When the Slavs were overrun on the island of Rugen, two temples were described. The temple of the god, Svantevit, was found in the castle of Arkona. It had a roof supported by four columns. The walls were in the form of purple rugs hung from the roof. It was located inside a temple building which had one door, a red roof, and strong walls. The inside wall was an ornamental, roughly-painted relief. On the inside were ornaments, many purple things, and animal horns. The outer walls were constructed of vertical posts and measured 20 meters by 20 meters. Within the temple, in a sunken base, was a huge wooden idol. It held a drinking horn in its right hand. During the harvest festival, wine was poured into this horn to prophesy the next year's crops. The higher the level reached, the better the crops would be next year. When Danish King Waldemar destroyed this temple, his men chopped the idol down at the base and it fell and wedged itself against the wall. These walls had to be dismantled to get the idol out. Gimbutas' discussion of Svetovit (a different spelling of Svantevit, perhaps) confused me quite a bit. She says Svetovit is the patron god of Rugen (but I thought she said Rugievit was??). Three other gods are described (with 2, 3 or even more heads): Jarovit (the god of Spring), Porovit (the god of Summer), and Ruevit (the god of Fall). Then she says, "These three aspects of Triglav encompass the spring-to-fall growing season for plants and the maturing season for animals". Here, I got so confused. Triglav is described as a three headed summer god in one place and, in another, as a god with four aspects (but what of the three aspects mentioned earlier). Triglav is the god with the largest range of temples across Slavic lands (Stettin, Brandenburg, and near Sibenik (close to the Adriatic Coast)).

After conquering Arkona, the next to fall on Rugen was Garz. There were three temples here, the largest devoted to Rugievit, the 'God of Rugen'. He had seven heads with seven swords hanging from his girdle, and an eighth in his hand. This temple was very similar to the one for Svantevit (inner room with roof and purple hanging rugs). The other two temples were for Porevit (perhaps a different spelling for Porovit, who is mentioned elsewhere in this book) and Porenut (for whom I could find no further description).

The belief in multi-headed (polycephalic) gods goes all the way back to Proto-Indo-European times, and was carried through into other offshoot groups (at least Iranians and Balts). The rest of the pantheon described by Gimbutas is much easier to understand. When describing a god with one name, which has several heads (each with their own name) to a non-slavic speaker like me (who wouldn't know if a slight change in spelling represents a different god or just a different spelling) - there's just bound to be confusion. This confusion aside, I have nothing but praise for Gimbutas' book.