Pirts day
The time shifts the planetary hours and the lunar-day boundary; the sun and phase readings stay day-based.
Waning moon 15% 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.
The toad in the marsh
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.
- + Silence, rest, fasting
- + Considered, unhurried work
- + Pirts and massage
- − 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 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- 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.
Planetary week
a third, independent systemTuesday · Mars ♂︎. Action, sport, conflict, surgery. There is much energy and it wants an outlet: physical effort, repairs, the garden, casting off surplus. Whoever lies idle on their side today feels poorly by evening. A good day to stand your ground and to finish what needs pressure. A poor one for delicate talks and matters of love. The shadow side is quarrels, haste, injury.
Current planetary hour: ☉︎ Sun — hour 7 of the night.
Strength, health, visibility, authority. The hour for showing yourself: speaking up, addressing someone higher, starting what needs to be noticed. Quiet requests and work where you must stay in the shadow go poorly.
The year wheel
Last: Mārtiņi
Next: Ziemassvētki, in 6 days
87% through this eighth of the year
The sun
- Sign
- ♐︎ in Sagittarius, 24.2° fire
- Day of the solar month
- day 24
- Next turning point
- the winter solstice, in 6 days
- Day length
- 6.8 h · sunrise 08:55 · sunset 15:41
In Sagittarius the sun rode low and the days grew short, yet tradition held that inner fire, not outer warmth, carried a person through this stretch toward the solstice. It was a season for journeys of the mind if not the body — for looking ahead rather than settling in. A restless spirit now was taken as natural, not a fault.
The day, read as one
Lunar day 26 and the waning moon were in quiet agreement, both naming pirts as the day's rightful work — cleansing, release, the letting go of what no longer served, with Scorpio's moon deepening that same pull toward shedding the surplus, even as it stirred a current of suspicion best left outside the pirts door. The day itself warned against vanity and haste, favouring silence and unhurried care over any boasting of achievements, while Mars's Tuesday pushed the opposite way, restless for action and impatient with stillness — a visitor might feel that pull but was wise to let the bathhouse absorb it rather than fuel conflict elsewhere. The hips and thighs were marked as vulnerable ground on this particular lunar day, so care there was warranted. Overhead, the sun's low passage through Sagittarius asked for inward reflection more than outward striving, lending the whole day a contemplative cast. Taken together, the traditions pointed toward a pirts visit well suited to quiet cleansing rather than vigorous exertion, provided it was entered without haste or self-regard.
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.