Imbolc

© ANNA FRANKLIN

——— Then came cold February, sitting
In an old waggon, for he could not ride,
Drawne of two fishes, for the season fitting,
Which through the flood before did softly slyde
And swim away; yet had he by his side
His plough and harnesse fit to till the ground,
And tooles to prune the trees before the pride
Of hasting prime did make them burgeon round.

Spenser.

Imbolc is the modern Pagan festival that marks the return of spring and life after the darkness and death of winter. It was one of the four pastoral festivals of our Celtic ancestors, but was also recognised and celebrated in other parts of the world under different names. It was finally Christianised as Candlemas, and some witches still call it by this name.

After Yule, the winter solstice- the longest night and shortest day of the year, with around only six hours of daylight here in Britain- light increases at the rate of two minutes a day, and by the Imbolc, this increase is very conspicuous. The Earth can be seen responding to it, and begins to stir back into action. Snowdrops and crocuses flower and early trees begin to bud. Animals start to emerge from hibernation and lambing begins - an obvious sign of regeneration and renewal. 

Various scholars have derived the word Imbolc from Ol-melc (ewe's milk) because the ewes are lactating at this time, or from Im-bolg (in the belly) implying the swelling belly of the Earth Goddess, or folcaim (I wash) because this is a time of purification.

In the Craft, we celebrate Imbolc as the time when the Hag of Winter is transformed into the Spring Goddess, renewed in her virginity. In ancient Rome young boys would play a game in which an old woman released a dragon [presumably representing winter] which must be fought and overcome, while a young maiden released a lamb. The winter hag Bera released Brigit in spring, according to the Scots.

In The Months, Leigh Hunt comments that

"If February were not the precursor of spring, it would be the least pleasant season of the year, November not excepted. The thaws now take place; and a clammy mixture of moisture and cold succeeds, which is the most disagreeable of wintery sensations."

 The coming of Imbolc is inextricably linked to the ending of the winter season of rest and withdrawal. Very little work was done on the land from Samhain [Halloween] till Imbolc. Many Candlemas carols talk of the return to work:

             Christmas hath made an end,

             Well-a-day! well-a-day!

              Which was my dearest friend,

              More is the pity!

              For with an heavy heart

              Must I from thee depart,

              To follow plough and cart

              All the year after.

It was also the also the time of the ploughing of the first furrow into which the corn dolly, kept safely in the farmhouse since the harvest, would be inserted to return fertility to the land. The ploughs would have been brought out, cleaned and blessed on Plough Monday [the first Monday after Twelfth Night] to make them ready.

Though we now consider Twelfth Night to be the end of the Yuletide season, in the past many considered this was Candlemas:

              When New Year's Day is past and gone;

              Christmas is with some people done;

              But further some will it extend,

              And at Twelfth Day their Christmas end.

              Some people stretch it further yet,

              At Candlemas they finish it.

              The gentry carry it further still

              And finish it just when they will;

              They drink good wine and eat good cheer

              And keep their Christmas all the year. [i]

Like Twelfth Night, it was marked by games, dancing and feasting presided over by the Lord of Misrule or Abbot of Unreason.  The Yule log was often burned up until Candlemas Eve. Robert Herrick (1591-1674) wrote:

End now the white-loafe and the pye,

And let all sports with Christmas dye.
        *        *        *
Kindle the Christmas Brand, and then
Till sunne-set let it burne,
Which quencht, then lay it up agen,
Till Christmas next returne.

Part must be kept wherewith to teend
The Christmas Log next yeare;
And where 'tis safely kept, the fiend
Can do no mischiefe there.[ii]

The custom prevailed in some parts of Britain until the early twentieth century. Even now in Rome, the manger scenes are left up until Candlemas. 

In England, this was the time to take down the Yuletide decorations. Robert Herrick wrote four poems about Candlemas. One contains instructions for removing greenery at Candlemas, and a warning what will happen if you don’t:

Down with the rosemary, and so

Down with the bays and mistletoe;

Down with the holly, ivy, all

Wherewith ye deck's the Christmas hall;

That so the superstitious find

Not one least branch there left behind:

For look! How many leaves there be

Neglected there, Maids, trust to me,

So many goblins you shall see.

At this time of year, in January, near to the plough in the sky, on its right are two stars the Pointers, point to the pole star, the last star in the tail of the little bear. Following the Great Bear is the constellation of Boote, the herdsman. When its Brightest star Arcturus or 'Bear Keeper, first rises over the eastern horizon in January, it means that spring is on its way, Arcturus is known as the one who comes, just as Arthur is called the once and future king. The Celtic Goddess Brighid was styled 'daughter of the bear', as her spring festival of Imbolc and follows the rising of Arcturus.

The ancient Celts celebrated Imbolc as the festival of the goddess Brighid when the married women of the tribe would paint themselves with woad and go naked to the festival site to honour the Crone Goddess, the Veiled One, while the younger women would gather gifts to offer at Brighid’s shrine.

Brighid is pan-Celtic goddess, appearing as Brighid or Brigit in Ireland, Brigantia in Northern England, Bride in Scotland, and Brigandu in Brittany. Her name is variously interpreted as deriving from breo-saighead "Fiery Arrow" or "The Bright One", or from the root Sanskrit word Brahti meaning "The Powerful One" or "The High One". She is said to be the daughter of the Dagda ['good god'] and the wife of Bres of the Formors. Her face is either pied, half youthful and half crone, or half beautiful and half ugly.

She was originally a sun and fire goddess, and this is reflected in her legends: she was born at sunrise on threshold of the house as her mother was on her way out to milk the cow, and immediately a tower of flame emerged from her forehead that stretched from earth to heaven, fulfilling a druid’s prophecy that she would be neither born inside or out, or during the day or night. Later a house she was in flamed up to heaven and a fiery pillar rose from her head, she also hung her cloak on sunbeams, cow dung blazed before her, and flames engulfed her body without burning her. In another tale, she carried a burning coal in her apron.

Brighid is a triple goddess, and some say that there are three Brighids: the Brighid of poetry, prophecy and inspiration who invented ogham; the Brighid of healing waters and midwifery; and lastly the Brighid of fire who oversees the hearth and the forge, and who is the patroness of craftsmen and women. This triplication was represented by the Druidic sign of awen ['inspiration'], known as the fiery arrows of Brighid since it is represented by three shafts of sunlight. It was likely Brighid who inspired the line in the famous Song of Amergin: "I am a fire in the head". She also has aspects as a goddess of fertility [including the craft of midwifery], livestock and warfare. She is a goddess of transformation: the transformation of ore to metal objects, seed to birth, inspiration to poetry and the passage from winter to spring.

Brighid was also the patroness of healing wells and springs, since the sun was believed to empower the water at certain times of year. In one story St Brigit fell into a river at nightfall and struck her head on a stone, staining the river red with blood. The water cured two dumb sisters and the stone became a healing stone- in other words, the sun goddess stains water red at sunset and sunrise, and the water she touches heals. This idea of the sun creating healing water at certain times of year is reflected in myths throughout the world. In another story, Brighid dropped a coal which caused a healing well to form at Ardagh. It is said that at Imbolc she dips her fingers in the waters to warm them for her feast day. Sacrifices were made to her where three streams met, and brass coins or rings were thrown into wells in her honour. At Easter people would go to her wells to see the sun dance.

Brighid is very much associated with women’s mysteries. Early 20^th century folklorists recorded prayers to Brighid, invoked for protection and fertility, especially concerning women and children.[iii] Like the Roman Vesta and the Greek Hestia, she is a goddess of the hearth fire. The business of the home rotated around the hearth- it was the place where people met to cook, eat and talk together. The hearth has been the centre of human life for at least 400,000 years. In Celtic tradition the ty teallach or 'hearth' was the heart of the home, and fire was often literally placed centrally in ancient dwelling places, such as Bronze and Iron Age roundhouses. Imagine frozen, blustery winter days, when there was little work that could be done on the land, and when the hours of daylight were short and the nights long. Fire meant the difference between survival and death, between comfort and cold pain. It was the centre of activity, where everyone gathered to eat and cook, to sit and warm themselves, and listen to the stories of the bards. The Latin word for it was focus, since it was the focus of the home. It was a refuge, a place of worship, the shrine of the sacred flame, and a celebration of life.

In many ancient religions, a fire was kept constantly burning to represent the presence of the divine. These would be ceremonially put out and relit on special occasions. The domestic goddess [of which Brighid is an incarnation] protected the home, safeguarding the well-being and security of the inhabitants, as well as its wealth and supplies. As the dwelling place of the living flame, the hearth was a holy place, a threshold between this world and the realm of the gods. Its rising smoke took prayers to the gods of the Upperworld, while the gods of the Worlds Below could be contacted through the hearthstone. The discovery of fire was the most important advance of humankind. It transformed human existence; people could keep warm, cook their food, protect themselves and later use it to shape metals. It has been celebrated and used in festivals throughout the world and employed to encourage that big brother of all fire- the sun- with bonfires, rolling flaming wheels, torches and candles. It is an agent of transformation- the food in the cauldron is changed as it cooks, raw ores and metals are altered into useful objects on the blacksmith’s forge, and it transforms the materials it consumes into ashes, and all these activities fell under the auspices of Brighid.         

As goddess of the hearth fire, she is the guardian of the home’s prosperity, including its inhabitants and animals. In this role she is associated with cattle and the dairy. 'Saint' Brigit was sent a-milking by her mother to make butter, and gave away all the milk to the poor; when the rest of the maids brought in their milk she prayed and the butter multiplied. The butter she gave away she divided into twelve parts. Many ancient people saw the Mother Goddess as a cow, including the Celts who honoured the Earth Cow and the Sky Bull who fertilised her. The twelve parts are the twelve houses of the Zodiac. The cow is seen as nurturing and the provider of life sustaining nourishment with its milk.

Brighid also presides over the forge fire. In the past, the smith was one of the most important members of the community. He made its tools and weapons, working with iron, a metal that changed the face of the ancient world. The first iron fell from the sky in the form of meteorites, a gift of the sky gods. Later iron ore was extracted from deep in the underworld belly of Mother Earth. The metal itself was mysterious, magnetic and stronger than any other. Iron objects were so valuable and holy that they were dedicated to the gods. For example, in a sacred lake in Wales –where offerings were made to the gods-  a seventh century BCE hoard was found which included iron sickles and spear heads. Every object created was a one-off, and had its own personality and in places seem to have been treated almost as sacrificial victims, covered in stones and laid in bogs. Smelting and forging processes were akin to magical rituals. The Celts grouped smiths with Druids as having the power of casting spells and curses. In myth, there is a connection between trades that use fire and magic.[1] The magical reputation of the smith persisted in Europe into the nineteenth century and is still extant in India and Africa. In Britain, it was believed that smiths were blood charmers [healers] and prophets that could foretell the future. In Celtic Europe blacksmiths were housed on the edge of the village, because they worked in dangerous territory- the threshold between the human world and the Otherworld. The smith was a shamanic figure, with one foot in the spirit realms, master of the boundaries between, and author of transformation. At Bryn y Castell [iv] in North Wales there is a forge dating from 230 BCE which is constructed in the form of a spiral. The entrance guards the fire from the prevailing wind, and as one goes further inside there is less and less light. [This was important as it was imperative to note the colours of the iron at its various stages.] In centre of spiral was the forge fire, the secret place where the magic of change was carried out.  The spiral is an ancient symbol of the journey of the sun from death to rebirth, and it is possible that a ritual analogy was being made between the sun’s journey and the magic of the smith whose hammer and the anvil raise sparks as from the sun, reforging the old into the new. In European, Indian and African cultures the smith is associated with spirits of fire, underworld deities and the sun in the underworld [where it travels at night or in winter]. In legend there are several supernatural smiths that dwell underground in the Land of the Dead. There are tales of people being rejuvenated in the smith’s fire or re-forged by a supernatural smith, a metaphor for rebirth or initiation. 

Finding that the worship of the Pagan goddess Brighid was too deeply ingrained to be eradicated, the Christians turned her into a saint, St. Brigid, given the role as the nursemaid of Jesus, though she was supposed to have lived several centuries later in the 5th-6^th century CE, and to have founded an abbey in Kildare. In Christian myth she was the foster mother of Jesus who distracted Herod’s soldiers by dancing with two candles, so that the holy family could escape. This is a direct appropriation of the role of the Pagan goddess nurturing the Child of Light, born at the winter solstice and growing stronger with each passing day, reflected in the increasing light. In Co Leitrim figures of sun, moon and stars are still fixed to a board with Brighid’s cross, symbolising the release of the sun from captivity in the winter.

Lá Fhéile Bríd [Brighid’s Day] was the first of the Celtic spring [still marked as such in Ireland].  On this day, Brighid was said to use her white wand to "breathe life into the mouth of the dead winter"[v]; meaning the white fire of the sun reawakened the land. An old poem stated:

"Today is the day of Bride

The Serpent shall come from the hole."

An effigy of the serpent was often honoured in the ceremonies of this day, making it clear that Brighid had aspects as a serpent goddess. As the serpent sloughed its old skin and was renewed, so the land shook off winter to emerge restored; the snake symbolised the cycle of life. When Brighid's cult was suppressed, then St Patrick had indeed banished the snakes [Pagans] from Ireland. Ironically there are even now many more places in Ireland named after Brighid than Patrick.

Her ancient festival became Candlemas when church candles were blessed. It remained a popular occasion in Celtic areas and most of its customs are plainly Pagan. Brighid was invited into the home by the woman of the house, in the form of a doll or corn dolly dressed in maidenly white with a quartz crystal placed over its heart. Oracles were taken from the ashes of the hearth fire, which people examined for a sign that Brighid had visited, i.e. a mark that looked like a swan's footprint which, if found, was considered a lucky omen. The swan was an ancient attribute of the goddess Brighid. Many Irish homes still have a Brighid's cross hung up somewhere, a kind of modified swastika with four arms; a solar emblem. Similar symbols are found all over northern Europe. These are renewed every Imbolc as a sign of the regeneration of the sun.

The goddess's chief shrine in Ireland was at Kildare [Cull Dara = 'Temple of the Oak'] where a perpetual flame was kept burning behind a circular hedge of shrubs or thorns. It was tended by a college of nineteen virgin priestesses called Daughters of the Flame. Each day a different priestess was responsible for maintaining the flame from sundrise till sundown. On the twentieth day, Brighid herself tended the flame. The number nineteen is significant and shows us we are dealing with a goddess who had solar/lunar aspects. The sun/moon’s progress through the heavens repeats itself every nineteen years [this is known as the Metonic cycle, after the Greek Sage Meton, who first described it]. Many stone circles have nineteen stones, some seem to have a vacant space for a missing twentieth, echoing the cycle of Brighid and her nineteen maidens. Castle Rigg Stone Circle, for example, is orientated to the sunrise at Imbolc. No man was ever allowed to enter the shrine or have contact with the priestesses; any male who did went mad. These priestesses mediated in times of war, like the virgin priestesses of the Roman hearth goddess Vesta.

With the coming of Christianity, the priestesses became nuns of the abbey said to have been founded by 'Saint Brigit' and were called Inghean an Dagha [‘Daughters of Fire’], tending a fire of peat bricks, fed with hawthorn twigs, which was said to burn without ash or waste. The place of the fire was described as being twenty feet square, with a stone roof. The abbey kept the flame burning for another thousand years until 1220 when the Archbishop of Dublin, shocked at this evidence of Pagan of fire-worship under the mask of Christianity, ordered the Kildare fire to be extinguished. It was, however, relit and maintained until the suppression of the nunnery during the reign of Henry VIII. During the Vatican modernisation program of the 1960's St. Brigit was decanonised- the church could find no evidence of such a saint, only a Pagan goddess.

 The other direct ancestor of the Christian festival Candlemas and the modern Pagan Imbolc is the ancient Roman festivals of the Parentalia and Feralia, celebrations of purification in honour of the goddess Juno that were celebrated between February 13^th and 18^th; February used to mark early spring in Rome.

Juno was the goddess of women, marriage and relationships. On February 1^st the Romans celebrated the fest of Juno Sospita [Juno the Saviour]. The consuls made a sacrifice to her, while young girls offered barley-cakes to the sacred snake in her grove [note the association with the snake, as in the case of Brighid]. If their offerings were accepted, their virginity was confirmed and the year's fertility assured. The cave where offerings were made is in Lanuvio, about 40 km from Rome. The name Lanuvio is thought to be derived from "The goddess covered in wool (lana)" since this is the season when ewes give birth.

The opening day of the Parentalia itself was February 13^th, dedicated to peace, love and the household gods. February 14^th was the second day of Parentalia called the Lupercalia. The day was dedicated to Juno-Lupa, the she-wolf.

February 15^th was the second day of Lupercal and the third day of Parentalia. The day is dedicated to Juno Februata [giving its name to February], Juno the Fructifier. Februata was an aspect of the Juno, mother of Mars, god of fire, war and fertility, and there are two possible derivations of the name:  from februare meaning "to expiate, to purify” or from  febris meaning fever, in the sense of the fever of love which strikes the human and animal kingdom in spring, with the warming of the land. It seems to have been a very ancient pastoral rite which persevered into classical times which commemorated young men's passage into manhood to the god Lupercus, a god worshipped for his ability to keep the wolves away from Rome. The celebration featured a lottery in which young men would draw the names of young girls from a box. What happened afterwards varied from place to place. In some areas a girl was assigned to each young man and would be his sweetheart during the remaining year. In others it was the single women who drew the billet with the single man's name on it. The couple would then form a temporary liaison for the erotic games to follow. Unless one or the other of them was unhappy with the selection they would remain partners for the following twelve months. Sometimes marriages resulted from this practice.

A group of priests called Luperci had the sole function of conducting the Lupercalia rites. Cicero described them as:

"A certain wild association of Lupercalian brothers, both plainly pastoral and savage, whose rustic alliance was formed before civilization and laws..." [vi]

The celebration was held in the Lupercal cave on the Palatine Hill in Rome where Romulus and Remus were said to have been sheltered and fed by a she-wolf before founding the city of Rome. Two naked young priests, assisted by Vestal Virgins, would sacrifice a dog and a goat. The dog may have been a substitute for a wolf, or the traditional sacrifice to the underworld powers. Blood from the animals was spread on the two priests' foreheads and wiped off with some wool dipped in milk. The priests then clothed themselves with loincloths made from the skin of the goat. They ran about the city, scourging women with februa (“means of purification") which were strips of skin taken from the sacrificed goat. The Romans believed that this flogging would purify them and assure their future fertility and easy childbirth. The goat is reputed a lusty animal, and therefore associated with fertility in many parts of the world. In the marriage ceremony of the Wawanga of East Africa, for example, a he-goat was killed and a long strip of skin was cut from its belly which is placed over the bride's head. The bridegroom's father then stated: "...if you leave us for any other man, may this skin repudiate you, and may you become barren." [vii] Ovid, in his Fasti, wrote:

In ancient times, purgations had the name
Of Februa, various customs prove the same;
The pontiffs from the rex and flamen crave
A lock of wool; in former days they gave
To wool the name of Februa.
A pliant branch cut from a lofty pine,
Which round the temples of the priests they twine,
Is Februa called; which if the priest demand,
A branch of pine is put into his hand;
In short, with whatsoe'er our hearts we hold
Are purified, was Februa termed of old;
Lustrations are from hence, from hence the name
Of this our month of February came;
In which the priests of Pan processions made;
In which the tombs were also purified
Of such as had no dirges when they died;
For our religious fathers did maintain,
Purgations expiated every stain
Of guilt and sin; from Greece the custom came,
But here adopted by another name;
The Grecians held that pure lustrations could
Efface an impious deed, or guilt of blood
Weak men; to think that water can make clean
A bloody crime, or any sinful stain.[viii]

With the coming of Christianity, the church tried to stamp out the customs associated with the Lupercalia.  In 494 CE, Pope Gelasius I tried to overwrite the festival by designating it the “Feast of the Purification of the Virgin Mary" to mark the time when Mary, the Queen of Heaven, was purified in the temple after giving birth to Christ. Counting forty days after the artificially imposed birth of Jesus on 25^th December, this now fell on February 2^nd, formerly associated with Juno, the Queen of Heaven. This feast is also known as Candlemas, when the church candles are blessed for the coming year.

Pope Sergius wrote:

"Undo this foul use and custom and turn it to God’s worship and our Lady’s... so that now this feast will be considered solemnly hallowed through all Christendom."

In the late fifth century CE the Church took the decision to set the nativity of Christ on December 25^th in order to supplant the Pagan winter solstice festivities, and replace them with a gloss of Christianity. Consequently, the day marking the purification of the Virgin Mary after the birth of Christ was set to February 2^nd. According to Mosaic Law, a woman is unclean for forty days after giving birth to a male child, and needs to be purified before she is fit to re-enter society.  The Church later tried to abolish the Candlemas festival, reasoning that Mary could not have been rendered unclean by giving birth to the Christ Child, but these attempts proved unsuccessful.

In the Catholic Church Candlemas is still celebrated and it still remains a listed feast day in the Church of England. Candlemas candle-carrying remained in England till its abolition by an order in council, in the second year of King Edward VI. In Britain, Candlemas was celebrated with a festival of lights. In the dark and gloomy days of February, the shadowy recesses of medieval churches twinkled brightly as each member of the congregation carried a lighted candle in procession around the church, to be blessed by the priest. Afterwards, the candles were brought home to be used to keep away storms, demons and other evils. This custom lasted in England until it was banned in the Reformation for promoting the veneration of magical objects. Even so, the symbol of the lighted candles had too strong a hold on the popular imagination to be entirely cast aside. Traces of the festival lingered until quite recently in other areas of the British Isles like little lights that refused to be blown out.

In the county of Shropshire, the snowdrop, first flower of spring, took the place of candles, being named, “Candlemas bells,” “Purification flowers” or – with a faint remembrance of Brighid, perhaps – “Fair Maid of February.”