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regard to the temples or cult halls of Porenut and Porevit, as the dcscription of the cult of Rugevit, who had priests, a tempie subject to a taboo and - as we know from Knytbngasaga - a treasury, points to the public charac-ter of the ritual, which, according to Saxo himself was only Sventovit’s due.

The sanctuary in Garz, as every tempie, was a centre of a community. The stronghold that sheltered it had been built on a hill dominating the neighbourhood, to the north of a lakę. It is the only known example of such location of a Slavonic tempie in relation to water. Perhaps swallows, divine birds worshiped by all Slavonic tribes, were believed to maintain the relation of water with the heaven domain of Perun (Moszyński, 1968, vol. 2/2, p. 557)? Some symbolic connection with the underworld cannot be excluded, as the Slavonic name of Garz, Korzenica, may be associated with the motive of the root of the tree of life.

If the argumentation presented above is correct, the existence of priest hierarchy in Rugen seems ąuite probable. The system would comprise the group of priests of Perun-Sventovit-Rugevit with the main tempie in Ar-cona, a smaller, but important one in the seat of the prince in Garz, and others, only vaguely known scattered around the whole territory, subordi-nate to the authority of Sventovit’s main shrine. As traces of the latter group we can enumerate the sanctuary of Pizamar in Asund, the place of cult of Tjamoglofi (Black-Headed), still not found (Knytlingasaga, ch. 122), the holy grove of Boku upon Strelasund (Knytbngasaga, ch. 121), the presumed sanctuary of Perun and Mokoś, suggested by village names such as Prohn and Muuks (Witkowski, 1970, p. 369), and finally a minutę but probable remnant of Rugevit’s cult near contemporary Bergen, called Góra (Mount) in Slavonic, where until now a mysterious statuę incorporated in the wali of Holy Virgin church exists and a formidable stronghold nearby is called Rugard (Haas, 1910, p. 82; 1918, p. 3-62). The shrine excavated by archae-ologists in Ralswiek comes from earber times.

3. Radogość (Rethra) and other temples of the Lutizens and Abodrites

The significance of Arcona for the Rans and the last pagan Slavonic tribes of the continent in the 12th c. is comparable to the role of Radogość for the Lutizens a century earlier. The name of Radogość for the first time appears in the sources at the tuming point of the history of a whole group of Polabian tribes. In the lOthc. the land of the Vilzens seemed to have been definitely conąuered by the Germans. The conąuest was even confirmed by establishing bishoprics in the invaded territory. But the invaders’ oppres-sion, mentioned straightforwardly by Thietmar (III, 17), caused their defeat. In 983 the Slavs overthrew the foreign rule (Bruske, 1955, p. 16-43; Labuda, 1960-1975, vol. 1, p. 205-246). Since then the name of Vilzens and mentions about their princes disappear from the sources. In place of them we meet Lutizens, a union of tribes ruled by priests and the counselling meeting, centered around the sanctuary in Radogość, which for the next century became the headquarters of uncompromising resistance against Christianiz-ation (Bruske, 1955, p. 5-8; SSS, vol. 4, p. 450-451, vol. 6, p. 431). The Lutizens chose their own way, which, however, led them to annihilation. It is not true that it gave no chance to create a State, as we can point to several similar tribal unions organized around a sanctuary in the history of the Romans, Greeks, Germans and other peoples (Beck, 1970, p. 242; Wenskus, 1961, p. 246-272). In Europę in the discussed period, however, there was no time or space for a slow evolution through such a stage. The success of pagan reaction in Slavonic tribes was only superficial, as it eventually caused a catastrophe (Strzelczyk, 1987a, p. 279-284). The forms of cult in Radogość and the social system of the Lutizens were by no means primitive, but belonged to the passing epoch. The only solution could have been Christi-anization in favourable circumstances. The obstacle was a deeply rooted mistrust to “the German God,” powerful but in pagan mentality perceived as supporting only his own followers, that is Germans (Kahl, 1962, p. 82-101). An additional factor was the tradition that burdened the Lutizens sińce the union emerged. The organization resulted from an upris-ing against Christianity, after a series of bloody battles and brutally sup-pressed insurrections, and could not change the political and religious course, as in the early-republican system of govemment adopted after

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