Mat Zemlya (Matka Ziemia or Matushka Zeml'ja)[1][a] is the Moist (or Water) Earth Mother[4] and is probably the oldest deity in Slavic mythology[5] besides Marzanna.
[6] In the early Middle Ages, Mati Syra Zemlya was one of the most important deities in the Slavic world.
An example of her importance is seen in this traditional invocation to Matka Ziema, made with a jar of hemp oil: 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".
[7][b][c][d] The imagery of the terre humide ("moist earth") also appears in funeral lamentations either as a geographical feature (as in Lithuanian and Ukrainian lamentations)[12] or invoked as Mère-Terre humide ("Mother Moist Earth").
[13][14][e][f][g][h] Up until World War I and the fall of the Russian Empire, 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.