CHAPTER IV

THE FIRE-FESTIVALS OF EUROPE

§ 1. _The Lenten Fires_

[European custom of kindling bonfires on certain days of the year,

dancing round them and leaping over them. Effigies are sometimes burnt

in the fires.]

All over Europe the peasants have been accustomed from time immemorial

to kindle bonfires on certain days of the year, and to dance round or

leap over them. Customs of this kind can be traced back on historical

evidence to the Middle Ages,[262] and their analogy to similar customs

observed in antiquity goes with strong internal evidence to prove that

their origin must be sought in a period long prior to the spread of

Christianity. Indeed the earliest proof of their observance in Northern

Europe is furnished by the attempts made by Christian synods in the

eighth century to put them down as heathenish rites.[263] Not uncommonly

effigies are burned in these fires, or a pretence is made of burning a

living person in them; and there are grounds for believing that

anciently human beings were actually burned on these occasions. A

general survey of the customs in question will bring out the traces of

human sacrifice, and will serve at the same time to throw light on their

meaning.[264]

[Seasons of the year at which the bonfires are lit.]

The seasons of the year when these bonfires are most commonly lit are

spring and midsummer; but in some places they are kindled also at the

end of autumn or during the course of the winter, particularly on Hallow

E'en (the thirty-first of October), Christmas Day, and the Eve of

Twelfth Day. We shall consider them in the order in which they occur in

the calendar year. The earliest of them is the winter festival of the

Eve of Twelfth Day (the fifth of January); but as it has been already

described in an earlier part of this work[265] we shall pass it over

here and begin with the fire-festivals of spring, which usually fall on

the first Sunday of Lent (_Quadragesima_ or _Invocavit_),[266] Easter

Eve, and May Day.

[Custom of kindling bonfires on the first Sunday in Lent in the Belgian

Ardennes.]

The custom of kindling bonfires on the first Sunday in Lent has

prevailed in Belgium, the north of France, and many parts of Germany.

Thus in the Belgian Ardennes for a week or a fortnight before the "day

of the great fire," as it is called, children go about from farm to farm

collecting fuel. At Grand Halleux any one who refuses their request is

pursued next day by the children, who try to blacken his face with the

ashes of the extinct fire. When the day has come, they cut down bushes,

especially juniper and broom, and in the evening great bonfires blaze on

all the heights. It is a common saying that seven bonfires should be

seen if the village is to be safe from conflagrations. If the Meuse

happens to be frozen hard at the time, bonfires are lit also on the ice.

At Grand Halleux they set up a pole called _makral_ or "the witch," in

the midst of the pile, and the fire is kindled by the man who was last

married in the village. In the neighbourhood of Morlanwelz a straw man

is burnt in the fire. Young people and children dance and sing round the

bonfires, and leap over the embers to secure good crops or a happy

marriage within the year, or as a means of guarding themselves against

colic. In Brabant on the same Sunday, down to the beginning of the

nineteenth century, women and men disguised in female attire used to go

with burning torches to the fields, where they danced and sang comic

songs for the purpose, as they alleged, of driving away "the wicked

sower," who is mentioned in the Gospel for the day. At Maeseyck and in

many villages of Limburg, on the evening of the day children run through

the streets carrying lighted torches; then they kindle little fires of

straw in the fields and dance round them. At Ensival old folks tell

young folks that they will have as many Easter eggs as they see bonfires

on this day.[267] At Pâturages, in the province of Hainaut, down to

about 1840 the custom was observed under the name of _Escouvion_ or

_Scouvion_. Every year on the first Sunday of Lent, which was called the

Day of the Little Scouvion, young folks and children used to run with

lighted torches through the gardens and orchards. As they ran they cried

at the pitch of their voices,

"_Bear apples, bear pears

And cherries all black

To Scouvion!_"

At these words the torch-bearer whirled his blazing brand and hurled it

among the branches of the apple-trees, the pear-trees, and the

cherry-trees. The next Sunday was called the Day of the Great Scouvion,

and the same race with lighted torches among the trees of the orchards

was repeated in the afternoon till darkness fell. The same custom was

observed on the same two days at Wasmes.[268] In the neighbourhood of

Liège, where the Lenten fires were put down by the police about the

middle of the nineteenth century, girls thought that by leaping over the

fires without being smirched they made sure of a happy marriage.

Elsewhere in order to get a good husband it was necessary to see seven

of the bonfires from one spot. In Famenne, a district of Namur, men and

cattle who traversed the Lenten fires were thought to be safe from

sickness and witchcraft. Anybody who saw seven such fires at once had

nothing to fear from sorcerers. An old saying ran, that if you do not

light "the great fire," God will light it for you; which seems to imply

that the kindling of the bonfires was deemed a protection against

conflagrations throughout the year.[269]

[Bonfires on the first Sunday of Lent in the French department of the

Ardennes.]

In the French department of the Ardennes the whole village used to dance

and sing round the bonfires which were lighted on the first Sunday in

Lent. Here, too, it was the person last married, sometimes a man and

sometimes a woman, who put the match to the fire. The custom is still

kept up very commonly in the district. Cats used to be burnt in the fire

or roasted to death by being held over it; and while they were burning

the shepherds drove their flocks through the smoke and flames as a sure

means of guarding them against sickness and witchcraft. In some communes

it was believed that the livelier the dance round the fire, the better

would be the crops that year.[270] In the Vosges Mountains it is still

customary to light great fires on the heights and around the villages on

the first Sunday in Lent; and at Rupt and elsewhere the right of

kindling them belongs to the person who was last married. Round the

fires the people dance and sing merrily till the flames have died out.

Then the master of the fire, as they call the man who kindled it,

invites all who contributed to the erection of the pile to follow him to

the nearest tavern, where they partake of good cheer. At Dommartin they

say that, if you would have the hemp tall, it is absolutely necessary

that the women should be tipsy on the evening of this day.[271] At

Épinal in the Vosges, on the first Sunday in Lent, bonfires used to be

kindled at various places both in the town and on the banks of the

Moselle. They consisted of pyramids of sticks and faggots, which had

been collected some days earlier by young folks going from door to door.

When the flames blazed up, the names of various couples, whether young

or old, handsome or ugly, rich or poor, were called out, and the persons

thus linked in mock marriage were forced, whether they liked it or not,

to march arm in arm round the fire amid the laughter and jests of the

crowd. The festivity lasted till the fire died out, and then the

spectators dispersed through the streets, stopping under the windows of

the houses and proclaiming the names of the _féchenots_ and

_féchenottes_ or Valentines whom the popular voice had assigned to each

other. These couples had to exchange presents; the mock bridegroom gave

his mock bride something for her toilet, while she in turn presented him

with a cockade of coloured ribbon. Next Sunday, if the weather allowed

it, all the couples, arrayed in their best attire and attended by their

relations, repaired to the wood of Saint Antony, where they mounted a

famous stone called the _danserosse_ or _danseresse_. Here they found

cakes and refreshments of all sorts, and danced to the music of a couple

of fiddlers. The evening bell, ringing the Angelus, gave the signal to

depart. As soon as its solemn chime was heard, every one quitted the

forest and returned home. The exchange of presents between the

Valentines went by the name of ransom or redemption (_rachat_), because

it was supposed to redeem the couple from the flames of the bonfire. Any

pair who failed thus to ransom themselves were not suffered to share the

merrymaking at the great stone in the forest; and a pretence was made of

burning them in small fires kindled before their own doors.[272]

[Bonfires on the First Sunday of Lent in Franche-Comté.]

In the French province of Franche-Comté, to the west of the Jura

Mountains, the first Sunday of Lent is known as the Sunday of the

Firebrands (_Brandons_), on account of the fires which it is customary

to kindle on that day. On the Saturday or the Sunday the village lads

harness themselves to a cart and drag it about the streets, stopping at

the doors of the houses where there are girls and begging for a faggot.

When they have got enough, they cart the fuel to a spot at some little

distance from the village, pile it up, and set it on fire. All the

people of the parish come out to see the bonfire. In some villages, when

the bells have rung the Angelus, the signal for the observance is given

by cries of, "To the fire! to the fire!" Lads, lasses, and children

dance round the blaze, and when the flames have died down they vie with

each other in leaping over the red embers. He or she who does so without

singeing his or her garments will be married within the year. Young folk

also carry lighted torches about the streets or the fields, and when

they pass an orchard they cry out, "More fruit than leaves!" Down to

recent years at Laviron, in the department of Doubs, it was the young

married couples of the year who had charge of the bonfires. In the midst

of the bonfire a pole was planted with a wooden figure of a cock

fastened to the top. Then there were races, and the winner received the

cock as a prize.[273]

[Bonfires on the first Sunday of Lent in Auvergne; the Granno invoked at

these bonfires may be the old Celtic god Grannus, who was identified

with Apollo.]

In Auvergne fires are everywhere kindled on the evening of the first

Sunday in Lent. Every village, every hamlet, even every ward, every

isolated farm has its bonfire or _figo_, as it is called, which blazes

up as the shades of night are falling. The fires may be seen flaring on

the heights and in the plains; the people dance and sing round about

them and leap through the flames. Then they proceed to the ceremony of

the _Grannas-mias_. A _granno-mio_[274] is a torch of straw fastened to

the top of a pole. When the pyre is half consumed, the bystanders kindle

the torches at the expiring flames and carry them into the neighbouring

orchards, fields, and gardens, wherever there are fruit-trees. As they

march they sing at the top of their voices,

"_Granno, mo mio,

Granno, mon pouère,

Granno, mo mouère!_"

that is, "Grannus my friend, Grannus my father, Grannus my mother." Then

they pass the burning torches under the branches of every tree, singing,

"_Brando, brandounci

Tsaque brantso, in plan panei!_"

that is, "Firebrand burn; every branch a basketful!" In some villages

the people also run across the sown fields and shake the ashes of the

torches on the ground; also they put some of the ashes in the fowls'

nests, in order that the hens may lay plenty of eggs throughout the

year. When all these ceremonies have been performed, everybody goes home

and feasts; the special dishes of the evening are fritters and

pancakes.[275] Here the application of the fire to the fruit-trees, to

the sown fields, and to the nests of the poultry is clearly a charm

intended to ensure fertility; and the Granno to whom the invocations are

addressed, and who gives his name to the torches, may possibly be, as

Dr. Pommerol suggests,[276] no other than the ancient Celtic god

Grannus, whom the Romans identified with Apollo, and whose worship is

attested by inscriptions found not only in France but in Scotland and on

the Danube.[277] If the name Grannus is derived, as the learned tell us,

from a root meaning "to glow, burn, shine,"[278] the deity who bore the

name and was identified with Apollo may well have been a sun-god; and in

that case the prayers addressed to him by the peasants of the Auvergne,

while they wave the blazing, crackling torches about the fruit-trees,

would be eminently appropriate. For who could ripen the fruit so well as

the sun-god? and what better process could be devised to draw the

blossoms from the bare boughs than the application to them of that

genial warmth which is ultimately derived from the solar beams? Thus the

fire-festival of the first Sunday in Lent, as it is observed in

Auvergne, may be interpreted very naturally and simply as a religious or

rather perhaps magical ceremony designed to procure a due supply of the

sun's heat for plants and animals. At the same time we should remember

that the employment of fire in this and kindred ceremonies may have been

designed originally, not so much to stimulate growth and reproduction,

as to burn and destroy all agencies, whether in the shape of vermin,

witches, or what not, which threatened or were supposed to threaten the

growth of the crops and the multiplication of animals. It is often

difficult to decide between these two different interpretations of the

use of fire in agricultural rites. In any case the fire-festival of

Auvergne on the first Sunday in Lent may date from Druidical times.

[French custom of carrying lighted torches (_brandons_) about the

orchards and fields to fertilize them on the first Sunday of Lent.]

The custom of carrying lighted torches of straw (_brandons_) about the

orchards and fields to fertilize them on the first Sunday of Lent seems

to have been common in France, whether it was accompanied with the

practice of kindling bonfires or not. Thus in the province of Picardy

"on the first Sunday of Lent people carried torches through the fields,

exorcising the field-mice, the darnel, and the smut. They imagined that

they did much good to the gardens and caused the onions to grow large.

Children ran about the fields, torch in hand, to make the land more

fertile. All that was done habitually in Picardy, and the ceremony of

the torches is not entirely forgotten, especially in the villages on

both sides the Somme as far as Saint-Valery."[279] "A very agreeable

spectacle, said the curate of l'Étoile, is to survey from the portal of

the church, situated almost on the top of the mountain, the vast plains

of Vimeux all illuminated by these wandering fires. The same pastime is

observed at Poix, at Conty, and in all the villages round about."[280]

Again, in the district of Beauce a festival of torches (_brandons_ or

_brandelons_) used to be held both on the first and on the second Sunday

in Lent; the first was called "the Great Torches" and the second "the

Little Torches." The torches were, as usual, bundles of straw wrapt

round poles. In the evening the village lads carried the burning brands

through the country, running about in disorder and singing,

"_Torches burn

At these vines, at this wheat_;

_Torches burn

For the maidens that shall wed_!"

From time to time the bearers would stand still and smite the earth all

together with the blazing straw of the torches, while they cried, "A

sheaf of a peck and a half!" (_Gearbe à boissiaux_). If two torchbearers

happened to meet each other on their rounds, they performed the same

ceremony and uttered the same words. When the straw was burnt out, the

poles were collected and a great bonfire made of them. Lads and lasses

danced round the flames, and the lads leaped over them. Afterwards it

was customary to eat a special sort of hasty-pudding made of wheaten

flour. These usages were still in vogue at the beginning of the

nineteenth century, but they have now almost disappeared. The peasants

believed that by carrying lighted torches through the fields they

protected the crops from field-mice, darnel, and smut.[281] "At Dijon,

in Burgundy, it is the custom upon the first Sunday in Lent to make

large fires in the streets, whence it is called Firebrand Sunday. This

practice originated in the processions formerly made on that day by the

peasants with lighted torches of straw, to drive away, as they called

it, the bad air from the earth."[282] In some parts of France, while the

people scoured the country with burning brands on the first Sunday in

Lent, they warned the fruit-trees that if they did not take heed and

bear fruit they would surely be cut down and cast into the fire.[283] On

the same day peasants in the department of Loiret used to run about the

sowed fields with burning torches in their hands, while they adjured the

field-mice to quit the wheat on pain of having their whiskers

burned.[284] In the department of Ain the great fires of straw and

faggots which are kindled in the fields at this time are or were

supposed to destroy the nests of the caterpillars.[285] At Verges, a

lonely village surrounded by forests between the Jura and the Combe

d'Ain, the torches used at this season were kindled in a peculiar

manner. The young people climbed to the top of a mountain, where they

placed three nests of straw in three trees. These nests being then set

on fire, torches made of dry lime-wood were lighted at them, and the

merry troop descended the mountain to their flickering light, and went

to every house in the village, demanding roasted peas and obliging all

couples who had been married within the year to dance.[286] In Berry, a

district of central France, it appears that bonfires are not lighted on

this day, but when the sun has set the whole population of the villages,

armed with blazing torches of straw, disperse over the country and scour

the fields, the vineyards, and the orchards. Seen from afar, the

multitude of moving lights, twinkling in the darkness, appear like

will-o'-the-wisps chasing each other across the plains, along the

hillsides, and down the valleys. While the men wave their flambeaus

about the branches of the fruit-trees, the women and children tie bands

of wheaten-straw round the tree-trunks. The effect of the ceremony is

supposed to be to avert the various plagues from which the fruits of the

earth are apt to suffer; and the bands of straw fastened round the stems

of the trees are believed to render them fruitful.[287] In the peninsula

of La Manche the Norman peasants used to spend almost the whole night of

the first Sunday in Lent rushing about the country with lighted torches

for the purpose, as they supposed, of driving away the moles and

field-mice; fires were also kindled on some of the dolmens.[288]

[Bonfires on the first Sunday in Lent in Germany and Austria; burning

the witch; burning discs thrown into the air; burning wheels rolled down

hill; bonfires on the first Sunday in Lent in Switzerland.]

In Germany, Austria, and Switzerland at the same season similar customs

have prevailed. Thus in the Eifel Mountains, Rhenish Prussia, on the

first Sunday in Lent young people used to collect straw and brushwood

from house to house. These they carried to an eminence and piled up

round a tall, slim beech-tree, to which a piece of wood was fastened at

right angles to form a cross. The structure was known as the "hut" or

"castle." Fire was set to it and the young people marched round the

blazing "castle" bareheaded, each carrying a lighted torch and praying

aloud. Sometimes a straw-man was burned in the "hut." People observed

the direction in which the smoke blew from the fire. If it blew towards

the corn-fields, it was a sign that the harvest would be abundant. On

the same day, in some parts of the Eifel, a great wheel was made of

straw and dragged by three horses to the top of a hill. Thither the

village boys marched at nightfall, set fire to the wheel, and sent it

rolling down the slope. Two lads followed it with levers to set it in

motion again, in case it should anywhere meet with a check. At

Oberstattfeld the wheel had to be provided by the young man who was last

married.[289] About Echternach in Luxemburg the same ceremony is called

"burning the witch"; while it is going on, the older men ascend the

heights and observe what wind is blowing, for that is the wind which

will prevail the whole year.[290] At Voralberg in the Tyrol, on the

first Sunday in Lent, a slender young fir-tree is surrounded with a pile

of straw and firewood. To the top of the tree is fastened a human figure

called the "witch," made of old clothes and stuffed with gunpowder. At

night the whole is set on fire and boys and girls dance round it,

swinging torches and singing rhymes in which the words "corn in the

winnowing-basket, the plough in the earth" may be distinguished.[291] In

Swabia on the first Sunday in Lent a figure called the "witch" or the

"old wife" or "winter's grandmother" is made up of clothes and fastened

to a pole. This is stuck in the middle of a pile of wood, to which fire

is applied. While the "witch" is burning, the young people throw blazing

discs into the air. The discs are thin round pieces of wood, a few

inches in diameter, with notched edges to imitate the rays of the sun or

stars. They have a hole in the middle, by which they are attached to the

end of a wand. Before the disc is thrown it is set on fire, the wand is

swung to and fro, and the impetus thus communicated to the disc is

augmented by dashing the rod sharply against a sloping board. The

burning disc is thus thrown off, and mounting high into the air,

describes a long fiery curve before it reaches the ground. A single lad

may fling up forty or fifty of these discs, one after the other. The

object is to throw them as high as possible. The wand by which they are

hurled must, at least in some parts of Swabia, be of hazel. Sometimes

the lads also leap over the fire brandishing lighted torches of

pine-wood. The charred embers of the burned "witch" and discs are taken

home and planted in the flaxfields the same night, in the belief that

they will keep vermin from the fields.[292] At Wangen, near Molsheim in

Baden, a like custom is observed on the first Sunday in Lent. The young

people kindle a bonfire on the crest of the mountain above the village;

and the burning discs which they hurl into the air are said to present

in the darkness the aspect of a continual shower of falling stars. When

the supply of discs is exhausted and the bonfire begins to burn low, the

boys light torches and run with them at full speed down one or other of

the three steep and winding paths that descend the mountain-side to the

village. Bumps, bruises, and scratches are often the result of their

efforts to outstrip each other in the headlong race.[293] In the Rhön

Mountains, situated on the borders of Hesse and Bavaria, the people used

to march to the top of a hill or eminence on the first Sunday in Lent.

Children and lads carried torches, brooms daubed with tar, and poles

swathed in straw. A wheel, wrapt in combustibles, was kindled and rolled

down the hill; and the young people rushed about the fields with their

burning torches and brooms, till at last they flung them in a heap, and

standing round them, struck up a hymn or a popular song. The object of

running about the fields with the blazing torches was to "drive away the

wicked sower." Or it was done in honour of the Virgin, that she might

preserve the fruits of the earth throughout the year and bless

them.[294] In neighbouring villages of Hesse, between the Rhön and the

Vogel Mountains, it is thought that wherever the burning wheels roll,

the fields will be safe from hail and storm.[295] At Konz on the

Moselle, on the Thursday before the first Sunday in Lent, the two guilds

of the butchers and the weavers used to repair to the Marxberg and there

set up an oak-tree with a wheel fastened to it. On the following Sunday

the people ascended the hill, cut down the oak, set fire to the wheel,

and sent both oak and wheel rolling down the hillside, while a guard of

butchers, mounted on horses, fired at the flaming wheel in its descent.

If the wheel rolled down into the Moselle, the butchers were rewarded

with a waggon-load of wine by the archbishop of Treves.[296]

[Burning discs thrown into the air.]

In Switzerland, also, it is or used to be customary to kindle bonfires

on high places on the evening of the first Sunday in Lent, and the day

is therefore popularly known as Spark Sunday. The custom prevailed, for

example, throughout the canton of Lucerne. Boys went about from house to

house begging for wood and straw, then piled the fuel on a conspicuous

mountain or hill round about a pole, which bore a straw effigy called

"the witch." At nightfall the pile was set on fire, and the young folks

danced wildly round it, some of them cracking whips or ringing bells;

and when the fire burned low enough, they leaped over it. This was

called "burning the witch." In some parts of the canton also they used

to wrap old wheels in straw and thorns, put a light to them, and send

them rolling and blazing down hill. The same custom of rolling lighted

wheels down hill is attested by old authorities for the cantons of

Aargau and Bâle. The more bonfires could be seen sparkling and flaring

in the darkness, the more fruitful was the year expected to be; and the

higher the dancers leaped beside or over the fire, the higher, it was

thought, would grow the flax. In the district of Freiburg and at Birseck

in the district of Bâle it was the last married man or woman who must

kindle the bonfire. While the bonfires blazed up, it was customary in

some parts of Switzerland to propel burning discs of wood through the

air by means of the same simple machinery which is used for the purpose

in Swabia. Each lad tried to send his disc fizzing and flaring through

the darkness as far as possible, and in discharging it he mentioned the

name of the person to whose honour it was dedicated. But in Prättigau

the words uttered in launching the fiery discs referred to the abundance

which was apparently expected to follow the performance of the ceremony.

Among them were, "Grease in the pan, corn in the fan, and the plough in

the earth!"[297]

[Connexion of these bonfires with the custom of "carrying out Death;"

effigies burnt on Shrove Tuesday.]

It seems hardly possible to separate from these bonfires, kindled on the

first Sunday in Lent, the fires in which, about the same season, the

effigy called Death is burned as part of the ceremony of "carrying out

Death." We have seen that at Spachendorf, in Austrian Silesia, on the

morning of Rupert's Day (Shrove Tuesday?), a straw-man, dressed in a fur

coat and a fur cap, is laid in a hole outside the village and there

burned, and that while it is blazing every one seeks to snatch a

fragment of it, which he fastens to a branch of the highest tree in his

garden or buries in his field, believing that this will make the crops

to grow better. The ceremony is known as the "burying of Death."[298]

Even when the straw-man is not designated as Death, the meaning of the

observance is probably the same; for the name Death, as I have tried to

shew, does not express the original intention of the ceremony. At Cobern

in the Eifel Mountains the lads make up a straw-man on Shrove Tuesday.

The effigy is formally tried and accused of having perpetrated all the

thefts that have been committed in the neighbourhood throughout the

year. Being condemned to death, the straw-man is led through the

village, shot, and burned upon a pyre. They dance round the blazing

pile, and the last bride must leap over it.[299] In Oldenburg on the

evening of Shrove Tuesday people used to make long bundles of straw,

which they set on fire, and then ran about the fields waving them,

shrieking, and singing wild songs. Finally they burned a straw-man on

the field.[300] In the district of Düsseldorf the straw-man burned on

Shrove Tuesday was made of an unthreshed sheaf of corn.[301] On the

first Monday after the spring equinox the urchins of Zurich drag a

straw-man on a little cart through the streets, while at the same time

the girls carry about a May-tree. When vespers ring, the straw-man is

burned.[302] In the district of Aachen on Ash Wednesday a man used to be

encased in peas-straw and taken to an appointed place. Here he slipped

quietly out of his straw casing, which was then burned, the children

thinking that it was the man who was being burned.[303] In the Val di

Ledro (Tyrol) on the last day of the Carnival a figure is made up of

straw and brushwood and then burned. The figure is called the Old Woman,

and the ceremony "burning the Old Woman."[304]

§ 2. _The Easter Fires_

[Fire-festivals on Easter Eve. Custom in Catholic countries of kindling

a holy new fire at the church on Easter Saturday; marvellous properties

ascribed to the embers of the fire; the burning of Judas.]

Another occasion on which these fire-festivals are held is Easter Eve,

the Saturday before Easter Sunday. On that day it has been customary in

Catholic countries to extinguish all the lights in the churches, and

then to make a new fire, sometimes with flint and steel, sometimes with

a burning-glass. At this fire is lit the great Paschal or Easter candle,

which is then used to rekindle all the extinguished lights in the

church. In many parts of Germany a bonfire is also kindled, by means of

the new fire, on some open space near the church. It is consecrated, and

the people bring sticks of oak, walnut, and beech, which they char in

the fire, and then take home with them. Some of these charred sticks are

thereupon burned at home in a newly-kindled fire, with a prayer that God

will preserve the homestead from fire, lightning, and hail. Thus every

house receives "new fire." Some of the sticks are kept throughout the

year and laid on the hearth-fire during heavy thunder-storms to prevent

the house from being struck by lightning, or they are inserted in the

roof with the like intention. Others are placed in the fields, gardens,

and meadows, with a prayer that God will keep them from blight and hail.

Such fields and gardens are thought to thrive more than others; the corn

and the plants that grow in them are not beaten down by hail, nor

devoured by mice, vermin, and beetles; no witch harms them, and the ears

of corn stand close and full. The charred sticks are also applied to the

plough. The ashes of the Easter bonfire, together with the ashes of the

consecrated palm-branches, are mixed with the seed at sowing. A wooden

figure called Judas is sometimes burned in the consecrated bonfire, and

even where this custom has been abolished the bonfire itself in some

places goes by the name of "the burning of Judas."[305]

[Easter fires in Bavaria and the Abruzzi.]

In the Hollertau, Bavaria, the young men used to light their lanterns at

the newly-kindled Easter candle in the church and then race to the

bonfire; he who reached it first set fire to the pile, and next day,

Easter Sunday, was rewarded at the church-door by the housewives, who

presented him with red eggs. Great was the jubilation while the effigy

of the traitor was being consumed in the flames. The ashes were

carefully collected and thrown away at sunrise in running water.[306] In

many parts of the Abruzzi, also, pious people kindle their fires on

Easter Saturday with a brand brought from the sacred new fire in the

church. When the brand has thus served to bless the fire on the domestic

hearth, it is extinguished, and the remainder is preserved, partly in a

cranny of the outer wall of the house, partly on a tree to which it is

tied. This is done for the purpose of guarding the homestead against

injury by storms. At Campo di Giove the people say that if you can get a

piece of one of the three holy candles which the priest lights from the

new fire, you should allow a few drops of the wax to fall into the crown

of your hat; for after that, if it should thunder and lighten, you have

nothing to do but to clap the hat on your head, and no flash of

lightning can possibly strike you.[307]

[Water as well as fire consecrated in the Abruzzi on Easter Saturday;

water consecrated in Calabria on Easter Saturday; water and fire

consecrated on Easter Saturday among the Germans of Bohemia; Easter

rites of fire and water at Hildesheim.]

Further, it deserves to be noted that in the Abruzzi water as well as

fire is, as it were, renewed and consecrated on Easter Saturday. Most

people fetch holy water on that day from the churches, and every member

of the family drinks a little of it, believing that it has power to

protect him or her against witchcraft, fever, and stomach-aches of all

sorts. And when the church bells ring again after their enforced

silence, the water is sprinkled about the house, and especially under

the beds, with the help of a palm-branch. Some of this blessed water is

also kept in the house for use in great emergencies, when there is no

time to fetch a priest; thus it may be employed to baptize a newborn

infant gasping for life or to sprinkle a sick man in the last agony;

such a sprinkling is reckoned equal to priestly absolution.[308] In

Calabria the customs with regard to the new water, as it is called, on

Easter Saturday are similar; it is poured into a new vessel, adorned

with ribbons and flowers, is blessed by the priest, and is tasted by

every one of the household, beginning with the parents. And when the air

vibrates with the glad music of the church bells announcing the

resurrection, the people sprinkle the holy water about the houses,

bidding in a loud voice all evil things to go forth and all good things

to come in. At the same time, to emphasize the exorcism, they knock on

doors, window-shutters, chests, and other domestic articles of

furniture. At Cetraro people who suffer from diseases of the skin bathe

in the sea at this propitious moment; at Pietro in Guarano they plunge

into the river on the night of Easter Saturday before Easter Sunday

dawns, and while they bathe they utter never a word. Moreover, the

Calabrians keep the "new water" as a sacred thing. They believe that it

serves as a protection against witchcraft if it is sprinkled on a fire

or a lamp, when the wood crackles or the wick sputters; for they regard

it as a bad omen when the fire talks, as they say.[309] Among the

Germans of Western Bohemia, also, water as well as fire is consecrated

by the priest in front of the church on Easter Saturday. People bring

jugs full of water to the church and set them beside the holy fire;

afterwards they use the water to sprinkle on the palm-branches which are

stuck in the fields. Charred sticks of the Judas fire, as it is

popularly called, are supposed to possess a magical and healing virtue;

hence the people take them home with them, and even scuffle with each

other for the still glowing embers in order to carry them, still

glimmering, to their houses and so obtain "the light" or "the holy

light."[310] At Hildesheim, also, and the neighbouring villages of

central Germany rites both of fire and water are or were till lately

observed at Easter. Thus on Easter night many people fetch water from

the Innerste river and keep it carefully, believing it to be a remedy

for many sorts of ailments both of man and beast. In the villages on the

Leine river servant men and maids used to go silently on Easter night

between the hours of eleven and twelve and silently draw water in

buckets from the river; they mixed the water with the fodder and the

drink of the cattle to make the animals thrive, and they imagined that

to wash in it was good for human beings. Many were also of opinion that

at the same mystic hour the water turned to wine as far as the crowing

of a cock could be heard, and in this belief they laid themselves flat

on their stomachs and kept their tongues in the water till the

miraculous change occurred, when they took a great gulp of the

transformed water. At Hildesheim, too, and the neighbouring villages

fires used to blaze on all the heights on Easter Eve; and embers taken

from the bonfires were dipped in the cattle troughs to benefit the

beasts and were kept in the houses to avert lightning.[311]

[New fire at Easter in Carinthia; consecration of fire and water by the

Catholic Church at Easter.]

In the Lesachthal, Carinthia, all the fires in the houses used to be

extinguished on Easter Saturday, and rekindled with a fresh fire brought

from the churchyard, where the priest had lit it by the friction of

flint and steel and had bestowed his blessing on it.[312] Such customs

were probably widespread. In a Latin poem of the sixteenth century,

written by a certain Thomas Kirchmeyer and translated into English by

Barnabe Googe, we read:--

"_On Easter Eve the fire all is quencht in every place,

And fresh againe from out the flint is fetcht with solemne grace:

The priest doth halow this against great daungers many one,

A brande whereof doth every man with greedie mind take home,

That when the fearefull storme appeares, or tempest black arise,

By lighting this he safe may be from stroke of hurtful skies:

A taper great, the Paschall namde, with musicke then they blesse,

And franckensence herein they pricke, for greater holynesse:

This burneth night and day as signe of Christ that conquerde hell,

As if so be this foolish toye suffiseth this to tell.

Then doth the Bishop or the Priest, the water halow straight,

That for their baptisme is reservde: for now no more of waight

Is that they usde the yeare before, nor can they any more,

Yong children christen with the same, as they have done before.

With wondrous pompe and furniture, amid the Church they go,

With candles, crosses, banners, Chrisme, and oyle appoynted tho:

Nine times about the font they marche, and on the saintes doe call,

Then still at length they stande, and straight the Priest begins withall,

And thrise the water doth he touche, and crosses thereon make,

Here bigge and barbrous wordes he speakes, to make the devill quake:

And holsome waters conjureth, and foolishly doth dresse,

Supposing holyar that to make, which God before did blesse:

And after this his candle than, he thrusteth in the floode,

And thrise he breathes thereon with breath, that stinkes of former foode:

And making here an ende, his Chrisme he poureth thereupon,

The people staring hereat stande, amazed every one;

Beleeving that great powre is given to this water here,

By gaping of these learned men, and such like trifling gere.

Therefore in vessels brought they draw, and home they carie some,

Against the grieves that to themselves, or to their beastes may come.

Then Clappers ceasse, and belles are set againe at libertée,

And herewithall the hungrie times of fasting ended bée."_[313]

It is said that formerly all the fires in Rome were lighted afresh from

the holy fire kindled in St. Peter's on Easter Saturday.[314]

[The new fire on Easter Saturday at Florence.]

In Florence the ceremony of kindling the new fire on Easter Eve is

peculiar. The holy flame is elicited from certain flints which are said

to have been brought by a member of the Pazzi family from the Holy Land.

They are kept in the church of the Holy Apostles on the Piazza del

Limbo, and on the morning of Easter Saturday the prior strikes fire from

them and lights a candle from the new flame. The burning candle is then

carried in solemn procession by the clergy and members of the

municipality to the high altar in the cathedral. A vast crowd has

meanwhile assembled in the cathedral and the neighbouring square to

witness the ceremony; amongst the spectators are many peasants drawn

from the surrounding country, for it is commonly believed that on the

success or failure of the ceremony depends the fate of the crops for the

year. Outside the door of the cathedral stands a festal car drawn by two

fine white oxen with gilded horns. The body of the car is loaded with a

pyramid of squibs and crackers and is connected by a wire with a pillar

set up in front of the high altar. The wire extends down the middle of

the nave at a height of about six feet from the ground. Beneath it a

clear passage is left, the spectators being ranged on either side and

crowding the vast interior from wall to wall. When all is ready, High

Mass is celebrated, and precisely at noon, when the first words of the

_Gloria_ are being chanted, the sacred fire is applied to the pillar,

which like the car is wreathed with fireworks. A moment more and a fiery

dove comes flying down the nave, with a hissing sound and a sputter of

sparks, between the two hedges of eager spectators. If all goes well,

the bird pursues its course along the wire and out at the door, and in

another moment a prolonged series of fizzes, pops and bangs announces to

the excited crowd in the cathedral that the fireworks on the car are

going off. Great is the joy accordingly, especially among the bumpkins,

who are now sure of an abundant harvest. But if, as sometimes happens,

the dove stops short in its career and fizzles out, revealing itself as

a stuffed bird with a packet of squibs tied to its tail, great is the

consternation, and deep the curses that issue from between the set teeth

of the clodhoppers, who now give up the harvest for lost. Formerly the

unskilful mechanician who was responsible for the failure would have

been clapped into gaol; but nowadays he is thought sufficiently punished

by the storm of public indignation and the loss of his pay. The disaster

is announced by placards posted about the streets in the evening; and

next morning the newspapers are full of gloomy prognostications.[315]

[The new fire and burning of Judas on Easter Saturday in Mexico.]

Some of these customs have been transported by the Catholic Church to

the New World. Thus in Mexico the new fire is struck from a flint early

in the morning of Easter Saturday, and a candle which has been lighted

at the sacred flame is carried through the church by a deacon shouting

"_Lumen Christi_." Meantime the whole city, we are informed, has been

converted into a vast place of execution. Ropes stretch across the

streets from house to house, and from every house dangles an effigy of

Judas, made of paper pulp. Scores or hundreds of them may adorn a single

street. They are of all shapes and sizes, grotesque in form and garbed

in strange attire, stuffed with gunpowder, squibs and crackers,

sometimes, too, with meat, bread, soap, candy, and clothing, for which

the crowd will scramble and scuffle while the effigies are burning.

There they hang grim, black, and sullen in the strong sunshine, greeted

with a roar of execration by the pious mob. A peal of bells from the

cathedral tower on the stroke of noon gives the signal for the

execution. At the sound a frenzy seizes the crowd. They throw themselves

furiously on the figures of the detested traitor, cut them down, hurl

them with curses into the fire, and fight and struggle with each other

in their efforts to tear the effigies to tatters and appropriate their

contents. Smoke, stink, sputter of crackers, oaths, curses, yells are

now the order of the day. But the traitor does not perish unavenged. For

the anatomy of his frame has been cunningly contrived so as in burning

to discharge volleys of squibs into his assailants; and the wounds and

burns with which their piety is rewarded form a feature of the morning's

entertainment. The English Jockey Club in Mexico used to improve on this

popular pastime by suspending huge figures of Judas, stuffed with copper

coins, from ropes in front of their clubhouse. These were ignited at the

proper moment and lowered within reach of the expectant rabble, and it

was the privilege of members of the club, seated in the balcony, to

watch the grimaces and to hear the shrieks of the victims, as they

stamped and capered about with the hot coppers sticking to their hands,

divided in their minds between an acute sense of pain and a thirst for

filthy lucre.[316]

[The burning of Judas at Easter in South America.]

Scenes of the same sort, though on a less ambitious scale, are witnessed

among the Catholics of South America on the same day. In Brazil the

mourning for the death of Christ ceases at noon on Easter Saturday and

gives place to an extravagant burst of joy at his resurrection. Shots

are fired everywhere, and effigies of Judas are hung on trees or dragged

about the streets, to be finally burned or otherwise destroyed.[317] In

the Indian villages scattered among the wild valleys of the Peruvian

Andes figures of the traitor, made of pasteboard and stuffed with squibs

and crackers, are hanged on gibbets before the door of the church on

Easter Saturday. Fire is set to them, and while they crackle and

explode, the Indians dance and shout for joy at the destruction of their

hated enemy.[318] Similarly at Rio Hacha, in Colombia, Judas is

represented during Holy Week by life-sized effigies, and the people fire

at them as if they were discharging a sacred duty.[319]

[The new fire on Easter Saturday in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre at

Jerusalem.]

But usages of this sort are not confined to the Latin Church; they are

common to the Greek Church also. Every year on the Saturday before

Easter Sunday a new fire is miraculously kindled at the Holy Sepulchre

in Jerusalem. It descends from heaven and ignites the candles which the

patriarch holds in his hands, while with closed eyes he wrestles in

prayer all alone in the chapel of the Angel. The worshippers meanwhile

wait anxiously in the body of the church, and great are their transports

of joy when at one of the windows of the chapel, which had been all dark

a minute before, there suddenly appears the hand of an angel, or of the

patriarch, holding a lighted taper. This is the sacred new fire; it is

passed out to the expectant believers, and the desperate struggle which

ensues among them to get a share of its blessed influence is only

terminated by the intervention of the Turkish soldiery, who restore

peace and order by hustling the whole multitude impartially out of the

church. In days gone by many lives were often lost in these holy

scrimmages. For example, in the year 1834, the famous Ibrahim Pasha

witnessed the frantic scene from one of the galleries, and, being moved

with compassion at the sight, descended with a few guards into the arena

in the chimerical hope of restoring peace and order among the contending

Christians. He contrived to force his way into the midst of the dense

crowd, but there the heat and pressure were so great that he fainted

away; a body of soldiers, seeing his danger, charged straight into the

throng and carried him out of it in their arms, trampling under foot the

dying and dead in their passage. Nearly two hundred people were killed

that day in the church. The fortunate survivors on these occasions who

succeeded in obtaining a portion of the coveted fire applied it freely

to their faces, their beards, and their garments. The theory was that

the fire, being miraculous, could only bless and not burn them; but the

practical results of the experiment were often disappointing, for while

the blessings were more or less dubious, there could be no doubt

whatever about the burns.[320] The history of the miracle has been

carefully investigated by a Jesuit father. The conclusions at which he

arrives are that the miracle was a miracle indeed so long as the

Catholics had the management of it; but that since it fell into the

hands of the heretics it has been nothing but a barefaced trick and

imposture.[321] Many people will be disposed to agree with the latter

conclusion who might hesitate to accept the former.

[The new fire and the burning of Judas on Easter Saturday in Greece.]

At Athens the new fire is kindled in the cathedral at midnight on Holy

Saturday. A dense crowd with unlit candles in their hands fills the

square in front of the cathedral; the king, the archbishop, and the

highest dignitaries of the church, arrayed in their gorgeous robes,

occupy a platform; and at the exact moment of the resurrection the bells

ring out, and the whole square bursts as by magic into a blaze of light.

Theoretically all the candles are lit from the sacred new fire in the

cathedral, but practically it may be suspected that the matches which

bear the name of Lucifer have some share in the sudden

illumination.[322] Effigies of Judas used to be burned at Athens on

Easter Saturday, but the custom has been forbidden by the Government.

However, firing goes on more or less continuously all over the city both

on Easter Saturday and Easter Sunday, and the cartridges used on this

occasion are not always blank. The shots are aimed at Judas, but

sometimes they miss him and hit other people. Outside of Athens the

practice of burning Judas in effigy still survives in some places. For

example, in Cos a straw image of the traitor is made on Easter Day, and

after being hung up and shot at it is burned.[323] A similar custom

appears to prevail at Thebes;[324] it used to be observed by the

Macedonian peasantry, and it is still kept up at Therapia, a fashionable

summer resort of Constantinople.[325]

[The new fire at Candlemas in Armenia.]

In the Armenian Church the sacred new fire is kindled not at Easter but

at Candlemas, that is, on the second of February, or on the eve of that

festival. The materials of the bonfire are piled in an open space near a

church, and they are generally ignited by young couples who have been

married within the year. However, it is the bishop or his vicar who

lights the candles with which fire is set to the pile. All young married

pairs are expected to range themselves about the fire and to dance round

it. Young men leap over the flames, but girls and women content

themselves with going round them, while they pray to be preserved from

the itch and other skin-diseases. When the ceremony is over, the people

eagerly pick up charred sticks or ashes of the fire and preserve them or

scatter them on the four corners of the roof, in the cattle-stall, in

the garden, and on the pastures; for these holy sticks and ashes protect

men and cattle against disease, and fruit-trees against worms and

caterpillars. Omens, too, are drawn from the direction in which the wind

blows the flames and the smoke: if it carries them eastward, there is

hope of a good harvest; but if it inclines them westward, the people

fear that the crops will fail.[326]

[The new fire and the burning of Judas at Easter are probably relics of

paganism.]

In spite of the thin cloak of Christianity thrown over these customs by

representing the new fire as an emblem of Christ and the figure burned

in it as an effigy of Judas, we can hardly doubt that both practices are

of pagan origin. Neither of them has the authority of Christ or of his

disciples; but both of them have abundant analogies in popular custom

and superstition. Some instances of the practice of annually

extinguishing fires and relighting them from a new and sacred flame have

already come before us;[327] but a few examples may here be cited for

the sake of illustrating the wide diffusion of a custom which has found

its way into the ritual both of the Eastern and of the Western Church.

[The new fire at the summer solstice among the Incas of Peru;

the new fire among the Indians of Mexico and New Mexico; the new fire

among the Esquimaux.]

The Incas of Peru celebrated a festival called Raymi, a word which their

native historian Garcilasso de la Vega tells us was equivalent to our

Easter. It was held in honour of the sun at the solstice in June. For

three days before the festival the people fasted, men did not sleep with

their wives, and no fires were lighted in Cuzco, the capital. The sacred

new fire was obtained direct from the sun by concentrating his beams on

a highly polished concave plate and reflecting them on a little cotton

wool. With this holy fire the sheep and lambs offered to the sun were

consumed, and the flesh of such as were to be eaten at the festival was

roasted. Portions of the new fire were also conveyed to the temple of

the sun and to the convent of the sacred virgins, where they were kept

burning all the year, and it was an ill omen if the holy flame went

out.[328] At a festival held in the last month of the old Mexican year

all the fires both in the temples and in the houses were extinguished,

and the priest kindled a new fire by rubbing two sticks against each

other before the image of the fire-god.[329] The Zuni Indians of New

Mexico kindle a new fire by the friction of wood both at the winter and

the summer solstice. At the winter solstice the chosen fire-maker

collects a faggot of cedar-wood from every house in the village, and

each person, as he hands the wood to the fire-maker, prays that the

crops may be good in the coming year. For several days before the new

fire is kindled, no ashes or sweepings may be removed from the houses

and no artificial light may appear outside of them, not even a burning

cigarette or the flash of firearms. The Indians believe that no rain

will fall on the fields of the man outside whose house a light has been

seen at this season. The signal for kindling the new fire is given by

the rising of the Morning Star. The flame is produced by twirling an

upright stick between the hands on a horizontal stick laid on the floor

of a sacred chamber, the sparks being caught by a tinder of cedar-dust.

It is forbidden to blow up the smouldering tinder with the breath, for

that would offend the gods. After the fire has thus been ceremonially

kindled, the women and girls of all the families in the village clean

out their houses. They carry the sweepings and ashes in baskets or bowls

to the fields and leave them there. To the sweepings the woman says: "I

now deposit you as sweepings, but in one year you will return to me as

corn." And to the ashes she says: "I now deposit you as ashes, but in

one year you will return to me as meal." At the summer solstice the

sacred fire which has been procured by the friction of wood is used to

kindle the grass and trees, that there may be a great cloud of smoke,

while bull-roarers are swung and prayers offered that the Rain-makers up

aloft will water the earth.[330] From this account we see how intimately

the kindling of a new fire at the two turning-points of the sun's course

is associated in the minds of these Indians with the fertility of the

land, particularly with the growth of the corn. The rolling smoke is

apparently an imitation of rain-clouds designed, on the principle of

homoeopathic magic, to draw showers from the blue sky. Once a year the

Iroquois priesthood supplied the people with a new fire. As a

preparation for the annual rite the fires in all the huts were

extinguished and the ashes scattered about. Then the priest, wearing the

insignia of his office, went from hut to hut relighting the fires by

means of a flint.[331] Among the Esquimaux with whom C.F. Hall resided,

it was the custom that at a certain time, which answered to our New

Year's Day, two men went about from house to house blowing out every

light in the village. One of the men was dressed to represent a woman.

Afterwards the lights were rekindled from a fresh fire. An Esquimau

woman being asked what all this meant, replied, "New sun--new

light."[332] Among the Esquimaux of Iglulik, when the sun first rises

above the horizon after the long night of the Arctic winter, the

children who have watched for his reappearance run into the houses and

blow out the lamps. Then they receive from their mothers presents of

pieces of wick.[333]

[The new fire in Wadai, among the Swahili, and in other parts of

Africa.]

In the Sudanese kingdom of Wadai all the fires in the villages are put

out and the ashes removed from the houses on the day which precedes the

New Year festival. At the beginning of the new year a new fire is lit by

the friction of wood in the great straw hut where the village elders

lounge away the sultry hours together; and every man takes thence a

burning brand with which he rekindles the fire on his domestic

hearth.[334] In the Bahr-el-Ghazal province of the Egyptian Sudan the

people extinguish their old fires at the Arab New Year and bring in new

fire. On the same occasion they beat the walls of their huts, the grass

thatches, and the walls of their enclosures in order to drive away the

devil or evil spirits. The beating of the walls and roofs is accompanied

by the firing of guns, the shouting of men, and the shriller cries of

the women.[335] Thus these people combine an annual expulsion of demons

with an annual lighting of a new fire. Among the Swahili of East Africa

the greatest festival is that of the New Year, which falls in the second

half of August. At a given moment all the fires are extinguished with

water and afterwards relit by the friction of two dry pieces of wood.

The ashes of the old fires are carried out and deposited at cross-roads.

All the people get up very early in the morning and bathe in the sea or

some other water, praying to be kept in good health and to live that

they may bathe again next year. Sham-fights form part of the amusements

of the day; sometimes they pass into grim reality. Indeed the day was

formerly one of general license; every man did that which was good in

his own eyes. No awkward questions were asked about any crimes committed

on this occasion, so some people improved the shining hour by knocking a

few poor devils on the head. Shooting still goes on during the whole

day, and at night the proceedings generally wind up with a great

dance.[336] The King of Benametapa, as the early Portuguese traders

called him, in East Africa used to send commissioners annually to every

town in his dominions; on the arrival of one of these officers the

inhabitants of each town had to put out all their fires and to receive a

new fire from him. Failure to comply with this custom was treated as

rebellion.[337] Some tribes of British Central Africa carefully

extinguish the fires on the hearths at the beginning of the hoeing

season and at harvest; the fires are afterwards rekindled by friction,

and the people indulge in dances of various kinds.[338]

[The new fire among the Todas of Southern India and among the Nagas of

North-Eastern India.]

The Todas of the Neilgheny Hills, in Southern India, annually kindle a

sacred new fire by the friction of wood in the month which begins with

the October moon. The ceremony is performed by two holy dairymen at the

foot of a high hill. When they have lighted the fire by rubbing two dry

sticks together, and it begins to burn well, they stand a little way off

and pray, saying, "May the young grass flower! May honey flourish! May

fruit ripen!" The purpose of the ceremony is to make the grass and honey

plentiful. In ancient times the Todas lived largely on wild fruits, and

then the rite of the new fire was very important. Now that they subsist

chiefly on the milk of their buffaloes, the ceremony has lost much of

its old significance.[339] When the Nagas of North-Eastern India have

felled the timber and cut down the scrub in those patches of jungle

which they propose to cultivate, they put out all the fires in the

village and light a new fire by rubbing two dry pieces of wood together.

Then having kindled torches at it they proceed with them to the jungle

and ignite the felled timber and brushwood. The flesh of a cow or

buffalo is also roasted on the new fire and furnishes a sacrificial

meal.[340] Near the small town of Kahma in Burma, between Prome and

Thayetmyo, certain gases escape from a hollow in the ground and burn

with a steady flame during the dry season of the year. The people regard

the flame as the forge of a spectral smith who here carried on his

business after death had removed him from his old smithy in the village.

Once a year all the household fires in Kahma are extinguished and then

lighted afresh from the ghostly flame.[341]

[The new fire in China and Japan.]

In China every year, about the beginning of April, certain officials,

called _Sz'hüen_, used of old to go about the country armed with wooden

clappers. Their business was to summon the people and command them to

put out every fire. This was the beginning of a season called

_Han-shih-tsieh_, or "eating cold food." For three days all household

fires remained extinct as a preparation for the solemn renewal of the

fire, which took place on the fifth or sixth day of April, being the

hundred and fifth day after the winter solstice. The ceremony was

performed with great pomp by the same officials, who procured the new

fire from heaven by reflecting the sun's rays either from a metal mirror

or from a crystal on dry moss. Fire thus obtained is called by the

Chinese heavenly fire, and its use is enjoined in sacrifices; whereas

fire elicited by the friction of wood is termed by them earthly fire,

and its use is prescribed for cooking and other domestic purposes. When

once the new fire had thus been drawn from the sun, all the people were

free to rekindle their domestic hearths; and, as a Chinese distich has

it--

"_At the festival of the cold food there are a thousand white stalks

among the flowers;

On the day Tsing-ming, at sunrise, you may see the smoke of ten

thousand houses_."

According to a Chinese philosopher, the reason for thus renewing fire

periodically is that the vital principle grows weaker and weaker in old

fire, whereas in new fire it is young and vigorous. This annual renewal

of fire was a ceremony of very great antiquity in China, since it is

known to have been observed in the time of the first dynasty, about two

thousand years before Christ. Under the Tcheou dynasty a change in the

calendar led to shifting the fire-festival from spring to the summer

solstice, but afterwards it was brought back to its original date.

Although the custom appears to have long fallen into disuse, the

barbarous inhabitants of Hainan, an island to the south of China, still

call a year "a fire," as if in memory of the time when the years were

reckoned by the annually recurring ceremony of rekindling the sacred

fire.[342] "A Japanese book written two centuries ago informs us that

sticks resembling the wands used for offerings at the purification

ceremony were part shaven and set up in bundles at the four corners of

the Gion shrine on the last day of the year. The priests, after prayers

were recited, broke up the bundles and set fire to the sticks, which the

people then carried home to light their household fires with for the New

Year. The object of this ceremony was to avert pestilence."[343]

[The new fire in ancient Greece and Rome.]

In classical antiquity the Greek island of Lemnos was devoted to the

worship of the smith-god Hephaestus, who was said to have fallen on it

when Zeus hurled him from heaven.[344] Once a year every fire in the

island was extinguished and remained extinct for nine days, during which

sacrifices were offered to the dead and to the infernal powers. New fire

was brought in a ship from the sacred isle of Delos, and with it the

fires in the houses and the workshops were relit. The people said that

with the new fire they made a new beginning of life. If the ship that

bore the sacred flame arrived too soon, it might not put in to shore,

but had to cruise in the offing till the nine days were expired.[345] At

Rome the sacred fire in the temple of Vesta was kindled anew every year

on the first of March, which used to be the beginning of the Roman

year;[346] the task of lighting it was entrusted to the Vestal Virgins,

and they performed it by drilling a hole in a board of lucky wood till

the flame was elicited by friction. The new fire thus produced was

carried into the temple of Vesta by one of the virgins in a bronze

sieve.[347]

[The new fire at Hallow E'en among the old Celts of Ireland; the new

fire on September 1st among the Russian peasants.]

Among the Celts of Ireland a new fire was annually kindled on Hallowe'en

or the Eve of Samhain, as they called it, the last day of October, from

which the Irish new year began; and all the hearths throughout the

country are said to have been relighted from the fresh fire. The place

where this holy flame was lit bore the name of Tlachtga or Tlactga; it

has been identified with a rath or native fort on the Hill of Ward near

Athboy in the county of Meath. "It was there," says the old Irish

historian, Geoffrey Keating, "that the Festival of the Fire of Tlactga

was ordered to be held, and it was thither that the Druids of Ireland

were wont to repair and to assemble, in solemn meeting, on the eve of

Samhain, for the purpose of making a sacrifice to all the gods. It was

in that fire at Tlactga, that their sacrifice was burnt; and it was made

obligatory, under pain of punishment, to extinguish all the fires of

Ireland, on that eve; and the men of Ireland were allowed to kindle no

other fire but that one; and for each of the other fires, which were all

to be lighted from it, the king of Munster was to receive a tax of a

_sgreball_, that is, of three pence, because the land, upon which

Tlactga was built, belongs to the portion of Meath which had been taken

from Munster."[348] In the villages near Moscow at the present time the

peasants put out all their fires on the eve of the first of September,

and next morning at sunrise a wise man or a wise woman rekindles them

with the help of muttered incantations and spells.[349]

[Thus the ceremony of the new fire in the Eastern and Western Church is

probably a relic of an old heathen rite.]

Instances of such practices might doubtless be multiplied, but the

foregoing examples may suffice to render it probable that the

ecclesiastical ceremony of lighting a sacred new fire on Easter Saturday

had originally nothing to do with Christianity, but is merely one case

of a world-wide custom which the Church has seen fit to incorporate in

its ritual. It might be supposed that in the Western Church the custom

was merely a survival of the old Roman usage of renewing the fire on the

first of March, were it not that the observance by the Eastern Church of

the custom on the same day seems to point back to a still older period

when the ceremony of lighting a new fire in spring, perhaps at the

vernal equinox, was common to many peoples of the Mediterranean area. We

may conjecture that wherever such a ceremony has been observed, it

originally marked the beginning of a new year, as it did in ancient Rome

and Ireland, and as it still does in the Sudanese kingdom of Wadai and

among the Swahili of Eastern Africa.

[The pagan character of the Easter fire appears from the superstitions

associated with it, such as the belief that the fire fertilizes the

fields and protects houses from conflagration and sickness.]

The essentially pagan character of the Easter fire festival appears

plainly both from the mode in which it is celebrated by the peasants and

from the superstitious beliefs which they associate with it. All over

northern and central Germany, from Altmark and Anhalt on the east,

through Brunswick, Hanover, Oldenburg, the Harz district, and Hesse to

Westphalia the Easter bonfires still blaze simultaneously on the

hill-tops. As many as forty may sometimes be counted within sight at

once. Long before Easter the young people have been busy collecting

firewood; every farmer contributes, and tar-barrels, petroleum cases,

and so forth go to swell the pile. Neighbouring villages vie with each

other as to which shall send up the greatest blaze. The fires are always

kindled, year after year, on the same hill, which accordingly often

takes the name of Easter Mountain. It is a fine spectacle to watch from

some eminence the bonfires flaring up one after another on the

neighbouring heights. As far as their light reaches, so far, in the

belief of the peasants, the fields will be fruitful, and the houses on

which they shine will be safe from conflagration or sickness. At

Volkmarsen and other places in Hesse the people used to observe which

way the wind blew the flames, and then they sowed flax seed in that

direction, confident that it would grow well. Brands taken from the

bonfires preserve houses from being struck by lightning; and the ashes

increase the fertility of the fields, protect them from mice, and mixed

with the drinking-water of cattle make the animals thrive and ensure

them against plague. As the flames die down, young and old leap over

them, and cattle are sometimes driven through the smouldering embers. In

some places tar-barrels or wheels wrapt in straw used to be set on fire,

and then sent rolling down the hillside. In others the boys light

torches and wisps of straw at the bonfires and rush about brandishing

them in their hands. Where the people are divided between Protestantism

and Catholicism, as in Hildesheim, it has been observed that among

Protestants the Easter bonfires are generally left to the boys, while in

Catholic districts they are cared for by grown-up persons, and here the

whole population will gather round the blazing pile and join in singing

choral hymns, which echo far and wide in the stillness of night.[350]

[The Easter fires in Münsterland, Oldenburg, the Harz Mountains and the

Altmark.]

In Münsterland these Easter fires are always kindled upon certain

definite hills, which are hence known as Easter or Paschal Mountains.

The whole community assembles about the fire. Fathers of families form

an inner circle round it. An outer circle is composed of the young men

and maidens, who, singing Easter hymns, march round and round the fire

in the direction of the sun, till the blaze dies down. Then the girls

jump over the fire in a line, one after the other, each supported by two

young men who hold her hands and run beside her. When the fire has

burned out, the whole assembly marches in solemn procession to the

church, singing hymns. They go thrice round the church, and then break

up. In the twilight boys with blazing bundles of straw run over the

fields to make them fruitful.[351] At Delmenhorst, in Oldenburg, it used

to be the custom to cut down two trees, plant them in the ground side by

side, and pile twelve tar-barrels, one above the other, against each of

the trees. Brushwood was then heaped about the trees, and on the evening

of Easter Saturday the boys, after rushing about with blazing beanpoles

in their hands, set fire to the whole. At the end of the ceremony the

urchins tried to blacken each other and the clothes of grown-up

people.[352] In Schaumburg the Easter bonfires may be seen blazing on

all the mountains around for miles. They are made with a tar-barrel

fastened to a pine-tree, which is wrapt in straw. The people dance

singing round them.[353] In the Harz Mountains the fire is commonly made

by piling brushwood about a tree and setting it on fire. At Osterode

every one tries to snatch a brand from the bonfire and runs about with

it; the better it burns, the more lucky it is. In Grund there are

torch-races.[354] In the Altmark the Easter bonfires are composed of

tar-barrels, bee-hives, and so forth, piled round a pole. The young folk

dance round the fire; and when it has died out, the old folk come and

collect the ashes, which they preserve as a remedy for the ailments of

bees. It is also believed that as far as the blaze of the bonfire is

visible, the corn will grow well throughout the year, and no

conflagration will break out.[355] At Braunröde, in the Harz Mountains,

it was the custom to burn squirrels in the Easter bonfire.[356] In the

Altmark, bones were burned in it.[357]

[The Easter fires in Bavaria; the burning of Judas; burning the Easter

Man.]

Further south the Easter fires are, or used to be, lit in many districts

of Bavaria. Thus on Easter Monday in some parts of Middle Franken the

schoolboys collect all the old worn-out besoms they can lay hands on,

and march with them in a long procession to a neighbouring height. When

the first chime of the evening bell comes up from the dale they set fire

to the brooms, and run along the ridges waving them, so that seen from

below the hills appear to be crested with a twinkling and moving chain

of fire.[358] In some parts of Upper Bavaria at Easter burning arrows or

discs of wood were shot from hill-tops high into the air, as in the

Swabian and Swiss customs already described.[359] At Oberau, instead of

the discs, an old cart-wheel was sometimes wrapt in straw, ignited, and

sent rolling and blazing down the mountain. The lads who hurled the

discs received painted Easter eggs from the girls.[360] Near Forchheim,

in Upper Franken, a straw-man called the Judas used to be burned in the

churchyards on Easter Saturday. The whole village contributed wood to

the pyre on which he perished, and the charred sticks were afterwards

kept and planted in the fields on Walpurgis Day (the first of May) to

preserve the wheat from blight and mildew.[361] About a hundred years

ago or more the custom at Althenneberg, in Upper Bavaria, used to be as

follows. On the afternoon of Easter Saturday the lads collected wood,

which they piled in a cornfield, while in the middle of the pile they

set up a tall wooden cross all swathed in straw. After the evening

service they lighted their lanterns at the consecrated candle in the

church, and ran with them at full speed to the pyre, each striving to

get there first. The first to arrive set fire to the heap. No woman or

girl might come near the bonfire, but they were allowed to watch it from

a distance. As the flames rose the men and lads rejoiced and made merry,

shouting, "We are burning the Judas!" Two of them had to watch the

glowing embers the whole night long, lest people should come and steal

them. Next morning at sunrise they carefully collected the ashes, and

threw them into the running water of the Röten brook. The man who had

been the first to reach the pyre and to kindle it was rewarded on Easter

Sunday by the women, who gave him coloured eggs at the church door.

Well-to-do women gave him two; poorer women gave him only one. The

object of the whole ceremony was to keep off the hail. About a century

ago the Judas fire, as it was called, was put down by the police.[362]

At Giggenhausen and Aufkirchen, two other villages of Upper Bavaria, a

similar custom prevailed, yet with some interesting differences. Here

the ceremony, which took place between nine and ten at night on Easter

Saturday, was called "burning the Easter Man." On a height about a mile

from the village the young fellows set up a tall cross enveloped in

straw, so that it looked like a man with his arms stretched out. This

was the Easter Man. No lad under eighteen years of age might take part

in the ceremony. One of the young men stationed himself beside the

Easter Man, holding in his hand a consecrated taper which he had brought

from the church and lighted. The rest stood at equal intervals in a

great circle round the cross. At a given signal they raced thrice round

the circle, and then at a second signal ran straight at the cross and at

the lad with the lighted taper beside it; the one who reached the goal

first had the right of setting fire to the Easter Man. Great was the

jubilation while he was burning. When he had been consumed in the

flames, three lads were chosen from among the rest, and each of the

three drew a circle on the ground with a stick thrice round the ashes.

Then they all left the spot. On Easter Monday the villagers gathered the

ashes and strewed them on their fields; also they planted in the fields

palm-branches which had been consecrated on Palm Sunday, and sticks

which had been charred and hallowed on Good Friday, all for the purpose

of protecting their fields against showers of hail. The custom of

burning an Easter Man made of straw on Easter Saturday was observed also

at Abensberg, in Lower Bavaria.[363] In some parts of Swabia the Easter

fires might not be kindled with iron or steel or flint, but only by the

friction of wood.[364]

[The Easter fires in Baden; "Thunder poles."]

In Baden bonfires are still kindled in the churchyards on Easter

Saturday, and ecclesiastical refuse of various sorts, such as

candle-ends, old surplices, and the wool used by the priest in the

application of extreme unction, is consumed in the flames. At Zoznegg

down to about 1850 the fire was lighted by the priest by means of a

flint which had never been used before. People bring sticks, especially

oaken sticks, char them in the fire, and then carry them home and keep

them in the house as a preservative against lightning. At Zoznegg these

oaken sticks were sword-shaped, each about an ell and a half long, and

they went by the name of "weather or thunder poles" (_Wetterpfähle_).

When a thunderstorm threatened to break out, one of the sticks was put

into a small fire, in order that the hallowed smoke, ascending to the

clouds, might ward off the lightning from the house and the hail from

the fields and gardens. At Schöllbronn the oaken sticks, which are thus

charred in the Easter bonfire and kept in the house as a protective

against thunder and lightning, are three in number, perhaps with an

allusion to the Trinity; they are brought every Easter to be consecrated

afresh in the bonfire, till they are quite burnt away. In the lake

district of Baden it is also customary to burn one of these holy sticks

in the fire when a heavy thunderstorm is raging.[365] Hence it seems

that the ancient association of the oak with the thunder[366] persists

in the minds of German peasants to the present day.

[Easter fires in Holland and Sweden; the burning of Judas in Bohemia.]

Thus the custom of the Easter fires appears to have prevailed all over

central and western Germany from north to south. We find it also in

Holland, where the fires were kindled on the highest eminences, and the

people danced round them and leaped through the flames or over the

glowing embers. Here too, as so often in Germany, the materials for the

bonfire were collected by the young folk from door to door.[367] In many

parts of Sweden firearms are, as at Athens, discharged in all directions

on Easter eve, and huge bonfires are lighted on hills and eminences.

Some people think that the intention is to keep off the Troll and other

evil spirits who are especially active at this season.[368] When the

afternoon service on Good Friday is over, German children in Bohemia

drive Judas out of the church by running about the sacred edifice and

even the streets shaking rattles and clappers. Next day, on Easter

Saturday, the remains of the holy oil are burnt before the church door

in a fire which must be kindled with flint and steel. This fire is

called "the burning of Judas," but in spite of its evil name a

beneficent virtue is ascribed to it, for the people scuffle for the

cinders, which they put in the roofs of their houses as a safeguard

against fire and lightning.[369]

§ 3. _The Beltane Fires_

[The Beltane fires on the first of May in the Highlands of Scotland;

description of the Beltane fires by John Ramsay of Ochtertyre in the

eighteenth century.]

In the central Highlands of Scotland bonfires, known as the Beltane

fires, were formerly kindled with great ceremony on the first of May,

and the traces of human sacrifices at them were particularly clear and

unequivocal. The custom of lighting the bonfires lasted in various

places far into the eighteenth century, and the descriptions of the

ceremony by writers of that period present such a curious and

interesting picture of ancient heathendom surviving in our own country

that I will reproduce them in the words of their authors. The fullest of

the descriptions, so far as I know, is the one bequeathed to us by John

Ramsay, laird of Ochtertyre, near Crieff, the patron of Burns and the

friend of Sir Walter Scott. From his voluminous manuscripts, written in

the last quarter of the eighteenth century, a selection was published in

the latter part of the nineteenth century. The following account of

Beltane is extracted from a chapter dealing with Highland superstitions.

Ramsay says: "But the most considerable of the Druidical festivals is

that of Beltane, or May-day, which was lately observed in some parts of

the Highlands with extraordinary ceremonies. Of later years it is

chiefly attended to by young people, persons advanced in years

considering it as inconsistent with their gravity to give it any

countenance. Yet a number of circumstances relative to it may be

collected from tradition, or the conversation of very old people, who

witnessed this feast in their youth, when the ancient rites were better

observed.

[Need-fire.]

"This festival is called in Gaelic _Beal-tene_--i.e., the fire of

Bel.... Like the other public worship of the Druids, the Beltane feast

seems to have been performed on hills or eminences. They thought it

degrading to him whose temple is the universe, to suppose that he would

dwell in any house made with hands. Their sacrifices were therefore

offered in the open air, frequently upon the tops of hills, where they

were presented with the grandest views of nature, and were nearest the

seat of warmth and order. And, according to tradition, such was the

manner of celebrating this festival in the Highlands within the last

hundred years. But since the decline of superstition, it has been

celebrated by the people of each hamlet on some hill or rising ground

around which their cattle were pasturing. Thither the young folks

repaired in the morning, and cut a trench, on the summit of which a seat

of turf was formed for the company. And in the middle a pile of wood or

other fuel was placed, which of old they kindled with _tein-eigin_--

i.e., forced-fire or _need-fire_. Although, for many years past, they

have been contented with common fire, yet we shall now describe the

process, because it will hereafter appear that recourse is still had to

the _tein-eigin_ upon extraordinary emergencies.

[Need-fire kindled by the friction of oak wood.]

"The night before, all the fires in the country were carefully

extinguished, and next morning the materials for exciting this sacred

fire were prepared. The most primitive method seems to be that which was

used in the islands of Skye, Mull, and Tiree. A well-seasoned plank of

oak was procured, in the midst of which a hole was bored. A wimble of

the same timber was then applied, the end of which they fitted to the

hole. But in some parts of the mainland the machinery was different.

They used a frame of green wood, of a square form, in the centre of

which was an axle-tree. In some places three times three persons, in

others three times nine, were required for turning round by turns the

axle-tree or wimble. If any of them had been guilty of murder, adultery,

theft, or other atrocious crime, it was imagined either that the fire

would not kindle, or that it would be devoid of its usual virtue. So

soon as any sparks were emitted by means of the violent friction, they

applied a species of agaric which grows on old birch-trees, and is very

combustible. This fire had the appearance of being immediately derived

from heaven, and manifold were the virtues ascribed to it. They esteemed

it a preservative against witchcraft, and a sovereign remedy against

malignant diseases, both in the human species and in cattle; and by it

the strongest poisons were supposed to have their nature changed.

[The Beltane cake and the Beltane carline (_cailleach_).]

"After kindling the bonfire with the _tein-eigin_ the company prepared

their victuals. And as soon as they had finished their meal, they amused

themselves a while in singing and dancing round the fire. Towards the

close of the entertainment, the person who officiated as master of the

feast produced a large cake baked with eggs and scalloped round the

edge, called _am bonnach beal-tine--i.e._ the Beltane cake. It was

divided into a number of pieces, and distributed in great form to the

company. There was one particular piece which whoever got was called

_cailleach beal-tine--i.e._, the Beltane _carline_, a term of great

reproach. Upon his being known, part of the company laid hold of him and

made a show of putting him into the fire; but the majority interposing,

he was rescued. And in some places they laid him flat on the ground,

making as if they would quarter him. Afterwards, he was pelted with

egg-shells, and retained the odious appellation during the whole year.

And while the feast was fresh in people's memory, they affected to speak

of the _cailleach beal-tine_ as dead.

"This festival was longest observed in the interior Highlands, for

towards the west coast the traces of it are faintest. In Glenorchy and

Lorne, a large cake is made on that day, which they consume in the

house; and in Mull it has a large hole in the middle, through which each

of the cows in the fold is milked. In Tiree it is of a triangular form.

The more elderly people remember when this festival was celebrated

without-doors with some solemnity in both these islands. There are at

present no vestiges of it in Skye or the Long Island, the inhabitants of

which have substituted the _connach Micheil_ or St. Michael's cake. It

is made at Michaelmas with milk and oatmeal, and some eggs are sprinkled

on its surface. Part of it is sent to the neighbours.

"It is probable that at the original Beltane festival there were two

fires kindled near one another. When any person is in a critical

dilemma, pressed on each side by unsurmountable difficulties, the

Highlanders have a proverb, _The e' eada anda theine bealtuin_--i.e., he

is between the two Beltane fires. There are in several parts small round

hills, which, it is like, owe their present names to such solemn uses.

One of the highest and most central in Icolmkil is called

_Cnoch-nan-ainneal_--i.e., the hill of the fires. There is another of

the same name near the kirk of Balquhidder; and at Killin there is a

round green eminence which seems to have been raised by art. It is

called _Tom-nan-ainneal_--i.e., the eminence of the fires. Around it

there are the remains of a circular wall about two feet high. On the top

a stone stands upon end. According to the tradition of the inhabitants,

it was a place of Druidical worship; and it was afterwards pitched on as

the most venerable spot for holding courts of justice for the country of

Breadalbane. The earth of this eminence is still thought to be possessed

of some healing virtue, for when cattle are observed to be diseased some

of it is sent for, which is rubbed on the part affected."[370]

[Local differences in the Beltane cakes; evidence of two fires at

Beltane; Beltane pies and cakes in the parish of Callander.]

In the parish of Callander, a beautiful district of western Perthshire,

the Beltane custom was still in vogue towards the end of the eighteenth

century. It has been described as follows by the parish minister of the

time: "Upon the first day of May, which is called _Beltan_, or

_Bal-tein_ day, all the boys in a township or hamlet, meet in the moors.

They cut a table in the green sod, of a round figure, by casting a

trench in the ground, of such circumference as to hold the whole

company. They kindle a fire, and dress a repast of eggs and milk in the

consistence of a custard. They knead a cake of oatmeal, which is toasted

at the embers against a stone. After the custard is eaten up, they

divide the cake into so many portions, as similar as possible to one

another in size and shape, as there are persons in the company. They

daub one of these portions all over with charcoal, until it be perfectly

black. They put all the bits of the cake into a bonnet. Every one,

blindfold, draws out a portion. He who holds the bonnet, is entitled to

the last bit. Whoever draws the black bit, is the _devoted_ person who

is to be sacrificed to _Baal_[371] whose favour they mean to implore, in

rendering the year productive of the sustenance of man and beast. There

is little doubt of these inhuman sacrifices having been once offered in

this country, as well as in the east, although they now pass from the

act of sacrificing, and only compel the _devoted_ person to leap three

times through the flames; with which the ceremonies of this festival are

closed."[372]

[Pennant's description of the Beltane fires and cakes in Perthshire.]

Thomas Pennant, who travelled in Perthshire in the year 1769, tells us

that "on the first of May, the herdsmen of every village hold their

Bel-tien, a rural sacrifice. They cut a square trench on the ground,

leaving the turf in the middle; on that they make a fire of wood, on

which they dress a large caudle of eggs, butter, oatmeal and milk; and

bring besides the ingredients of the caudle, plenty of beer and whisky;

for each of the company must contribute something. The rites begin with

spilling some of the caudle on the ground, by way of libation: on that

every one takes a cake of oatmeal, upon which are raised nine square

knobs, each dedicated to some particular being, the supposed preserver

of their flocks and herds, or to some particular animal, the real

destroyer of them: each person then turns his face to the fire, breaks

off a knob, and flinging it over his shoulders, says, 'This I give to

thee, preserve thou my horses; this to thee, preserve thou my sheep; and

so on,' After that, they use the-same ceremony to the noxious animals:

'This I give to thee, O fox! spare thou my lambs; this to thee, O hooded

crow! this to thee, O eagle!' When the ceremony is over, they dine on

the caudle; and after the feast is finished, what is left is hid by two

persons deputed for that purpose; but on the next Sunday they

re-assemble, and finish the reliques of the first entertainment"[373]

[Beltane cakes and fires in the parishes of Logierait and Kirkmichael;

omens drawn from the cakes.]

Another writer of the eighteenth century has described the Beltane

festival as it was held in the parish of Logierait in Perthshire. He

says: "On the first of May, O.S., a festival called _Beltan_ is annually

held here. It is chiefly celebrated by the cow-herds, who assemble by

scores in the fields, to dress a dinner for themselves, of boiled milk

and eggs. These dishes they eat with a sort of cakes baked for the

occasion, and having small lumps in the form of _nipples_, raised all

over the surface."[374] In this last account no mention is made of

bonfires, but they were probably lighted, for a contemporary writer

informs us that in the parish of Kirkmichael, which adjoins the parish

of Logierait on the east, the custom of lighting a fire in the fields

and baking a consecrated cake on the first of May was not quite obsolete

in his time.[375] We may conjecture that the cake with knobs was

formerly used for the purpose of determining who should be the "Beltane

carline" or victim doomed to the flames. A trace of this custom

survived, perhaps, in the custom of baking oatmeal cakes of a special

kind and rolling them down hill about noon on the first of May; for it

was thought that the person whose cake broke as it rolled would die or

be unfortunate within the year. These cakes, or bannocks as we call them

in Scotland, were baked in the usual way, but they were washed over with

a thin batter composed of whipped egg, milk or cream, and a little

oatmeal. This custom appears to have prevailed at or near Kingussie in

Inverness-shire. At Achterneed, near Strathpeffer in Ross-shire, the

Beltane bannocks were called _tcharnican_ or hand-cakes, because they

were kneaded entirely in the hand, and not on a board or table like

common cakes; and after being baked they might not be placed anywhere

but in the hands of the children who were to eat them.[376]

[Beltane fires in the north-east of Scotland to burn the witches; the

Beltane cake.]

In the north-east of Scotland the Beltane fires were still kindled in

the latter half of the eighteenth century; the herdsmen of several farms

used to gather dry wood, kindle it, and dance three times "southways"

about the burning pile.[377] But in this region, according to a later

authority, the Beltane fires were lit not on the first but on the second

of May, Old Style. They were called bone-fires. The people believed that

on that evening and night the witches were abroad and busy casting

spells on cattle and stealing cows' milk. To counteract their

machinations, pieces of rowan-tree and woodbine, but especially of

rowan-tree, were placed over the doors of the cow-houses, and fires were

kindled by every farmer and cottar. Old thatch, straw, furze, or broom

was piled in a heap and set on fire a little after sunset. While some of

the bystanders kept tossing the blazing mass, others hoisted portions of

it on pitchforks or poles and ran hither and thither, holding them as

high as they could. Meantime the young people danced round the fire or

ran through the smoke shouting, "Fire! blaze and burn the witches; fire!

fire! burn the witches." In some districts a large round cake of oat or

barley meal was rolled through the ashes. When all the fuel was

consumed, the people scattered the ashes far and wide, and till the

night grew quite dark they continued to run through them, crying, "Fire!

burn the witches."[378]

[Beltane cakes and fires in the Hebrides.]

In the Hebrides "the Beltane bannock is smaller than that made at St.

Michael's, but is made in the same way; it is no longer made in Uist,

but Father Allan remembers seeing his grandmother make one about

twenty-five years ago. There was also a cheese made, generally on the

first of May, which was kept to the next Beltane as a sort of charm

against the bewitching of milk-produce. The Beltane customs seem to have

been the same as elsewhere. Every fire was put out and a large one lit

on the top of the hill, and the cattle driven round it sunwards

(_dessil_), to keep off murrain all the year. Each man would take home

fire wherewith to kindle his own."[379]

[Beltane fires and cakes in Wales.]

In Wales also the custom of lighting Beltane fires at the beginning of

May used to be observed, but the day on which they were kindled varied

from the Eve of May Day to the third of May. The flame was sometimes

elicited by the friction of two pieces of oak, as appears from the

following description. "The fire was done in this way. Nine men would

turn their pockets inside out, and see that every piece of money and all

metals were off their persons. Then the men went into the nearest woods,

and collected sticks of nine different kinds of trees. These were

carried to the spot where the fire had to be built. There a circle was

cut in the sod, and the sticks were set crosswise. All around the circle

the people stood and watched the proceedings. One of the men would then

take two bits of oak, and rub them together until a flame was kindled.

This was applied to the sticks, and soon a large fire was made.

Sometimes two fires were set up side by side. These fires, whether one

or two, were called _coelcerth_ or bonfire. Round cakes of oatmeal and

brown meal were split in four, and placed in a small flour-bag, and

everybody present had to pick out a portion. The last bit in the bag

fell to the lot of the bag-holder. Each person who chanced to pick up a

piece of brown-meal cake was compelled to leap three times over the

flames, or to run thrice between the two fires, by which means the

people thought they were sure of a plentiful harvest. Shouts and screams

of those who had to face the ordeal could be heard ever so far, and

those who chanced to pick the oatmeal portions sang and danced and

clapped their hands in approval, as the holders of the brown bits leaped

three times over the flames, or ran three times between the two fires.

As a rule, no danger attended these curious celebrations, but

occasionally somebody's clothes caught fire, which was quickly put out.

The greatest fire of the year was the eve of May, or May first, second,

or third. The Midsummer Eve fire was more for the harvest. Very often a

fire was built on the eve of November. The high ground near the Castle

Ditches at Llantwit Major, in the Vale of Glamorgan, was a familiar spot

for the Beltane on May third and on Midsummer Eve.... Sometimes the

Beltane fire was lighted by the flames produced by stone instead of wood

friction. Charred logs and faggots used in the May Beltane were

carefully preserved, and from them the next fire was lighted. May fires

were always started with old faggots of the previous year, and midsummer

from those of the last summer. It was unlucky to build a midsummer fire

from May faggots. People carried the ashes left after these fires to

their homes, and a charred brand was not only effectual against

pestilence, but magical in its use. A few of the ashes placed in a

person's shoes protected the wearer from any great sorrow or woe."[380]

[Welsh belief that passage over or between the fires ensured good

crops.]

From the foregoing account we learn that bonfires were kindled in Wales

on Midsummer Eve and Hallowe'en (the thirty-first of October), as well

as at the beginning of May, but that the Beltane fires in May were

deemed the most important. To the Midsummer Eve and Hallowe'en fires we

shall return presently. The belief of the people that by leaping thrice

over the bonfires or running thrice between them they ensured a

plentiful harvest is worthy of note. The mode in which this result was

supposed to be brought about is indicated by another writer on Welsh

folk-lore, according to whom it used to be held that "the bonfires

lighted in May or Midsummer protected the lands from sorcery, so that

good crops would follow. The ashes were also considered valuable as

charms."[381] Hence it appears that the heat of the fires was thought to

fertilize the fields, not directly by quickening the seeds in the

ground, but indirectly by counteracting the baleful influence of

witchcraft or perhaps by burning up the persons of the witches.

[Beltane fires in the Isle of Man to burn the witches; Beltane fires in

Nottinghamshire.]

"The Druidical anniversary of Beil or Baal is still celebrated in the

Isle of Man. On the first of May, 1837, the Baal fires were, as usual on

that day, so numerous as to give the island the appearance of a general

conflagration."[382] By May Day in Manx folk-lore is meant May Day Old

Style, or _Shenn Laa Boaldyn_, as it is called in Manx. The day was one

on which the power of elves and witches was particularly dreaded, and

the people resorted to many precautions in order to protect themselves

against these mischievous beings. Hence at daybreak they set fire to the

ling or gorse, for the purpose of burning out the witches, who are wont

to lurk in the form of hares.[383] On the Hemlock Stone, a natural

pillar of sandstone standing on Stapleford Hill in Nottinghamshire, a

fire used to be solemnly kindled every year on Beltane Eve. The custom

seems to have survived down to the beginning of the nineteenth century;

old people could remember and describe the ceremony long after it had

fallen into desuetude.[384]

[Beltane fires in Ireland.]

The Beltane fires appear to have been kindled also in Ireland, for

Cormac, "or somebody in his name, says that _belltaine_, May-day, was so

called from the 'lucky fire,' or the 'two fires,' which the druids of

Erin used to make on that day with great incantations; and cattle, he

adds, used to be brought to those fires, or to be driven between them,

as a safeguard against the diseases of the year."[385] Again, a very

ancient Irish poem, enumerating the May Day celebrations, mentions among

them a bonfire on a hill (_tendal ar cnuc_); and another old authority

says that these fires were kindled in the name of the idol-god Bel.[386]

From an old life of St. Patrick we learn that on a day in spring the

heathen of Ireland were wont to extinguish all their fires until a new

fire was kindled with solemn ceremony in the king's house at Tara. In

the year in which St. Patrick landed in Ireland it chanced that the

night of the extinguished fires coincided with the Eve of Easter; and

the saint, ignorant of this pagan superstition, resolved to celebrate

his first Easter in Ireland after the true Christian fashion by lighting

the holy Paschal fire on the hill of Slane, which rises high above the

left bank of the Boyne, about twelve miles from the mouth of the river.

So that night, looking from his palace at Tara across the darkened

landscape, the king of Tara saw the solitary fire flaring on the top of

the hill of Slane, and in consternation he asked his wise men what that

light meant. They warned him of the danger that it betokened for the

ancient faith of Erin.[387] In spite of the difference of date between

Easter and Beltane, we may suspect that the new fire annually kindled

with solemn ceremony about Easter in the king of Ireland's palace at

Tara was no other than the Beltane fire. We have seen that in the

Highlands of Scotland down to modern times it was customary to

extinguish all fires in the neighbourhood before proceeding to kindle

the sacred flame.[388] The Irish historian Geoffrey Keating, who wrote

in the first part of the seventeenth century, tells us that the men of

Ireland held a great fair every year in the month of May at Uisnech

(_Ushnagh_) in the county of Meath, "and at it they were wont to

exchange their goods and their wares and their jewels. At it, they were,

also, wont to make a sacrifice to the Arch-God that they adored, whose

name was Bèl (_bayl_). It was, likewise, their usage to light two fires

to Bèl, in every district of Ireland, at this season, and to drive a

pair of each kind of cattle that the district contained, between those

two fires, as a preservative to guard them against all the diseases of

that year. It is from that fire, thus made in honour of Bèl, that the

day [the first of May] on which the noble feast of the apostles, Philip

and James, is held, has been called Bèltaini, or Bèaltaine

(_Bayltinnie_); for Beltaini is the same as Bèil-teinè, i.e. Teiné Bhèil

(_Tinnie Vayl_) or Bèl's Fire."[389] The custom of driving cattle

through or between fires on May Day or the eve of May Day persisted in

Ireland down to a time within living memory. Thus Sir John Rhys was

informed by a Manxman that an Irish cattle-dealer of his acquaintance

used to drive his cattle through fire on May Day so as to singe them a

little, since he believed that it would preserve them from harm. When

the Manxman was asked where the dealer came from, he answered, "From the

mountains over there," pointing to the Mourne Mountains then looming

faintly in the mists on the western horizon.[390]

[Fires on the Eve of May Day in Sweden; fires on the Eve of May Day in

Austria and Saxony for the purpose of burning the witches.]

The first of May is a great popular festival in the more midland and

southern parts of Sweden. On the eve of the festival, huge bonfires,

which should be lighted by striking two flints together, blaze on all

the hills and knolls. Every large hamlet has its own fire, round which

the young people dance in a ring. The old folk notice whether the flames

incline to the north or to the south. In the former case, the spring

will be cold and backward; in the latter, it will be mild and

genial.[391] Similarly, in Bohemia, on the eve of May Day, young people

kindle fires on hills and eminences, at crossways, and in pastures, and

dance round them. They leap over the glowing embers or even through the

flames. The ceremony is called "burning the witches." In some places an

effigy representing a witch used to be burnt in the bonfire.[392] We

have to remember that the eve of May Day is the notorious Walpurgis

Night, when the witches are everywhere speeding unseen through the air

on their hellish errands. On this witching night children in Voigtland

also light bonfires on the heights and leap over them. Moreover, they

wave burning brooms or toss them into the air. So far as the light of

the bonfire reaches, so far will a blessing rest on the fields. The

kindling of the fires on Walpurgis Night is called "driving away the

witches."[393] The custom of kindling fires on the eve of May Day

(Walpurgis Night) for the purpose of burning the witches is, or used to

be, widespread in the Tyrol, Moravia, Saxony and Silesia.[394]

§ 4. _The Midsummer Fires_

[The great season for fire-festivals in Europe is the summer solstice,

Midsummer Eve or Midsummer Day, which the church has dedicated to St.

John the Baptist; the bonfires, the torches, and the burning wheels of

the festival.]

But the season at which these fire-festivals have been mostly generally

held all over Europe is the summer solstice, that is Midsummer Eve (the

twenty-third of June) or Midsummer Day (the twenty-fourth of June). A

faint tinge of Christianity has been given to them by naming Midsummer

Day after St. John the Baptist, but we cannot doubt that the celebration

dates from a time long before the beginning of our era. The summer

solstice, or Midsummer Day, is the great turning-point in the sun's

career, when, after climbing higher and higher day by day in the sky,

the luminary stops and thenceforth retraces his steps down the heavenly

road. Such a moment could not but be regarded with anxiety by primitive

man so soon as he began to observe and ponder the courses of the great

lights across the celestial vault; and having still to learn his own

powerlessness in face of the vast cyclic changes of nature, he may have

fancied that he could help the sun in his seeming decline--could prop

his failing steps and rekindle the sinking flame of the red lamp in his

feeble hand. In some such thoughts as these the midsummer festivals of

our European peasantry may perhaps have taken their rise. Whatever their

origin, they have prevailed all over this quarter of the globe, from

Ireland on the west to Russia on the east, and from Norway and Sweden on

the north to Spain and Greece on the south.[395] According to a mediæval

writer, the three great features of the midsummer celebration were the

bonfires, the procession with torches round the fields, and the custom

of rolling a wheel. He tells us that boys burned bones and filth of

various kinds to make a foul smoke, and that the smoke drove away

certain noxious dragons which at this time, excited by the summer heat,

copulated in the air and poisoned the wells and rivers by dropping their

seed into them; and he explains the custom of trundling a wheel to mean

that the sun, having now reached the highest point in the ecliptic,

begins thenceforward to descend.[396]

[T. Kirchmeyer's description of the Midsummer Festival.]

A good general account of the midsummer customs, together with some of

the reasons popularly alleged for observing them, is given by Thomas

Kirchmeyer, a writer of the sixteenth century, in his poem _The Popish

Kingdome_:--

"_Then doth the joyfull feast of John the Baptist take his turne,

When bonfiers great with loftie flame, in every towne doe burne;

And yong men round about with maides, doe daunce in every streete,

With garlands wrought of Motherwort, or else with Vervain sweete,

And many other flowres faire, with Violets in their handes,

Whereas they all do fondly thinke, that whosoever standes,

And thorow the flowres beholds the flame, his eyes shall feele no paine.

When thus till night they daunced have, they through the fire amaine

With striving mindes doe runne, and all their hearbes they cast therin,

And then with wordes devout and prayers, they solemnely begin,

Desiring God that all their illes may there consumed bee,

Whereby they thinke through all that yeare from Agues to be free.

Some others get a rotten wheele, all worne and cast aside,

Which covered round about with strawe, and tow, they closely hide:

And caryed to some mountaines top, being all with fire light,

They hurle it downe with violence, when darke appeares the night:

Resembling much the Sunne, that from the heavens downe should fal,

A straunge and monstrous sight it seemes, and fearfull to them all;

But they suppose their mischiefes all are likewise throwne to hell,

And that from harmes and daungers now, in safetie here they dwell_."[397]

From these general descriptions, which to some extent still hold good,

or did so till lately, we see that the main features of the midsummer

fire-festival resemble those which we have found to characterize the

vernal festivals of fire. The similarity of the two sets of ceremonies

will plainly appear from the following examples.

[The Midsummer fires in Germany; the celebration at Konz on the Moselle:

the rolling of a burning wheel down hill.]

A writer of the first half of the sixteenth century informs us that in

almost every village and town of Germany public bonfires were kindled on

the Eve of St. John, and young and old, of both sexes, gathered about

them and passed the time in dancing and singing. People on this occasion

wore chaplets of mugwort and vervain, and they looked at the fire

through bunches of larkspur which they held in their hands, believing

that this would preserve their eyes in a healthy state throughout the

year. As each departed, he threw the mugwort and vervain into the fire,

saying, "May all my ill-luck depart and be burnt up with these."[398] At

Lower Konz, a village prettily situated on a hillside overlooking the

Moselle, in the midst of a wood of walnut-trees and fruit-trees, the

midsummer festival used to be celebrated as follows. A quantity of straw

was collected on the top of the steep Stromberg Hill. Every inhabitant,

or at least every householder, had to contribute his share of straw to

the pile; a recusant was looked at askance, and if in the course of the

year he happened to break a leg or lose a child, there was not a gossip

in the village but knew the reason why. At nightfall the whole male

population, men and boys, mustered on the top of the hill; the women and

girls were not allowed to join them, but had to take up their position

at a certain spring half-way down the slope. On the summit stood a huge

wheel completely encased in some of the straw which had been jointly

contributed by the villagers; the rest of the straw was made into

torches. From each side of the wheel the axle-tree projected about three

feet, thus furnishing handles to the lads who were to guide it in its

descent. The mayor of the neighbouring town of Sierck, who always

received a basket of cherries for his services, gave the signal; a

lighted torch was applied to the wheel, and as it burst into flame, two

young fellows, strong-limbed and swift of foot, seized the handles and

began running with it down the slope. A great shout went up. Every man

and boy waved a blazing torch in the air, and took care to keep it

alight so long as the wheel was trundling down the hill. Some of them

followed the fiery wheel, and watched with amusement the shifts to which

its guides were put in steering it round the hollows and over the broken

ground on the mountainside. The great object of the young men who guided

the wheel was to plunge it blazing into the water of the Moselle; but

they rarely succeeded in their efforts, for the vineyards which cover

the greater part of the declivity impeded their progress, and the wheel

was often burned out before it reached the river. As it rolled past the

women and girls at the spring, they raised cries of joy which were

answered by the men on the top of the mountain; and the shouts were

echoed by the inhabitants of neighbouring villages who watched the

spectacle from their hills on the opposite bank of the Moselle. If the

fiery wheel was successfully conveyed to the bank of the river and

extinguished in the water, the people looked for an abundant vintage

that year, and the inhabitants of Konz had the right to exact a

waggon-load of white wine from the surrounding vineyards. On the other

hand, they believed that, if they neglected to perform the ceremony, the

cattle would be attacked by giddiness and convulsions and would dance in

their stalls.[399]

[The Midsummer fires in Bavaria; Cattle driven through the fire; the new

fire; omens of the harvest drawn from the fires; burning discs thrown

into the air.]

Down at least to the middle of the nineteenth century the midsummer

fires used to blaze all over Upper Bavaria. They were kindled especially

on the mountains, but also far and wide in the lowlands, and we are told

that in the darkness and stillness of night the moving groups, lit up by

the flickering glow of the flames, presented an impressive spectacle. In

some places the people shewed their sense of the sanctity of the fires

by using for fuel the trees past which the gay procession had defiled,

with fluttering banners, on Corpus Christi Day. In others the children

collected the firewood from door to door on the eve of the festival,

singing their request for fuel at every house in doggerel verse. Cattle

were driven through the fire to cure the sick animals and to guard such

as were sound against plague and harm of every kind throughout the year.

Many a householder on that day put out the fire on the domestic hearth

and rekindled it by means of a brand taken from the midsummer bonfire.

The people judged of the height to which the flax would grow in the year

by the height to which the flames of the bonfire rose; and whoever

leaped over the burning pile was sure not to suffer from backache in

reaping the corn at harvest. But it was especially the practice for

lovers to spring over the fire hand in hand, and the way in which each

couple made the leap was the subject of many a jest and many a

superstition. In one district the custom of kindling the bonfires was

combined with that of lighting wooden discs and hurling them in the air

after the manner which prevails at some of the spring festivals.[400] In

many parts of Bavaria it was believed that the flax would grow as high

as the young people leaped over the fire.[401] In others the old folk

used to plant three charred sticks from the bonfire in the fields,

believing that this would make the flax grow tall.[402] Elsewhere an

extinguished brand was put in the roof of the house to protect it

against fire. In the towns about Würzburg the bonfires used to be

kindled in the market-places, and the young people who jumped over them

wore garlands of flowers, especially of mugwort and vervain, and carried

sprigs of larkspur in their hands. They thought that such as looked at

the fire holding a bit of larkspur before their face would be troubled

by no malady of the eyes throughout the year.[403] Further, it was

customary at Würzburg, in the sixteenth century, for the bishop's

followers to throw burning discs of wood into the air from a mountain

which overhangs the town. The discs were discharged by means of flexible

rods, and in their flight through the darkness presented the appearance

of fiery dragons.[404]

[The Midsummer fires in Swabia; omens drawn from the leaps over the

fires; burning wheels rolled down hill; burning the Angel-Man at

Rottenburg.]

In the valley of the Lech, which divides Upper Bavaria from Swabia, the

midsummer customs and beliefs are, or used to be, very similar. Bonfires

are kindled on the mountains on Midsummer Day; and besides the bonfire a

tall beam, thickly wrapt in straw and surmounted by a cross-piece, is

burned in many places. Round this cross as it burns the lads dance with

loud shouts; and when the flames have subsided, the young people leap

over the fire in pairs, a young man and a young woman together. If they

escape unsmirched, the man will not suffer from fever, and the girl will

not become a mother within the year. Further, it is believed that the

flax will grow that year as high as they leap over the fire; and that if

a charred billet be taken from the fire and stuck in a flax-field it

will promote the growth of the flax.[405] Similarly in Swabia, lads and

lasses, hand in hand, leap over the midsummer bonfire, praying that the

hemp may grow three ells high, and they set fire to wheels of straw and

send them rolling down the hill. Among the places where burning wheels

were thus bowled down hill at Midsummer were the Hohenstaufen mountains

in Wurtemberg and the Frauenberg near Gerhausen.[406] At Deffingen, in

Swabia, as the people sprang over the midsummer bonfire they cried out,

"Flax, flax! may the flax this year grow seven ells high!"[407] At

Rottenburg in Swabia, down to the year 1807 or 1808, the festival was

marked by some special features. About mid-day troops of boys went about

the town begging for firewood at the houses. In each troop there were

three leaders, one of whom carried a dagger, a second a paper banner,

and a third a white plate covered with a white cloth. These three

entered each house and recited verses, in which they expressed an

intention of roasting Martin Luther and sending him to the devil; and

for this meritorious service they expected to be paid, the contributions

being received in the cloth-covered plate. In the evening they counted

up their money and proceeded to "behead the Angel-man." For this

ceremony an open space was chosen, sometimes in the middle of the town.

Here a stake was thrust into the ground and straw wrapt about it, so as

to make a rude effigy of human form with arms, head, and face. Every boy

brought a handful of nosegays and fastened them to the straw-man, who

was thus enveloped in flowers. Fuel was heaped about the stake and set

on fire. When the Angel-man, as the straw-effigy was called, blazed up,

all the boys of the neighbourhood, who had gathered expectantly around,

fell upon him with their wooden swords and hewed him to pieces. As soon

as he had vanished in smoke and flame, the lads leaped backward and

forward over the glowing embers, and later in the evening they feasted

on the proceeds of their collection.[408] Here the Angel-man burnt in

the fire appears to be identified with Martin Luther, to whom, as we

have seen, allusion was made during the house-to-house visitation. The

identification was probably modern, for we may assume that the custom of

burning an effigy in the Midsummer bonfire is far older than the time of

Luther.

[The Midsummer fires in Baden; omens drawn from leaps over the fires;

burning discs thrown into the air; Midsummer fires in Alsace, Lorraine,

the Eifel, the Harz districts and Thuringia; burning barrel swung round

a pole.]