Vaz
Tabasaran · deity · Tabasaran traditional religion; continuing · Recorded classification
Vaz, the Moon, is the male counterpart and brother of Rig the Sun. The Tabasaran tale of the luminaries makes him the desirous brother from whom the Sun-sister fled; thereafter the two chase one another through the heavens, the Moon holding the night and yielding the sky whenever his sister rises. The gendering of Sun as feminine and Moon as masculine is characteristic of the wider Daghestani and Nakh-Daghestanian solar-lunar mythology.
Domains
- moon night
Powers
- presides over the night sky
Relations
- sibling: RigMoon the brother and Sun the sister, protagonists of the Tabasaran solar-lunar tale.'Mifologicheskie obrazy solntsa i luny v verovaniyakh narodov Dagestana', Cyberleninka (secondary)
Sources
- In Tabasaran myth the Moon (Vaz) is male, brother of the Sun; he desired his sister, who fled, and he is now eternally pursued or pursuing across the sky in the alternation of day and night.: 'Mifologicheskie obrazy solntsa i luny v verovaniyakh narodov Dagestana', Cyberleninka (secondary); Mifologicheskaya proza tabasarantsev: syuzhety i obrazy (dissertation abstract, Makhachkala) (secondary)