Žemyna¶
Folk sources [Historical record]¶
Žemyna (“earth”, from žemė) is the Baltic earth goddess. The first written naming is Jan Łasicki’s De diis Samagitarum (c. 1582, printed 1615; “Zemina”), followed by Daukša, Daniel Klein (1666) and Matthäus Prätorius (1690s). Prätorius describes the household rite of žemyneliauti: beer poured on the ground, a cock or hen cooked and eaten, the remains offered to the goddess. Other recorded practices: bread of the last harvest buried before sowing, a black piglet sacrificed, and kissing the earth in prayer. She is the wife of Perkūnas in later folklore (hence no ploughing before the first thunder), though the pairing is a reconstruction.
Earth-oaths (kissing or eating soil) come from later ethnography; medieval treaties name gods, not the earth. Dagotuvės as an equinox feast is a modern Romuva reconstruction.
Žemyna
Žemyna · god¶
Type |
god |
Note |
Earth goddess; mother and nourisher of all living beings, sworn by earth in oaths. |
In the saga¶
Domain: earth, fertility, oaths sworn on soil. Element: Earth (“Žemė tau laikys”), zenith Dagotuvės (autumn-equinox dusk). Force-face: with Medeina’s grief she hardened into the Root-Mother. She patronises Priesaika: an earth-oath is binding physically, and the oath-breaker’s land rejects him.
Book I: the Pebble’s first working is “the old power of Gabija and Žemyna, passed through a mother’s hands” (ch. 3); Kęstutis says “Žemyna still holds us” (ch. 4) and, dying, calls his nephews the greatest cowards “this Žemyna ever carried” (ch. 9). After Vytautas’s army burns a village, Žemyna “took the first part of the debt” (ch. 20): a red blister under the pouch and a cold pebble. Henė notes that Žemyna has her hour at Dagotuvės and that blood spilled on owed ground is heard then (Book III ch. 8). Samogitian baptism puts one God above “Perkūnas and Žemyna” (Book IV ch. 3). Weakness: she turns away from the one who burns the land, and she cannot work at sea or in the air.
Offerings & taboos¶
Bread and beer given to the ground; the kissed soil of oaths. Taboos: ploughing or sowing before the first thunder (later folk rule), and breaking an earth-oath, for the land will refuse the breaker.
Pronunciation¶
zheh-MEE-nah (IPA [ʒʲɛˈmʲiːnɐ]), stress že-MY-na.
Relations
Element: Žemė (Earth)
Force-faces: Šaknų Motina (Root-Mother)
Patron of: Priesaika (oath-binding)
Servants: Kaukas / barzdukai (field-luck) — The unnamed dead, kept in the soil to tend the fields. · Milžinai (giants) — Asleep in the land; their bones are the hills.
Domain Earth, fertility, oaths sworn on soil
Layer God (Layer I) · her wild grief with Medeina's hardened into the Force Šaknų Motina
Element Earth, Žemė tau laikys · zenith Dagotuvės, autumn-equinox dusk
Force-face Šaknų Motina, the Root-Mother
Offerings Beer poured on the ground; bread of the last harvest buried before sowing; the kissed soil of oaths; a cock or hen in the household rite (Prätorius)
Taboos Ploughing or sowing before the first thunder (late folk rule); breaking an earth-oath; burning her land
Signs The oath-breaker's land rejects him: crops fail, horses throw him, the forest loses him; a red blister under the pouch and a cold pebble (Book I ch. 20)
Unmovable Will. Stillness and endurance on another (tau) or oneself (man). Her zenith halves the cost.
Earth-oaths. Binding physically. She patronises Priesaika alongside Perkūnas.
The unnamed dead. She keeps them in the soil to tend the fields (the kaukai).
The one who burns the land. She turns away. After Vytautas's army burns a village she takes the first part of the debt (ch. 20).
Sea and air. An Earth working is impossible there.
Petrification. A major Earth working turns the caster to stone for the length of the effect, and costs permanent grace.
Desecration. An earth-debt, separate from any working.
Connections¶
graph LR
el_earth["Žemė (Earth)"]
kaukas["Kaukas / barzdukai (field-luck)"]
milzinai["Milžinai (giants)"]
priesaika["Priesaika (oath-binding)"]
root_mother["Šaknų Motina (Root-Mother)"]
zemyna["Žemyna"]
zemyna -->|Element| el_earth
zemyna -->|Patron of| priesaika
root_mother -->|Force-face of| zemyna
kaukas -->|Servant of| zemyna
milzinai -->|Servant of| zemyna
style zemyna stroke-width:3px