Fragallia

Pirts day

November 19, 2025 · computed for Rīga

The time shifts the planetary hours and the lunar-day boundary; the sun and phase readings stay day-based.

New moon 1% 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.

1 5 10 15 20 25 30
29

The octopus

Satanic day Anti-phase: day 15

The Moon is unseen, the reserves spent, the month's negative packed tight. The most dangerous day; the astral haze makes dreams and foretellings false.

Was favoured
  • + Only what is necessary, and finishing it
  • + Fasting, repentance, humility
  • + Baking bread at home; smoking juniper
Was avoided
  • − Starting or even planning something new
  • − Dark rooms, murky water
  • − Bone jewellery, disorder
Symbol
an octopus, a hydra
Body
the rectum
Stones
serpentine, black pearl, labradorite

Health — a divinatory system, not medicine

The rectum and the anus. Problems there were read as a sign of weak defence. Lingering illnesses could be treated successfully today.

Dreams

The astral haze — dreams and foretellings are false today.

Moon in Scorpio water

Depth, secrecy, passion, transformation. A strong sign for cleansing, investigation, and shedding the surplus. At the same time — jealousy, suspicion, the pull toward revenge.

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.

♄︎ Saturn 4. of the day

Planetary week

a third, independent system

Wednesday · Mercury ☿︎. Words, documents, roads, trade, talks. The best day of the week to sort papers, write letters, study, buy and sell, bring people together. The mind is quick but shallow, so large decisions are better left. The day calls for honesty and precision: what is said today is remembered. The shadow side is chatter, distraction, small lies.

Current planetary hour: ♄︎ Saturn — hour 4 of the day.

Limits, discipline, ordering, closing off. Slowness is an advantage here: archives, debts, repairs, fasting, casting off the old, anything where you must say “no.” A poor hour for beginnings and celebrations. The shadow side is heaviness of heart and fear.

♈︎ ♉︎ ♊︎ ♋︎ ♌︎ ♍︎ ♎︎ ♏︎ ♐︎ ♑︎ ♒︎ ♓︎ Meteņi Lieldienas Ūsiņi Jāņi Māras Miķeļi Mārtiņi Ziemassvētki ☉︎ 7.8 h

The year wheel

Last: Mārtiņi
Next: Ziemassvētki, in 33 days

27% through this eighth of the year

The sun

Sign
♏︎ in Scorpio, 27.3° water
Day of the solar month
day 28
Next turning point
the winter solstice, in 33 days
Day length
7.8 h · sunrise 08:13 · sunset 16:04

The sun's passage through Scorpio was felt as the cold taking real hold — warmth withdrew inward, and the body was said to conserve rather than spend. Old lore treated this as a season for going quiet, for keeping close what mattered, not for open display. Illness caught now was thought to run deeper and linger longer than at other turns of the year.

The day, read as one

The lunar day and the new moon both counseled restraint: the thirtieth corpus called this the emptied, most dangerous day, fit only for finishing necessary things, fasting, and baking bread, while the new moon itself asked for thought rather than work and for meeting it with full hands. Scorpio deepened that mood from two directions at once — the Moon's passage there favoured cleansing and shedding surplus, while the sun's long transit of the sign was felt as warmth withdrawing inward, a season for going quiet rather than open display. Wednesday's Mercury cut somewhat against this, lending the mind a quick, practical turn suited to words and small dealings, though tradition still warned against trusting it with anything large. Taken together, the day read less as one for beginning a pirts visit with ambition than for a modest, necessary one — a bath for finishing and settling rather than starting, with nothing new planned and nothing looked into too closely.

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.