Perkwunos

This article or section should specify the language of its non-English content, using {{lang}}, {{transliteration}} for transliterated languages, and {{IPA}} for phonetic transcriptions, with an appropriate ISO 639 code. Wikipedia's multilingual support templates may also be used. See why. (June 2021)

This article contains characters used to write reconstructed Proto-Indo-European words (for an explanation of the notation, see Proto-Indo-European phonology). Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode combining characters and Latin characters.

Perk^wunos (Proto-Indo-European: *perk^wunos, 'the Striker' or 'the Lord of Oaks') is the reconstructed name of the weather god in Proto-Indo-European mythology. The deity was connected with fructifying rains, and his name was probably invoked in times of drought. In a widespread Indo-European myth, the thunder-deity fights a multi-headed water-serpent during an epic battle in order to release torrents of water that had previously been pent up. The name of his weapon, *meld-n-, which denoted both "lightning" and "hammer", can be reconstructed from the attested traditions.

Perk^wunos was often associated with oaks, probably because such tall trees are frequently struck by lightning, and his realm was located in the wooded mountains, *per-k^wun-iyo. A term for the sky, *h₂ekmōn, apparently denoted a "heavenly vault of stone", but also "thunderbolt" or "stone-made weapon", in which case it was sometimes also used to refer to the thunder-god's weapon.

Contrary to other deities of the Proto-Indo-European pantheon, such as *Dyēus (the sky-god), or *H₂éwsōs (the dawn-goddess), widely accepted cognates stemming from the theonym *Perk^wunos are only attested in Western Indo-European traditions. The linguistic evidence for the worship of a thunder god under the name Perk^wunos as far back as Proto-Indo-European times (4500–2500 BC) is therefore less secured.^[1]