🌿 the Oak & the Holly king 🍂🍁
Every year, the Oak King rises with the light of the spring and the song of his friend, the Robin.
At summer, he grows in power and gifts the earth with vitality and abundance. The earth then gifts it's crops onto their children, the human race and the animals upon it.
The Holly king beings with him the darker half of the year as he moves across the land.
However, as the days begin to grow cold there rises the Holly king with his mascot - the Wren.
The Oak King and the Holly king fight for the land, with the Holly king winning and as a result brings about Winters spell. All would tremble and flee to their homes out of fear of the harshness of the cold and darkness.
Yet little did they know, was that winter was a necessary end, that the Oak king would rise again and be reborn from the darkness.
There are many tales and many interpretations, some even embodying the earth as a youthful and fertile goddess, some conveying the duality of one king and the other as one in the same. Some may even find parallels within the tale of how Lugh defeats Balor every Lughnasadh.
Nonetheless, the tale of the Oak King and the Holly King is one that has been echoed throughout history, for as long as there have been seasons and the sun has burned bright, so have the Oak King and Holly King lived, then died, and lived again continuously.
