Temple of Poseidon, Cape Sounion. Athens, Greece.
The summer season solstice, the longest day of the yr, formally marks the start of summer season.
Within the historic Greek Attic or Athenian calendar, the brand new yr started with the looks of the primary full moon after the summer season solstice (There was no single Greek calendar, nearly each historic Greek society had its personal calendar).
June’s full moon, often known as the strawberry moon, was named for its look throughout strawberry season. Right here, the strawberry moon rises over the Temple of Apollo in historic Corinth on June 17, 2019 – Photograph by Valerie Gache – AFP Through Getty Photos
The summer season solstice additionally fell precisely one month earlier than the Olympic Video games, one of the vital necessary occasions in historic Greece, could be opened.
Within the Northern Hemisphere, the summer season solstice on June twentieth (or twenty first) annually is the second when the North Pole tilts closest to the solar, which is at its highest level within the sky.
This yr (2024) the summer season solstice falls on Thursday 20 June at 23:50 Jap European time
The Crown:
The traditional Greek pageant celebrating the summer season solstice
Cronos and his spouse Rhea by Karl Friedrich Schinkel. 1850.
In historic Greece, to have a good time the summer season solstice, the Kronia pageant was held in honor of Kronos (Cronus), king of the Titanes, god of agriculture and father of Zeus.
Kronos managed the cycle of the seasons and the expansion of crops and represented the harvest, a time of prosperity.
The pageant of Kronia i used to be distinctive in that it departed from the traditional Greek inflexible social hierarchy.
Slaves and masters celebrated collectively, typically even reversing roles, to mirror Kronos’ “Golden Age” of equality and peace.
Persephone returns to earth
The Return of Persephone – Frederic Leighton (1830–1896) – Leeds Artwork Gallery – England.
Throughout the pageant, the traditional Greeks additionally celebrated the return to Earth of Persephone, daughter of Demeter, goddess of harvest and agriculture, a time when the land was reborn and flourished.
Persephone had been kidnapped by Hades, who fell in love together with her at first sight and carried her to his kingdom; the underworld.
She was destined to stay six months (the winter months) underground and 6 months (the summer season months) on Earth.
Dionysus:
God of wine and Liberator of human souls
Dedication to Bacchus (Dionysus) – 1889 – By Sir Lawrence Alma Tadema – Artwork Museum Hamburger Kunsthalle – Hamburg – Germany.
Throughout the Kronia festivities, the traditional Greeks raised their glasses to Dionysus, the god of wine, additionally thought of the liberator of human souls.
They believed that the after-effects they skilled from ingesting wine was a god inside them liberating and liberating them from their inhibitions.
Subsequently, Dionysus was the nice liberator.
The magical hearth of Klidonas or the fireplace of the heliotrope:
St. John’s Eve
Saint John’s Hearth with festivities in entrance of a Christian Calvary shrine in Brittany, 1893 – Le Petit Journal 1-07-1893.
In historic instances, the celebration of St. John Klidonas, or St. John Heliotropos, as he was referred to as in some areas, held the evening of June 21.
These celebrations, now often known as Midsummer Eve and Midsummer Eve, are sometimes thought of separate; nonetheless, each are held at the moment, June 24th.
In historic Greece, the “fortunate bonfires” had been lit, often at crossroads, the evening earlier than the solstice, which individuals jumped over one after the other or in pairs.
Klidonas Customized – Naxos Island – Greece.
The leap over the flames was a type of cleaning by hearth ritual, the place folks had been free of all evil to enter the brand new yr with a clear slate.
Additionally they made needs as they jumped over the flames; New 12 months’s resolutions if you’ll.
All of the trash and particles from the earlier yr could be thrown onto the fireplace, together with the maypole, which was the primary to hit the flames.
This burning symbolized renewal and regeneration.
Klidona’s divination ritual for love and marriage
Two Historic Greek Girls Filling Their Water Jugs at a Fountain (Girls of Corinth) – Portray by Henry Ryland – 1898
“Klidonas” comes from the traditional Greek phrase “κλήδων” (klidon) that means “the sound of the soothsayer” and was used to explain the mixture of random and disjointed phrases throughout a divination ceremony.
To hold out the divination ritual, village women collect and one in all them goes to the properly to carry the “nonetheless water” or the “measureless water”, so referred to as as she should not say a phrase to anybody on the best way to and from the properly.
When the water is introduced, every lady then throws a private merchandise, like a allure, referred to as “rizikari” (from the phrase “riziko” that means destiny).
The pot is then lined with a material whereas praying to Saint John after which positioned in an open room in a single day.
The subsequent morning the lady who introduced the water should take it inside earlier than daylight.
Within the afternoon, an aged girl recites a brief poem every time a lady chooses a allure.
These spontaneous poems are believed to disclose the longer term husband of the unknown lady who occurs to own the allure.
“Summer time Solstice”
A poem by Giorgos Seferis
George Seferis – Greek diplomat and poet – The primary Greek to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature – 1963.
Summer time solstice I
On the one hand, the solar at its greatest,
on the second new moon,
distant in reminiscence as these breasts.
Between them the abyss of an evening filled with stars,
the deluge of life.
The horses on the threshing flooring
gallop and sweat
over scattered our bodies.
Every little thing finds its manner there,
and this lady
which you immediately noticed when she was stunning
sinking, yielding, kneeling.
The millstones grind all the things collectively
and all the things turns into stars.
The night of the longest day.
(Translated by Edmund Keeley & Philip Sheppard)
Associated submit:
The month of Poseidon – winter solstice in historic Greece
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