Ajysyt is the name of the Mother goddess of the Turkic Yakut people from the Lena River region of Siberia.[1] The name means "birthgiver" and may also be called the "Mother of Cradles".[2] Her full name is given as Ajysyt-ijaksit-khotan, meaning "Birthgiving nourishing mother".
Ajysyt was responsible for conducting the soul of a newborn child to its birth and attended every birth.[1] Women would channel Ajysyt, believing that doing so would relieve them of pain during childbirth.[2] She kept a golden book in which she recorded each one. She is said to have lived on a mountain top in a house with seven stories[2], from which she controlled the fate of the world.[1] The word "ajysyt" is also used to describe a male spirit that oversees the birth of male animals, such as a male horse, while the use of the word is feminine when relating to the birth of a female horse.[3]
In legend she appeared to a white youth out of the roots of the Cosmic Tree (or world pillar of Yryn-al-tojon) which itself stood beside a lake of milk. By suckling the youth from her breasts she caused his strength to increase a hundredfold.
Ajysyt is a featured figure on Judy Chicago's installation piece The Dinner Party, being represented as one of the 999 names on the Heritage Floor.[1]