Balkan Wolf/Dog in Folklore Interpretations in the Mythology of Nature by N. Nodilo through T. R. Đorđević to Lj. Radenković and P. Plas

This interpretive timeline presents (not necessarily in chronological order) the imaginary of the “Balkan” wolf/dog in South Slavic customs and beliefs from Natko Nodilo, through T. R. Đorđević and Lj. Radenković, all the way to contemporary cultural animal studies research by P. Plas (the author employs a methodology that integrates ethnolinguistic/semiotic and linguistic-anthropological and ethnopoetic approaches), contextually related to other Slavs and Indo-European comparative mythology in the framework of archetypal wolf/dog phobias (lupophobia, kinophobia). While Nodilo relies on A. de Gubernatis’ interpretation of nature mythology, T. R. Đorđević follows the ethnographic material of the South Slavs (as for Croatia, he carefully researched, among other things, the wolf/dog entries in the Collection of Folk Life and Customs of the South Slavs), and Lj. Radenković semiotically observes the wolf/dog in the symbolism of the world of the South Slavs, where he notes that the closest domestic animals to man are the horse, sheep, cow and ox, followed by the bull, goat, donkey, hen, pig, dog and cat. So-called wild animals are arranged in relation to the god-shepherd (God’s shepherd) – the bear is closest to him, and the wolf is the farthest.