Wheel of the Year


Dec. 21st - Winter Solstice (Yule)

Lore: It's the longest night and shortest day of the year. Yule is the return of the sun and rebirth of light. It's a time of new beginnings. A great time for dedication to new projects. A traditional practice is the creation of a Yule Tree. (This is how 'Christmas Trees' got started). The tree can be decorated with traditional Wiccan crafts such as dried rosebuds, cinnamon sticks, popcorn or cranberry garlands, crystals, apples, oranges and lemons. The celebration welcomes the rebirth of the sun Gods and Goddesses.


Feb. 2nd - Candlemas (Imbolc)

Lore: Fertility and growth are celebrated at this time. Initiations into groups or covens are convened at this time. One tradition calls for the lighting of all lamps or candles in the home just for a few moments to honor the suns return. Persephone returns from the pool re-born.


March 21 - Ostara (Spring Equinox)

Lore: It's time to get in touch with that inner child. Taking walks through meadows, taking in the rebirth of the plants and animals that had been dormant through the winter. It's an ideal time to plant seeds or work on your magical garden. Spending time doing things you remember as a child, blowing bubbles, drawing, dressing up. Persephone returns to her mother Demeter from the underworld and all earth blooms in celebration.


May 1 - Beltane (May Day)

Lore: Beltane approches the height of fertility of the year and is symbolized by womens passions. The Goddess in all her beauty bearing blooms and greening the land. It's the time where the maiden moves into the mother phase. Persephone has come of age and is discovering sexuality. Traditionally in Wiccan England couples would make love among the fields on May eve and it was said to enhance the fertility of the growing crops. It symbolizes the weaving of the Earth and the Universe which can be acted out with the May Pole.


June 21 - Summer Solstice (Midsummer)

Lore: Longest day and shortest night of the year. It's the first Sabbat of the waning year. It's when the Mother is at her peak sexually and fertility wise. Everything is in full bloom and the promise of the harvest is still a ways away. Persephone goes to rejoin her grandmother Hecate in the underworld. Her Mother Demeter distraught by her absense stops all growth and death begins. The Goddess who was born at Yule has now grown to maturity.


Aug. 1st - Lammas (Lughnasadh)

Lore: A time of the early harvest, when the Mother begins her croning. What has been asked for during the Summer Soltice is ready to be. Along with celebrating the first fruits of harvest it can also be a good time for bonding with animals and nature.


Sept. 21 - Mabon (Autum/Fall Equinox)

Lore: The promise made at Summer Solstice and Lammas has been fufilled. The children of the Mother are nourished from her great abundance. The Goddess born at Yule has reached menopause, and is croning. Persephone is in the underworld and Demeter has halted all growth until her return. Traditional activities include walking in forests, gathering seed pods and dried plants


Oct. 31st - Samhain (All Hallow's Eve)

Lore: As the wheel of the year turns, this Sabbat marks the death of the old and the beginning of the new. Traditionally viewed as the one night where the veil to the other world is the thinnest therefore easier to commune with those who have passed before us. The Crone is revered and may be why the ugly old witches with warts on their noses are always portrayed at this time for Halloween. The candy given out to trick-o-treaters may have stemmed from the tradition of leaving food outside ones door for the souls of the dead. Candles left in windows were believed to light the way of the dead to the lands of eternal summer. Burying apples in the hard packed earth feeds the passed ones on their journey. This is a great time to rid oneself of baggage of negative thoughts from the past. To put to rest what has been done and think ahead to new beginnings.

The Sabbats of Wicca


Because witches honor nature, they have eight festivals, or Sabbats, that mark the year as it turns through its seasons. The following is basic information about these Sabbats, and includes both standard Wiccan information as well as my personal Sabbat

Samhain happens near Halloween and is when the Wiccan year begins. My altar cloth is black, because we are in the time of year that is dark. On my altar is the harvest, our "dead Lord" whose life is in the crops and "sacrificed" when the crops are.

Yule or winter solstice happens near December 21, which is the longest darkest night of the year. The dark of Winter is safe like my bedcovers at night. Dark whispers of a Mother's love caress me. In the darkness of the Mother's womb, the void I am.

Brigid or Candlemas, on February 2, is the festival of the Goddess Brigid, patron of poetry, healing, and metalsmithing. Brigid's poetry inspires me to shake off winter's sleep now, stretch and start to get ready for Spring. I am still drowsy.

Spring Equinox happens about March 21, and I pass from one time into the other, yet am between one time and another. I completely shed winter's sleep. As a time of passing, transition, it is powerful - a time of balance - equal day and equal night.

Beltane or May-Day, is a celebration of love. And we're talking Pagan now! Love -- moon rhymes with June, so the universe gets created.LAHV! The Ancient people, from the Priests and Priestesses to the farmers understood the power of love: loving company between two people is an echo of the act that created all things. No, let me rephrase that: it IS the act of creation.

Summer Solstice happens about June 21. All things move in spirals, and I watch the year move in a spiral, right now spiraling up to the sun's climax. I celebrate summer and the heat of the Gods.

Lammas is August 1. Now the Corn King dies as his body is harvested from the fields so that I may be fed, so that I may live, so that I may go into the winter months of darkness rich with his blood and love in my veins. The Dark King, Shepherd of celebrations of the Wintertime. Some of my crops are harvested and I give thanks. Some of my crops are not yet ready and I must insure their harvest.

Fall Equinox happens near or on September 21.Today, the length of night time is equal to the length of daytime. At the Equinox, I become aware that this time is not the balance, or rather the order, one usually sees in nature. Nature is not reallI face the darkness of the fall and winter ahead and so face mysteries. The Goddess has surprises for me in the wintry months ahead that will surpass my best hopes.

Copyright Francesca De Grandis, 1986 through 1996. The wide range of copyright dates are because much of this material is excerpted from lectures, articles, books, and Sabbat rituals written over a ten year period.

1