Mat Zemlya (Matka Ziemia or Matushka Zeml'ja) is the

Earth Mother A mother goddess is a goddess who represents a personified deification of motherhood, fertility goddess, fertility, creation, destruction, or the earth goddess who embodies the bounty of the earth or nature. When equated with the earth or t ...

and is probably the oldest deity in

Slavic mythology Slavic mythology or Slavic religion is the religious beliefs, myths, and ritual practices of the Slavs before Christianisation, which occurred at various stages between the 8th and the 13th century. The South Slavs, who likely settled in the Bal ...

. She is also called Mati Syra Zemlya meaning ''Mother Damp Earth'' or ''Mother Moist Earth''. Her identity later blended into that of

Mokosh Mokosh ( orv, Мóкошь) is a Slavic goddess mentioned in the Primary Chronicle, protector of women's work and women's destiny. She watches over spinning and weaving, shearing of sheep, and protects women in childbirth. Mokosh is the Mother G ...

Mythology

In the early

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire ...

, Mati Syra Zemlya was one of the most important

deities A deity or god is a supernatural being who is considered divine or sacred. The ''Oxford Dictionary of English'' defines deity as a god or goddess, or anything revered as divine. C. Scott Littleton defines a deity as "a being with powers greater ...

in the Slavic world. Slavs made oaths by touching the Earth, and sins were confessed into a hole in the Earth before death. She was worshipped in her natural form and was not given a human personage or likeness. Since the adoption of

Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest and most widespread religion with roughly 2.38 billion followers representing one-third of the global popula ...

in all Slavic lands, she has been identified with

Mary Mary may refer to: People * Mary (name), a feminine given name (includes a list of people with the name) Religious contexts * New Testament people named Mary, overview article linking to many of those below * Mary, mother of Jesus, also calle ...

, the mother of Jesus. An example of her importance is seen in this traditional invocation to Matka Ziema, made with a jar of

hemp oil Hemp oil (hemp seed oil) is oil obtained by pressing hemp seeds. Cold pressed, unrefined hemp oil is dark to clear light green in color, with a nutty flavor. The darker the color, the grassier the flavour. It should not be confused with hash oi ...

: ::East – "Mother Earth, subdue every evil and unclean being so that he may not cast a spell on us nor do us any harm." ::West – "Mother Earth, engulf the unclean power in thy boiling pits, and in thy burning fires." ::South – "Mother Earth, calm the winds coming from the South and all bad weather. Calm the moving sands and whirlwinds." ::North – "Mother Earth, calm the North winds and clouds, subdue the snowstorms and the cold." ::The jar, which held the oil, is buried after each invocation and offering is made at each Quarter. (Slavonic mythology 1977:287) Old Slavic beliefs seem to attest some awareness of an ambivalent nature of the Earth: it was considered men's cradle and nurturer during one's lifetime, and, when the time of death came, it would open up to receive their bones, as if it were a "return to the womb". The imagery of the ''terre humide'' ("moist earth") also appears in funeral lamentations either as a geographical feature (as in Lithuanian and Ukrainian lamentations) or invoked as ''Mère-Terre humide'' ("Mother Moist Earth").

Cultic practices

Up until

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

and the fall of the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War ...

, peasant women would perform a rite to prevent against plague by plowing a furrow around the village and calling on the protection of the Earth spirits by shrieking.

Related characters

The Slavic ''

bogatyr A bogatyr ( rus, богатырь, p=bəɡɐˈtɨrʲ, a=Ru-богатырь.ogg) or vityaz ( rus, витязь, p=ˈvʲitʲɪsʲ) is a stock character in medieval East Slavic legends, akin to a Western European knight-errant. Bogatyrs appear m ...

Mikula Selyaninovich Mikula Selyaninovich (russian: Микула Селянинович, Mikula the Villager's Son) is a Russian epic hero, a ''bogatyr'' - plowman, from the Novgorod Republic '' bylina'' cycle.Leonard Arthur Magnus, "The Heroic Ballads of Russia". K. P ...

, or Mikula the Villager, is closely connected with Mat Zemlya.Leonard Arthur Magnus,
The Heroic Ballads of Russia
. K. Paul, Trench, Trubner & Company, Limited, 1921, pp. 23-26.Dixon-Kennedy, Mike (1998). ''Encyclopedia of Russian and Slavic Myth and Legend''. Santa Barbara, California: ABC-CLIO. pp. 189-191. .

Footnotes

Notes

External links

Day of the Divine Mother of Herbs
{{Slavic mythology Agricultural goddesses Fertility goddesses Slavic goddesses Earth goddesses Creator goddesses Supernatural beings identified with Christian saints