Hag Stone Journal

May Day

May Day

031
April 21 to April 27
In This Issue: Journal Prompt, Meditation, Home, Outdoors, Community, Body, Magic, Poem / Quote, Craft, Cookery, Moon Phases, Activism, Recommendations, Next Week

May Day, an ancient spring holiday falling between the spring equinox and the summer solstice, celebrates fertility in all its many forms. On May 1st, rituals for the blessing of fertile lands, fertile livestock, fertile bodies, and fertile minds will take place across Europe and in the new homelands of the European diaspora.

The quaint Medieval vision of children dancing with ribbons around a maypole may have its roots in the Roman festival Floralia, which celebrated Flora, goddess of flowers. Floralia, held in late April, was celebrated with theatrical performances, the release of hares and goats, and competitions. Every three years, the Floralia would occur during the Maiouma, a month-long festival of nocturnal revels honoring Dionysus and Aphrodite. The Maiouma was known for orgies of food and licentiousness and was banned during the reign of Emperor Constantine, the first Christian Roman emperor. Yet, blossoming from that ancient Roman festival, May Day celebrations of fertility have continued, observed with flowers, maypoles, dancing, and bonfires.

This May Day, my desires for fertility include a fertile garden, as well as a fertile mind and fertile spirit. I connect to fertile energy through all the things I want to create.

I also pray for our land to be fertile, for flowers to bloom in abundance and for food to grow to feed us all. I want my relationships to be fertile grounds for love, caring, fun, and kindness. I want my community to be fertile with unity and support. I want the many artists and creators that I know to have the blessing of fertility as they birth their restorative, meaningful art into the world. And I want our fertile hearts to grow in love, kindness, and mercy, and to seek out those aspects in the hearts of our neighbors.

May Day is a very potent time to define your fertile hopes, wishes, and dreams. Try some May Day inspired ritual activities to connect to the spirit of fertility and spring.


By Heather Gray

Journal Prompt

What feels fertile to you now? What actions can you take to honor and invest in that fertility?

I am very committed to working in my backyard garden this year. I want to go out every morning and dig up weeds, water the plants, and nibble on the fresh vegetables and fruit.

I am also feeling the very fertile ground of fairy tales, and I am excited to research more fairy tale themes for Hag Stone Journal.

Meditation

It was an old May Day tradition for young women in Edinburgh, Scotland to climb to the highest point of the city, Arthur’s Seat, and wash their face with morning dew.

Washing one’s face with morning dew is also a May Day ritual for rural Romanian women. In Ireland, women would sometimes roll in the dew. May Day dew is thought to confer youthfulness and attractiveness.

Imagine the sense of potent magic of May Day that folks felt: even the dew was charged with fertility-related powers. Tap into that magic. Wake up with the dawn on May Day and wash your face with dew. Imbue yourself with the fertility and fecundity to create whatsoever you desire.

Cookery

Asparagus and Goat Cheese Frittata

  • 1 tbsp olive oil
  • 1 tbsp onion, finely diced
  • ½ lb asparagus, trimmed and cut into ½” pieces
  • 4 large eggs
  • ½ cup crumbled goat cheese
  • ⅓ cup heavy cream
  • 2 dashes of Tabasco sauce
  • 1 tsp salt
  • Pepper to taste

Directions:

Heat olive oil in ovenproof skillet or cast-iron pan over medium heat. Add onion and cook, stirring occasionally, until translucent, about 3 minutes.

Add chopped asparagus and cook, stirring occasionally, until just tender, about 6 minutes.

Preheat broiler to high.

In medium bowl, whisk together eggs, cream, Tabasco, salt, and pepper to taste. Pour eggs over asparagus and stir to combine.

Dot surface of egg mixture with crumbled goat cheese.

Cook, without stirring, until eggs are set on the bottom and beginning to set on top, about 5 minutes.

Transfer skillet to oven and broil, 4-5” from heating element, until eggs are completely set, about 2 minutes.

Cut into wedges and serve hot or at room temperature.

 

Craft

This May Day, crown yourself May Queen with a beautiful flower crown.

Supplies:

  • Twine
  • Scissors
  • Flowers (fresh or artificial)
  • Floral tape

Directions:

Measure out enough twine to loosely fit around the crown of your head. Don’t make it too tight, because you want to leave room for the flowers.  

I used artificial flowers for this crown. The flowers I used were already attached to wire that I wound around the twine. I could have also attached the flowers with green floral tape.

I used flowers of different sizes and colors, as well as green leaves to flesh out a very full crown.

Happy May Day!

Home

May Day is celebrated by decorating your home, inside and out, with greenery and flowers. Green branches are placed over doors and as table centerpieces, and green leaves are woven into wreaths for doors.

In Greece, green wreaths bedecked with wildflowers are hung on doors until Midsummer Night/St. John’s Eve, when they are burned in bonfires. It was an old custom for young people to take turns jumping over the burning wreaths– perhaps a revival of May Day competitions in the ancient Floralia festival.

In Romania, green branches were used to decorate gates for good luck, and were kept in place until the wheat harvest, when they were burned in a fire that was used to bake the first bread from the new wheat.

In Wales, folks gather hawthorn branches (May Day is the only time of the year it is considered safe to cut this tree that is special to the fairies) to decorate the outside of their houses.

Yellow flowers were a favorite in Ireland and Scotland. Hawthorn flowers – as well as primrose, rowan, hazel, and gorse – decorated doorways and windows, and were made into bouquets and fastened to cows and to the equipment used for milking and butter making.

It was also popular in Ireland, through the late 19th century, to decorate a May Bush. A small tree outside of the home would be decorated with flowers, ribbons, and painted shells. A branch of hawthorn could also be used as the May Bush. Some folklorists suppose that the tradition of decorating a May Bush is associated with tree worship and inviting the blessing of the spirit of the tree. Thorn trees were usually decorated because they are associated with fairies. It is possible the May Bush is the origin of the maypole, as it was custom in some parts of Ireland to dance around the May Bush and then burn it in a sacred bonfire. (Other places would leave the May Bush decorated for the entire month of May.)

This May Day, either from the wild or from a store, gather greenery and flowers for your home. You can put green wreaths on your door, branches of green on your gate, and yellow flowers in your window boxes and on your cow.

Also consider getting the family together to decorate a bush or branch with ribbons, flowers, and painted shells. Invite the spirit of the tree, the goddess of May, the Green Man and Green Woman, or your God to bless you, your family, and your home.

Outdoors

Maypoles are a traditional icon of May Day festivals. Wooden poles wreathed with garlands of greenery and flowers are paraded through the village and often erected on the village green. Long colorful ribbons hanging from the maypole are braided around the pole in intricate weaving dances.

While maypoles may have been part of a pagan fertility ritual, their use was first recorded in a medieval Christian context. Chaucer mentions in his writing of a particularly large maypole erected by church parishioners at St. Andrew Undershaft in London.  

The erecting of maypoles on May Day was outlawed in Britain during the Protestant Reformation, reinstated during the reign of the Catholic Queen Mary, outlawed again by parliament during the Interregnum for “Heathenish vanity, generally abused to superstition and wickedness”, and then finally returned to the people with the Restoration in 1660, when “maypoles were put up at every crossway”, according to English writer John Aubrey.

The history of the maypole was also contentious in early America. In 1628, William Bradford, the governor of New Plymouth (what would become Plymouth, Massachusetts), wrote about an incident where a number of indentured servants broke away to create their own colony:

“They also set up a May-pole, drinking and dancing about it many days togaether, inviting the Indean women, for their consorts, dancing and frisking togither, (like so many fairies, or furies rather,) and worse practises. As if they had anew revived & celebrated the feasts of the Roman Goddess Flora, or the beasly practieses of the madd Bacchinalians. Morton likwise (to shew his poetrie) composed sundry rimes & verses, some tending to lasciviousnes, and others to the detraction & scandall of some persons, which he affixed to this idle or idoll May-polle. They changed also the name of their place, and instead of calling it Mounte Wollaston, they call it Merie-mounte, as if this joylity would have lasted ever. But this continued not long, for after Morton was sent for England, shortly after came over that worthy gentleman, Mr. John Indecott, who brought a patent under the broad seall, for the governmente of the Massachusetts, who visiting those parts caused the May-polle to be cutt downe, and rebuked them for their profannes, and admonished them to looke ther should be better walking; so they now, or others, changed the name of their place againe, and called it Mounte-Dagon.”

American author, Nathaniel Hawthorne, wrote about this incident in his short story The May-pole of Merry Mount, in which Hawthorne satires both the free-loving Merry Mount colonists and the Puritan Endicott.

The maypole tradition carries on in the United States. In Philadelphia, Bryn Mawr college has a maypole tradition that goes back to its founding:

 

May Day is a perfect time to dance outdoors and celebrate the return of summer and the power of fertility.

Body

Historically, May Day is celebrated with dancing: dancing around a bonfire, dancing around the maypole, and Morris dancing. Morris dancing is a choreographed English folk dance where the dancers wear bells and sometimes incorporate into the dance the clapping together of sticks/swords or the waving of handkerchiefs.

The history of Morris dancing stretches back to the mid-1400s, and by the mid-1700s was associated with May Day celebrations. Like many countryside folk customs, Morris dancing fell out of common practice in the mid-1800s. But, fortunately, it experienced a revival in the early days of the 20th century. There are now Morris dancing organizations around the world, with 150 teams (called sides) in the United States.

There are six styles of Morris dancing, each with their own traditions. For example, the North West has a tradition of mixed gender sides and intricate steps with a garlanded wicker hoop, whereas the Border Morris tradition is known for costumes decorated with ribbons, strips of cloth, or colored paper; and an emphasis on stick clapping.

Traditional musical accompaniment for Morris dancing was a pipe and tabor or violin, but now a melodeon, a type of accordion, is most common.

 

 

What traditional folk dances are associated with your culture? Irish stepping? The Polish Krakowiak? Swedish folk dancing? Dancing the Hora? Consider taking a folk dancing class from any culture that excites you or that is available in your area. And consider dancing to welcome May.

Moon Phases

April 26th is the Second Quarter Moon.

Magic

May Day coincides with the ancient Gaelic festival Beltane. Beltane, meaning “bright fire”, is one of four cross quarter days, along with Samhain, Imbolc, and Lughnasadh. Observed throughout the Gaelic lands of Ireland, Scotland, and the Isle of Man, it marked the beginning of summer, when cattle were driven out to their summer pastures.

Ritual bonfires were kindled on Beltane, and cattle and people walked around or between the fires to receive blessings for the coming season. Feasts were held, and portions of food and drink– and even small portions of blood from the cattle– were offered to the fairies and spirits. Houses were adorned with yellow flowers, May Bushes were decorated, and maidens washed their faces with the morning dew.

The ritual bonfire is thought to have been the most important aspect of the Beltane festivities. All other fires in the house and village were put out and then rekindled from the sacred bonfire. The smoke and ashes were believed to have protective qualities, and would be rubbed on the bodies of people and livestock. Torches lit from the sacred bonfire would be carried around the boundary of the home to consecrate the dwelling.

In some parts of Scotland, a symbolic human sacrifice was enacted. A person would leap over the fire three times, and then, for some period of time afterwards, would be spoken of as if dead.

Sumer Is Icumen In

– A medieval English Round

Middle English:

Svmer is icumen in

Lhude sing cuccu

Groweþ sed

and bloweþ med

and springþ þe wde nu

Sing cuccu

 

Awe bleteþ after lomb

lhouþ after calue cu

Bulluc sterteþ

bucke uerteþ

murie sing cuccu

 

Cuccu cuccu

Wel singes þu cuccu

ne swik þu nauer nu

 

Sing cuccu nu • Sing cuccu.

Sing cuccu • Sing cuccu nu

 

Modern English:
Summer has arrived,

Sing loudly, cuckoo!

The seed is growing

And the meadow is blooming,

And the wood is coming into leaf now,

Sing, cuckoo!

 

The ewe is bleating after her lamb,

The cow is lowing after her calf;

The bullock is prancing,

The billy-goat farting,

Sing merrily, cuckoo!

 

Cuckoo, cuckoo,

You sing well, cuckoo,

Never stop now.

 

Sing, cuckoo, now; sing, cuckoo;

Sing, cuckoo; sing, cuckoo, now!

 

Listen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMCA9nYnLWo

Community

This May Day, in one of your communities, you could revive the tradition on giving out May Baskets.

You could also consider hosting a May Day garden party with asparagus frittata, cake, and wine. Guests can make flower crowns, decorate a May Bush, and you can all end with a bonfire.

Or perhaps your community is hosting something akin to this amazing Beltane Fire Society festival in Edinburgh:

Activism

In many parts of the world, May 1st is International Workers Day, a day to celebrate laborers and the working class. For many countries, it is the history of labor unions and workers’ rights that come to mind, not a spring festival, when they think of May Day.

May 1st was the day chosen to commemorate the tragic Haymarket affair of 1886, in which a peaceful labor demonstration in Chicago’s Haymarket Square turned deadly when an unknown person threw a bomb at the police. Seven police officers and four civilians were killed, and dozens were injured in the ensuring riot.

The workers were striking for better working conditions: specifically for an 8 hour work day.

At the time, the working population in Chicago– many of whom were immigrants– were laboring 60 hours a week, 6 days a week, for $1.50 a day. Employers fired and blacklisted union members and strikers, and hired thugs to disrupt union meetings and spies to infiltrate those unions and create ethnic tension to divide members.

The aftermath of the Haymarket Affair was seen as a miscarriage of justice by the international community. Hundreds of labor leaders and workers were rounded up, and four were executed by hanging.

Today, in most countries around the world, May Day is a public holiday with large workforce parades, and is called Labor Day or Workers’ Day. Citizens commemorate their own countries’ histories of organizing for workers’ rights, and honor the folks who lost their lives in the fight for better working conditions. Today, May Day demonstrations are mostly peaceful, with singing and parades, but there also continue to be moments of violent conflict between workers and police.

Even though Labor Day is officially celebrated in September in the United States, there are still protests, parades, and rallies for workers in most major cities on May Day. As we head towards May Day, we can educate ourselves on the history of labor movements; the people who fought for better and safer working conditions like the 8 hour work day, weekends, and child labor laws; and what workers are currently fight for in our country and in our states.

 

Recommendations

I recommend The Wicker Man, the British horror movie from 1973. In this cult classic, a British police officer investigates a pagan cult’s mysterious and sinister May Day festival.

 

Next Week

Next week we will explore the sacred lore of the Green Man.