page_title: Pysanka
section_title: Scevomorphic motifs
hierarchical_section_title: Pysanka / Symbolism in pysanky / Scevomorphic motifs
caption_attribution_description: English: A traditional Ukrainian pysanka with rake motifs. The rakes symbolize clouds, and their tines are raindrops.
context_page_description: A pysanka is a Ukrainian Easter egg, decorated with traditional Ukrainian folk designs using a wax-resist method. The word pysanka comes from the verb pysaty, "to write" or "to inscribe", as the designs are not painted on, but written with beeswax.
  Many other Central and Eastern European ethnic groups decorate eggs using wax resist for Easter. These include the Belarusians, Bulgarians, Carpatho-Rusyns, Croats, Czechs, Hungarians, Lithuanians, Poles, Romanians, Serbs, Slovaks, Slovenes and Sorbs.
context_section_description: Scevomorphic designs are the second-largest group of designs, and are representations of man-made agricultural objects. These symbols are very common, as Ukraine was a highly agricultural society, and drew many of its positive images from field and farm. Some of these symbols are actually related to agriculture; others have older meanings, but were renamed in more recent times based on their appearance.
  Common symbols include the ladder (symbolizing prayers going up to heaven) and the sieve/resheto (a plowed field, or perhaps the separation of good and evil).
  Rakes and combs are often depicted; both are meant to invoke a good harvest. Both are rain symbols. The body of the rake (sometimes depicted as a triangle) is the cloud, and the teeth symbolize rain drops. (Note: these combs are not hair combs, but agricultural implements.)
  Windmills, a variation on the broken cross (swastika) motif, are actually sun symbols, not agricultural symbols. The movement of the cross echoes the movement of the sun across the sky.
caption: A traditional Ukrainian pysanka with rake motifs
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