Balkan Wolf/Dog in Folklore Interpretations in the Mythology of Nature by N. Nodilo to T. R. Djordjević to Lj. Radenković and P. Plas

Folkloristics 10/1 (2025): 35–51
Author: Suzana Marjanić
Text:

The interpretive timeline presents the imaginary of the “Balkan” wolf/dog in South Slavic customs and beliefs from Natko Nodilo to Tihomir R. Djordjević and Ljubinko Radenković all the way to contemporary cultural animal studies research by Pieter Plas (the author employs a methodology that integrates ethnolinguistic/ semiotic and linguistic-anthropological and ethnopoetic approaches), contextually related to other Slavs and Indo-European comparative mythology in the framework of archetypal wolf/dog phobia (lupophobia, kinophobia). And while Nodilo relies on Angelo de Gubernatis’s interpretation of nature mythology, Tihomir R. Djordjević follows the ethnographic material of the South Slavs (as for Croatia, he carefully researched, among other things, the wolf/dog entries in the Collection of Folk Life and Customs of the South Slavs), and Ljubinko Radenković semiotically observes the wolf/dog in the symbolism of the world of the South Slavs, where he observes that the domestic animals closest to man are the horse, sheep, cow, and ox, followed by the bull, goat, donkey, hen, pig, dog, and cat. The so-called wild animals are arranged in relation to the god-shepherd (God’s shepherd)—the bear is the closest to him, and the wolf is the farthest.

Keywords: wolf, dog, fear, folklore interpretations, South Slavic customs and beliefs.