Why Rodnover ≠ Slavic Pagan

Having spent many years dealing with English-speaking Pagans I noticed that some equate Rodnovers with Slavic Pagans or think that the former is an umbrella term for the latter. Sometimes it’s not clear whether one is a Rodnover or not since the term was used by many different groups back in the days. But today we can draw a more or less clear line. This short list is by no means ultimate, but should suffice for a newcomers and/or foreigners interested in the topic.

WHO ARE RODNOVERS?

While English Wikipedia lists J.Stachniuk and V.Shaian as founders of the movement this is plain wrong. The two were interested in Slavic pre-christian beliefs and did a lot to popularize their revival neither of them is known among the wast majority of modern rodnovers. The latter are far more familiar with academic Boris Rybakov's writings as well as those of practitioners such as volkh Veleslav (I.Cherkasov) and late Ozar the Raven (L.Prozorov). There used to be a lot of small Rodnover denominations and there still is some variety, but the majority of the radically different ones have dwindled and/or separated into something else entirely (e.g. Ynglism).
When talking about a collective at least some generalization is in order, so forgive me if the list I am about to provide does not fit each and every Rodnover out there.

MAIN RODNOVER TRAITS

Rodnovers are:

-Ethnically Russian (Polish, Ukrainian and other Slavic Pagans can sometimes use similar terms (e.g. Ridna Vira), yet should not be confused with Russian rodnovers)

-Use modern symbology such as the so-called symbol of Veles

-Have fake gods in their pantheon as a result of old academic theories. Have inaccurate reconstructions of real pre-christian Gods of Slavs (e.g. Veles as a God of animals)

-Consider miniature axes from Ancient Rus to be religious symbols. Most of them think those axes were connected with Perun which this is not true

-Respect authors such as (but not limited to) Rybakov, Dobroslav, Ozar, Veleslav etc

AFTERWORD
This text was not written to attack or discredit the Rodnover movement, but only to differenciate it from the other Slavic Pagans. Hope it was informative enough for you.