Beltane

 

Beltane, the Eve of May, is when green life begins its return in the northern temperate zones – and how I miss it!  Six months in opposite, Samhain, aka Halloween, is when vegetation dies and when one must feed cattle from stored-up fodder for the following six months. 

Beltane is the Celtic “beginning of summer”, when cattle were driven out of their winter barns to the greening pastures.  After six months locked in winter stanchions, my father would let the cows out in the first week or two of May, when the grass was a-growin’ again.  The cows would buck and jump and run with wild excitement, and they would gorge themselves on new green grass.  Father’s favorite months of the year were always May and June. 

This holiday is also called Walpurgis Night in northern Europe.  One can consider it the Springtime Halloween.  Witches’ revel on that night, as in Goethe’s classic Faust as well as in certain Dracula stories. 

(Also, it is Camerone Day.  Vive La Legion!) 

-Zenwind. 

.