Description

Beltane Ritual Box Use – What is Beltane?

Beltane is the third of eight special holidays in the pagan calendar, or Wheel of the Year.

There are four great fire festivals of the Pagan Celtic year and the modern Witch’s calendar. The two greatest of these are Samhain (the beginning of winter) and Beltane (the beginning of summer). Being opposite of each other, they separate the year into halves.

Your Beltane celebration can begin at sundown of the proceeding day, April 30th, since the Celts figured time from sundown to sundown. At dusk the leaders of the community would light the Bel-fires on the tops of the nearest beacon hills. these ‘need-fires’ had healing properties and everyone would jump through the fire (sky-clad or clothed) to ensure protection from harm for the following year. Frequently, cattle would be driven between two bon fires (oak wood being the favorite fuel) and in the morning, taken to summer pastures.

Various Beltane customs include: walking the circuit of one’s property (beating the bounds), repairing fences and boundary markers, feasting, music, drinking, and bathing your face in the dew of the May morning to retain youth and beauty. The most recognizable symbol of the day is the May Pole. Our Puritan forebears reacted with pious horror to the rites of Beltane, most especially the phallic symbolism of the pole being danced around by young men and women since Beltane is a celebration of fertility, sexuality and fruitfulness returning to the Earth.