In the late Neolithic Age (10,200 - 4500 BCE), Europe is a wild unsettled place. Great bears, aurochs and big cats roam the forests. Evil spirits howl and whisper on chill winter nights. Human beings are not apex predators. Humans are prey.
Yet, in the world of mortals, knowledge of agriculture grows. Early domestic animals appear c. 10,000 BCE, when humans are domesticated by cats. Herding, trade and the keeping of livestock including chickens, sheep, horses, goats and cows expand during the Bronze Age.
On the Caspian Steppe, south of the Danube River in Europe, live the Proto-Indo-European speakers. From this language group many others derive, including English, German, French, Spanish, Hungarian and Romanian. Here emerges the Goat God of woodlands and fields.
Proto-Indo-Europeans occupying the grasslands from the Black to the Caspian Sea eventually disperse. Depending on region they assume different cultural identities, all with one deep-rooted link in the primal subconscious.
People settle into agriculture and learn how to enrich the soil, where and when to plant the seed. As these land-based activities become cyclic, the lusty pastoral god of roads, woods and herds comes into the world of mortals.
His hair is wild, his beard unkempt. Péh₂usōn roams the meadows and woodlands, blasting out tunes on his pipes. His legs are those of a goat, clad in woolly fur with cloven hooves, and horns curl from his head.
He's a frightening apparition. Despite his fierce appearance, Péh₂usōn protects travelers on the roads, shepherds and flocks in the fields. Also a deity of wilderness, he influences success in the hunt.
His maddened music may be heard from a distance. It's said he will teach anyone to play the reed pipes. Reed pipes are popular early instruments, made of local reeds, stalks or stems. The pipe can be cut as a single reed with holes, or a combination of reeds in various sizes.
His pipes might be made from the rough horsetail reed, the world's oldest plant. A fertility deity, he's virile, lascivious and proud of it. He pursues all genders and most species. This is the primal god who will develop complex mythology as ancient Greek Pan.
The song of his pipes entrance young men and women to dance. They drink ambrosia, honey mead or wine, and lose all inhibitions as music whirls around them. His is a feast of wild abandon.
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