This may look like some kind of strange religious worship of the Tree... But it's just an old singing game involving imitating certain movements (connected with everyday tasks - although some of them feel kind of outdated now by modern standard... like washing clothes by hand...).
I looked up the game to check its origin and found that it's actually originally British, and then called "Here we go round a mulberry bush". I think in Swedish we use a slightly different melody, and we say "juniper bush" - but on this occasion, they had replaced it with "Easter tree"!
In old traditions here, Easter Eve was a night to watch out for witches and other evil forces at work... (being the night before Christ rose from the dead). From that has also sprung traditions to light bonfires and fireworks at night to keep evil away; and (more playfully) for children to dress up as witches. No doubt the traditions still vary throughout our oblong country. But they also change with time. In my childhood, and in this part of Sweden, bonfires and fireworks were still common at Easter. From early childhood, I remember dressing up as Easter witch at my paternal grandparents' house, and dad also lighted a few fireworks in their garden at night. Nowadays, the big fireworks night is New Year's Eve, and bonfire night is Walpurgis Night (April 30th). But you may still see a few little witches - and other strange creatures! - around at Easter...
Have to say this chicken (leading the dance games) looked a lot scarier to me than the cute little witches that could also be spotted here and there in the crowd...
I prefer the cute witches over the chicken for sure.. what a fun tradition.
ReplyDeleteThat is a stern looking chicken! Our big bonfire season is Fall. Are the green polka dot outfits the witches? So cute and springlike! I still remember Here We Go Round The Mulberry Bush, it used to be sung a lot. This is the first I have ever heard of an Easter witch, but it makes sense. All of ours stick to Halloween and Fall.
ReplyDeleteVarious Easter traditions here, too; especially in villages, almost every one has their own things going on. What is common to all of Germany, though, is seeing family, eating and drinking well, hiding chocolate eggs and bunnies in the garden for the children to find and then a walk or short bike ride after the big meal. In some areas, people still dress in their Sunday best and many go to church.
ReplyDeleteI don't think the Easter Bunny tradition ever really grew very strong here... At least in my own mind, I could never figure out why a bunny would be handing out eggs! Everyone knows eggs come from chickens, right? (or chickens from eggs...)
DeleteI cannot remember ever celebrating Easter other than as a religious festival when I was younger. I remember Mum or Dad dyeing our Easter Day morning boiled eggs different colours and we probably had chocolate Easter Eggs. I looked up English Easter traditions. but most of them meant nothing to me or, like the Maypole, were not to my mind Easter traditions anyway.
ReplyDeleteGraham, I think most of our holiday traditions here are really a mess of both religious and pagan origin if we try to analyze them :) As my parents weren't church-goers (not even at Christmas or Easter), that side of the holidays played no part in my early childhood memories. Nowadays it does, though! This year, I went to church services both on Good Friday and on Easter Sunday, even though that did not get mentioned in this blog post.
Deleteoh it sounds very enthralling, lots of pagan traditions in there too.
ReplyDeleteYes Amy, our holiday traditions are really very much a messy mix of "a little bit of everything"! ;)
Delete