THE PANTHEON
Mother deities
Zeme (Lith., zemyna) functioned as a primordial goddess and major fertility deity. Her name means “earth”, and she is commonly referred to as Zemes mate (Mother of the Earth).
All humans are the children of Earth: in Lithuanian, the word designating men (zmogus) and women (zmond) are derived from the word for Earth.Zemes mate, as she appears in folk tales, has up to a hundred sisters, herself being the eldest of the siblings. The sources may also be interpreted as suggesting that she presents herself in all these shapes, some of which have very special functions, as indicated by their descriptive names: Darzu mate (Mother of the Garden), Lauku mate (Mother of the Fields), Meza mate (Mother of the Forest). Some descriptive names point to a specific plant or animal that is under each mother’s protection: Lazdu mate (Mother of the Hazel), Senu mate (Mother of Mushrooms) and Briezu mate (Mother of Deer). The role of each particular mother is expanded: they are transformed from being purely fertility goddesses to protectors in general, as indicated by such names as Pirts mate (Mother of the Sauna) and Uguns mate (Mother of Fire). Morphologically related are the goddesses Kapu mate (Mother of the Grave), Smilsu mate (Mother of Sand) and Vein mate (Mother of the Dead). In many names the word mate is used to mean not only “mother” but also “goddess”, as in, for example, the names Saules mate and Laimas mate, designating the mother goddess of the sun and the mother goddess of fortune. Other mother goddesses ruled over the sea (Juras mate, Mother of the Sea) and air (Veju mate, Mother of the Winds). The latter has its counterpart in the Vedic tradition as Vayu mata, the spouse of the god of winds (vayii). In Baltic religion, however, these Mother goddesses never seem to have had spouses attributed to them.
Mara is another important mother goddess, who rules over life, death and rebirth.
Earth and waters constitute her realm. As Marsava she is the protector of cows, animals that were especially venerated in the Baltic tradition. In the transmigration of souls, a topic mentioned in Latvian folk tales, the soul of the deceased mother occasionally takes the form of a cow in order to help her children. Etymologically her name derives from an Indo-European root *-mer- l-mor-. This root lies at the basis of words such as Sanskrit mara (which can mean both “death” and “love”), English to mar, nightmare, and Russian mor (“plague, death”). In Latvian mirt (“to die”), merdet (“to kill”) and murgs (“nightmare”) explain her field of activities. She is generally understood as a black-haired goddess, as opposed to Laima (see below) who is fair-haired. She is the protector of animals and of the kettle. Toads and frogs are her favourites; by embodying the souls of the deceased they are under her special protection. Up to the Second World War, a tradition on the Curonian spit was to make the gravemarkers in the graveyard in the form of a toad, even though the population was Lutheran. The grave-markers on female graves were carved from the wood of the linden tree (Tilia cordata) and those for men were made from oak, two trees symbolizing femininity and masculinity in the Baltic tradition. A popular Latvian belief is that one should not hurt a frog or toad, or one’s mother will die soon.Mara herself occasionally takes the shape of a black adder. In order to seek the protection of Mara, one has to sacrifice a black kid on the crossroads at midnight between Monday and Tuesday while reciting the appropriate magical formulae. Similar practices are known to have been carried out in relation to other mother deities (Adamovics 1956: 569; Straubergs 1941: 628-9). In the Russian tradition (Smits 1930: 168) her counterpart might be Zmeja Marina (“Snake Marina”). Such attempts to connect Mara with Zmeja Marina or with the Virgin Mary have, however, been criticized by earlier and contemporary scholars such as Brunenieks (1938: 24), Karulis (1988: 8) and Kursite (1996: 311).
Though Mara is traditionally not called “Mother”, she is treated as such.Mother goddesses acquired new roles in agrarian society, and there appeared such figures as the Mother of Milk, Mother of the Night Watch, Mother of Flax, and so forth. Archaeological excavations have unearthed artifacts from the second millennium BCE that indicate a transition to an agrarian mode of subsistence, but do not document religious life from this period.4 For information on these agrarian goddesses, we are once again largely confined to analysing the daina and other forms of folklore.
Celestial gods
Dievs is the central god of Baltic pre-Christian religion. In the Baltic traditions Dievs has anthropomorphic characteristics. Linguists agree that etymologically the Latvian name Dievs (and its counterpart in other Baltic languages: Lithuanian, Dievas; Old Prussian, Deivas) has a common origin with names of such deities as the ancient Indian Dyaus (mentioned, e.g., in Mahabharata, Book I, ch. 93) and the Greek Zeus, which are in turn derived from the Indo-European root *dyeu- and its derivatives. The meaning of words derived from this root is “the heavens”. In cosmogonic myths he is the demiurge, the creator of the world and of humans. In this act of creation he is assisted by his counterpart Veins, whose etymology is unclear. Recent scholarship (Toporov 1990: 293-8) connects this latter figure with the cult of ancestors. Velis, plural Veli, that is, the souls of the deceased who are ruled by the Mother of Veli (Latvian Vein mate), the ruler of the deceased, the underworld and darkness, are allowed to come into this world in autumn during the Time of Veli (Velu talks'), traditionally from September 29 (St Michael’s day) until October 23 (Simjudi) or in some places until November 10 (Saint Martin’s day). During this time, the veli visit their former home and kinsfolk. They are entitled to a special treat: various kinds of food left for them on the kitchen table or in the barn.
Nowadays this time lasts up to the first Sunday before Advent when the end of Velu laiks is celebrated by lighting candles in graveyards. The Mother of Veli may later have become the Mother of Veins, a character of Latvian folk tales, and veli recast as velni or “devils”. Jods (“black” in the Livonian language) is another word used for the devil. In Baltic religions the colour associated with Jods/Velns is black, perhaps a sign of their chthonic origin. The celestial deities, by contrast, are fair.In the versions of legends that have reached us, Dievs is represented as mild and caring for his creation, whereas Veins is presented in a rather comic vein. He attempts to spoil Dievs’s creation, and does so either unintentionally (tricksterlike, he creates mountains on the earth by spitting mud over the smooth surface of the earth created by Dievs) or intentionally: Dievs created humans with one leg “to walk good ways only” and one arm “to do good things only” but Veins gave them the other leg “to walk bad ways” and the other arm “to do bad things”. Veins originally had kept the sun and moon for himself, but Dievs got hold of them and threw them into the sky: the sun with his right hand and the moon with the left one.
There are many different versions of the cosmogonic legends, many of which have been recorded at a comparatively late point in time. In many of these legends, Dievs does not remain in his heavenly dwelling, but often descends from his celestial abode to live among the people. He can be met on one’s path or knocking on one’s door in the shape of an old man dressed in beggar’s robes testing the virtue and generosity of humans who are afterwards rewarded or punished accordingly. But his true home is on the top of the mountain of heaven. Haralds Biezais (1975: 323) indicates that Cardinal Valenti in 1604 provided the oldest evidence that the Balts worshipped a god of heaven. Valenti recorded the name of this deity as Tebo Deves, a corrupted form of debess dievs (“sky god”).
That same year, the Jesuit father Janis Stribins, in his discussion of ancient Latvian religion, noted that the Balts claimed that they had a sky god: Habemus, inquit, Deum q(ui) habet curam coeli, “We have, he says, God who rules the sky (or: whose care is the sky)” (Biezais 1975: 323). It is from this celestial yard that Dievs saddles his horses and rides down the mountain of heaven over the farmers’ fields so that the crops will thrive. Dievs is thus closely associated with horses, which may preserve a very ancient Indo-European mythic element. Horses were highly respected and their meat was never used for food by the Baltic peoples.Another god connected with the cult of horses is Usins, who happens also to be the god of spring. He is one of the sons of Dievs. His day was celebrated on April 23. Usins is the one who decorates the world with fresh grass and gives new leaves to trees around that time.
In folk songs the role of Dievs as creator is expressed by three verbs: laist (to let something happen), likt (to make something happen) and dot (to give). Man has to accept the moral laws of the universe as set down by Dievs. In such cases Dievs shares the most important junctures in the life of the farmer, even the sacrificial feasts by blessing them with beer (Latvian alus), “the drink of gods”.
Saule is the personification of the sun. This name is also derived from an Indo- European root (*sehul-, and variants). Saule is a female deity, wedded to Meness (the moon) who happens to be a male god in the Baltic traditions. In fact it has been suggested (Biezais [1972] 1998: 117) that the sun is usually a female deity for people living in the north, where it is mild and nourishing. Saule is also referred to as Saules Mate (“mother sun”). Around 4000 numbered folk songs (Vlke- Freiberga 1997-2002: III. 7) refer to this clearly feminine figure. She appears as a benevolent, generous, richly dressed and playful being. It is she who drives her luminous chariot over the mountain of heaven by day.
When night approaches, she lets her horses graze beyond the sea and takes a boat in which she sails off, floating in the sea when she rises early the next morning.Saule/the sun is the major point of reference in the spatial bisection of the cosmos along the vertical plane that Vlke-Freiberga (1997-2002: I. 12, 70-73) suggested was in place between above and below. This world, designated in Latvian by pasaule, literally means “the place under the sun”, whereas the otherworld/underworld, designated by Vinasaule/Vinpasaule, would literally mean “that sun” or “the other sun”. Saule also becomes the major point of reference in temporal relations: the limited span of human lives is measured against the eternity of the sun. Saule is both the symbol of eternity and of a human life: humans resemble the rising sun in childhood and the setting sun in old age. Sun becomes the mediator between this life and afterlife. According to Vlke-Freiberga (1997-2002:1. 59) Saule (just like the ancient Greek god Hermes) is a psychopomp, a leader of the souls of the dead. Traditionally, burial rituals had to be accomplished before sunset. This is why every day just after sunset all work