Author of all texts about mythology on these web-pages is Lidija Bajuk:

   lidija.bajuk@posluh.hr
   scena.hgu.hr/lidija-bajuk/


  1. PERUN
      - The Sky
      - The Mountain
  2. PERUNIKA
      - Leluya
      - Ball lightning
  3. AQUARIUS
      - Candlemen
      WATER MAID
      - Fairies
      - Witches
  4. DRAGON
      - Water
      SNAKE
      - Bogorodica
        (Rainbow)
  5. GREEN GEORGE
      - The Moon
      - Corn Spirit
  6. LEPA MARA
      - Hair
      - Embroidery
  7. GRABANCIJAŠ
      - Light
  8. PESJANEK
      - Forest
  9. LITTLE RED HAT
       (DWARF)
      - The Cap, Little Hat
  10. STRAHE & MRAKI
        (GIANTS)



LEPA MARA (BEAUTIFUL MARA)

She is whiter than snow, fairer than a rose and has golden hair brighter than the sun. She wakes up in March when the thundermaker Perun makes the first thunders and lightning. Together with Perun's wife Perunika, she opens the heaven's gates in spring.

Spring is the time when her future husband and twin brother, the mythical Green George sets her free from a chest. She descends heaven, i.e. the golden bough of a mythical tree on St. George's day. She drinks dew and gets her strength from the wind and her joy from the smell of flowers. She is tall and thin, has rosy cheeks more beautiful than a rose, black eyes like the thorn bush and walks making small steps like a quail. She wears a white dress decorated with rose buds and stars, with golden circles embroidered on it, she has a string of pearls on her forhead and around her neck. She wears an apron and a cape of flowers, leaves and moonlight. She is a weaver, tailor, embroiderer, lacemaker, knitter, washer, cleaner, keeper of the home fire, baker, inn keeper, shepherdess, coachwoman, chaser of witches, medicine woman, poetess, bride, spring, moonlight, golden star, dawn, giver of light, love, hapiness and fertility. During the day she is a kind girl sitting on a high, dry/golden/strong/holy branch of a mythical tree in the middle of Paradise or a flowering meadow and at dusk or during the night and in winter she is a girl whose sweetheart left her and together with her mother she is represented as an unknown, poor, fickle, proud, evil, cruel or ageing resident and ruler of the west or underground empire. Her mother is the fire lightning (Mary, Perunika). The mother becomes baba Jaga/Luca/Roga (the Lithuanian Rugiuboba), she is poverty, hunger, waste land, the stepmother, misfortune, death, widow, old and ugly witch who can cast evil spells by looking at you with her evil eye. The mother is then known as Jagbaba, Jez(i)baba, M(a)rzana, Mokos, Vodanojka, Zim(n)a (''winter''), (Z)deracica (''devourer''). Her daughter Lepa Mara then becomes a stranger, a woman from Arabia, Budim, Greece, Turkey or a poor Cinderella, changeable moon or moonlight, a proud girl or cruel Mora(na). The name Morana comes from the indoeuropean stem ''mer'', meaning ''to crumble'' or ''to die''. Croatian words ''mrijeti'', ''umirati'', ''umarati'', ''smrt'', ''moriti'', ''zamor'', ''odmor'', ''mrak'', ''Mura'' all meaning death or tiredness (Mura is the name of a river in Croatia) are derived from it. The two of them are inconstant like the time of day or the seasons. Changing their form from fairies into witches, they represent the dual spirit of nature. They are godesses and representatives of darkness and light, white and black, clear and cloudy sky, spring and winter, plenitude and hunger, medicinal and poisonous things, health and sickness, youth and old age, love and hate, care and carelessness, morality and sinn, fortune and misfortune, good and evil.





They make gods, good and evil spirits quarrel. Perunika makes Perun and Veles quarrel over her, Lepa Mara makes her divine brothers quarrel over her. She promises that she will jump off a silver bridge (during daytime it is the rainbow and in the night it is Kumovska Slama (the Milky Way)) with one of them as his bride and thus run away from the other one who wants her as his mistress. By jumping into the water of forgetfulness, she will cross the border between the day and night, between the new and old year, between heaven and hell, enter the sea of night, disappear and thus keep her chastity. If she doesn't marry one of the night gods, one of them will catch her and force her to marry and have a child with him, but eventually she will escape him. In any case, he will have his revenge by blinding, strangling, petrifying or burning her. These cruel acts represent the principles of the night or winter time. She comes to life again on the passionate love flame of her lover (who is sometimes her former torturer) and gives her life flame to the moon, who is in love with her, to keep it for her. When the servants of the divine finally find her and with the help of her father Perun, or a handsome stranger (Green Goerge) free her of her chains, she marries Green George on a white whinged horse and gives him her life flame, a golden apple from the Paradise tree and her necklace, the first morning or spring light. In return he gives her a gold ring and marries her on midsummer day. Even though they come from the same divine stem and they are siblings, they devote themselves to enchantment and love and thus make all living creatures grow and bear fruit. Their wedding night should be on Friday, the day of the week dedicated to the godess of love and beauty. On each young Friday, that is the first Friday of the month there were celebrations and rituals connected with the fertility of the fields, orchards and gardens. In fact Mary of Fire and Beautiful Mara, although they are represented as mother and daughter in the Croatian oral tradition, are both archetypes of the same mythical female character. The only difference is that in pre-Christian tradition one of them lives longer and the other one is a bit younger. They are represented as different plants: basil, peach, birch, lily of the walley, oxeye daisy, apple, strawberry, fir, violet, poppy, olive, lime-tree, rose, rosemary, dog-rose and plum. When they are represented as animals they are: dove, quail, mare, doe, cow, sow, coockoo, marten (in Russian vernacular an expression for the female sex organ), hen, swan, weasel, swalow, butterfly, fox, bee, partridge, falcon, otter, she-wolf, snake, frog and woodpecker. Even though her father is a sun god, she is also a demon and earth godess, like her mother. At the same time she is a kind sister and a passionate lover. She and her mother Perunika (Mary of Fire) were godesses of beauty, love, fertility, marriage, marital happiness and the house fire. They were also the symbols of the resurrection of nature from the winter sleep. In the homes of the ancient Slavs there were small altars in the corner of the house with wax, amber or wooden figurines where girls and women used to offer sacrifices like flowers, ribbons, embroidered napkins, etc. A fire burnt there that could be put out only using your fingers, otherwise the peace of the house would be put out with it. The eternal female principle embodied in numerous mythical female characters in fact represents the nature, the primal principles, the soul, the instinct, the feeling, the subconscious, the inconscious, the dream, the search, the journey, beauty, attraction, desire, love, the moving force of the world.