
A numen that recurs in the doctrinal scriptures, ecclesiastical statutes, and confessional questions is described as Rod-Rozanica. These data show that Rod-Rozanicy:
- seem to personify fate (they are equated with the terms ‘fatum, fortuna’);
- have some connection with the cult of the dead. (On Boxing Day, a church-prohibited death feast is held in their honour);
- merge with Saint Mary in Christian-pagan syncretism.
Rozanica means: mother, fate, womb, genealogy, family tree.
Rod and Rozanicy form a mythical couple consisting of a parendros and a parendra (cf. Artemid-Artemis). The explicit equation with Osiris-Isis seems to place Rod-Rozanicy in the category of the mythical couple well known in the history of religion: mother-goddess-consort. We may consider the paredra Rozanica as a kind of rudimentary mother goddess, who ensured the fertility of the clan, the land and the cattle, and ruled over the realm of the dead. She was felt as a multiple being, perhaps threefold (three, or a multiple of three).
(Vyncke, 1969)