KALVIS

also called Kalvaitis, or Kalvelis (Lithuanian), Latvian Kalejs in Baltic religion, the heavenly smith, usually associated with a huge iron hammer. A smith in the tradition of the Greek Hephaistos and the Vedic Tvastr, Kalvis also seems to have been a dragon killer, a function in which he was superseded by the Christian St. George. Every morning Kalvis hammers a new sun for Aurine (Latvian Auseklis), the dawn, and a silver belt and golden stirrups for Dievo suneliai (Latvian Dieva deli), the morning and evening stars. Kalvis' extraordinarily large iron hammer, by whose aid the sun was said to have been freed from imprisonment, was honoured by the Lithuanians as late as the turn of the 15th century.