselves, the Pact’s human party (Tylioji Sutartis). The clergy are brokers, not servants: some honest, some frightened. Raganos stand outside the Pact.

Internal tensions¶

The Krivis of 1345-82 hid the Pact’s blood price. Lot-casters read what the paymaster wants. After 1387 the clergy scatter: the žyniai into villages as healers, the vaidilutės baptised and married off, and the Krivis walks into the felled grove. The saga holds that Galminas is the last of the old žyniai in 1409-10; the “last žynys” of Book V is his pupil, and five singers remain after 1448 (V ch. 27).

Notable members¶

Krivis, Eglė, Galminas.

Relations

Bound by: Tylioji Sutartis (Silent Pact)

Members: Eglė (vaidilutė → Pelkių Eglė) (…–1382) · Krivis of Šventaragis

Connections¶

graph LR
  egle["Eglė (vaidilutė → Pelkių Eglė)"]
  krivis["Krivis of Šventaragis"]
  pagan_clergy["Pagan clergy (Krivis, žyniai, vaidilutės)"]
  silent_pact["Tylioji Sutartis (Silent Pact)"]
  krivis -->|Member of| pagan_clergy
  egle -->|Member of| pagan_clergy
  silent_pact -->|Binds| pagan_clergy
  style pagan_clergy stroke-width:3px