MAY
Goddesses of the Calendar Month:
Artemis
Maia, a Pleiad
Flora
Maia, Goddess of Growth
Maiestas
Tanit, Tanith
Belesama, Belisma
Medb, Maeve, Queen
The Feminine Principle
The Virgin Mary
May (personified)
Maia
Hera
MAY 1st
Assyrian: THE MOON GODDESS. (Esther Harding, Woman’s Myst. p. 45) “The moon tree is often shown in pictures ... In one Assyrian picture it has ribbons like our Maypole. Perhaps a dance may have taken place around the tree in those faraway. days, like the dance that is still performed round the Maypole on May Day. In such a dance the ribbons would be interwoven, as in our own dance, to represent the decking of the bare tree with bright-coloured leaves and flowers and fruits, all gifts of the moon goddess, giver of fertility”.
Canaanite: ASHERAH. (Neumann, The Great Mother, p. 259) “Since the investigations of Mannhardt and Frazer, the central role of the Maypole and Christmas tree in vegetation rites has been so well known ... The numinous-feminine character of the tree speaks to us in the manticism not only of Greece and in the Germanic countries but also in the Old Testament. We know of the veneration in which the tree cult was held among the Semites - the tree cult of the heights; the worship of the cult pole of Asherah, the goddess of heaven; and the ritual dance around the tree”. Note: (Hooke, Bab. and Assyr. Rel. p. 33) “The sacred pole as the symbol of Ishtar, or Astarte, or any other form of the mother goddess, is everywhere to be found in the ancient Near East”.
Greek: DAMIA. See under Bona Dea.
LETO, LATONA. See under Maia.
Roman: BONA DEA. (Seyffert, Dict.) “Bona Dea (‘the good goddess’). An Italian deity, supposed to preside over the earth, and all the blessings which spring from it … The anniversary of the foundation of her temple was held on the 1st of May, when prayers were offered to her for the averting of earthquakes”.
(Ovid, Fasti, V. 148) “May 1st … the Good Goddess must be the theme of my song”. The poet then describes the founding of her temple. (Commentary by Frazer) “The Good Goddess ... Cornelius Labeo regarded her as an Earth-goddess, identical with Maia, Fauna, Ops, and Fatua; he affirmed that her character as an Earthgoddess was proved by the secret rites observed in her honour, and that she was involved in the books of the pontiffs under the titles Good, Fauna, Ops, and Fatua … Her identification with the old Roman Goddess Maia, who gave her name to the month of May, may have arisen from the accident that both were worshipped on May Day. According to Festus, the Good Goddess was also called Damia, her priestess bore the title Damiatrix ... This points to an identification or confusion of the Good Goddess with the Greek goddess Damia, a divinity of growth and fertility akin to Demeter”.
(Propertius, IV, ix. 23) “But far off we heard the laughter of cloistered maids, where a holy grove made a dark encircling wood, the secret place of the Goddess of Women (Butler: ‘the Bona Dea’), with holy fountains and rites ... Wreaths of purple veiled its portals far-withdrawn and a hut shone with sweet fire of incense. A poplar decked the shrine with far-spread leaves, and its deep foliage shielded singing birds”.
DEA DIA. (Seyffert, Dict.) “Arval Brothers (Fratres Arvales =of the fields). The Latin name for a college of priests consisting of twelve life-members, who performed the worship of Dea Dia ... a goddess probably identical with the old Roman goddess of the cornfields, Acca Larentia, who also is said to have founded this fraternity ... their badge was a white fillet and a wreath of ears of. corn. The Arvales held their chief festival on three days in May, on the 1st and 3rd in Rome, on the 2nd in the grove, with a highly complicated ceremonial, including a dance in the temple of the goddess, to which they sang the written text of a hymn so antiquated that its meaning could scarcely be understood”. (Bloch, O.C.D.) “Fratres Arvales ... The college consisted of twelve members chosen from the most distinguished senatorial families by co-optation; the reigning Emperor was always a member ... The most important ceremony of this brotherhood took place in May in honour of the goddess Dea Dia to whom the grove was dedicated. The rites of this agricultural cult belong to an early stage of Roman religion”.
FATUA, FAUNA and OPS. See under Bona Dea.
FLORA; The Floralia, Fourth Day. (Brewer, Dict.) “Polydore Virgil says that the Roman youths used to go into the fields and spend the calends of May in dancing and singing in honour of Flora, goddess of fruits and flowers”. (Unicorn Gardens, Beltane 1980) “The May baskets of flowers and the Maypole came from the Roman ‘Floralia’, the festival of flowers. The Romans welcomed the month of May by dedicating the month to Flora, the Roman flower goddess; and spent the first day of May gathering flowers as offerings to her. In ancient times, Roman children made little images of Flora and decorated them with flowers on this day”. See also under Roman- British: Flora.
MAIA, MAIA MAIESTAS. (Seyffert, Dict.) “Maia ... one of the Pleiads … The Romans identified her with an old Italian goddess of spring, Maia Maiestas (also called Fauna, Bona Dea, Ops.), who was held to be the wife of Vulcan, and to whom the flamen of that god made offering … on the 1st of May”.
(Perp. Fest. Cal.) “May 1st ... Maia and Latona. Aspects of Hidden Spiritual Mother”. (Fell of Isis Dir.) “May 1st ... Maia and Latona”.
Phoenician-Carthaginian: TANAT, TANITH. (Doreen Valiente, ABC of Witchcraft, p. 66) “Tanat [is] the Phoenician moon goddess, whose worship, it was claimed, was still carried out in Cornwall and the West of England, being celebrated by ritual bonfires on the old pagan festival dates”. (Durdin-Robertson, Goddesses of Chald. p. 133) “It is possible that the great Celtic festival of Beltane, on May 1st, may derive its name from the first two deities of the Carthaginian Triad, Baal-Hammon, Tanit and Eshmun”. The Irish word for fire, teine, closely resembles the Carthaginian tine, which is regarded as a gift of Tanit (Venus Urania). This is demonstrated as follows by O’Connor (Chronicles of Eri, Vol. 1. p. ccxlii) “A comic writer of Rome, named Plautus, amongst other of his works, wrote a piece, called Poenulus, Anglice the Carthaginian … You are to note, that the first line is Carthaginian, the second line is Iberian or Eri (i.e. Old Irish), and the third is the servile translation thereof into English.
“ ‘Handone silli hanum bene, sille in mus-tine.
Andon sillei anam feni, sillei san baois tetgne.
Although Venus instils vigor, she also instils the fire of concupiscence’.”
Celtic: Bealtaine, Beltane, Ceadamh, Cedsoman. (Dineen, Dict.) “Bealtaine, the Irish May Festival, the month of May; la Bealtaine, the first day of May … Bealtaine and Samhain were the leading terminal dates of the civil year”. (id.) Céadamh, May-Day; May 1st; lit. first (of) summer; caileann Céadamhan, Calends of May; Dia Déadamhan, May-Day; mí Céadamhan, month of May”. Joyce, Soc. Hist. Ireland, Vol. 11. p. 389) “The first day of May was the beginning of Summer. It was called Belltaine or Beltene (pronounced Bel-ti-na), which is the name for the 1st May still always used by speakers of Irish; and it is well known in Scotland, where Beltane has quite taken its place as an English word … Another name for May Day, according to Cormac’s Glossary (p. 36) is Cedsoman”.
(Keating, Gen. Hist. Ireland, p. 234) “The Convocation of Visneach … was kept upon the first day of May ... Upon this occasion they were used to kindle two fires in every territory of the kingdom, in honour of this pagan god (i.e. Beul). It was a solemn ceremony at this time to drive a number of cattle of every kind, between these fires, this was conceived to be an antidote and a preservation against the murrain, or any other pestilential distemper among cattle, for the year following ... The derivation of the word is this, La in Irish signifies a day, Beul is the name of the pagan deity, and Teinne is the same with fire in the English, which words when pronounced together, sound La Beultinne”. (Joyce, Soc. Hist. Ireland, Vol. 1. p. 291) “The driving of cattle through fires against disease on the eve of 1st of May, and on the eve of the 24th June ... continued in Ireland, as well as in the Scottish Highlands, to a period within living memory (Carmichael, Carmina Gadelica 11. 340, for Scotland). Many curious fire-customs are still, or were until very lately, prevalent in some parts of the country on May-Day, and the evening before”.
DONANN, DANA; The Tuatha De Danann; The Landing of the Tuatha De Danann in Ireland. (Lebor Gabala Erenn, Vol. IV. p. 141) “Tuatha De Danann ... And they came to Ireland, on Monday, the kalends of May, in ships”. (id. p. 161) “Of her (i.e. Danann) are named the three gods of Dana, and the Tuatha De Danann”. (Keating, Gen. Hist. Ireland, p. 90) “The Tuatha De Dananns continued seven years in the north of Scotland, and then they removed to Ireland. They arrived there upon the first Monday in the month of May (note: the translation quoted by Wood, Prim. Inhabitants of Ireland, p. 23, reads: ‘and landed on Monday the first of May’), and immediately set fire to their shipping; as the poet observes in this manner,
“They land upon the shore, and then they burn
Their ships, resolving never to return.
“When they came upon the coast, they had recourse to their enchantments to screen them from the observations of the inhabitants (i.e. the Firbolgs) and, accordingly, by their magic skill, they formed a mist about them for three days and three nights”.
Note: (Joyce, Soc. Hist. Ireland, Vol. 1, p. 251) “The name Tuatha Dea Danann signifies the tuatha, or people of the goddess Danu or Danann, who was the ‘mother of the gods’ ... According to our bardic chronicles the Dedannans were the fourth of the prehistoric colonies that arrived in Ireland many centuries before the Christian era. They were magicians, and highly skilled in science and metal-working. After inhabiting Ireland for about two hundred years, they were conquered by the people of the fifth and last colony - the Milesians (i.e. Gaels). When they had been finally defeated ... they held secret council, and arranged that the several chiefs, with their followers, were to take up residence in the pleasant hills all over the country - the side [shee] or elfmounds - where they could live free from observation or molestation”.
The Sidhe, The Fairies; The Departed. (Evans Wentz, Fairy-Faith, p. 439) “Beltene, or the first of May, was another day anciently dedicated to fetes in honour of the dead and fairies”. (John Glynn, cited by Evans Wentz, id. p. 42) “On May Day the good people (i.e. the sidhe) can steal butter if the chance is given them. If a person enters a house then, and churning is going on, he must take a hand in it, or else there will be no butter”. See also May 11th.
(Druids Cal.) “May 1. Beltaine. Drink from a well before sunrise. Wash in the morning dew, and adorn yourselves with , greenery ... watch the sun come up, dance round the Maypole, and otherwise abandon yourself to the season. A woodland frolic culminating in indiscretion is the order of the day”. (Perp. Fest. Cal.) “May 1. Beltane Day, Druidic and Gaelic Summer Festival”. (Fell. of Isis Dir.) “May 1st. Beltaine”.
Roman-British: FLORA. (Whistler, English Fest. p. 144) on May Day customs: “Sometimes two circles, intersecting and bound with blossom, were fixed to the top of a staff, wound spirally with flowers in the manner of the classical thyrsus. In Rutland … garlands of the kind were made by children very early in the morning, from flowers they had picked the evening before. The same device may have been used at the Floralia in Roman Britain, the festival of Flora, goddess of flowers, heralded in Rome with a braying of trumpets. For Roman remains have been found in the neighbourhood of King’s Lynn, and here, in the last century, these formal emblems were carried about the town with a great deal of monotonous hooting on cows’ horns. The two hoops were crossed on the point of a staff, and bound with bunches of flowers interspersed with evergreens ... [on top] were bright-coloured flying ribbons. Below, on the centre of the globe, was a doll fixed to the top of the staff, her name being long since forgotten. It may have been Flora herself. It was certainly the local goddess of flowers. (William Hone’s Table Book, 1827, Pt. 1. Rather similar garlands were made at mell Magna in the 1930’s - Rolf Gardner, England Herself, 1943, p. 137)”.
(Graves, The White Goddess, p. 176) on the hawthorn: “its later orgiastic use … corresponds with the cult of the Goddess Flora, and ... accounts for the English medieval habit of riding out on May Morning to pluck flowering hawthorn boughs and dance around the maypole. Hawthorn blossom has, for many men, a strong scent of female sexuality; which is why the Turks use a flowering branch as an erotic symbol. Mr. Cornish proves that this Flora cult was introduced into the British Isles in the first-century (before this era) by the second Belgic invaders.”
GWENHWYVAR, GWENEVER, Queen. (Evans Wentz, Fairy-Faith, p. 312) “Malory relates that when Queen Guenever advised her knights of the Round Table that on the morrow (May Day, when fairies have special power) she would go on maying, she warned them all to be well-horsed and dressed in green. This was the colour that nearly all the fairy-folk of Britain and Ireland wear. It symbolizes, as many ancient mystical writings declare, eternal youth and resurrection and re-birth, as in all nature during the springtime”.
Welsh: Calan Haf. (Matriarchy News, No. 3) “May 1st ... In Welsh it is Galan Haf, the first day of summer.”
British: May-day. THE LADY OF THE MAY, THE MAYQUEEN, THE QUEEN OF THE MAY. (Dr. Johnson, Dict.) “May-lady, (May and Lady.) The queen or lady of the May, in the old May-games.
“ ‘A choir of bright beauties in spring did appear,
To choose a May-lady to govern the year’.
“Dryden, Lady’s Song”.
(O.E.D., May) “Queen of the May, Lady of the May (cf. Maylady); a girl chosen to be queen of the games on Mayday, being gaily dressed and crowned with flowers”. (id.) “May-lady. A Queen of the May. Also, a puppet in a Mayday game.” (Brewer, Dict.) “Queen of the May. A village lass chosen to preside over the parish sports on May Day”. (Tennyson, The May Queen):
“You must wake and call me early, call me early, mother dear;
Tomorrow will be the happiest time of all the glad New Year;
Of all the glad New-year, mother, the maddest merriest day;
For I’m to be Queen o’ the May, mother, I’m to be Queen o’ the May...
“But I must gather knots of flowers, and buds and garlands gay,
For I’m to be Queen o’ the May, mother, I’m to be Queen o’ the May…
“The honeysuckle round the porch has wov’n its wavy bowers,
And by the meadow trenches blow the faint sweet cuckoo-flowers;
And the wild marsh-marigold shines like fire in swamps and hollows gray,
And I’m to be Queen o’ the May, mother, I’m to be Queen o’ the May.
“The night-winds come and go, mother, upon the meadow-grass,
And the happy stars above them seem to brighten as they pass;
There will not be a drop of rain the whole of the livelong day;
And I’m to be Queen o’ the May, mother, I’m to be Queen o’ the May.
“All the valley, mother, ‘ill be fresh and green and still,
And the cowslip and the crowfoot are over all the hill,
And the rivulet in the flowery dale ‘ill merrily glance and play,
For I’m to be Queen o’ the May, mother, I’m to be Queen o’ the May” ...
(Whistler, English Fests. p. 142) “in the 1930’s there would still be villages where the Maypole would be danced around (See George Long, The Folklore Calendar 1930; also A. R. Wright and T. E. Lones, British Calendar Customs: England, 1936-8, Vol. II, for recent examples of May observance), and still a great many schoolchildren in London and the country who would keep the festival and crown a Queen. In the last fifty years there has been, in fact, a revival of interest in the May ... Tennyson perhaps began it, with his popular poem; William Morris carried it on; the explorers and exponents of traditional songs and dances gave it substance, and the Scouts and Guides translated it into action; but Ruskin is the man above all to whom we owe the children’s May Day. It was he who initiated the ‘Coronation’ ceremony at Whitelands College in the 1880’s”. (id. p. 149) “The crowning of a child queen, the dwarf Maypole and the ribbon-plaiting dances were all introduced or inspired by Ruskin ... But in the end we must return to the London Elementary School Children - we must catch them while they are still busy with multi-coloured ribbons at Blackheath ... Theirs are now the arbour and the crowning of the Queen, the garlands on poles and the Maypole ... They will take out the streamers that hang from it in a wide circle, they will bow to one another, and move off to a lilting tune, half with the sun and half against it, weaving in and out, drawn closer to the centre by the shortening strands, till, the tune changing, they turn face about, and set off again to unravel the plaited rope”.
(Marian Green, A Harvest of Festivals, p. 138) on May festivals in Kent and Sussex: “Traditionally, there is the May Queen, chosen from the pupils at one of the junior schools, who is crowned and decked in a long white cloak and carries a garland of flowers. Usually she has a number of attendants, even a May King in some places, although it is really her day. She ... is a representation of the White Goddess, the Earth Mother in her Maiden aspect. In ancient times there was a sacred festival ... The ordinary folk would spend the night before the feast in the woods, gathering green branches and flowers to deck a bower for the Queen and King, among other things ... Sometimes after this dance everyone would go out into the fields with garlanded sticks and broom handles, covered with flowers and leap high, singing and dancing, to make the corn grow tall”.
(Eileen Bradley, Mrs. Widgery, p. 71) on a modern May Day ceremony: “May Day brought particularly colourful events to our school ... Last year’s queen placed the crown on the head of the newly-elected queen and placed the scarlet robe around her shoulders, then the flower girls presented posies to the queens. past and present, and their attendants”.
MAID MARIAN. (Brewer, Dict. May) “The early English consecrated May-day to Robin Hood and Maid Marian … Stow says that the villagers used to set up May-poles, and spend the day in archery, morris-dancing and other amusements.”
Gaelic: THE MAY QUEEN, THE QUEEN OF THE MAY. (O’Brien, Round Towers, p. 236) “ ‘Anciently’, says McSkimin, in his History of Carrickfergus, ‘a large company of young men assembled each May-day ... One of the party was called King ... they went to the houses of the most respectable inhabitants round about ... In the course of this ramble the King always presented a rich garland of flowers to some handsome young woman, who was hence called “the Queen of the May” till the following year’ ”.
(Frazer, Golden Bough abgd. p. 131) “In the south-east of Ireland on May Day the prettiest girl used to be chosen Queen of the district for twelve months. She was crowned with wild flowers; feasting, dancing, and rustic sports followed, and were closed by a grand procession in the evening. During her year of office she presided over rural gatherings of young people at dances and merry-makings”.
(McLean, Fire Fests. p. 7) on the four major Celtic festivals: “The Fire Festivals are distinctly Female in nature ... On Beltane, May Day, there is the choosing of an earthly May Queen to represent the Goddess”. (id. p. 18) on Beltane: “this festival reflects the transformation of the Young Woman Virgin aspect of the Goddess into the Mother Goddess, in the human sphere through the mystery of sexuality ...
“On May morning special attention was also given to the sacred wells and springs. These Holy Wells reflect the female aspect of the Earth Forces ... At these sacred places, we can see the dark mystery of the welling up of the sacred spring, with its life giving and healing properties. These are the female organs of the Earth forces”.
Manx: QUEEN OF THE MAY. (Jane Harrison, Ancient Art and Ritual, p. 61) “on May Day in the Isle of Man a Queen of the May was chosen, and with her twenty maids of honour, together with a troop of young men for escort”.
French: THE MAY QUEEN. (Frazer, Golden Bough, abgd. p. 131) “The May Queen is common in France”.
MELUSINA. (Brewer, Dict.) “Melusina. The most famous of the fées of France”. (id.) “Melusines. Gingerbread cakes bearing the impress of a beautiful woman ‘bien coiffée’, with a serpents’ tail; made by confestioners for the May Fair in the neighbourhood of Lusignan near Poitiers. The allusion is to the transformation of the fairy Melusina every Saturday”. Note: (Baring-Gould, Curious Myths: Melusina, p. 500) “The prevalence of tales of Mermaids among Celtic populations indicates these water-nymphs as having been originally deities of those peoples”.
Alsatian: THE LITTLE MAY ROSE. (Frazer, Golden Bough abgd. p. 25) “At Thann, in Alsace, a girl called the Little May Rose, dressed in white, carries a small May-tree, which is gay with garlands and ribbons. Her companions collect gifts from door to door, singing a song:
“ ‘Little May Rose turn round three times,
Let us look at you round and round!
Rose of the May, come to the greenwood away,
We will be merry all.
So we go from the May to the roses’.
“... the produce of the year is supposed to depend on the gifts offered to these May singers”.
Russian: THE MAY-DAY TREE. (Jane Harrison, Ancient Art and Ritual, p. 60) on the May Day ritual: “Sometimes the tree itself, as in Russia, is dressed up in woman’s clothes”.
Russian-Lithuanian: THE MAY MAIDEN. (Frazer, Golden Bough abgd. p. 126) “In Russian Lithuania, on the first of May, they used to set up a green tree before the village. Then the rustic swains chose the prettiest girl, crowned her, swathed her in birch branches and set her beside the May-tree, where they danced, sang, and shouted ‘O May! O May!’”
Jewish: THE VIRGIN MARY. (Unicorn Gardens, Beltane 1980) “Mayday ... Roman children made little images of Flora and decorated them with flowers on this day (as Christian celebrations began to replace the pagan festivals, these May dolls were turned into likenesses of the Virgin Mary)”.
General: (Doreen Valiente, ABC of Witchcraft, p. 48) “In Sussex, the May-Pole used to be topped with a large birch broom. A ‘besom’ is a dialect term for a [loose] female ... and the female genitals were known vulgarly as ‘the broom’. To ‘have a brush’ was to have sexual intercourse. This throws considerable light on the real significance of the broomstick in witch rituals, and in old folkdances, in which it often plays a part 1).
(Whistler, English Fest. p. 143) “According to ancient belief ... nothing makes beautiful like kissing the dew on May morning. People have held that belief in the present century. As for Mrs. Pepys in an earlier one, she thought it ‘the only thing in the world to wash her face with’, and got up every year at four o’clock to do it. Some used even to run a silver spoon through the grass, and bottle it”. (id. p. 150) “May-Day ... Mention, must be made of the Milkmaid’s garland ... a glittering trophy of silver utensils, fixed to a cloth-covered pyramid, carried about like a sedan chair on poles (illustration in The Everyday, Book, col. 570)”. (McLean, Five Fest. p. 19) “The dew of the May morning was collected and incorporated into the rituals ... The ancient peoples with their deeper insight into the spiritual processes in nature, recognised this dew as a magical substance bearing the essence of the Earth”. (Unicorn Gardens, Beltane 1980) “The dew of May morning has traditionally held a magical place for our ancestors. To bathe in it would bring beauty, to walk in its healing powers, or milk churned to butter in May was held to have medicinal properties”.
THE WITCHES; Greater Sabbat. See under February 1st and April 30th.
THE GODDESS OF SPRING. (Fell of Isis Dir.) “May 1st. Festival of the Goddess of Spring”.
THE GREAT WORLD MOTHER. (Prep. Fest. Cal.) “May 1st ...The Great World Mother”.
THE QUEEN OF HEAVEN. (Lux. Madriana Cal.) “Maia 14th (May 1) Exaltation of the Queen of Heaven”.
MAY 2nd
Roman: DEA DIA; Second Day of Festival. See under May 1st.
Indian: YASHODHARA. (Fell. of Isis Dir.) “May 2nd: Gautama Buddha and his wife, Princess Yashodhara. Wesak”.
MAY 3rd
Greek: CHLORIS. See under Flora.
Roman: BONA DEA. (Seyffert, Dict.) “Bona Dea ... a secret festival was held to her on behalf of the public welfare, in the house of the officiating consul or praetor of the city, by matrons and the Vestal Virgins, on the night of May 3 - 4. The mistress of the house presided ... the women performed a dance, accompanied by wind and stringed instruments”. (Lempriere, Dict.) “Bona Dea ... the festivals were celebrated only in the night by the Roman matrons ... all the statues of the men were carefully covered with a veil where the ceremonies were observed”. (O.C.D., Bona Dea) on the same rites: “The room was decorated with vine-branches and other plants and flowers ... Wine was brought in, but called milk, and the covered jar containing it a honey-pot”. See also under Tarentia.
(Soames, on Mosheim, Eccl. Hist. Vol. 1. p. 173) on the introduction of the Eleusinian Mysteries in the reign of Hadrian: “That some mysteries had before this time been introduced into the Roman worship, appears from the Epistles, of Cicero to Atticus ... Gronovius, indeed understands these (Mysteria Romana) to be the worship of the goddess Bona Dea. See his Observ. 1. iv, c. 9)”.
DEA DIA; Third Day of Festival. See under May 1st.
FLORA; The Floralia, Last Day. (Ovid, Fasti, V. 183) “May 3rd. ‘Come, Mother of Flowers, that we may honour thee with merry games; last month I put off giving thee thy due. Thou dost begin in April and passest into the time of May (Frazer: ‘April 28th to May 3rd’), the one month claims thee as it flies, the other as it comes. Since the borders of the months are thine and appertain to thee, either of the two is a fitting time to sing thy praises … Tell me thyself who thou art; the opinion of men is fallacious; thou wilt be the best voucher of thine own name’.
“So I spoke, and the goddess answered my questions thus, and while she spoke, her lips breathed vernal roses: ‘I who now am called Flora was formerly Chloris: a Greek letter of my name is corrupted in the Latin speech. Chloris I was, a nymph of the happy fields where, as you have heard, dwelt fortunate men of old. Modesty shrinks from describing my figure … I enjoy perpetual spring; most buxom is the year ever; ever the tree is clothed with leaves, the ground with pasture. In the field that are my dower, I have a fruitful garden, fanned by the breeze and watered by a spring of running water. This garden my husband filled with noble flowers and said, ‘Goddess, be queen of flowers’. Oft did I wish to count the colours in the beds ... Soon as the dewy rime is shaken from the leaves, and the varied foliage is warmed by the sunbeams, the Hours assemble, clad in dappled garments, and cull my gifts in light baskets. Straightway the Graces draw near, and twine garlands and wreaths to bind their heavenly hair. I was the first to scatter new seeds among the countless peoples … Perhaps you may think that I am queen only of dainty garlands; but my divinity has to do also with the tilled fields. If the crops have blossomed well, the threshing-floor will be piled high; if the vines have blossomed well, there will be wine; if the olive-trees have blossomed well, most bounteous will be the year … Honey is my gift. ‘Tis I who called the winged insects, which yield honey, to the violet, and the clover, and the grey thyme …’
“I had thought that the shows were annual; the goddess denied it, and added to her former discourse a second speech. ‘We, too, are touched by honour; we delight in festivals and altars … if we are neglected, we avenge the wrong … I myself was once neglected by the Roman Senate. What was I to do? By what could I show my resentment? What punishment exact for the slight put on me? In my gloom I relinquished my office. I guarded not the countryside, and the fruitful garden was naught to me. The lilies had dropped; you might see the violets withering, and the tendrils of the crimson saffron languishing .. I did not will it so, nor am I cruel in my anger; but I did not care to ward off these ills. The Senate assembled and voted an annual festival to my divinity if the year should prove fruitful. I accepted the vow. The consuls (Frazer: 174 before this era) Laenas and Postumius celebrated the games which had been vowed to me’.
“I was about to ask why these games are marked by greater wantoness and broader jests; but it occurred to me that the divinity is not straight-laced, and that the gifts she brings lend themselves to delights. The brows of wassailers are wreathed with stitched garlands, and the polished table is buried under a shower of roses ... Maudlin the lover sings at the hard threshold of his fair lady ... The reason why a crowd of courtesans frequents these games is not hard to discover. She is none of your glum, none of your high-flown ones; she wishes her rites to be open to the ordinary people; and she warns us to use life’s flower, while it still blooms.
“But why is it that whereas white robes are given out at the festival of Ceres, Flora is neatly clad in attire of many colours? Is it because the harvest whitens when the ears are ripe, but flowers are of every hue and every shape? She nodded assent and at the motion of her tresses the flowers dropped down, as falls the rose cast by a hand upon a table.
“There yet remained the lights, the reason whereof escaped me; when the goddess thus removed by doubts: ‘Lights are thought to befit my days either because my fields do glow with purple flowers; or because neither flowers nor flames are of a dull colour, and the splendour of both attracts the eye; or because nocturnal licence befits my delights. The third reason comes nearest the truth …
“Her tale was ended, and she vanished into thin air. A fragrance lingered; you could know a goddess had been there. That Naso’s lay may bloom for aye, O strew, I pray thee, goddess, thy boons upon my breast!” (Philocalus, Kal. anno 354) “May 3. Floralici”.
TARENTIA. (Plutarch, Lives, Cicero) “It being evening. [Cicero] went to the house of a friend and near neighbour; for his own was taken over by the women, who were celebrating with secret rites the feast of the goddess whom the Roman call the Good, and the Greeks the Women’s goddess. For an offering is annually performed to her in the consul’s house, either by his wife or mother, in the presence of the vestal virgins.
“Whilst Cicero was doubting what course to take, a portent happened to the women in their offering. For on the altar, where the fire seemed wholly extinguished, a great and bright flame issued forth from the ashes of the burnt wood ... but the holy virgins called to Tarentia, Cicero’s wife, and bade her haste to her husband, and command him to execute what he had resolved for the good of his country, for the goddess had sent a great light to the increase of his safety and glory”.
MAY 4th
Roman: BONA DEA. See under May 3rd.
North African: ST. MONICA. (Irish Catholic Dir.) “May 4th. St. Monica”. See also below.
Irish: The Veneration of the Holy Thorn Tree. (Graves, The White Goddess, p. 175) “In his well-documented study, Historic Thorn Trees in the British Isles, Mr. Vaughan Cornish writes of the sacred hawthorns growing over wells in Goidelic provinces ... at Tin’ahely in County Wicklow: Devotees attended on the 4th of May, rounds were duly made around the well, and shreds torn off their garments and hung on the thorn’. He adds: ‘This is St. Monica’s Day …’ Plainly, since St. Monica’s Day, New Style, corresponds with May 15th, Old Style, this was a ceremony in honour of the Hawthorn month, which had just begun”.
MAY 8th
Roman-Cornish: FLORA; The Furry Dance, Flora Day, The Floral Dance. (Lewis’s Top. Dict. England) “Helston, or Helleston ... Cornwall ... This town has from time immemorial been noted for a popular festival held annually on the 8th of May, called ‘the Furrey’, supposed to have been derived from the Roman Floralia, or games in honour of the goddess Flora: on this occasion persons parade the streets with garlands of flowers, and all ranks partake of the pleasures of dancing and various rural amusements”. See also under Maid Marian.
British: MAID MARIAN; AUNT MARY MOSES. (Marian Green, A Harvest of Festivals, p. 28) on the Furry Dance: “The name ‘Furry’ is possibly derived from the Latin word Feria meaning a fair or holy day, usually of a religious nature ... Another popular name is Flora Day, or the Floral Dance, under which name the written words of the song are usually known. This would relate to Flora, the Roman Goddess of the spring and flowers, and was popularly used in Helston in the eighteenth, nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, probably deriving from eighteenth-century interest in all things of the classical period, including history and architecture”.
(id. p. 27) “In Helston the Furry Dance is always held on May 8th, unless this day falls on a Sunday or Monday (The latter being Helston’s cattle-market day)”.
(id. p. 23) on the song sung at the festival: “There are five verses usually sung today; the first deals with Robin Hood and Little John ... Traditional heroes of Britain, Robin Hood and his Merrie Men appear in all sorts of guises in folk plays,’ and Maid Marian is another version of the Goddess of the Woodlands and Wildthings, so here is the first link with ancient legends …
“The last verse somehow seems to repeat ... the Padstow song, for here we have ‘Aunt Mary Moses’, rather like ‘Old Ursula Birdhood’; some sort of nature spirit impersonated … or perhaps 4 remembrance of the Lady Mary who is herself a version of an older maid/mother Goddess. Here Aunt Mary Moses ‘and , all her power and might, O’, occurs” …
(Druids Cal.) “Flora Day. Flora, goddess of flowers, reigns in May and is a great encouragement to dancing. Among the English, this season sees an outbreak of the ancient rites of Morris dancing and furry dancing. Furry Dance, Helston, Cornwall”.
JULIAN of Norwich. (Church of England Cal.) “May 8th. Julian of Norwich, Mystic, c. 1417.”
MAY 9th
Roman: The Lémures; The Lémuria, First Day. (Frazer on Ovid, Fasti, p. 424) “The Lémures were the wandering ,spirits of the dead ... The ghosts who visited the houses on the three days of the festival were the spirits of kinsfolk departed this life. From this it appears that the three days of the Lemuria were All Souls’ Days, on which the spirits of the dead were supposed to revisit their old houses”. (Rose, O.C.D.) “Lemuria, 9, 11, 13 May”.
(Ovid. Fasti, V; 421) “May 9th … there will be celebrated an olden rite, the Nocturnal Lemuria: it will bring offerings to the silent ghosts. The year was formerly shorter ... Yet even then people brought gifts to the ashes of the dead, as their due ... When midnight has come and lends silence to sleep, and dogs and all ye varied fowls are hushed, the worshipper who bears the ancient rite in mind and fears the deities arises ... and he makes a sign with the thumb in the middle of his closed fingers (Frazer: ‘The charm to avert the evil eye; it is called in Italian “the fig”, la fica or mano fica’. Note: (Doreen Valiente, ABC of Witchcraft, p. 112) ‘The mano in fica is made by closing all the fingers into a fist, and thrusting the thumb between the first and second fingers. “The fig” is a synonym for the female genitals … a defence against the Evil Eye’. Physiologically this gesture represents the clitoris in the labia) ... he turns, and first he receives black beans and throws them away with face averted; but while he throws them he says: ‘These I cast; with these beans I redeem me and mine’. This he says nine times, without looking back: the shade is thought to gather the beans, and to follow unseen behind”.
MAY 11th
Roman: The Lémures; The Lémuria, Second Day. See under May 9th.
Manx: Oie Voaldyn, Old May-Day Eve. The Fairies; THE WITCHES. (Sophia Morrison, cited by Evans Wentz, Fairy Faith, p. 124) “May 11th in Manx Oie Voaldyn, ‘Mayday Eve’. On this evening the fairies were supposed to be particularly active ... and witches, who were also active at this time”.
Irish: The Lúnantishees. (Evans Wentz, Fairy-Faith, p. 53) on the Shee or Fairies: “The lunantishees are the tribes that guard the blackthorn trees or sloes; they let you cut no stick on the eleventh of November (the original November Day), or on the eleventh of May (the original May Day)”.
MAY 13th
Roman: The Lémures; The Lémuria, Third Day. See under May 9th.
Portuguese: OUR LADY OF FATIMA; First of the monthly Apparitions. (von Daniken, Miracles of the Gods, p. 216) “13.5.1917. After an unexpected flash of lightning, three shepherd children of Fatima, Portugal, saw Mary in a gleaming white robe, with a brilliant crown of roses, floating above an oak tree.” See also under October 13th.
MAY 14th
Egyptian: ISIS. (Perp. Fest. Cal.) “May 14th. The finding of Osiris and Rejoicings of Isis”. (Fell. of Isis Dir.) “May 14th. The Finding of Osiris and Rejoicing of Isis ... Success in the Quest. Discovery”.
The Panegyric of Isis. (Isodorus, Hymn II. 21) to Isis: “Remembering your gifts, men to whom you have granted, wealth and great blessing (which you give them to possess all their lives). All duly set aside for you one tenth of these blessings, rejoicing each year at the time of the Panegyric.
“Thereafter you allow them, as the year rolls round (again), everyone to rejoice in the month of Pachon.
“Joyful after your festival, they return home reverently (and are) filled with the sense of blessedness that comes only from you.”
(id. Hymn III. 28) to Isis: “If You are present here too, you witness (men’s) individual virtue, delighting in the oblations, liberations and offerings, of the men who dwell in the Nome of Suchos, the Arsinoïtes, men of mixes races who all, yearly, are present on the twentieth of Pachon and Thoth, bringing a tenth for you, and Sokonopsis most sacred of gods, at Your feast.
“O Hearer of prayers, black-robed Isis, the Merciful, and you great gods who share the temple with her, send Paeon to me, healer of all ills.
“Isidorus wrote (it).”
Note: The 20th Pachon, in the fixed Alexandrian calendar, corresponds to the 15th May.
MAY 15th
Graeco-Roman: MAIA; Festival in honour of Maia and Mercury. (Rose, O.CD.) “Maia ... was associated with Mercurius, and worshipped also on 15th May, the natalis of his temple, apparently under the title Inuicta (‘Maiae inuict.,’ Fasti Antiates on that date)”.
Roman: VESTA. (Esther Harding, Woman’s Myst. p. 128) “Where the sacred fire of the moon is tended by Vestal priestesses, they are usually responsible also for the rain rituals ... just as in ancient Rome, the Vestal Virgins, guardians of the sacred fire of Vesta, performed a ceremony at the Ides of May, the time of the full moon, to regulate the water supply”.
MAY 17th
Roman: DEA DIA. (Perp. Fest. Cal.) “May 17th. Dea Dia, the Great Mother”. (Fell. of Isis Dir.) “May 17th. The Great Goddess. The Cosmos. Nature. Space as Mother. Power, Tenderness.”
MAY 20th
Japenese: OKINAGA-TARASHI-HIME, The Empress JINGO. (Herbert, Shinto) on Japanese Festivals: “May 20th. On the same day in Sakata, the Hie-Jinja, during the Sannomatsuri, also paraded huge dolls, by which they represent Jimmu-Tenno and JinguKogo”.
MAY 21st
Sun enters Gemini (tropical).
MAY 23rd
Roman: FLORA The Rosalia. (Guirand and Pierre, New Lavousse, p. 210) “Flora ... On the twenty-third of May there was another festival in her honour, a rose festival.” (Rose, O.C.D.) “Rosalia or Rosaria ... The Romans were extravagantly fond of roses and used them especially on all manner of festival occasions ... It is therefore not remarkable that a feast of roses was a common event ... feasts of roses are recorded in a number of documents, none earlier than Domitian, at Capua on 5th May, at Rome on 23rd May ... and 21st May, at Pergamum on 24-26 May, and at various places in northern Italy and central Europe on dates ranging from about 1st June to the middle of July; in other words, at the time of year when roses were to be had abundantly”.
(Philocalus, Kal. anno 354) “May 23. Macellus rosa sumat”.
Note: (Waite, Bro. of Rosy Cross, p. 85) on the symbolism of the Rose: “it was sacred especially to Venus, considered as the goddess of love”. See also under June 24th.
MAY 24th
French: THE MOTHERS OF ARLES. (Graves, White Goddess, p. 191) “At Arles, in Provence, the cult of the Goddess as a Triad or Pentad of Mothers has survived under Christian disguise until today, when her festival is celebrated from May 24th to May 28th … now her devotees are largely gipsies. As a Triad she has become known as ‘The Three Maries of Provence’ or ‘The Three Maries of the Sea’; as a Pentad she has had Martha added to her company, and an apocryphal serving-girl called Sara”.
British: QUEEN VICTORIA. Born on May 24th, 1819. (Frazer, Golden Bough abgd. p. 100) “There is said to have been a sect in Orissa some years ago who worshipped. . Queen Victoria in her lifetime as their chief divinity”. (Evans Wentz, Tibetan Book of the Dead, p. 116) “The late Lama Kazi Dawo-Sandup told me that, because Tibetans saw the likeness of Queen Victoria on English coins and recognized it as being that of Dolma, there developed throughout Tibet during the Victorian Era a belief that Dolma had come back to birth again to rule the world in the person of the Great Queen of England; and that, owing to this belief, the British representatives of the Queen then met with an unusually friendly reception in their negotiations with Lhassa, although probably unaware of the origin of the friendship”.
MAY 25th
Roman: FORTUNA PUBLICA. (Ovid, Fasti, V. 729) “May 25th. Nor will I pass thee over, thou Public Fortune of the powerful people, to whom a temple was dedicated next day”.
Chinese: The Tao; THE MOTHER OF THE WORLD. (Fell. of Isis Dir.) “May 25th. The Tao (Chinese and Japanese) Mysticism of the Way. The Eastern gate to the Heart”.
(The Tao-te-King, cited by Tharchin, Ms.).
“There is a thing confusedly formed
Born before heaven and earth.
Silent and void
It stands alone and does not change,
Goes round and does not weary.
It is capable of being the mother of the world.
I do not know its name
So I style it ‘the Way’,
I give it the makeshift name ‘The Great’
(Commentary by Tharchin) “By living in harmony with the flux of the universe and holding fast to the eternal principles behind it, one is ‘holding fast to the mother‘, following the way, not attempting to interfere with processes beyond one’s control”.
General: ANTHEA. (Lux Madriana Cal.) “Hera 10 (May 25). Anthea’s Day”.
MAY 26th
Roman: The Secular (Centennial) Games, Preparatory Festival. PROSERPINA, DIANA and the MOERAE (PARCAE). (Perowne, Roman Myth. p. 108) “The Ludi Saeculares take their name from the word saeculum, which meant originally a period stretching ... roughly a century. (Lily Taylor, O.CD.) “At Augustus’ request the Quindecimviri made calculations for the celebration and fixed the length of the Saeculum at 110 years”. (Perowne, Roman Myth. p. 108) on the games held by Augustus in 17 before this era: “On the 26th May and the two following days material for purification, torches, sulphur and bitumen, were distributed by the priests to all free inhabitants of Rome, whether citizens or not. Even bachelors, who had recently been banned from public entertainments, were to be admitted. During the next three days, the people came before the College of Fifteen, the Quindecimviri, and offered first fruits, as is done today at harvest festivals. It was just at this time that the Ambarvalia used to go round the ripening crops, and that the penus of Vesta was cleaned to receive the new grain”.
(Zosimus, Hist. Nova, book II. i.1) “[They have the name of the Secular Games] ... this festival contributes to the healing of epidemics, gangrenes and illnesses”. (id. 11, v. 1) “Here is a description of the sequence of the festival: the heralds, going around to all parts, exhort everyone to assemble together for the festival, for a spectacle which they would never have seen before ... in the hot season, a few days before the celebration of the ceremony, the quindecimvirs, seated on a platform on the Capitol and in the temple which stands on the Palatine, distribute to the people objects of purification: these were torches, sulphur and asphalt ... Every one being gathered together in the places indicated, and at the same time in the temple of Artemis, built on the Colline Hill, each person carries wheat, barley and beans; then they solemnly celebrate, in honour of the Moerae, Nocturnal festivals during ... nights.”
(Commentary by Paschoud) “The preparatory phase of the Games comprises: a) the proclamation (according to the formula which Zosimus gives and which is also found in Herodian, 3, 8, 10 and elsewhere) ... b) the distribution of the purgamenta and the suffimenta; c) distributio (or acceptio) frugum (these ceremonies take place before the temple of Jupiter on the Capitol and that of Apollo on the Palatine, the second equally on the Aventine, before the temple of Diana); this preparatory phase occupies the last days of the month of May ... there would first be nocturnal ceremonies dedicated to the Parcae or Moerae during x nights”. See also under May 31st.
MAY 27th
Roman: The Secular (Centennial) Games, Preparatory Festival. PROSERPINA, DIANA and the MOERAE (PARCAE), See under May 26th.
MAY 28th
Roman: The Secular (Centennial) Games, Preparatory Festival. PROSERPINA, DIANA and the MOERAE (PARCAE). See under May 26th.
MAY 29th
Roman: CERES; The Ambarvalia. (Lempriere, Dict.) “Ambarvalia, a joyful procession round the ploughed fields, in honour of Ceres the goddess of corn. There were two festivals of that name celebrated by the Romans, one about the month of April, the other in July. They went three times round their fields crowned with oak leaves, singing hymns to Ceres, and entreating her to preserve their corn. The word is derived from ab ambiendis arvis, going round the fields”. (Seyffert, Dict.) “Ambarvalia. The Italian festival of blessing the fields, which was kept at Rome on May 29th ... a prayer [was] originally addressed to Mars, afterwards usually to Ceres and other deities of agriculture, that the fruits of the field might thrive”.
(Virgil, Georgics I. 339) “First of all, worship the deities, and pay great Ceres her yearly rites, making offering on the glad sward ... Then let all your country folk worship Ceres; for her wash the honeycomb with milk and soft wine, and three times pass round the young crops, while the whole choir of your comrades follow exulting, and loudly call Ceres into their homes; nor let any put his sickle to the ripe corn, ere for Ceres he crown his brow with oaken wreath, dance artless, and chant her hymns”. See also under Moveable Festivals: Rogation Days.
HONOR and VIRTUS. (Philocalus, Kal. anno 354) “May 29. Ludi. Honor et Virtus Zinza.”
The Secular (Centennial) Games, Preparatory Festival. PROSERPINA, DIANA and the MOERAE (PARCAE). See under May 26th.
May 30th
Roman: The Secular (Centennial) Games, Preparatory Festival. PROSERPINA, DIANA and the MOERAE (PARCAE). See under May 26th.
May 31st
Roman: Secular (Centennial) Games, First Night. PROSERPINA, JUNO, LATONA, DIANA, THE MOERAE (PARCAE), THE EILITHYIAE and TERRA MATER. (Brewer,. Dict.) “Secular Games. Those held by the Romans only once in a century ... in honour of Pluto and Proserpine, and were instituted in obedience to the Sibylline verses, with the promise that ‘the empire should remain in safety so long as this admonition was observed’.” (Lily Taylor, O.C.D.) “Secular Games, scenic games (ludi) … performed by the Roman State to commemorate the end of one saeculum and the beginning of a new one. The saeculum, defined as the longest span of human life, was fixed in the Republic as an era of a hundred years. The celebration was ordered by the Sibylline Books ... The ceremony took place in the Campus Martius, near the Tiber, at a spot which was known as Tarenturn or Terentum. The gods honoured in the republican ludi are said to have been Dis and Prosperpina, who had an altar nearby …”
“... Augustus’ ludi in 17 (before this era) are well known from Horace’s Carmen Saeculare, and from an inscription, found near the Tiber, which gives details of the complicated ritual. They consisted of three nights and three successive days of ... archaic scenic games, and of seven supplementary days of more modern entertainment in theatre and circus. Each night Augustus and Agrippa made appropriate offerings ... beside the Tiber to the Moerae, to the Eilithyiae, and to Terra Mater. The scenic games continued night and day, and 110 matrons held sellisternia for Juno and Diana”. Note: (White, Dict.) “selli-sternia, spreading of seats; hence, Religious banquets offered to female deities”.
(Zosimus, Hist. Nova, book II. v. 2.) “When the time of the festival which is celebrated in the Field of Mars for three days and as many nights, has come, offerings are dedicated on the bank of the Tiber, at Tarentum; they are made to the following deities: to Zeus, to Hera, to Apollo, to Leto, to Artemis, and especially to the Moerae, to the Eileithyiae, to Demeter, to Hades and to Persephone”.
(Commentary by Paschoud) “The Games start on the night of the 31st of May to the 1st of June; it is then that takes place the offering to the Moerae celebrated by the Emperor ... also, on the same night … one hundred and ten matrons celebrate the Sellisternia (a holy meal offered to the goddesses, whose statues are placed on seats) to Juno and to Diana; during the same night also are given sacred representations in a theatre, as Zosimus states”. (id.) “The oracle is arranged in the following manner; v. 69, offering of the first night to the Parcae)”.
(id.) “The Games here described conform to the ritual created in 17 by Augustus and followed by all his successors; it is very different from the primitive ritual, which was concerned essentially with the chthonian divinities Dis and Prosperpine; Augustus implicates other divinities in the festival and adds numerous elements of Greek origin”.
Jewish: THE VIRGIN MARY; The Feast of Our Lady Queen of Heaven. (Ashe, The Virgin, p. 200) “By the early Middle Ages ... Mary had five holy days of her own ... The Church added one more for general observance, the feast of Our Lady Queen of Heaven, kept on 31st May”.
The Virgin Mary, at the end of the 4th century, received the same form of worship as that paid to the other Queens of Heaven. According to Ashe (The Virgin, p. 150) “The Collyridians, he (i.e. Epiphanius) explains ... worship Mary as Queen of Heaven”. On this worship Mosheim (Eccl. Hist. Vol. 1. p. 414) writes: “The [Collyridian sect], whom the ladies especially favoured ... worshipped St. Mary as a goddess, and thought she ought to be honoured and appeased with libations, oblations, and offerings of cakes (in Greek kollyrides, in Latin collyridae)”. (Commentary by Soames) “See Epiphanius, Haeres. lxxviii, lxxix The Collyridianae (for Epiphanius makes them all females) were women ... They came from Thrace, and the yet more distant regions of Scythia, into Arabia. It was their practice to dress out a car, or a square throne (kerikon), spread over it a linen cloth, and on a clear day, once a year, place on it during the day a loaf of bread, or a cake (kollyris) which they offered to the Virgin Mary. Dr. Mosheim (in his Lectures) considered them as a set of persons who had considerable heathenism about them; and supposed this offering of a cake was derived from paganism. While they were ... pagans, they were accustomed to bake and present to the goddess Venus, or Astarte (the moon), certain cakes which they called collyrides. And when they became Christians, they thought this honour might now be best shown to Mary. The doctor had in his eye, perhaps, a passage in Jeremiah (vii. 18: ‘the women knead their dough, to make cakes to the queen of heaven’) ... and in general, it is well known, that the offering of cakes in pagan worship, was a customary thing”.
(The Koran, ch. V. v.116) “And when Allah will say: O Jesus, son of Mary! did you say to men, take me and my mother for two gods besides Allah.” (Commentary by Maulvi Mohammad Ali) “From this description of Mary being taken for a god by the Christians ... Mary is no doubt spoken of as being taken for an object of worship by the Christians ... ‘Peter Damian ... apostrophizes her as deified and endowed with all power in heaven and earth, yet not forgetful of our race ... (Ency. Br. 11th ed., vol. 17, p. 813)’, and thus Mary was raised to the throne of Divinity along with Jesus”.
(Wace [12th Cent.], cited by Bridgett, Our Lady’s Dowry, p. 372):
“She is Queen ...
The Virgin is in heaven, in glory.
We ought ever to be mindful of her
And put in her great confidence;
For know well and believe without doubt,
Whosoever shall love and serve her
And honour her with a good heart
Will never lack her aid
In death or in life”.
(Goethe, Faust, last verses):
Doctor Marianus (Prostrate, adoring)
“Penitents look up elate, Where she beams salvation;
Gratefully to blessed fate Grow, in recreation!
‘Be our souls, as they have been Dedicate to Thee!
Virgin Holy, Mother Queen, Goddess, gracious be!
Chorus Mysticus
“All things transitory But as symbols are sent:
Earth’s insufficiency Here grows to Event:
The Indescribable, Here it is done:
The Woman-Soul leadeth us Upward and on!”
THE VIRGIN MARY and ELISABETH. (Church of England Cal.) “May 31. The visit of the Blessed Virgin Mary to Elisabeth.”
French: JEANNE D’ARC. (Perp. Fest. Cal.) “May 31st. Jeanne D’Arc”. (Fell. of Isis Dir.) “May 31st: Jeanne D’Arc. The Old Religion. Loyalty to the land. Will. Fire. Ultimate Triumph in the undertaking. Danger overcome …”
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