Apsat

Apsat is the Svan lord of small game, presiding over the birds of the air and the fish of the mountain streams, and in some accounts over deer and wild fowl generally. He belongs to the circle of hunting deities who serve Ber Shishvlish, the Lord of the Bare Mountain, alongside the Angel of the Forest and Saint George. He is pictured living in a forest hut with a wife and daughters, sometimes marrying a daughter to a worthy hunter. His name and function are shared with the Ossetian Æfsati and other central-Caucasian traditions, marking him as an ancient regional master-of-animals whose favour a hunter must win. Where Dæl governs the horned beasts of the high crags, Apsat governs the lesser creatures of forest and water, the two dividing dominion over the hunt.

Domains

• birds
• fish
• small game

Powers

• grants birds and fish to hunters

Relations

• ally: Ber ShishvlishApsat serves as one of the forest gods aiding the Lord of the Bare Mountain.Charachidzé, Georges (1968), Le système religieux de la Géorgie païenne, Paris: Maspero (secondary)
• ally: Cxekis AngelwezCharachidzé, Georges (1968), Le système religieux de la Géorgie païenne, Paris: Maspero (secondary)
• ally: JgërægCharachidzé, Georges (1968), Le système religieux de la Géorgie païenne, Paris: Maspero (secondary)
• rival: DælCharachidzé, Georges (1968), Le système religieux de la Géorgie païenne, Paris: Maspero (secondary)

Sources

• Apsat is the Svan master of small game, patron of birds and fish, one of the forest deities of the hunting pantheon.: Charachidzé, Georges (1968), Le système religieux de la Géorgie païenne, Paris: Maspero (secondary)
• He is said to dwell in a hut deep in the forest with his wife and daughters, whom he occasionally gives in marriage to hunters.: Virsaladze, Elene (1976), Gruzinskij oxotnichij mif i poezija, Moscow: Nauka (secondary)