Pombagira, the Holy Streetwalker

Abstract

While Baba Yaga and Kālī are ancient Eurasian threshold divinities, mainly expressed by symbols of death and decomposition, transformation, the womb, ambiguity, and wilderness, Pombagira and Santa Muerte are contemporary examples of liminal personae that appeared as a consequence of crisis, “a weakening and eventual suspension of the ordinary, taken-for-granted structures of life” (Szakolczai 156), in the changing socioeconomic conditions of twentieth-century Latin America. They are polyvalent and mobile, and they excel in liminal activities while dwelling in peripheral areas of society and the world. Their worshippers are equally marginalized in their respective milieus in Brazil and Mexico, often being outsiders and holding an inferior status.

[The] sorceresses were seen lying on their backs in the fields or woods, naked above the navel and gesticulating with their forearms and thighs. They keep their limbs in an arrangement suitable for that filthy act, while the incubus demons work with them invisibly.

—MacKay 313

With my red dress

I come to the ceremony

With my necklace, earring and bracelet,

I come to work!

I use the best perfumes,

To please everybody,

I am Pomba-Gira,

And let’s work!¹