Dielli, the Sun

Albanian folk pantheon · deity · Albanian folk pantheon traditional religion; continuing · deity

Dielli, the Sun, is personified in Albanian folk belief as a male deity embodying light, warmth and life. He and the Moon, Hëna, form a celestial pair: in some tales they are husband and wife and the parents of E Bija e Hënës dhe e Diellit ('the Daughter of the Moon and the Sun'), while in others they are brother and sister, in which case they are not regarded as consorts. The veneration of the Sun is widely reflected in Albanian traditional tattooing and ornament, and the cosmic opposition of Sun and Moon is mirrored in the mythic struggle of the drangue and the kulshedra.

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