Many festivals not of Christian origin were derived from
the ceremonies with which the heathen peoples of Europe had been accustomed to
mark the changes of the seasons. Thus, April Fool's Day formed a relic of
festivities held at the vernal equinox. May Day, another festival of spring,
honored the spirits of trees and of all budding vegetation. The persons who
acted as May kings and May queens represented these spirits. According to the
original custom a new May tree was cut down in the forest every year, but later
a permanent May pole was set up on the village common. On Midsummer Eve (June
23), which marked the summer solstice, came the fire festival, when people
built bonfires and leaped over them, walked in procession with torches round
the fields, and rolled burning wheels down the hillsides. These curious rites
may have been once connected with sun worship. Hallow Eve, so called from being
the eve of All Saints' Day (November 1), also seems to have been a survival of
a heathen celebration. On this night witches and fairies were supposed to
assemble. Hallow Eve does not appear to have been a season for pranks and
jokes, as is its present degenerate form. Even the festival of Christmas,
coming at the winter solstice, kept some heathen features, such as the use of
mistletoe with which Celtic priests once decked the altars of their gods. The
Christmas tree, however, is not a relic of heathenism. It seems to have come
into use as late as the seventeenth century.
