Ostara
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Ostara | |
 Osterfeuer in Sankt Peter-Ording |
|
| Also called | Egg Day, Eostre, Spring Equinox |
|---|---|
| Observed by | Neopagans Wiccans |
| Type | Pagan |
| Significance | Marks the Celtic Mid-Spring, and the Astronomical beginning of Spring |
| Date | Spring Equinox on March 20 or 21 in the Northern Hemisphere September 21 or 22 in the Southern Hemisphere |
| 2007 date | March 21 (North) or Sept 23 (South) |
| 2008 date | March 20 (North) or Sept 22 (South) |
| 2009 date | March 20 (North) or Sept 22 (South) |
| Celebrations | Celebrating the new life and fertility of the land |
| Related to | Eostre, Spring Equinox, Quarter days |
Ostara is a modern pagan festival. Easter eggs and easter hare come from this festival. If there was no historical link there would be no easter eggs nor would there be easter as a name for the christian festival wich is a plaggiate of this festival.
Contents |
[edit] Etymology
The name Ostara goes back to Jacob Grimm, who, in his Deutsche Mythologie, speculated about an ancient German goddess Ostara, after whom the Easter festival (German: Ostern) could have been named. Grimm's main source is De temporum ratione by the Venerable Bede. Bede had put forward the thesis that the Anglo-Saxon name for the month of April, Eostur-monath, was named after a goddess Eostre[1].
[edit] Wiccan festival
Ostara is one of the four lesser Wiccan holidays or sabbats of the Wheel of the Year. Ostara is celebrated on the spring equinox, in the Northern hemisphere around March 21 and in the Southern hemisphere around September 23, depending upon the specific timing of the equinox. Among the Wiccan sabbats, it is preceded by Imbolc and followed by Beltane.
In the book Eight Sabbats for Witches by Janet and Stewart Farrar, the festival Ostara is characterized by the rejoining of the Mother Goddess and her lover-consort-son, who spent the winter months in death. Other variations include the young God regaining strength in his youth after being born at Yule, and the Goddess returning to her Maiden aspect.
[edit] References
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||
