Bird Gods in Ancient Europe 



quite another tongue from Greek and later 

 gave their name to Pannonia. 



Pan, then, once the chief god of all that 

 part of Europe, has a parallel in Vaino among 

 the Finns. As the latter is always unfortunate 

 in love, as he pursues Aino till she drowns 

 herself, so Pan is rarely successful; in the 

 case of Syrinx he loses her on the borders 

 of the stream. Vaino invents the kantele ; 

 Pan, the pipes. The form we meet him in 

 among the Aryan Greeks is a mere fragment 

 of what he was : for he has parted with his 

 thunder to Zeus ; his eloquence and song and 

 sun traits and ill success with nymphs to 

 Apollo ; his magic to Mercury; his water 

 craft to Neptune. When Pan reaches out to 

 seize the lovely, fleeing Syrinx by the hair 

 and grasps the blades of the reeds, he consoles 

 himself with the pipes that he fashions from 

 them. Vaino is an "all-round" god who 

 fashions his harp from the head of a giant 

 sturgeon or pike, and while driving off his 



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