Cosmic symbolism is found in the very structure of the habitation. The house is an imago mundi. The sky is conceived as a vast tent supported by a central pillar; the tent pole or the central post of the house is assimilated to the Pillars of the World and is so named.

Mircea Eliade, “The Sacred and the Profane”.

In Mongol cosmology, yurt, or ger, can symbolize axis mundi through its architectural elements such as the central pole and smoke hole. This architectural symbolism transforms the yurt into a sacred center where mythical time and space converge. The aurora borealis illuminating the sky above the yurt embodies the mundus imaginalis, the imaginal realm where spiritual realities take visible form, thus acting simultaneously as natural phenomenon and symbol of spiritual ascent.