Dievas

Lithuanian Dievas, Latvian Dievs and Debestēvs ("Sky-Father"), Latgalian Dīvs, Old Prussian Diews, and Yotvingian Deivas was the primordial supreme god in Baltic mythology, and one of the most important deities, together with Perkūnas and the brother of Potrimpo. He was the god of light, the sky, prosperity, wealth, the ruler of gods, and the creator of the universe. Dievas is a direct successor of the Proto-Indo-European supreme sky father god *Dyēus of the root *deiwo-. Its Proto-Baltic form was *Deivas. Dievas had two sons (Dievo sūneliai (Lithuanian) or Dieva dēli (Latvian)) known as the Heavenly Twins. Since the conversion of Latvia and Lithuania to Christianity and continuing in modern times, this word refers to the Christian God. In English, Dievas may be used as a word to describe the God (or, the supreme god) in the pre-Christian Baltic religion, where Dievas was understood to be the supreme being of the world. In Lithuanian and Latvian, it is also used to describe God as it is understood by major world religions today. Earlier *Deivas simply denoted the shining sunlit dome of the sky, as in other Indo-European mythologies. The celestial aspect is still apparent in phrases such as Saule noiet dievā ("The sun goes down to god"), from Latvian folksongs. In Hinduism, a group of celestial deities are called the devas, a result of shared Proto-Indo-European roots.