For ancient pagans in Scandinavia, cracking open a Carlsberg and singing We Love Our Land around a bonfire, perhaps, was a bit unforeseeable. However, pagans did light fires to heal pain and protected their souls on midsummers, or as its presently known in Denmark, Sankt Hans Aften or Saint Johns Eve.
The dear late Sankt Hans, or Saint John the Baptist, surely never imagined that descend
Look out, here come the pagans. It’s late May in central London and a man dressed as a tree, a witch in a velvet robe and a woman pretending to be a raven with a long black beak are dancing through the streets of Holborn, with several hundred others, moving to the rhythm of a dozen loud drums. They could wake the god of thunder with their noise but it’s OK, the people at the back with the broadswo
Burying the dead facedown in ancient times didn’t mean RIP, according to new research that says the practice was both deliberate and widespread.
Experts have assumed such burials were either unusual or accidental.
But the first global study on the facedown burials suggests that it was a custom used across societies to disrespect or humiliate the dead.
Lead study author Caroline Arcini of
If there were as such a thing as a scholar-gunslinger, it would be Camille Paglia, the American critic and teacher.
That’s the image she offered us on the cover of Vamps and Tramps, her 1994 collection of essays. Camille is dressed in black, hands raised mid-air, wearing a holster over her hip. But her main weapon is not the classic six-shooter (or the punk makeup she wears on the cover). It’s
Stonehenge was littered with rubbish this morning after record numbers of people descended on the site for the summer solstice.
Around 36,500 people enjoyed the carnival atmosphere at the ancient stone circle on Salisbury Plain, Wiltshire - but pagan worshippers were left disappointed after fellow revellers left the site strewn with rubbish.
Druid Jim Saunders, 33, from Reading, is a member
Druids began their incantations, Wiccan priestesses drew their cowls tight against the damp morning air and four half-naked Papuan dancers waved their hands in the air and went: Woo, woo, woo.
Only the guest of honour failed to put in an appearance at Stonehenge.
A record 36,500 people had gathered at the prehistoric monument on Salisbury Plain to watch the sun rise. So many turned out to
For the sun, its the big day out.
Today is the summer solstice, the longest day of the year and the beginning of summer on the Gregorian calendar. Some will greet the great day with celebrations; others may just be interested in all of the scientific facts under the sun.
The origins of midsummer are based in European traditions in some cases, said Ellen McHale, executive director of the N
Stonehenge was probably the place not to be yesterday at 4.58am. The site had been turned into a cross between the Glastonbury Festival and the Notting Hill Carnival, with an estimated 36,500 revellers waiting for sunrise on the Summer Solstice, including assorted druids, Wicca devotees, King Arthur Pendragon (formerly known as John Rothwell), a few recreational drug-users and thousands of people
Once again, the Wheel of the Year turns to the Summer Solstice. Annual almanacs say Litha will begin on June 21, 2009 at 5:45 a.m., Greenwich Time.
On Litha Eve, Pagans gather to ‘drum down’ the sun and since this is a day when the powers of Nature are at their highest point, and believed to be when ‘the veil between worlds’ is again thin, we use this time for divination of the future.
A quality of air emanates from old trees that so wonderfully changes and renews a weary spirit, said Robert Louis Stevenson.
In pursuit of the oldest living tree in Co Dublin, it was no surprise that certain charismatic, beguiling types would appear, demanding the odd detour. Was this mission doomed from the start, though? The most accurate way to determine the age of a tree, after all, is to
