Starting the New Year 2025 with a New Newsletter

The prize draw of a free diary for 5 people will take place on the 7th January.

Please do Sign up to our new Monthly Newsletters on our Home Page of our Website to be kept updated of folklore goings-on, exciting new products & new encounters that we use to create our folklore related items, as well as giveaways, competitions & suggestions of things to make & different ways to celebrate the passing year. You can also sign up to the Spaces App to be a member & automatically be kept updated.

Finally please do send us any folklore or traditions you know of - we are always interested & often use credited snippets in our diary & calendar.

Wishing you all a Happy New Year 2025 - let it be a kind one to us all x

Winter Solstice

In the bleak midwinter …a beautiful soulful wintertime song that reminds us of the

weather challenges that we face to get through wintertime. At this time of solstice we are given an opportunity to draw breath and think about the importance of our sun as we face reduced light and warmth over the coming winter months in the knowledge that this day signifies us moving towards the lighter part of the year. We know it will take time but we know it is happening. For many people and many cultures the idea of rebirth(of our sun) and renewal (of the light in our lives) is the message of the day together with hope.

The winter solstice although only a momentary annual event, is and has been of significance to people over a considerable length of time in our history. The alignment of two of the largest stones at Stonehenge to sunset on the solstice suggests this to be true, as does Maeshowe chambered cairn on Orkney that is aligned to the winter setting sun for approximately six weeks, allowing the gentle sunlight to enter the structure and touch the back wall. Sid Broga Cairn at New Grange in County Meath is aligned to the sunrise at this time of the year, again being built in such a way as to allow light of our sun to penetrate the darkness of the structure. Of course what we don’t know is what did these early people do at these places, we can speculate but we don’t know.

But after having such effort by our early ancestors to, it appears, to give such significance to this time of the year it all falls a bit quiet, with no grand gestures of this scale on our isles.

One thing we have learnt as gatherers of folklore is that people often want verification

Of authenticity and they want traditions to be old. Quite how old is another matter, but a historical basis of current practices is often sought out. Of course the very nature of a lot of folklore is its origins in stories and observances that have been passed down.

The human unreliable aspect of inaccurate recording or memory often makes folklore like shifting sands, it is fluid, it evolves and always has.

So to pinpoint if and how many annual events were marked, if at all, is tricky. If you also add a ‘wanting’ of us all to be following ancestral traditions to give some kind of connection has often resulted in ‘wished-for’ and even newly created ‘traditions’.

But after all isn’t this what folklore is ? A practice of the people. In conversation recently with a festival organiser, they said if it happens three times it becomes tradition. We probably all have a number or amount of years that we think brings sufficient authenticity and authority to make something a practice we want to follow and take part in.

Story plays a part in telling us things that may have been beliefs, entertainment or often to act as warnings and behavioural guidelines such as the tales of the Cailleach, a character of the Highlands of Scotland who brings in winter and determines how long it should stay. It became customary to carve the image of the Cailleach into logs of wood to then be tossed onto the fire in an attempt to banish winter.

The role of reduced daylight hours and the cold of winter was an annual battle for people to survive and is still a challenging and deadly force today for some in our communities. It’s therefore unsurprising that tales of battles between light and dark were told. The battle between the Holly Lord and Oak Lord being such an example that has found its way into part of trying to represent the real battle that is faced. Many of our tales and traditions on Britain and Ireland have come via Nordic routes. Yule itself having Scandinavian roots of the winter festival Juul, when logs were/are burned and fires lit to symbolize the heat and life-giving properties of our returning sun. The stronger and brighter the fire the more our sun would be encouraged to return.

As our already complex mix of heritage becomes even further enhanced with people from many cultures, with their own cultural backgrounds and ways of marking the passing year, increases we find ourselves in exciting times of seeing which traditions and tales will be taken through into the next generations.

At Talking Trees ‘headquarters’ we usually hold our own tradition of a quiet day outdoors gathering greenery to decorate our home and experiencing the British winter landscape before lighting out bonfire on the solstice evening with a modest but seasonal vegetable and fruit based feast but this year we are in the city that never sleeps, New York, and experiencing a very different Yuletide and Winter Solstice celebration. It has reminded us of the very different ways we live our lives and is turning out to be full of light and joy in a very different way.

Although we have little evidence and little authentic tradition or folklore relating to the winter solstice we do still hold onto an innate feeling of marking this time of year.

As authors of the Country Wisdom & Folklore Diary our feelings have always been that it is rather magickal to split our year into significant times to help us traverse the year ahead. The seasons being our starting point but we also enjoy observing the eight points of the Wheel of the Year. These pauses give us focus, time to reflect, to observe(particularly nature) and to then move on with renewed energy and hope.

We sincerely hope you too will enjoy this way to pass through the year. And consider that whilst our personal endeavour is indeed to keep alive the old ways we also add that we want to celebrate the year by also celebrating new and emerging ways to mark the year ahead.

One of things we enjoy is seeing if the ‘important’ winter weather predictors hold true. We keep a note in our diary to check out the ‘accuracy’ of some of the old weather sayings. As an agricultural people the weather and particularly the harshness of winter was and is very much on people’s minds.

We will be particularly interested to see if

‘The date of the first snowflakes falling tells how many times it will snow in the coming winter.’

We experienced our first snowfall on 19th November which would mean we will have another 18 snow occurrences this winter !

And if we have an abundance of acorns indicating a cold winter is coming.

Thick nutshells, apple peel or onion skins predicting a severe winter. 

An abundance of berries being a sign of cold and snowy weather.

Leaves that fall late indicating wild winter storms coming.

Flowers blooming in winter being an indicator of bad weather (this always seems that it should indicate warmer weather)

Squirrels with very bushy tails indicate a colder winter as does them stashing their nuts high in the trees. It is said that this indicates the snow will be deep.

”When squirrels early start to hoard,

winter will pierce us like a sword.”

If Robins are seen near or in the house then winter will be cold and if bees or hornets build their nests inside a barn or shed, expect a hard winter. A hornets nest found in winter can indicate the depth the snow will be.

And particularly appropriate for the winter solstice - “As the days lengthen, the cold strengthens.” (The coldest time of the year is mid-January, about 3 weeks after the shortest day)

A New Year beckons but for now we have the days of Yuletide, we have the most wonderful and probably most followed folklore of a Magickal gift giver yet to visit us, known by many names worldwide and coming in many guises, but in our isles it is Father Christmas, who will come to believers and remind us of a spirit and traditions that we still hold so dearly in our lives at wintertime. We bring nature into our homes through trees, wreaths, cones and deck our halls. We bring light through candles and fairy lights. And we remember one another and those that have passed and those we hold dear now.

And thankfully many people help others to have shelter, warmth, companionship and sustenance in their lives. Please be kind to others if you can by a small act of generosity. Collectively small acts make a big difference.

Wishing you all a most Magickal wintertime, and that warmth, love and light are with you throughout. Our best wishes for a Happy Yuletide full of old and new traditions.

See you in 2025, and thank you so much for your kind support throughout this and past years in our endeavour to keep alive the old ways and celebrate the year.

#folklore, #traditions, #yuletide, #Christmas

#wheeloftheyear, #oldways, #wintersolstice, #NewYork, #NYC, #Britain #Ireland

Trick or Treat ?

Those of you who have followed our blogs & publications over the years will know at the heart of what we aim to do at Talking Trees is ‘Keeping Alive the Old Ways & Celebrating the Year’ which includes both new traditions as well as the ancient. Halloween as we know it today is probably the best and most successful example of a mash folklore. At the heart of folklore is the root of the word itself – Lore - ‘a body of traditions and knowledge on a subject or held by a particular group, typically passed from person to person by word of mouth’. And as we all know that as we pass things on, they change and become of the place, the time and often of the people themselves. Halloween has certainly done just that and has become a ‘folklore’ phenomenon in and of The USA to the point where I’d cite it as being the ‘origin’ place of it in its current form and popularity, with its roots coming from the Scottish, Irish and other European settlers.

We are currently ‘touring’ America and Canada and over the past month have seen a level of preparation and anticipation of this folklore event in these countries that is not matched anywhere else.

Its easy as a folklorist from Britain to become a bit ‘sniffy’ when it comes to folklore because of our long history, our hybrid culture developed from being a conquered and conquering nation and our roots as agricultural/pastoral, all of which has resulted in a wealth of past traditions, superstitions and annual celebrations. However, our ‘younger cousins’ have masterfully taken the core elements of a summers end festival, originating in our isles, to great heights of new ‘join-in’ festivity.

Our blend of Halloween connects Gaelic Samhain, marked particularly in Ireland, Scotland and Isle of Man and Nos Galan Gaeaf in Wales, that marked the end of summer and beginning of winter, together with the Christian church’s marking All Saints Day and Catholic All Souls Day, a tradition of seasonal bonfires, initially part of the end of the pastoral cycle, and Bonfire traditions following The Gunpowder Plot’s notoriety particularly in Southern England and into the Midlands, all of which led to a version of Halloween that was particularly celebrated in the Northern regions of the UK. A recent survey showed that people aged 60 plus had little or no association or memory of celebration of Halloween as children if they lived in the South or Midlands and that only northern and particularly Scottish people had recollections of the time being marked in any way. What we do know is that turnip carved lanterns, apple bobbing, divination games and guising door to door ‘begging ‘was part of the ‘northern’ traditions apparently influenced by wanting to recognise the change of season and with an inherent fear of the dark months and association with ghosts and the fey folk that have been recorded by that age group. But it appears that it began to spread, to become more present over the past 30 years, into all of the UK as America’s celebrations influenced us.

The key elements of ‘our’ Halloween were taken over to the States by those first settlers, together with a sprinkling of Victorian revival folklore ‘traditions’ and the writings of the likes of James George Frazer (1854–1941), who was a famous British anthropologist of his day, and who wrote the phenomenally successful book The Golden Bough in which he attempted to explain a history of our traditions - not always very accurately some would say - giving versions of how and why things were done.

What followed became America’s own full-on take which has now been brought back to us and the rest of the world, such is its popularity.

I could be cynical that the ‘candy’producers, modern popular culture such as films and TV and all types of commercial gain have fuelled the development of this seasonal celebration, however when we look at many a tradition there have always been ‘facilitators’ that financially benefit as interest and opportunity present themselves, with their contributions adding to the occasion. I think of the monks back in Chirbury in the late 12th and 13th centuries, who made tiny saint figures, to be purchased aiding connection and prayer, basically holy merchandise, that were sold to people who attended the gatherings on the borderland hills in places such as nearby Rorrington, where we once lived, and that even now they could occasionally be found ‘littering’ the banks of the stream.

What we have noticed here in the States is not just the pumpkin ‘Jack-a-lanterns’ grotesque carved faces but that many, many homes have pumpkins, squash, corn cobs and all manner of vegetables, corn, flowers adorning their porches and as wreaths on doors and swags along balconies that seem to hark much more to a celebration of harvest end. The popularity of Farmer’s Almanacs over here in some way has helped perpetuate and keep alive the seasonal influences, often referencing the origins and beginnings back to the early settlers’ countries and linking it to Summers end and the end of the agricultural cycle. The other influence seems to be the proximity to Mexico and Latin-American culture which has its own celebration of Día de los Muertos- Day of the Dead, that takes place over a couple of days incorporating Catholic All Souls Day on November 2nd. The beautiful decoration on many of the rather grisly skulls and skeletons that populate these celebrations really bring a different level of creativity and colour into proceedings, as life as much as death is honoured and have spilled into Halloween decorations and costumes.

We have of course also seen streets, shops, homes ‘dressed’ in suitably scary and very commercial looking Halloween merchandise and shops filled with so many sweet items for ‘Trick-or-Treat’ purposes that one can only imagine dentists gleefully rubbing their hands as they deal with the aftermath. But there really is a palpable excitement here as suitably themed music permeates the air, flyers and posters for events are everywhere and there is a real feeling of marking the day. This is after all at the heart of many a folklore tradition – it is of the moment; it is of the people now and it is being shared not only through generations but back to the ‘origin’ countries – showing them/us how to do it. I should add that not all Americans mark Halloween in this manner and some prefer not to mark it at all, but it is hard to get away from being involved, such is its popularity, especially if you have children, but not exclusively.

And yes there is a big part of me that craves a quiet private bonfire of lawn raked leaves & garden cuttings, a simple jacket potato, a baked apple, candlelight and only an owl serenading my marking the cross-quarter day of Samhain (a tradition I have taken on from our Gaelic neighbours traditions) where I remember my recent and past ancestors, have time to contemplate summers end and mark winter’s beginning. But being in the USA & Canada, seen through my folklorist eyes, has made me realise the true celebration is that we are united as people still wanting to keep alive the old ways and celebrate the year. The enthusiasm is catching.

Thank you to all the lovely people in the USA and Canada that we have met on our travels and for sharing your folklore and ways of celebrating with us.

Here are some Folklore Traditions in the UK that are rather calming compared to our USA cousins and that you may want to try as part of your celebrations today.

Listen to or try singing some ‘Souling’ songs – these were songs traditionally sung for the dead that became taken around houses in return for a soul cake or other financial or food recompense. By singing a souling song the soul of recently departed loved ones , that may be in purgatory would come closer to their heavenly goal. (Most associated with All Soul’s Day – 2ndDecember) it became one of many ‘begging’ traditions to support the poor and needy, together with ‘guising’ (the tradition of disguising yourself) then going door to door or in a central location to achieve food or finance to help survival when work was short.

Make some Soul Cakes- certainly nowhere near the intake of sugar of current ‘trick or treat candy! The Soul cake would traditionally be marked with a cross cut into it. Large estate houses were recorded as having cooks bake many batches made to hand out to the poor and needy. Or perhaps a bowl of Frumenty, a porridge like meal that could be sweet or savoury and was recoded as given to the ploughmen on finishing the harvest as well as featuring in Christmas meals in poorer households.

Divination Games – became popular as this time of the year has become associated with our ancestors and the dead. One such game was looking into a mirror at midnight and seeing who appears to predict a future spouse.

Apples are particularly associated with this time of year with apple bobbing, apples on strings and even the pips in apples being utilised into divination games.

It is hardly surprising that minds became focussed on death as the winter began and the vulnerable were picked off by illness, cold and famine. It is thought that by wearing costumes, lighting bonfires and making merry was a way to face up to the demons lurking and waiting to get us in the dark winter nights.

Ghostly Tales – the telling of ghostly tales over the winter months has long been popular, as we are in the darker part of the year and we find ourselves more easily frightened by the shadows, we become drawn to reading, listening to or sharing tales – true or otherwise.

However you choose to mark this time of the year we wish you more treats than tricks, happiness, a bit of frightening fun and that you have a cosy late-autumn and wintertime . Make time to remember those who are no longer with us and invite them into your hearts and homes to mark summers end with you and the transition into winter.

You may want to take a look at our new Countdown ‘Advent’ Calendars from our shop

https://www.talkingtreespublishers.co.uk/shop

Both have a slightly more folklore and ghostly look. The Winter Wassailing Countdown shows mummers visiting the crab apple tree to wassail it for a bountiful supply of fruit in the following year to benefit the animals of the woods and The Yuletide Hauntings Countdown includes famous December Hauntings behind each door and shows a ghostly Mari Lwyd on its front.

#halloween #traditions #allhallowseve #samhain #folklore #halloweenusa #hauntings #pumpkins #salem #california #oldways