Pirts day
Every layer is read at this time; sunrise and sunset are the chosen day's.
New moon 0% illuminated
During the new moon, the body's strength was considered at its lowest ebb. Folk tradition favoured a shorter, gentler pirts visit over this phase — little vigour was expected, and rest mattered more than a vigorous whisking.
The golden swan
It does not fall every month, and may last only a few hours. The day for closing the circle: settling accounts, forgiving, giving thanks to the departing month.
- + Finishing what was begun this month
- + Returning debts and borrowed things
- + Cleansing the home, pirts, work with stones
- − New plans and beginnings
- − Coarse food and meat
- − Investing money
- Symbol
- a golden swan
- Body
- the heart; the pineal gland
- Stones
- marble, black garnet, rock crystal
Health — a divinatory system, not medicine
The heart and the pineal gland. Heart attacks today were held to be dangerous; other illnesses begun now do not retreat quickly, but overcoming them was said to bring a lengthening of life.
Dreams
True and wise; they show the month's mistakes.
Moon in Capricorn earth
Work, responsibility, career, limits. Emotion quiets, the mind turns cold and clear. The best time for serious, sustained work; the worst for seeking warmth and comfort.
Canon: The golden swan; the body — the heart and the pineal gland.
epadomi.com: A separate Russian source (luna.rf) gives “the mountain” and the brain hemispheres. An exception, not the norm.
epadomi.com is a divergent branch, shown for cross-checking — not the reference.
Latvian folk tradition
a separate layer · by moon phase, not by numbered day- The new moon is met with full hands, not empty.
- You must not look at the new moon with an empty pocket — rub a coin in your pocket without taking it out.
- On first sight: “The itch to the fence, sleep to the pig, health from God to me!”
Source: Pēteris Šmits, Latviešu tautas ticējumi. Not the numbered-day corpus above.
Planetary week
a third, independent systemMonday · Moon ☾︎. Mood, home, memory, family. Sensitivity is higher than usual — toward people and toward food. A good day for housework, for caring for a mother and elders, for water treatments, for anything that calls for gentleness. A poor day for important decisions and public steps: plans tend to change. The shadow side is emotional unsteadiness and taking offence.
Current planetary hour: Mars ♂︎ — hour 4 of the day.
Leadership, struggle, conflict, surgery. Much energy, and it wants an outlet — physical work, sport, a decisive conversation, casting off surplus. The shadow side: irritability, haste, injury, burnt bridges.
The year wheel
Last: Ziemassvētki
Next: Meteņi, in 36 days
20% through this eighth of the year
The sun
- Sign
- ♑︎ in Capricorn, 9.2° earth
- Day of the solar month
- day 9
- Next turning point
- the spring equinox, in 80 days
- Day length
- 6.8 h · sunrise 09:01 · sunset 15:51
The sun turned at its lowest in Capricorn, and the shortest day was kept as the year's true hinge — the cold was at its hardest, but so, tradition insisted, was the promise that light was about to grow again. Endurance, not comfort, was the virtue of this season; a fire lit now was lit in hope rather than in need alone. The body was told to bear with the cold rather than fight it.
The day, read as one
Rarely did the lunar count close its circle on the very day the moon itself turned dark: the thirtieth day's call to settle accounts and cleanse the pirts met a new moon that favored quiet thought over fresh undertakings, so the two agreed that this was better spent finishing than beginning. Latvian folklore added its own small gesture of readiness — a coin turned in the pocket rather than empty hands — fitting well enough with a day of closing debts. The moon's passage through Capricorn and Monday's lunar rule pulled in slightly different directions, one cooling the mood toward solitary discipline, the other warming it toward gentleness and the care of elders, so some tension was there to be felt rather than resolved. The sun likewise sat in Capricorn, that old season of enduring the cold rather than escaping it, which sat comfortably beside the number-day's warning against coarse food and heavy indulgence. Altogether this was no day for new plans or bold decisions, but tradition held it suited to quiet closing, cleansing, and warmth taken gently rather than sought in excess.
Generated with Claude · cached for this day and updated when the corpus changes
Your lunar birth day
computed on your device · only the day (1–30) is used, never the dateThis is folk and divinatory material, not health advice. It is written in the past tense on purpose — "was avoided", "was considered" — and describes what tradition held, not what you should do. A pirts visit is a real load on the heart and circulation; judge heat, duration and frequency for your own body.