Mabon
From Association of Independent Readers and Rootworkers
Mabon, also known as The Autumnal Equinox, Fall Equinox, Mheillea, Foghar, Alban Elfed, Harvest Home, Second Harvest, Fruit Harvest, Wine Harvest, Feast of the In-Gathering, and Gŵyl Ganol yr Hydref, is a seasonal Pagan and Neo-Pagan festival which is celebrated as one of the eight holidays on the Wheel of the Year.
In the Northern Hemisphere it is held on September 20 - September 24 (during the Autumnal Equinox) when the Sun is at 0° Libra.
In the Southern Hemisphere it is held on March 20 - March 23 (during the Autumnal Equinox) when the Sun is at 0° Aries.
The holiday itself has been a part of Celtic culture for many generations. One earlier name for it, Mheillea, refers to the ancient Manx harvest festival of Yn Mheillea. However, the name Mabon, which is how it is known among modern Neo-Pagans, especially in the Americas, was coined around 1970 by the American Wiccan author Aidan Kelly (1940 - ) to honour Mabon, a youthful male hero in Welsh literature and mythology.
In the story "How Culhwch won Olwen," in the Welsh Mabinogion, Mabon appears as Mabon ap Modron, stolen from his mother's arms when he was only three nights old and "no one knows where he is, or what he is, or whether he is alive or dead." As the tale unfolds, Culhwch has been required to perform a series of "impossible tasks" to win the hand of his beloved Olwen, the daughter of the giant Ysbaddaden. Among these tasks is the hunt and capture of the Twrch Trwyth, a fabled wild boar. Culhwch enlists King Arthur to help him, and, as it turns out, Mabon is alive, and has been imprisoned in Gloucester. He is freed by King Arthur's war-band because he is the only man on Earth who is able to hunt with the dog Drudwyn, which is the only dog on Earth which can track the trail of the Twrch Trwyth.
It is likely that, as with other Brittonic and Celtic figures of legend, Mabon and his mother had formerly been recognized as deities. They may even have been a sacred mother-and-son pair in the pre-Christian era, as Aidan Kelly surmised. In any case, Kelly's neologism for this harvest festival has become the most commonly used name for the holiday among Wiccans today.
Mabon is celebrated primarily as a feast day. It is calendrically tied to the Autumnal Equinox in September, but in the reimaginings of Kelly and his community, modern Mabon festivals include recognizable elements derived from a variety of indigenous regional European and European-American folkloric harvest festivals. Given the wide range of climates and crops in Europe, and also in North America, where such traditions were transplanted from the 17th through the 20th centuries, these harvest festiivals were originally celebrated throughout the long Autumn season, in keeping with regional crop harvest times.
Among the celebrations that have contributed to the modern Neo-Pagan Mabon are the Czech, Slavic, and Czech-American Dozinky grain harvest and beer festivals of late August to mid-September, the Italian and Italian-American grape harvest and wine crush festivals of September, the German and German-American Oktoberfest beer celebrations of late September and early October, and the American Thanksgiving festival in November. Toasting with alcoholic drinks features prominently in these regional festivals, because the heavy work of harvesting is finished for the year, and also because putting up a portion of the harvest in the form of alcohol is a way to preserve it for later use.
In contemporary religious Neo-Paganism, the rituals of Mabon involve gaining the blessings of the God and Goddess to sustain the faithful during the dark and cold winter nights, toasting with alcoholic beverages, celebrating through rites of thanksgiving, making offerings to the God and Goddess, and reflecting on the blessings bestowed.
Credits
This page is brought to you by the AIRR Tech Team:
- Author: catherine yronwode
- Contributors: ConjureMan, Papa Newt, nagasiva yronwode
- Images: Unknown Postcard Artist, Unknown Photographer; photo-edited by catherine yronwode
