Down with the rosemary and bays,
Down with the mistletoe;
Instead of holly, now up-raise
The greener box, for show.
The holly hitherto did sway;
Let box now domineer,
Until the dancing Easter-day,
Or Easter’s eve appear.
From Ceremonies of Candlemas Eve by Robert Herrick (1591-1674).
Imbolc or Imbolg, also called Brigid’s Day, is a Gaelic traditional festival marking the beginning of spring. It is held on 1 February, or about halfway between the winter solstice and the spring equinox. Historically, it was widely observed throughout Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man.
Date: Saturday, February 1, 2020 (sometimes Feb 2)
Significance: beginning of spring
Celebrations: feasting, making Brigid’s crosses and Brídeógs, visiting holy wells, divination, spring cleaning
Also called: Lá Fhéile Bríde (Irish), Là Fhèill Brìghde (Scottish Gaelic), Laa’l Breeshey (Manx)
Imbolg means “in the bag” but is understood as “in the belly” and refers to the coming of milk and the sheep carrying lambs. It is also the availability of lamb meat during the cold season. Many celebrate Imbolg today without awareness to its significance in the past.
Today, our refrigerators protect us and a multitude of shops are open 24/7… But just imagine that there are no shops and its windy, dark, wet and cold and the only foods you have are the seeds for the next years crop / harvest and all the time you know that there are a multitude of young lambs “in the belly” and the importance of this cross-quarter day become real.
Imbolg is also called Imbolc, Oimelc, Candlemas, Feast of Lights, and Brigit’s Day and this is so because the original connection to the daughter of the Dagda (Bríd) was displaced by succeeding religions that today honour St Brigid.
February 2 is also Groundhog’s Day (USA). The groundhog is a manifestation of the God. He has been sleeping since Samhain and stirs in his slumber to get a take on the coming light.
- If Candlemas day be sunny and bright, Winter again will show its might.
- If Candlemas day be cloudy and grey, Winter soon will pass away.
Originally one of the four great Celtic fire festivals, it was later to be Christianized as St Brigid’s day, celebrated on February 1st. Brigid was herself probably based on the Celtic goddess Brigit. She is often seen as having two sisters, also bearing the same name, making her, in effect, a Triple Goddess. She had governance over all things which rose up high or that elevated the soul. She ruled flames and fire, hill-forts and mountain tops, wisdom and intelligence, poetry and the craft of the blacksmith, healing and skilled warfare (a thing admired in Celtic society) and the art of Druidry.
Her most familiar symbol is that of the Brigit’s Cross (also called Brigid’s cross, Brighid’s cross, or Crosóg Brigde). This is an object generally made from rushes and sometimes straw. It has four arms that emanate from a square center and is reminiscent of a fylfot (similar to a swastika) sun wheel, hinting that it was probably originally a symbol of this type. Even today these are a common sight in Celtic lands; most especially in Ireland where a folk belief persists that Brigit’s Cross will protect a house from fire. Celebrations and rituals for Brigit typically took the form of welcoming the goddess into the homestead with the idea that fertility would be ensured for the coming months ahead. For example, on the Isle of Man, people would gather green rushes and stand in their doorways, holding them whilst saying:
“Brede, Brede, tar gys my thie tar dyn thie ayms noght. Foshil jee yn dorrys da Brede, as lhig da Brede e heet staigh“, which when translated means “Bridget, Bridget, come to my house, come to my house tonight. Open the door for Bridget and let Bridget come in” .
The rushes are of course phallic symbols and the call to come in is an invitation to be impregnated. This was echoed in the Hebrides, where a family would dress up a sheaf of corn in female clothing and then lay the doll in a basket that contained a wooden club.
Other Pagan festivities from this month emphasized purification as a means to ensure fertility. Indeed, the word February derives from the Latin februare, meaning “to purify”. Perhaps most significant of the festivities and rituals centered on this theme was the Roman Lupercalia, which had as its aim the success of crops and animal husbandry, as well as the general prosperity and welfare of the people.
The festival was celebrated near the cave of the Lupercal, just outside Rome, from where Romulus and Remus, the founders of that city, were believed to have been suckled by a she-wolf. Goats and a dog would be sacrificed and it may have been that originally the sacrifice was human. The skins of these animals, known as februa, were then cut into strips and these were used by priests to whip girls and young women around the walls of the city. Strange as it may seem to us today, this was believed to ensure fertility and make child birth easier. There is also a theory that suggests that the origins of St Valentine’s Day [6] come from this festival, as lovers would have paired off to make the best use of the sexual license at this time.
As well as fertility and purification, February was also traditionally a time to renew protection of one’s home and well-being. The seventeenth century poems of clergyman Robert Herrick, show that this aspect of Pagan celebrations survived happily in Christian England. His poem The Ceremonies for Candlemas Day speaks of how the Yule log would be relit and then saved to light a new log the following Christmas, with the object of keeping a home from harm:
Kindle the Christmas brand, and then
Till sunset let it burn;
Which quench’d, then lay it up again,
Till Christmas next return.
Part must be kept, wherewith to tend
The Christmas log next year:
And where ’tis safely kept, the fiend
Can do no mischief there.
As well as vestiges of these old Pagan practices, the modern festival of Imbolg has some distinctly Christian overtones provided by the celebration of Candlemas. In 494 CE this event replaced the Lupercalia, when Pope Gelasius created a feast of the Purification of the Virgin, also commemorating the presentation of Jesus to the temple. The chief feature of the ceremony used to be the lighting of candles on February the 2nd and it is probably from this practice that the use of a multitude of candles in the Wiccan celebration derives.