The Old Woman
Grandmothers, wise women, witches. The old woman turns up in Archetype Matrix entries from many different countries.
What Jung wrote
In his essay on the mother archetype Jung lists the many forms the Great Mother can take: the grandmother, the nurse, the wise woman, the goddess, and also the witch. He insisted the archetype has two faces. It can shelter and feed, and it can hold on too tightly or devour.
The old woman in particular carries the knowledge of a long life, of birth and death and of what lasts. Fairy tales keep both of her, the kind woman at the well and the one in the house in the woods, and Jung saw no reason to choose between them.
- C. G. Jung, “Psychological Aspects of the Mother Archetype”, Collected Works, Vol. 9i
What the world is logging
Counts include every entry naming Old Woman or Wise Old Woman.
Logged with the mood
- Calm31%
- Excited31%
- Anxious19%
- Sad13%
- Fear6%
Where it is logged most
- United States5
- Brazil3
- Australia2
- Canada1
- Japan1
Most common moon phase
Waning Crescent (4 entries)
Counted from anonymous Archetype Matrix entries. Updated October 8, 2026.
What we don’t do
We won’t tell you what your old woman means. Jung himself distrusted fixed dream dictionaries and held that a symbol can only be read in the life of the person who dreams it. Archetype Matrix only counts: who logged the same image, where, and in what mood.
Other symbols
ForestSnakeOceanBoatAlienShadowLionDogWolfWaterEagleMirrorFishHorseGoldOld Man
