Progressive Latvian embellishments of their ugunskrusts, "fire-cross", aka swastika

Latvian reverence for the swastika

Fragments of the Stāmeriene shawl. Unearthed in 1898, it was woven some time during the late Iron Age age, 10th-11th centuries. Latviešu Tautas Tērpu Vēsture (History of Latvian Folk Costume), 1936.
Reproduction of the shawl presented to the Stāmeriene parish in celebration of Latvia's centenary. Rather than being woven, its design featuring 37 swastikas in 20 different variations is fashioned using 6,970 bronze ringlets.
The ANSALDO A1 BALILLA with Latvian aviation insignia, ca. 1925. latvianaviation.com

The oldest example ever found of the swastika, ugunskrusts ("fire-cross") in Latvian, is 15,000 years old, carved in mammoth tusk, unearthed in Ukraine. The use of the swastika among the ancestors of the Latvians is surely as ancient because the Slavic and Baltic languages/cultures stem from a common Balto-Slavic proto-ancestor.

The swastika appears in many versions in Latvian folk costumes and crafts. Indeed, there is no other culture in which it appears more ornately or in more variations. It is inseparably ingrained in Latvian identity. Different incarnations of the swastika cross symbolize different Latvian deities or aspects of life. The right-facing swastika: Pērkons ("Thunder", thus the "Thunder Cross"), left-facing: Laima ("Good Fortune"), while the multi-pronged Zars ("branch") denoted happiness; lastly, rounded, with narrowing and curved ends, Ķeksis ("hook") — similar to a multi-pronged Balto-Slavic sign denoting the sun. In Latvian mythology, the fire-cross ultimately symbolizes the sun's (Saule) never-ending movement, defeating evil while promoting good health and good fortune.

Incarnations of the ugunskrusts
Mittens with a swastika pattern
needleb.wordpress.com
Latvian armed forces dance ensemble, denounced for displaying "Nazi swastika"
Contemporary ugunskrusts pendant
at zimjuspeks.lv

Rhetoric

Hitler stained the reputation of the swastika. Prior to the rise of Nazi Germany, aside from widespread general use of the swastika, both Latvian and Finnish militaries, and units of the American military had adopted swastika insignia.

Recognition that there are uses of the swastika which predate and supercede Nazism has been slow to materialize. In 2008 — 88 years after Hitler adopted the swastika as the symbol of Nazism — the second Hindu-Jewish Leadership Summit1 recognized the Hindu use of the swastika as ancient and unrelated to Nazi Germany and Aryanism:

Svastika is an ancient and greatly auspicious symbol of the Hindu tradition. It is inscribed on Hindu temples, ritual altars, entrances, and even account books. A distorted version of this sacred symbol was misappropriated by the Third Reich in Germany, and abused as an emblem under which heinous crimes were perpetrated against humanity, particularly the Jewish people. The participants recognize that this symbol is, and has been sacred to Hindus for millennia, long before its misappropriation.

Unfortunately, no such exception is made for the Latvians' equally ancient use of the swastika. Activists invoke their so-called "alliance" fighting "for Hitler" in World War II — in reality, combat on the Eastern front resisting Soviet reinvasion and unrelated to the Holocaust or Nazism — to denounce any appearance of the swastika as evil, for example, attacking a Latvian dance troupe for displaying the "Nazi swastika." Never the Latvian swastika. Even unrelated Latvian signs are cited as proof Latvians are Nazis, as in this description of a Latvian Legion Commemoration Day procession in 2013:

"In uniform, ancient surviving members of the Latvian Legion of the Waffen-SS have come out, proud and happy. Young people join them, carrying swastika-like insignia with their flowers...2"

"All For Latvia" Jumis banner
"Peoples' Union" Jumis and Ugunskrusts

Those "swastika-like" insignia were likely political party banners featuring the sign of Jumis, the god of fertility and abundant yield. In pagan practice, there were multiple Jumi, featuring a Jumis dedicated to each crop: barley, rye, flax, nuts, and others. The symbol itself represents two crossed spikes of wheat, and was often featured as a decoration at the roof-peak of barns, granaries, and homes—often inside the home, hung in a place of honor.

To avoid or confront misinformation — a choice

Flag of the Finnish Air Force Academy

There is no better example of the hold misconceptions can have over public discourse as when Latvian craftspeople, tasked in 2006 with producing 4,500 pairs of mittens as gifts for NATO summit3 delegations and media, were forbidden to use the Latvian fire-cross. It was feared that those unfamiliar with Latvian folklore and culture might take mittens decorated with swastikas the wrong way. Latvian swastikas are no more "Nazi" than those of their Finnish neighbors to the north—or of the world's billion-plus adherents of Hinduism. Now, seventeen years later and in the face of continued accusations, the NATO summit appears a missed opportunity for Latvians to reclaim the Latvian "fire-cross" as their own and put manufactured and misinformed controversy to rest.

Read on for js/index.html.

Below, pages from Arveds Paegle's children's "ABC" of Latvian signs ornamentation. (We also dedicate a page to his Lielvārde belt.)

Page 9, ornamenting the swastika
Page 10, ornamenting the swastika

1Summit declaration at www.millenniumpeacesummit.org/2nd_Hindu-Jewish_Leadership_Summit_Declaration.pdf, retrieved March 21, 2021
2 (cite web) cite_web|title=Brodsky: Latvia's second coming—The world can't afford to ignore a resurgent Nazi movement|first=Richard|last=Brodsky|date=2013-03-23|url=http://www.timesunion.com/opinion/article/Brodsky-Latvia-s-second-coming-4379690.php 
3The summit was held November 28–29, 2006.

Additional Reading

  •  (cite web) cite_web|url=http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-29644591|title=How the world loved the swastika — until Hitler stole it|publisher=BBC News Magazine|date=2014-10-23|retrieved=2018-05-28|last=Campion|first=Mukti Jain 
  • For more information on the Holocaust in Nazi-occupied Latvia, we recommend Prof. Andrew Ezergailis's scholarship web site, Holocaust Archives of Latvia, USA and his seminal work, Holocaust in Latvia.
  • For history of the Latvian Legion including examination of the test of "war criminal" evidence in court and portrayal in books and the press, see latvianlegion.org.
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