40 WOMAN AS WITCH 



dances of maidens, communal feasting and drinking, 

 while we have still extant songs made by pious folk 

 to replace the old ribald May-Day songs. 1 In Esthonia, 

 at midsummer, the maidens go to certain hilltops, and 

 there, bedecked with flowers, dance and sing round fires. 

 On Midsummer Night this often degenerated into a 

 veritable bacchanal ; there were dances of nude women 

 and a licentiousness such as we hear of at the witch- 

 gatherings. The privilege of a similar license was 

 claimed by women also at the great festival of spring, 

 in which respect it may be noted that February in 

 Mecklenburg is said to be the woman's month, i.e. the 

 month in which women rule. 



On the Konigstuhl, near Heidelberg, when I was 

 a student there, the whole town was to be found on 

 Walpurgisnacht. Groups of maidens and students 

 went up singing through the woods, there was 

 dancing at the top, and waiting to see the sun rise. 

 At Whitsuntide, in the Obererzgebirge, there used 

 to be dancing outdoors all night. In Mecklenburg, on 

 Midsummer Night, a great caldron is carried round, 

 in which eggs, butter, milk, are collected ; there 

 are choral dances, especial antique dances, and a 

 common meal lasting till late into the night. The 

 special lighting of the Midsummer fires and the driving 

 the herds through them to protect them from witch- 

 craft, the Hahnensclilag r , trace of an old cock-sacrifice, 

 all which occur in the same district, are fossils of 

 old religious rites. Noteworthy and suggestive is the 

 appearance of the caldron - - the witches' caldron 



1 Even as the same folk have recently replaced the old bridal songs in Iceland ! 



