Midsummer Night

In the folk beliefs of the peasant community, Midsummer Night was one of the most magical nights of the year, when nature flowed with power. The border between the human world and the supernatural realm was believed to be thinner than usual, and there are many stories of fantastic things that could happen on this night.

Medicinal plants were said to be extra powerful and were therefore gathered during Midsummer Night. Midsummer Day was also sought after; if you walked barefoot on it, you would stay strong and healthy throughout the year. Dew was also collected to cure diseases and to ensure that bread and beer would ferment properly throughout the year. In some places, people also visited special Midsummer springs and drank the water in them to gain health and strength.

Divination and omens were common in peasant society. The major festivals of the year were considered particularly suitable for predicting the future. Midsummer was the festival of love and if you wanted to know who you would live with, this was the right time.

Love fortune telling was probably mostly a playful pursuit, but there was still a touch of seriousness to it. One form of Midsummer magic still exists today: picking flowers to put under your pillow to dream about the person you are going to marry.

According to tradition, the flowers were to be picked in silence – if it was broken, the magic was also broken. Silence is a common element in the magical thinking of the peasant community, a mark that a rite is being performed. The number of flowers picked varies, but the most common numbers are seven or nine. Uneven numbers are perceived as Sometimes tradition also says that the person who is tracking should climb over as many fences as she picks flowers. This can be seen as a symbolic crossing of the boundary between the ordinary world and the supernatural.

With that, I would like to wish you a nice midsummer weekend /Eva-Lena