The Gifts of the Winter Solstice Goddesses by Carolyn Lee Boyd

In the midnight hour of the darkest night, they ride through the magic forest, bells jingling, alone or leading a wild entourage, giving gifts and sometimes punishments. Holle, Frau Gode, Perchta, La Befana, and Lady Hera have made their raucous spirit rides between Winter Solstice and Epiphany for centuries or even millennia. What, good or bad, will they bestow upon us this year?

On the Winter Solstice, Patricia Monaghan says, Holle (also known as Holda and other names)  “traveled the world in her wagon”  and “checked the quality of each woman’s (spinning) work and offered rewards or punishments” (288). Who was She? Max Dashu reminds us that Holle was an Earth goddess and “the ‘Mother of All Life’ and ‘The Great Healer’ (256-257). However, Holle was also originally the Death Goddess and  “she controls …the regeneration of nature…For Holle as the Mother of the Dead, bread was baked at Christmas time called Hollenzopf, meaning “Holle’s bread” (243), according to Marija Gimbutas.

Meanwhile, Frau Gode, another form of Holle, rode in a wagon drawn by dogs, sending one into any house with an open door to bark for a year.  “The next year, the beleaguered residents could relieve themselves of the pet by firmly closing the door as Frau Gode rode by” (288), according to Monaghan.

Holle’s sister Perchta also rode and punished spinners who wasted wool, “stuffing the remnants” into the spinner’s torn-open stomach. January 6 was “Perchta’s Day” when “everyone ate pancakes of meal and milk in her honor” and “left bits for Perchta”  (290-291), Monaghan wrote.

More benevolently, Italy’s La Befana is an old woman who rides her broomstick on the night of January 5th, the eve of Epiphany, giving gifts to good children and “coal, garlic, and turnips” to those who were bad, according to Lydia Ruyle.

Finally, Dashu tells us that Rhinelanders “into the early 1400s” believed that Lady Hera (not the Greek goddess of the same name) “flew through the air between Christmas and Epiphany” with bells and gave “an abundance” of gifts (252).

These goddesses are sage guides as we traverse this liminal Solstice when the sun stands still; a season when, to our ancestors who revered or placated them, death from cold or starvation as well as the promise of spring was always present. Who are they and what gifts of guidance do they bring us now when dire environmental and other crises as well as radiant opportunities for individual and global healing are on the horizon?

These goddesses are old, fierce, insightful, and commanding. Some were associated with witches. They unapologetically flex their might. We grow their kind of sagacity and self-confidence only through decades of navigating traumas and victory but rarely do we see role models like this for our own old age. Their gift is to show us how to not only revere them, but be them when we need to do so.

The goddesses are intensely passionate about what they do and stand for, whether it is respect for doing daily work well, the moral education of children, or generosity as a way of life. These aspects of every day life are to be honored. Their gift is to remind us that the effects of our choices of who to be, what to value, and how to live every day will reverberate throughout time as we influence those of the next generation and offer them our own gifts.

The goddesses are not judgmental, not delighting in finding fault, but are, instead, truthful. They reward or punish both women and children based on what has been done well or not without excuses or favor. This gift is the understanding that insight into the reality of our actions is necessary for our own growth and effectiveness and to best decide our next course wisely, personally and collectively.

The nearness of the goddesses during this season forces us to realize that the human and spirit worlds are just a breath away from one another, something our ancestors understood as a fact of every day life. This gift is a deeper understanding that we can be grounded in our everyday world while being open to the influence of these and other goddesses on ourselves and our world. At the same time, we can heed Frau Goude’s warning about carelessly leaving the door between our realms open when it is time for the gateway between them to close.

Finally, remember that these goddesses had their origin in the Death Goddess and are associated through spinning to fate. They offer us the essential truth that letting go and endings are necessary for life to regenerate. In addition, the goddesses remind us that this regeneration happens through the miracle of gifts, whether that is the Earth renewing Herself each spring so that living beings can thrive, or of the compassion and love of humanity these goddesses show by traveling through our world each year bestowing abundance, or our own acts on behalf of others that create hope for the future.

These gifts are so much more meaningful than the toys in Santa’s pack, given for conforming to society’s norms of “goodness.” The true gift of these goddesses is our and our world’s wildness and wholeness: our respect for our fierce selves and life experience, our participation in life with untamed and undomesticated passion, our ability to see ourselves and our actions truthfully and accept either congratulations or consequences, and our giving of our own spiritual and creative largesse. This Solstice, or, for those in the South, at the next Winter Solstice, let’s join the wild ride with our sisters across the Earth in our own time, giving our own wisdom and abundance to ourselves, each other, and our planet.

Sources:

Dashu, Max. Witches and Pagans: Women in European Folk Religion, 700-1100. Richmond, CA: Veleda Press, 2016.

Gimbutas, Marija. The Civilization of the Goddess: The World of Old Europe. New York, NY: Harper Collins, 1991.

Monaghan, Patricia. Encyclopedia of Goddesses and Heroines. Novato, CA: New World Library, 2014.

Ruhle, Lydia. La Befana, in Return to Mago E-Magazine, January 5, 2015, https://www.magoism.net/2015/01/art-la-befana-by-lydia-ruyle/.

(Meet Mago Contributor) Carolyn Lee Boyd