# caturday may beltane walpurgisnacht sea art quote easter spring easter2022 womensart gallowayfolklore folklore lore plantlore

On May 1st, it’s maypole time. An old European tradition cheering the midpoint between the spring & summer solstice, the joy of warm weather, & agrarian hope —bliss was had with festive fun & flirting. Puritans loathed the unbridled joy, which made it more fun 😉

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2022-05-01

Never tease a cat, especially not tonight on Walpurgis eve, it will turn into a witch and harm you...

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2022-04-30

Place three pieces of coal under your butter churn to keep the fairies out of it, tie a pole to your cow’s tail so that they can’t steal your milk. Leave some for them on your doorstep or at a fairy tree. Dress the horns of your herd with flowers for luck.

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2022-04-30

A girl sleeping in a fairy rath on May eve was carried off by the Aos Sí, leaving only a shadow body, was reclaimed with proper rituals, complains she:

"...it is all gone, and you have brought me back, and I shall never, never see the beautiful palace more”

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2022-04-30

Hawthorn flowers are also called blossom. They are sacred to the goddess Brighid when she brings new life & fertility & appear from April until June. Known as a faery tree, the hawthorn should never be harmed, & brings love & healing to the heart.

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2022-04-30

A potent beauty charm was believed to be hawthorn dew on May Day.

'The fair maid who, on the first May,
Goes to the fields at break of day,
Washes in dew from the hawthorn tree,
Will ever after handsome be'.


🎨 John Waterhouse

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2022-04-30

“Walpurgis Night, when, according to the belief of millions of people, the devil was abroad - when the graves were opened and the dead came forth and walked. When all evil things of earth and air and water held revel."
~ Bram Stoker

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2022-04-30


Many items are regarded as bad luck to keep inside one’s home. Some are practical (garden hoe, open umbrella). Others are harbingers of bad luck. It is believed that displaying paintings or photographs of scenes of disasters will bring distress to your home.

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2022-04-23

I am an optimist about things in general, but I look upon the sea as the ancients viewed their gods, with superstition. ~ E.A. Pye (Sea View by Moonlight by Ivan Aivazovsky)

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2022-04-17

Lily of the Valley is one of the lilies of Originally linked to Ostara, the ancient Germanic goddess of the flower symbolises the arrival of new light & life. Image: Cicely Mary Barker

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2022-04-16

🌊🧜‍♀️🌊In Rostherne Mere, Cheshire, a church bell lost long ago in its waters can be heard chiming at dawn on Easter Sunday - it's said that a mermaid swims through a subterranean channel from the river Mersey to ring the bell and sit upon it to sing.

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2022-04-16

Eating Flowers by Liz Grounds
According to the 1903 book "Encyclopaedia of Superstitions, Folklore, And The Occult Sciences Of The World" good luck will ensue on your birthday if you eat primroses. Please note that the book is highly unreliable.

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2022-04-09

Botticelli depicted Venus arriving at the shore after her birth, having emerged from the sea fully-grown.
"…she was carried over the waves of the resounding sea on soft foam. The gold-filleted Horae happily welcomed her & clothed her with heavenly raiment…"

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2022-04-09

My late grandmother would say that Galloway was the last stronghold of the Ancient Folk (faeries).
In 1850 a hawthorn tree halted the widening of the road between Glenluce and Newton Stewart because it was 'faerie property'.


art: Joanna Wolska

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2022-04-02

If you wash sheets on Holy Thursday you will be laid out in those sheets as a corpse before the next Holy Thursday comes...

Yorkshire Folk-Lore (1909)

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2022-04-02

🌸🍀🌸To dream of violets foretells good fortune and a change for the better in the dreamer's life.

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2022-03-27



Christmas rose was considered a protective plant, able to drive away evil spirits

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2022-03-26

Tsubaki blooms are associated with death and oddities in Japan, and are forbidden from hospitals. When a tsubaki tree is a century old, it manifests a spirit, often a seductive young woman, whose breath alone can shapeshift a human.

🖼: M. Meyer

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2022-03-26

While Narcissus gave his name to naecissus flowers, they are themselves sacred to Persephone and spring: when stolen by Hades, she was picking them, and when returning along the Styx to the world above, they grew: they are signs of her return.

🖼: W. Crane

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2022-03-26

In England it’s thought the lily of the valley’s scent attracts nightingales, helping them find their mates. Less pleasantly, if someone gives you the flower, they must plant it for you or your family will suffer a death before year’s end
🎨Shodo Kawarazaki

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2022-03-26