russian ethnic nationalism and religion todaywith spiritual searching’ (2014: 16). One is, however, unlikely to
find such clear- cut ‘ideal types’ in practice: a ‘spiritual individual’
and a nationalist may coexist in one person.
Neopaganism is not only a political movement, but also a rela-
tively insular sub- culture, with its own language, dress code and
rules of behaviour. Native believers strive to use ‘Slavic’ names
of the month in place of Latin ones (stuzhen’ instead of January,
liuten’ instead of February), for example, or to replace foreign
words with ‘Slavic’ equivalents (svetopisi instead of fotografii,
izvedy instead of interv’iu). As a rule, native believers undergo
a kind of ‘baptism’ and adopt ‘pagan names’ – Aratov took
Ogneved (from ogon’, fire), for example. Radicals insist that
native believers must always wear Slavic tunics and head- bands.
Appropriate shirts can be bought on neopagan websites, or a
pattern downloaded for sewing at home. However, most neopa-
gans wear special clothes only for religious feasts, and politicised
neopagans are less likely to dress in such clothing. Concerned
with ‘respectability’, leaders of political movements wear normal
shirts and ties. Vladimir Avdeev, for example, explains:
I have undergone pagan initiation, I have a sacred pagan name. I have
all of this. But I do not play these games, I do not run around with a
little ribbon round my forehead. I go around in a suit and tie like a
normal European person. (Belov 2005)We should also bear in mind that not everyone can afford to dress
in accordance with the specific demands of this sub- culture.
In Russian nationalism the pagan sector is not so much mar-
ginalised as closed off. The pool of potential neophytes is prob-
ably almost exhausted and neopagan organisations are unlikely
to grow significantly. The native believer sub- culture (with cos-
tumes, pagan names, sacrifices and so forth) most likely scares
off new recruits to the nationalist movement, so nationalist
leaders who strive for mass participation prefer not to advertise
their affiliations with native belief. Many pagans also empha-
sise that they are not opposed to the secular state, and that
paganism in particular ‘can exist and develop perfectly well in
a secular society’ (Valkovich 2014: 106). Thus, there seems to