Section 3. The Easter Fires.
ANOTHER occasion on which these fire-festivals are held is Easter Eve,
the Saturday before Easter Sunday. On that day it has been customary in
Catholic countries to extinguish all the lights in the churches, and then to
make a new fire, sometimes with flint and steel, sometimes with a
burning-glass. At this fire is lit the great Paschal or Easter candle, which
is then used to rekindle all the extinguished lights in the church. In many
parts of Germany a bonfire is also kindled, by means of the new fire, on
some open space near the church. It is consecrated, and the people bring
sticks of oak, walnut, and beech, which they char in the fire, and then take
home with them. Some of these charred sticks are thereupon burned at
home in a newly-kindled fire, with a prayer that God will preserve the
homestead from fire, lightning, and hail. Thus every house receives "new
fire." Some of the sticks are kept throughout the year and laid on the
hearth-fire during heavy thunder-storms to prevent the house from being
struck by lightning, or they are inserted in the roof with the like intention.
Others are placed in the fields, gardens, and meadows, with a prayer that
God will keep them from blight and hail. Such fields and gardens are
thought to thrive more than others; the corn and the plants that grow in
them are not beaten down by hail, nor devoured by mice, vermin, and
beetles; no witch harms them, and the ears of corn stand close and full.
The charred sticks are also applied to the plough. The ashes of the Easter
bonfire, together with the ashes of the consecrated palm-branches, are
mixed with the seed at sowing. A wooden figure called Judas is sometimes
burned in the consecrated bonfire, and even where this custom has been
abolished the bonfire itself in some places goes by the name of "the
burning of Judas." 1
The essentially pagan character of the Easter fire festival appears plainly
both from the mode in which it is celebrated by the peasants and from the
superstitious beliefs which they associate with it. All over Northern and
Central Germany, from Altmark and Anhalt on the east, through Brunswick,
Hanover, Oldenburg, the Harz district, and Hesse to Westphalia the Easter
bonfires still blaze simultaneously on the hill-tops. As many as forty may
sometimes be counted within sight at once. Long before Easter the young
people have been busy collecting firewood; every farmer contributes, and
tar-barrels, petroleum cases, and so forth go to swell the pile.
Neighbouring villages vie with each other as to which shall send up the
greatest blaze. The fires are always kindled, year after year, on the same
hill, which accordingly often takes the name of Easter Mountain. It is a fine
spectacle to watch from some eminence the bonfires flaring up one after
another on the neighbouring heights. As far as their light reaches, so far,
in the belief of the peasants, the fields will be fruitful, and the houses on
which they shine will be safe from conflagration or sickness. At
Volkmarsen and other places in Hesse the people used to observe which
way the wind blew the flames, and then they sowed flax seed in that
direction, confident that it would grow well. Brands taken from the bonfires
preserve houses from being struck by lightning; and the ashes increase
the fertility of the fields, protect them from mice, and mixed with the
drinking-water of cattle make the animals thrive and ensure them against
plague. As the flames die down, young and old leap over them, and cattle
are sometimes driven through the smouldering embers. In some places
tar-barrels or wheels wrapt in straw used to be set on fire, and then sent
rolling down the hillside. In others the boys light torches and wisps of straw
at the bonfires and rush about brandishing them in their hands. 2
In Münsterland these Easter fires are always kindled upon certain definite
hills, which are hence known as Easter or Paschal Mountains. The whole
community assembles about the fire. The young men and maidens, singing
Easter hymns, march round and round the fire, till the blaze dies down.
Then the girls jump over the fire in a line, one after the other, each
supported by two young men who hold her hands and run beside her. In
the twilight boys with blazing bundles of straw run over the fields to make
them fruitful. At Delmenhorst, in Oldenburg, it used to be the custom to cut
down two trees, plant them in the ground side by side, and pile twelve
tar-barrels against each. Brush-wood was then heaped about the trees,
and on the evening of Easter Saturday the boys, after rushing about with
blazing bean-poles in their hands, set fire to the whole. At the end of the
ceremony the urchins tried to blacken each other and the clothes of
grown-up people. In the Altmark it is believed that as far as the blaze of
the Easter bonfire is visible, the corn will grow well throughout the year,
and no conflagration will break out. At Braunröde, in the Harz Mountains, it
was the custom to burn squirrels in the Easter bonfire. In the Altmark,
bones were burned in it. 3
Near Forchheim, in Upper Franken, a straw-man called the Judas used
to be burned in the churchyards on Easter Saturday. The whole village
contributed wood to the pyre on which he perished, and the charred sticks
were afterwards kept and planted in the fields on Walpurgis Day (the first
of May) to preserve the wheat from blight and mildew. About a hundred
years ago or more the custom at Althenneberg, in Upper Bavaria, used to
be as follows. On the afternoon of Easter Saturday the lads collected
wood, which they piled in a cornfield, while in the middle of the pile they
set up a tall wooden cross all swathed in straw. After the evening service
they lighted their lanterns at the consecrated candle in the church, and
ran with them at full speed to the pyre, each striving to get there first. The
first to arrive set fire to the heap. No woman or girl might come near the
bonfire, but they were allowed to watch it from a distance. As the flames
rose the men and lads rejoiced and made merry, shouting, "We are
burning the Judas!" The man who had been the first to reach the pyre and
to kindle it was rewarded on Easter Sunday by the women, who gave him
coloured eggs at the church door. The object of the whole ceremony was
to keep off the hail. At other villages of Upper Bavaria the ceremony,
which took place between nine and ten at night on Easter Saturday, was
called "burning the Easter Man." On a height about a mile from the village
the young fellows set up a tall cross enveloped in straw, so that it looked
like a man with his arms stretched out. This was the Easter Man. No lad
under eighteen years of age might take part in the ceremony. One of the
young men stationed himself beside the Easter Man, holding in his hand a
consecrated taper which he had brought from the church and lighted. The
rest stood at equal intervals in a great circle round the cross. At a given
signal they raced thrice round the circle, and then at a second signal ran
straight at the cross and at the lad with the lighted taper beside it; the one
who reached the goal first had the right of setting fire to the Easter Man.
Great was the jubilation while he was burning. When he had been
consumed in the flames, three lads were chosen from among the rest, and
each of the three drew a circle on the ground with a stick thrice round the
ashes. Then they all left the spot. On Easter Monday the villagers gathered
the ashes and strewed them on their fields; also they planted in the fields
palmbranches which had been consecrated on Palm Sunday, and sticks
which had been charred and hallowed on Good Friday, all for the purpose
of protecting their fields against showers of hail. In some parts of Swabia
the Easter fires might not be kindled with iron or steel or flint, but only by
the friction of wood. 4
The custom of the Easter fires appears to have prevailed all over Central
and Western Germany from north to south. We find it also in Holland,
where the fires were kindled on the highest eminences, and the people
danced round them and leaped through the flames or over the glowing
embers. Here too, as often in Germany, the materials for the bonfire were
collected by the young folk from door to door. In many parts of Sweden
firearms are discharged in all directions on Easter Eve, and huge bonfires
are lighted on hills and eminences. Some people think that the intention is
to keep off the Troll and other evil spirits who are especially active at this
season. 5