More Saint Lucy’s
Saint Lucy was considered in folk tradition to be the patron saint of seamstresses, coachmen, glaziers and grinders.
On the feast of St. Lucy, spinning on a spinning wheel was strictly prohibited. Illustrative photo Open-air museum and museum in Pribylina, Slovakia
Today we celebrate the feast of St. Lucy (December 13), who is the patron saint of seamstresses, coachmen, glaziers and grinders. The feast of St. Lucy belonged primarily to women and girls, and perhaps in order to relax a little, they were not allowed to enter on this day. Various customs and masked processions were associated with this day. Let us recall the old customs.
Who was Saint Lucy?
Saint Lucy was born in Syracuse, Sicily, in the 3rd century, the daughter of wealthy noble parents. Legend has it that she chose to remain a virgin, rejected all offers of marriage, and gave her possessions to the poor.
She is said to have gouged out her eyes once to discourage another suitor. A disappointed and rejected pagan suitor denounced her as a Christian. The judge ordered her to be sacrificed to the pagan gods, but the girl refused. Therefore, he ordered her to be dragged to a brothel, but St. Lucy stood rooted to the ground and it was impossible for the executioners to move her. The executioner, who was present, became angry and plunged a dagger into St. Lucy's throat (this happened in 304).
On the eve of St. Lucy's Day, "Lucky" would walk around the buildings. "Lucka", a tall, white-clad "Lucka" would walk around with a large wooden knife, which she would use to scare children that she would slit the stomach of anyone who did not fast during Advent. In some places, more than one Lucka would walk around the buildings, and would give gifts to children who knew how to pray, while threatening others with a whip.
Saint Lucy was also seen as a protector against witches. Therefore, superstitious housewives would give their livestock a piece of enchanted dough mixed with special spices every day from Saint Lucy's Day until Christmas Eve to protect them.
In Moravia, they protected themselves against witches by setting aside a log of wood from the feast of St. Lucy until the Nativity of Christ, and burning the logs on the Nativity of Christ. People believed that this would protect them from witches in the coming year.
The feast of St. Lucy belonged primarily to women and girls, and perhaps to give them a little rest, they were not allowed to spin or pull feathers on this day. In the Šumava region, spinners even took their spinning wheels out of the living room to the attic on that day.
Various customs, mask parades, various speeches, and the control of traditional prohibitions were the responsibility of girls and women.
In many Czech villages, women disguised as Lucky checked households and if they caught a housewife plucking feathers or spinning flax, they pounced on her to ruin the illegal work - they blew the feathers away and untangled the spun thread.
In the 19th century, girls in white coats walked around České Budějovice, their faces covered with a mask resembling a large stork's beak that could be tapped. They would slam the door of the house, enter the room, and say in raised voices: "I'm going, I'm going, I'll drink the night away!" Without doing anything else, they would leave again.
There were many variations of the rounds. Around Orlík, girls aged 12-14 would walk around completely covered in a white sheet, with white flour on their wet faces. They would walk in groups of three to six; one would have a brush in her hand to scrub the floor, another would "whitewash" the walls with a brush, and another would force the children to pray with a broom. If they could, she would give them a treat from a basket.
Lucky was often accompanied by a priest mask who prayed, blessed and sometimes preached humorous things. No payment was asked for the performance and the viññé, everything was done for pleasure and entertainment.
(Source: Church Year and Folk Customs - Vlastimil Vondruška and Book Archive of Czech Tradition)
Dnes slavíme svátek sv. Lucie (13. prosince), která je patronkou švadlen, kočích, sklenářů a brusičů. Svátek sv. Lucie patřil především žená
The connection of the name of Saint Lucy (December 13) with the Latin lux (light) was probably the reason why she was given a holiday on December 13 in the 6th century. Until the introduction of the Gregorian calendar in 1582, this fell on the date of the winter solstice, which is also evidenced by well-known proverbs, such as "Saint Lucy drinks the night, but does not add 4 days to the day" and "Lucy shows her power, gives us the longest night". With this decision, the church probably overshadowed the cult of a mysterious demonic being, which in the pre-Christian period was associated with the solstice. Among the Slavs, a female deity known as Mara, Mařena or Morana ruled over death, fate, mysterious spells and the winter season. It is worth noting that in folk tradition, personified death and winter appear in the form of a white-clad female being. Although the arrival of winter in our environment is associated with the feast of St. Catherine ("Saint Catherine comes dressed in white 4 ), her power culminates precisely during the winter solstice.
In folk culture, St. Lucy appears primarily as a protector against witches, as evidenced by sources from the early 17th century. A whole series of magical practices on this day are aimed precisely at preventing witches from harming livestock. A twelve-day cycle of weather forecasts for the following year used to be started on Lucy's Day. The most famous custom, however, is the tradition of going around the streets of the masquerade, associated with the ritual cleansing of homes and monitoring compliance with the prohibitions on spinning and the rules of fasting.
The prohibition of spinning was apparently related to the original cult of ancestors and the belief in the power and vengeance of supernatural forces in the transitional period of Advent. Similar customs are also documented from the Znojmo region, specifically from Vranovská with an overlap with Moravian-Budějovice, and from Moravské Krumlov. However, more detailed information about their course is usually lacking. From the area around Moravské Budějovice, there are reports of a luca resembling St. Barbara. She was dressed in white and had a floured face. She was covered in a sailcloth and held a goose-wing feather in her hand. She entered silently, swept the dust off the paintings, cleaned the shelves and cupboards, combed the hair of those present and left silently again. There were more luca in Dačice. They were girls dressed in white dresses decorated with bows and with faces made of flour. They carried wooden spoons and danced in the buildings. While dancing, they knocked each other with the wooden spoons. Anyone who laughed at them was pricked. In the Novoměstsko area, spinning wasnot allowed. Anyone who paid attention saw St. Lucia walking through the village, holding a wooden spoon, a lance, a spindle and a bucket at her side. Wherever there was spinning, she came to the window, stopped and knocked. Where they did not stop even after knocking, she entered and knocked the guilty women on their fingers. For a year, it is said, these unfortunate women could not pick up a feather or a spindle. She gave good children something to put in their stockings, she took naughty children with her, pulled them out of bed and stuffed them into a bucket. When they screamed, she tied tow around their mouths. Parents in the Tišnov region used to scare disobedient children that St. Lucy would tear off their noses with pliers.
Twelve days after Lucy's Day, the weather was predicted. As it was on these days, so was the weather in the twelve months of the following year (in the Znojmo region, documented, for example, in Plenkovice). The holiday of St. Lucy in Lower Austria had a different character, where one remarkable custom apparently arrived with Croatian emigrants. Local farmers predicted the future harvest using the so-called "Lucie's wheat 44 or "Lucienweizen 44 . A bowl was filled with to germinate wheat grains and on Christmas Eve, based on their height and appearance, it was estimated how much grain the next year's harvest would bring. However, a decorative candle was also inserted into the middle of such a bowl, and so "Lucia's wheat 44" over time became an indispensable Christmas decoration.
Zvyky a tradice obcí na Znojemsku
