Obraz biedronki w poezji litewskiej

ENThe subject of this research is the reconstruction of the image of the ladybird on the basis of lyrical works of Lithuanian poets. The research material consists of fragments of 203 poems by 117 poets. The names of the ladybird will be discussed, its characteristic features and behaviour indicated, its specific habitat. The collected data are compared with the myth reconstructed by Vladimir Toporov (1978, 1981). In the poetry, the ladybird is seen as a representative of the weak sex – a woman with a specific appearance, living on earth and doing earthly work. It is also easy to see the connection between the ladybird and fire (the Sun): the beetle stubbornly ascends towards warmth and light – to heaven, its former home. The ladybird is a creature of divine nature: it can predict the weather, it grazes God or the wind, bathes the rain, etc. The imagery that occurs in the poetry is decidedly positive, which is perhaps why the motif of transgression of the ban and falling is missing, and the theme of expecting a child is omitted. Keywords: ladybird, poetry, image, meaning, conceptual metaphor.

• Kalbotyra / Linguistics
• Literatūrologija / Literary Studies