How did the ancient peoples envision paradise? Someone dreamed of islands inhabited by eternally young maidens, someone dreamed of palaces where battles do not stop, and someone saw happiness in places where the supply of corn does not dry up.
Iriy
In Slavic mythology, in the southern and western regions, where birds fly away in winter, Iriy or Viry was located - a legendary country, later associated with paradise. This is the island of the seventh heaven, the roof of which was the eighth and ninth heavens.
In accordance with ancient Slavic myths, the ancestors of all birds and animals live on this island (before the name of the beast that lived on this island, they said “elder” or “old”, this spoke of their maturity and bodily power). In the Belarusian and Ukrainian languages, there are also expressions about migratory birds: “lyatsyats at vyray” (Belorussian) and “fly at virii” (read: letity at vyri) (Ukrainian), which are not used in another context.
Dilmun
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The Sumerians, who formed one of the first civilizations in history, approximately in the VI-V millennia BC, placed paradise and the cradle of mankind on the legendary island of Dilmun, located, presumably, in the Persian Gulf, somewhere “at sunrise”, “beyond bitter water. In the Sumerian myth of Enki and Ninhursag, Dilmun is described as a happy corner of the earth, a blooming garden where there is no place for sickness, old age, and death:
So Dilmun would have remained in history an unattainable paradise for mortals, if in later Sumerian letters he would not have been mentioned as a trading partner, from where copper, precious stones and pearls were exported in exchange for agricultural products from Mesopotamia. This discovery prompted archaeologists of the 20th century to seriously engage in searches for a Sumerian paradise.
They took scientists to the island of Bahrain, located in the center of the Persian Gulf, where traces of the "Barbara culture", an ancient civilization of the 3rd millennium BC, were found. Around the same time, the epic of Gilgamesh relates the trip of the Babylonian king to Dilmun. Moreover, the famous Bahraini burial mounds were found there - graves plundered in ancient times, so that the mystery of their creators remained unsolved. But according to the most common version, the people who so persistently buried their dead in Bahrain were the Sumerians.
Island of women
The Celts, like all other peoples, placed their paradise somewhere on the periphery of their world. In the case of Ireland, it could be either hollow hills - ancient burial complexes inherited by the Celts from their predecessors (New Grange, Cruahan or Knot), or a mythological country, covered with fog, located in the West in the Atlantic Ocean.
In terms of the benefits provided, the Celtic paradise did not differ much from Dilmun or the ancient Greek Elysium - it was a country where everything was in abundance, and eternally young maidens inhabited it.
But unlike, say, the Sumerian paradise, she was not so inaccessible to mortal husbands who often wandered there during their voyages. We are told about this by the legends that have come down to us in the medieval texts of the "voyages" (immrama). Some, such as the Irish heroes Ma'el-Dun and Bran, remained there, cohabiting with the local queens, and the power of time had no power over them while they were in those parts.
But all such stories have a similar ending. Driven by longing for home, the travelers left the island of paradise, but having set foot on the shores of Ireland, they either turned to dust or remained deeply old - time took its toll.
Valhalla
The paradise of the Scandinavians corresponded to their ardent disposition. In the palaces of Odin, which was a huge hall with a roof made of gilded shields with supports made of spears, the Vikings faced daily battles to the death, after which they resurrected and feasted.
And they were served by beautiful maidens from Odin's army - the Valkyries.
In the Scandinavian picture of the world, Valhalla was located somewhere in heaven, and one could get there only through a brave death in battle. Gathering his heavenly army, Odin did not disdain tricks, organizing the death of the bravest and most skillful. At least, this is how Scandinavian legends explained the death of leaders and heroes.
The righteous who did not know how to use the sword, as well as women and children, the way to Valhalla was ordered. They fell into the possession of the chthonic monster Hel - the gloomy world of the dead, from which there was no return even for the gods. However, the best of women could hope for a place in Folgwangra - the abode of the goddess Freya.
Tonatiu'ican, Sinkalko and the Tlacoca dwelling
Like the Scandinavians, among the Aztecs, the form of the afterlife was determined by the circumstances of death. The warriors who died in battle or were sacrificed went to the House of the Sun of Tonatiu'ichan, where every day at sunrise they met the luminary and escorted him to the zenith, walking alongside him in a solemn march.
There, in the western part of the sky (Sinkalko), the Mosihuakezke ("divine women"), who died during the first childbirth, took over the baton.
The drowned or those whose death was associated with the water deity Tlaloc could count on a good share in the afterlife. They went to Tlaloc's Place, where:
Those who died under other circumstances ended up in the Aztec hell - Mitklan, located in the northern part of the world, where terrible torments awaited the unfortunate, and after four years their souls disappeared forever
Elysium
The ancient Greeks and Romans dreamed of the unattainable Elysium or the Champs Elysees - the islands of the blessed on the western end of the world near the Ocean River, where the greatest heroes of antiquity, or rather the Greeks of the "fourth generation", spend their time without sorrow and worries. Ordinary Greeks belonging to the "fifth generation" were doomed to drag out a miserable existence in the kingdom of Hades, regardless of how they lived their lives.
However, such an idea of Elysium is characteristic of the completely archaic times of Homer and Hesiod (VIII-VII centuries BC). In a later period, the Champs Elysees become available to the righteous. So, the ancient Greek poet Pindar (VI-V centuries BC) mentions the island where the blessed of soul live, spending time at sports games and musical evenings. Four hundred years later, the ancient Roman poet Virgil, having placed Elysium in the Afterlife, will call it a place of reward for the righteous.
Shveta-Dvipa
“In the Sea of Milk, north of Meru, lies the large island of Shvepa-dvipa, the White Island, or the Island of Light. There is a country where bliss is eaten. Its inhabitants are brave men, remote from all evil, indifferent to honor and dishonor, marvelous in appearance, full of vitality."
Where this paradise from the ancient Indian epic Mahabharata was not sought. Some Indianists, such as Colonel Wilford, identified Shwetu-dvipa with Great Britain. Why not? An island across the sea in the north (for the authors of the Mahabharata). Helena Blavatsky, in The Secret Doctrine, placed Shweta-dvipa in the region of the modern Gobi Desert. Some researchers, on the other hand, see Arctida under the White Island - a hypothetical northern polar continent that once existed in the Arctic, but as a result of cataclysms that supposedly occurred from 18 to 100 thousand years ago, it went under water (hypothesis of the German zoographer Eger). Supporters of Arctida often associate the legend of Shveto-dvip with Hyperborea, which, according to ancient authors, was also located somewhere far to the north. But the north is a loose concept. Some linguists have found similarities between the Uralic place names and Indian names. So, based on the research of A. G. Vinogradov and S. V. Zharnikova, the legendary Shveta-dvipa ended up on the territory of the Urals, the White Sea, the basins of the Northern Dvina and Pechora rivers, the Volga-Oka interfluve.
Tatiana Shingurova