Baltic mythology has a faraway ancestor in Proto-Indo-European mythology. Lore of the Baltic region has deep roots, reflecting the fierce nature of the land. Today's Balts are largely in the regions of Latvia and Lithuania.
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The Balts evolve from a group of Indo-European tribes who settle the area between the lower Vistula and southeast shore of the Baltic Sea, and upper Daugava and Dnieper rivers. Germanic people live west of the Baltic lands. Over time Balts identify as East or West.
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Later sources describe the Balts as tall and broad with high foreheads, light blond hair and large cheekbones. Originally the Balts are part of the migrational waves of people from the Pontic-Caspian Steppe beginning in the 4th millennium BCE.
They raise crops such as rye wheat, potatoes, and beets. Fishing, hunting and livestock such as sheep, goats and pigs are well suited to the harsh lands with fertile interior valleys and marshes.
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Along the coasts the storms of the Baltic Sea throw chunks and nuggets of the gold of the north, amber, from a primeval forest deep beneath the waves. With traders, amber travels down the Oder, Dneipe, Vistula, Daugava and other river courses.
The Balts have the amber market cornered, with more amber discovered in the area than any other along the coast. The Amber Roads are among the earliest trade routes.
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Horses are of prime importance to the Balts, and a sign of wealth. Attesting to a strong horse culture, thousands of horses throughout the southeast Baltic region are found in human cemeteries from the 2nd up to the 14th centuries CE.
The Baltic coastal regions are among last parts of Europe to be Christianized, and for good reason. Southerners don't know what's more inhospitable, the climate or the attitude. Even the Romans, after a few attempts, came, saw and decided not to conquer.
The Baltic people include:
East Balts: Lithuanians (including Samogitians) and Latvians (including Latgalians)
West Balts: Old Prussians, Curonians, Sudovians, Skalvians, Yotvingians and Galindians, whose languages and cultures are now extinct.
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Mythology has origins in millennia past. Ancient Baltic gods and divine entities include:
Saulė or Saule - Sun (Goddess)
Mēness (Lithuanian Mėnulis; “Moon”) - also a war god
Dieva dēli, Dievo sūneliai - sons of the sky god
Dievas - Sky god (PIE Dyḗus or Dyḗus Ph₂tḗr, Greek Zeus)
Zemes māte (Dabas māte) - Mother Earth (Mother Nature)
Laima - Goddess of fate & happiness
Velnias - Devil, trickster
Milda (Aleksota) - Goddess of love
Patrimpas (Potrimpo) - God of the Sea, earth, crops
A mountain forms the firmament, possibly of stone. Here reside the Sky Gods. They include the Sun, Moon, Sky Father and his sons. Saule rides over the sky in a chariot drawn by horses who may be ridden by the sons of the Sky God.
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In the Proto-Indo-European pantheon, Seh₂ul is the sun goddess. She's the protoype for Baltic Saule, whose influence spreads during the early days of humankind. Within the pantheon, deities become more complex.
Saulė can be perceived as two or more goddesses. Saule is the personified Sun, and Saules meita is the Sun's daughter, bride to Sky Gods. The journey of the Sun beneath the earth at night is echoed in Egyptian, Hittite and cross-European cultures.
Cycles of rebirth are seen throughout the natural world, including those of the daily rise and set of the sun and the activities of the moon. On the terrestrial sphere it's obvious new life grows from old or dead organic matter. Saule is at the center of Baltic religion.
Her estate is on the sky mountain. It borders that of Dievs. He's the deity of light, sky, prosperity, wealth, ruler of gods, and the creator of the universe. In Proto-Indo-European myth, he's Dyḗus or Dyḗus Ph₂tḗr, the daylight-sky god, who becomes Zeus in Greece.
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The Dieva dēli and Saules meitas (“Daughters of the Sun”) work and play together. Sometimes the behavior of their children enrages Dievs and Saule against each other.
The concept of the Indo-European Divine Twins and Deific Family appears in Baltic mythology as the Dieva dēli or Dievo sūneliai (sons of god). They're children of the Sky God Dievas (Dievs).
Dieva dēli may destroy the rings of Saules meitas, or Saules meitas break the weapons of Dieva dēli. The anger of Saule and Dievs lasts three days. Some scholars explain this through natural phenomena, such as the three days before the new moon.
Mēness is the moon, who bestows his monthly renewal of strength upon all growing things. The young or new moon is sometimes known as Dievaitis (Lithuanian: Little God or Prince). He's empathetic to mortals and honored by farmers.
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He appears as a war god in cosmic attire in a chariot drawn by gray horses. Though attired with weapons he represents romance. He's a suitor or the husband of Saule. In one tale they're parents of the Earth. Due to discord between them, they visit her at separate times.
In the Baltic skies, Pērkons (Latvian; Lithuanian Perkūnas; “Thunderer”) makes weapons and jewelry. God of thunder, lightning, storms, rain, fire, war, law, fertility, mountains and oak trees, Perkūnas pursues his nemesis Velnias in a chariot of stone and fire, or red hot iron.
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On his divine chariot Perkūnas appears in the shape of a gray-haired old man with a big beard of many colors. He wears white and black clothes, and holds a goat on a cord in one hand, and a horn or axe in the other.
The chariot is pulled by two to four red / black and white horses or goats. In Samogitian sources, Perkūnas blasts through the firmament as a horseman upon a fiery steed.
Perkunas is a powerul warrior, divine metal smith, storm and weather god. As a fertility god he's connected with agriculture. Growing crops is not an easy industry in the Baltic north, where heavy clay earth breaks plows, and good weather is crucial after long cold winters.
In various societies including ancient Baltic the Earth is not a sphere but a huge round plate floating on the primeval seas. The concept of the world ocean surrounding the lands is prevalent among both seafaring and land-bound cultures.
A sun tree or world tree grows at the edge of the path of Saulė. When she sets, Saulė hangs her belt on the tree. It's usually an oak but also described as linden or other tree. It's in the middle of the world ocean, or to the west.
Zemes māte (Dabas māte) - Mother Nature, also known as Mother Earth or the Earth Mother, is Goddess of life and creation. She makes the first humans and other animals. In Baltic religion she's among the most worshipped deities.
Laima is Goddess of fate and happiness. In Baltic belief she's one of most important deities. She determines the destiny of humans. Her symbols are broom, and herringbone. Her tree is the Linden (Tilia).
Along with sky deity Dievs, and Saule, the sun, Laima determines the length and fortune of human life. Also a popular goddess, she's still revered in parts of Latvia.
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As the Baltic tradition is an oral one, some early tales are lost. However Christianization of the Baltic and suppression of pagan deities doesn't happen until the 13th-14th century CE, or the High Middle Ages in southern realms. Folklore lasts longer.
Medieval German writer Adam of Bremen in the 11th century CE is the first to use the term Baltic meaning the sea. Before Adam's time, various ancient places names, such as Balcia or Baltia, refer to a legendary island in the Baltic.