Fragallia

Pirts day

April 24, 2025 · computed for Rīga

Every layer is read at this time; sunrise and sunset are the chosen day's.

Waning moon 17% illuminated

The waning moon was long held as the best time for a pirts visit. This was when cleansing and letting go were most encouraged — heavier whisking and a longer, more thorough visit were favoured.

1 5 10 15 20 25 30
26

The toad in the marsh

Heavy day Anti-phase: day 12

One of the more perilous days — not satanic but critical. A misleading enchantment with one's own achievements is the risk; energy was said to drain out through the mouth.

Was favoured
  • + Silence, rest, fasting
  • + Considered, unhurried work
  • + Pirts and massage
Was avoided
  • − Chatter, vanity, haste
  • − Starting anything — you sink into the marsh
  • − Swimming, pulling teeth
Symbol
a toad, a marsh
Body
the hips, the thighs
Stones
orpiment, blue nephrite

Health — a divinatory system, not medicine

The hips and thighs. Hip-joint injuries taken on this day were considered especially serious. Illness was thought dangerous.

Moon in Pisces water

Dreams, intuition, mercy, art. The border between yourself and others thins — it is easy to take on someone else's mood. A good time for meditation and music; a poor one for agreements and alcohol.

Latvian folk tradition

a separate layer · by moon phase, not by numbered day
  • On the waning moon — pirts, water treatments, casting off the surplus.
  • Trees felled on the old moon rot less.

Source: Pēteris Šmits, Latviešu tautas ticējumi. Not the numbered-day corpus above.

☿︎ Mercury 4. of the day

Planetary week

a third, independent system

Thursday · Jupiter ♃︎. Growth, learning, law, travel, generosity. A day for large questions: strategy, study, courts and institutions, long-term agreements, helping others. What is begun on a Thursday tends to grow. A good day to ask and to give — money included. The shadow side is exaggeration, promises beyond your strength, and the wish to teach others how to live.

Current planetary hour: Mercury ☿︎ — hour 4 of the day.

Words, documents, roads, trade, talks. The best hour to write, study, buy and sell, bring people together, sort papers. The mind is quick but shallow — a large decision is better not settled right now.

♈︎ ♉︎ ♊︎ ♋︎ ♌︎ ♍︎ ♎︎ ♏︎ ♐︎ ♑︎ ♒︎ ♓︎ Meteņi Lieldienas Ūsiņi Jāņi Māras Miķeļi Mārtiņi Ziemassvētki ☉︎ 15.0 h

The year wheel

Last: Lieldienas
Next: Ūsiņi, in 11 days

76% through this eighth of the year

The sun

Sign
♉︎ in Taurus, 4.4° earth
Day of the solar month
day 5
Next turning point
the summer solstice, in 58 days
Day length
15.0 h · sunrise 05:52 · sunset 20:52

With the sun in Taurus the warmth settled into the ground rather than the blood — a slower, steadier heat that favoured the body over the mind. Appetite returned in full, and rest felt earned rather than lazy. It was held to be a poor season for hurry of any kind.

The day, read as one

Lunar day 26 and the waning moon agreed closely: this was a day for quiet withdrawal rather than beginnings, and pirts itself sat squarely among the favoured things in both the numbered corpus and Latvian folk tradition, which together pointed to cleansing and letting go rather than taking on anything new. The Moon in Pisces softened the edges further, leaning toward inward, wordless time rather than company or drink, while the body's old-day warning fell on the hips — a reminder, in this reading, to move without haste. Thursday's planetary temper pulled the other way, toward growth and large undertakings, which sat oddly against a day better suited to silence and finishing old business; tradition held that its ambitions were best set aside for calmer ground. The sun's slow Taurus heat, at least, matched the day's overall mood — steady, earned rest rather than urgency — making the pirts itself, taken unhurried and quiet, the one thing nearly every thread of the day agreed on.

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 date

This 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.