The Celtic Fire Festival, Imbolc is celebrated on the 1st of February. Click the link to read all about it in Lily Wight’s Guide To The Wheel Of The Year.
https://lilywight.com/2013/02/02/imbolc-the-beginners-guide-to-the-wheel-of-the-year/
Posted in Wheel of The Year, tagged Brighid, Brigid, Candlemas, Celtic Festivals, Culture, Events, History, Holiday, Imbolc, Inspiration, Lammas, Life, Lifestyle, Nature, Religion, Spirituality, Spring on January 30, 2015| 3 Comments »
The Celtic Fire Festival, Imbolc is celebrated on the 1st of February. Click the link to read all about it in Lily Wight’s Guide To The Wheel Of The Year.
https://lilywight.com/2013/02/02/imbolc-the-beginners-guide-to-the-wheel-of-the-year/
Posted in Wheel of The Year, tagged 2014, Art, Culture, Events, Halloween, History, Holiday, Life, Lifestyle, Nature, Religion, Samhain, Spirituality, Wheel Of The Year on October 23, 2014| Leave a Comment »
Samhain – pronounced “sow – inn” and known presently as Halloween – is celebrated from sunset to sunset on 31st October to 1st November. It is the most important Fire Festival or Sabbat on the ancient Wheel of The Year calendar.
“Samhain” has been variously translated as “first frost” or “Summer’s end”: opposing suggestions with the same meaning. It is the name for November in ancient and modern Gaelic.
Samhain lies between The Autumn Equinox and The Winter Solstice. It marks the death of the year and the end of the annual agricultural cycle. Many ancient cultures throughout The Western Hemisphere regarded Samhain as their New Year’s Eve.
Samhain is the third and final harvest on The Wheel of The Year calendar. After Lughnasadh (grain and cereals) and Modron (fruit and vegetables) herding communities drove livestock back from…
View original post 423 more words
Posted in Macabre, Wheel of The Year, tagged Arts, Culture, Day of The Dead, Dia de Los Meurtos, Events, Halloween, History, Holiday, Jack O' Lantern, Life, Lifestyle, Nature, Religion, Samhain, Spirituality, Wheel Of The Year on October 29, 2013| 10 Comments »
Updated 23/10/2014
Samhain – pronounced “sow – inn” and known presently as Halloween – is celebrated from sunset to sunset on 31st October to 1st November. It is the most important Fire Festival or Sabbat on the ancient Wheel of The Year calendar.
“Samhain” has been variously translated as “first frost” or “Summer’s end”: opposing suggestions with the same meaning. It is the name for November in ancient and modern Gaelic.
Samhain lies between The Autumn Equinox and The Winter Solstice. It marks the death of the year and the end of the annual agricultural cycle. Many ancient cultures throughout The Western Hemisphere regarded Samhain as their New Year’s Eve.
Samhain is the third and final harvest on The Wheel of The Year calendar. After Lughnasadh (grain and cereals) and Modron (fruit and vegetables) herding communities drove livestock back from Summer pasture to be housed or slaughtered for winter, furthering the festival’s associations with death. The eighth century scholar, Bede refers to November as the “blood month”.
According to ancient beliefs the mythic courtship of a god and goddess symbolised the eternal rotation of seasons. At Samhain the Goddess, in her crone or hag aspect, midwifes the waning or sacrificed God into the Underworld where he will journey until his rebirth at Yule with the promise of Spring.
Crone Goddesses, such as Celtic Ceridwen and Greek Hecate, ease transitions and guard borders and crossroads. They are keepers of arcane wisdom and herbal lore who are associated with broomsticks (for cleansing thresholds) and cauldrons (for brewing natural medicines). Halloween “witches” are a modern remnant of this frequently misunderstood ancient archetype.
Sexy Halloween witches owe their style to The Morrígan, the Gaelic Dark Mother or Raven Goddess who presides over death and battle – akin to the Scandinavian Valkyries. At Samhain The Morrígan mates with The Dagda (the Gaelic All-Father) to bring creation from chaos.
Samhain is considered a liminal time; when the veil between the mortal and the preternatural realms – the living and the dead – is at its thinnest. Ancestors are remembered and honoured with a variety of worldwide customs that continue to this day, such as the Mexican Dia de Los Meurtos or Day of The Dead.
Costuming for Halloween is an ancient tradition with many possible origins and purposes. Celebrants may have daubed themselves with ash from ritual bonfires or disguised themselves to confuse, deter or even consort with mischievous otherworldly creatures before parading from house to house to collect donations for the Samhain feast: the likely origin of trick or treating.
It wouldn’t be Samhain without a pumpkin lantern. The gourd was the first domesticated plant species and has been used for carving for thousands of years. Pumpkin lamps were carved with fearsome faces as festival decorations; to light parades and repel unwelcome spirits. Jack o’ Lantern was another name for will-o’-the-wisp; strange but naturally occurring flares of marsh gas. Jack o’ Lantern evolved into a folkloric hero who tricks The Devil in a variety of tales. Barred from the afterlife he roams the world forever, carrying a single ember from the fires of Hell in his pumpkin lamp.
Posted in Blog Awards, tagged Arts, Blog, Blog Awards, blogging, Inner Peace, Inspiration, Life, Musinings, Religion, Spirituality, WordPress, Writing, Writing 2013 on July 9, 2013| 1 Comment »
The greatest gift is the surprise you didn’t know you needed; so gracious thanks to shiny Summer, Contributing Editor at Grow Your Innerself, for the Inner Peace Award with the accompanying words ~
Sweet you,
I’ve an award for you, for the person who you are and the things you share with the world.
Thank you for that..
Namasté, Summer
Namasté indeed 🙂
We’ll be awarding a little more peace to bloggers who create beautiful spaces on the web next month!
Posted in Wheel of The Year, tagged Easter, Easter Egg, Events, History, Inspiration, Lent, Life, Mad March Hare, Nature, Ostara, Pagan, Photography, Religion, Spirituality, Spring Equinox, Vernal Equinox, Wheel Of The Year, Wicca, Ēostre on March 20, 2013| 11 Comments »
Updated 19/03/2015
Ostara (Old High German) or Ēostre (Old English) falls upon 20th March. It is one of eight ancient Wheel Of The Year festivals denoting seasonal shifts.
Ostara marks The Vernal (meaning “youthful”) Equinox: the height of Spring.
Daylight and darkness are balanced at The Equinox, prior to the lengthening of days: a period sometimes referred to as Lent. It is a time to celebrate fecundity and growth.
Ostara is named for an ancient Germanic goddess and the month that bears her name; Ôstarmânoth, now April.
Ostara is a dawn goddess associated to the Greek Eos and the Roman Aurora. She represents the resurrection of light following the death of Winter.
Ostara’s totem animal is the hare: a symbol of fertility dating back to prehistoric times. The hare was admired for its enthusiastic mating rituals and it’s associations to moon goddesses and the female reproductive cycle.
Eggs are an ancient symbol of renewal, fertility and life-force. They can be decorated to represent the wishes we hope will manifest in the coming summer.
Eggs were used to play a number of festival games such as treasure hunts, races and relays (our modern egg and spoon race).
Ostara is a solar festival so bonfires, hearth fires and candles can also be lit.
The daffodil or “harbinger of Spring” is the traditional flower of the Ostara festival.
Posted in Lego, tagged Construction, Design, Entertainment, Galleries, Lego, Lego Hell, Lego Sculpture, Religion, Sculpture, Spirituality, toys on February 7, 2013| 5 Comments »
Libera Nos A Malo (Deliver Us From Evil) ©Icare.
Click the smiley for a Lego interpretation of Dante’s Inferno! 🙂
Posted in Macabre, Victoriana, tagged Blog, Cage Coffin, Cemetery, Coffin, Features, Gothic, Grave Robbing, Graveyard, History, Photography, Religion, Truth & Rumours, Vampire, Victorian on May 16, 2012| 8 Comments »
Amazing!
Although this is a bit different from what I usually post, I came upon this picture on the internet and just had to share. I have read and watched a lot on the subject of the undead and vampires, and even read about this cage over graves before. However, I have never actually seen a picture of one before and found it unique. So, I know what your asking, “so what does this have to do with this site and why is it posted?” Well, it has to do with the Victorian era and all of their superstitions and what we now know of as irrational fears.
The caged grave as seen above was used to prevent one of two things. 1: If you were to come back alive and become a walking undead then you wouldn’t be able to remove yourself from this cage and you could be dealt…
View original post 318 more words