In Expedition to Castle Ravenloft, Babba Zeneeba worships a demon prince named Chernavog, whom she refers to as The Green God. It gives the stat for his aspect, but that's it. There's no description of what he looks like, or more importantly, what his demonic portfolio is. Does anyone know if he has been detailed in a source elsewhere? If not, any advice on what he should be like? I picture him as looking pretty much like Chernabog from Night on Bald Mountain, except smaller, and not stuck in a mountain. He has warlock powers, so I figured mabye I could portray him as a corrupting influence. Just to explain the "green" part of him, mabye he has something to do with a tainted forest? That would fit with Barovia well.
Chernavog appears to be a rendering of the Slavic mythological entity Chernobog. Chernobog is the "black god" or "evil one" and little remains of him mythologically.
What does this mean?
Run free with him! I would say take a stab at it and run him the way you imagine him; as far as I know there is no details for him elsewhere.
That's interesting. In the Neil Gaiman novel American Gods there's a fat old slavic drunkard god called Czernobog.
I guessed he must have been a real-world deity as Gaiman always uses obscure mythology, but I didn't know anything about him. Now he's a D&D demon?
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That's interesting. In the Neil Gaiman novel American Gods there's a fat old slavic drunkard god called Czernobog.
I guessed he must have been a real-world deity as Gaiman always uses obscure mythology, but I didn't know anything about him. Now he's a D&D demon?
I think I remember reading that Gaiman said he could find very little information on Czernobog, so just kind of filled in the blanks himself...
Of course there's a long tradition of using real world dieties as D&D demons...
Wikipedia only states that there is not much information to him - he is probably been a god of darkness and thunderstorms, and opposed (or even just another aspect) of Bielobog, a sun god. There are lots of variant spellings to his name, apparently.
In general, these old mythologies are much less defined than what we gamers would wish. The "green" aspect could be interpreted as a dark, destructive (from a human PoV) nature aspect (evil druids, anybody ?)
Stefan
That's interesting. In the Neil Gaiman novel American Gods there's a fat old slavic drunkard god called Czernobog.
He is said to have been appeased by libations, so thats probably the source of Gaimans idea of a drunkard god :-)
Stefan
I belive Cernobog and Bilobog are supposed to be brother gods from slavic mythology representing Night/Winter (cernobog) and Day/Summer (Bilobog) but also they are the same god that changes faces as the night/winter turnes to day/summer...
Don't dig too deeply....
GGG
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Chernobolg: old slavic god, god of darkness and storms, accepted human sacrifices made by smashing in the skull with a rock or hammer. (Gaimans version actually had a hammer). Chern, didn't live in the sky or on mountain tops, but deep in the earth at the roots of the mountains, the sacrifices were made at the mountaintop so the blood would run down from the roof of the world and Chern would see it. His brother/other face Bilbolg accepted the sacrifice of livestock, and always at a clearing in the forest, so that their blood would nurture the growing things in the world.
Pretty standard slavic myth actually, if you need to detail it more just expand along the lines that every creature of Slavic myth is above all serious, scary, potentially dark, and ultimately required for the well bring of the world as we know it.
Also semi-officially recognized as the big uuber-demon running the show in Fantasia's "Night on Bald Mountain".
Also, while Chernobog is rather dead mythologically, his legacy lives on. Chernobyl is an example of such.