New stock now up online -
👉 'Peasant' - the new Weird Walk music zine.
👉 Angeline Morrison - 'The Sorrow Songs' - Green vinyl re-issue.
👉 Anne Briggs - Records Store Day 2024 limited edition re-issue + 7-inch EP.
Plus:
👉 Dave Evans great lost folk LP from 1972 - 'Elephantasia'.
Reading a news article I just learned that the astrological date for Beltane is actually May 5th though everybody celebrates it on May 1st technically tomorrow is the true Beltane. So if you missed it on the 1st you have a second chance to do it again tomorrow. #Beltane#witches#pagan#ceremony#celebration#brightfire#sabbat
This year's maypole turned out pretty good! Couldn't sing songs cuz I have a cold, but thankfully after all these years, my kids have learned some, so they sang for me.
Hope everyone us having a great #Beltane may your happiness and laughter burn bright!
Happy Beltane! Nothing like an 800 year old #summer welcoming song to celebrate. Lyrics below (original ye olde English followed by modern English translation). Sumer is icumen in...
Sumer is icumen in,
Lhude sing cuccu!
Groweþ sed and bloweþ med
And springþ þe wde nu,
Sing cuccu!
Awe bleteþ after lomb,
Lhouþ after calue cu.
Bulluc sterteþ, bucke uerteþ,
Murie sing cuccu!
Cuccu, cuccu, wel singes þu cuccu;
Ne swik þu nauer nu.
Pes:
Sing cuccu nu. Sing cuccu.
Sing cuccu. Sing cuccu nu!
Modern English
Summer has arrived,
Loudly sing, Cuckoo!
The seed grows and the meadow
blooms
And the wood springs anew,
Sing, Cuckoo!
The ewe bleats after the lamb
The cow lows after the calf.
The bullock stirs, the stag farts,
Merrily sing, Cuckoo!
Cuckoo, cuckoo, well you sing,
cuckoo;
Don't ever you stop now,
Sing cuckoo now. Sing, Cuckoo.
Sing Cuckoo. Sing cuckoo now!
Unsure what to do for Beltane, so I lit a candle outdoors and carried it inside and lit incense and another candle that I'll let burn for as long as it goes.
Woke up with a fever, so my Beltane celebrations will be subdued, oh well. I am still absolutely giddy at seeing the little baby leaves erupt from the trees and the daffodils in their full glory.
Wishing a blessed #Beltane to all my fellow Pagans conjuring summer in!
Today, May 1, 1973, Police Sergeant Neil Howie finds that he is unable to leave remote Hebridean island Summerisle. The island residents celebrate May Day with pagan rituals (The Wicker Man, 1973)
#WyrdWednesday#LegendaryWednesday: `At #Beltane there were great bonfires everywhere, the most important being in Uisnech, where an oenach ("reunion") was held, which was one of the most important festivals in #Ireland. There were banquets with potlatch activities, races on foot and with chariots, as well as the assessment of taxes for the following year'.
Source: Helmut Birkhan „#Kelten“
#Beltane was probably also a slaughter festival, and one of the great Celtic feasts. The fire cult practised everywhere was associated with lustration rites, as the cattle were driven between burning fires to avert the danger of epidemics.
Source: Helmut Birkhan „#Kelten“
Happy Beltane my fellow witches on the northen hemisphere! And blessed Samhain to you southern lot.
Joyous celebrations all around! #pagan#paganHolidays#beltane#mabon#witches#celebration
EDIT.
I apparently messed it up, it's Samhain down south! fixed it.
Also, BIG #gratitude for my apartment, which lets me see 2 kinds of #CherryBlossoms out back & #city beauty out front even if I'm not well enough to go out 🙌🏽
#WyrdWednesday#LegendaryWednesday: The #druids used their great magic (chants) to make two beneficial fires with healing flames at #Beltane. The herds were brought to these fires every year against epidemics. They made the herds pass between them.
Source: Le Roux/Guyonvarc'h „Die #Druiden“
Have a lovely #Beltane or #InternationalWorkersDay! If you don't celebrate the former, be sure to celebrate the latter, because now more than ever, we must remember how hard it was to win the worker rights we have today, and fight hard to win more! ✊️
Happy May Day! This is hand-pulled lino block print of the Jack-in-the-Green (or Jack o' the Green) an English folk tradition for May Day. Wearing a conical or pyramidal wicker or wooden frame covered in foliage so as to conceal the wearer, the Jack-in-the-Green leads a May Day procession, dancing often with musicians and other figures. 🧵1/2
🌸🍀💐🌿🌷🌱
#FolkloreThursday: The #Celtic summer began with the #Beltane (‘bright fire’ or ‘lucky fire’) festival on May 1. Beltane celebrates the start of summer, the crop and pasturing season. Although scholars are non-commital, many of us believe #Beltane honors the ancient continental #Celtic sun and healer God #Belenus.
Source: #OBOD, the Order of #Bards, #Ovates and #Druids
#Beltane ("Fire of Bel") was a central festival of "balance" in honour of the king at the end of the dark season of winter and the beginning of the light season of summer.
Source: Le Roux/Guyonvarc'h „Die #Druiden“ #Celtic
#WyrdWednesday#LegendaryWednesday: The meaning 'Bel-Fire' possibly refers to the god Belenus (Helmut Birkhan „#Kelten“).
After Epona, he was the #Celtic deity most frequently mentioned by ancient authors in Gaul, Noricum, Illyria, Britain and Ireland. #Beltane