|
Click stars for Universe today
Cafe
Diem!
For all my Yule needs
Highly recommended:
Folklore of World Holidays
by Margaret
Read MacDonald
The Book of Saints
Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them
Adventures in a TV Nation
By Michael Moore
Drawing Down the Moon
Globalization/Anti-Globalization
Body Wisdom
Celtic Daily Prayer
Internet Sacred Text Archive CD-ROM
Life in a Medieval Village
Fighting for Hope To support this
project
Search by keywords for books, music, computers, software, home and family
products and much more.
An Inconvenient Truth
By Al Gore; DVD &
book
The Permaculture Home Garden
By Linda Woodrow
The Corporation
Highly recommended DVD
How
to Kill a Country
Remotely
Controlled: How Television Is Damaging Our Lives and What We Can Do About
It
What
Would Jefferson Do?
By Thom
Hartmann
How
Mumbo-Jumbo Conquered the World
Pagan
Christianity
Hello Laziness!
By Corrine Maier
For
God and Country: Faith and Patriotism Under Fire
By James Yee
Crimes Against Nature : How George W Bush and His Corporate
Pals Are Plundering the Country and Hijacking Our Democracy
By Robert F Kennedy, Jr
The Price of Loyalty
The
Torture Debate in America
The
Culture of the New Capitalism
The God Who Wasn't There
A
Question of Torture
By Alfred McCoy
When Corporations Rule the World
Alternatives to Economic Globalization
Feminism Without Borders
Commercializat of Intimate Life
By Arlie Russell Hochschild
The Men Who Stare at
Goats
The Skeptic's Dictionary
Medieval Celebrations
Daily Everything
The Chronicles of
Narnia Boxed Set
CS Lewis
The Chronicles of Narnia (3 disc set)
Fighting for Hope
Petra
Kelly
Thinking Green!
Petra
Kelly
Women's Activism and Globalization
Secrets and Lies
The Clash of Civilizations
Imperial Crusades
Aborigine Dreaming
The Medieval Cookbook
The Murray Bookchin Reader
Environmental Activism
Astro pic of the day
American Folklore
Permaculture
Dictionary of Classical Mythology, Religion, Literature
& Art (Seyffert)
Sun Goddess
A Treasury of Irish Myth, Legend, and Folklore
More books, calendars, T-shirts, mugs, music, posters, etc at
Cafe Diem!
Photo of the day
Mother Earth Spirituality
Bushwhacked
Shamanism
The Mayan Factor
The Mayan Oracle
The Survival of the Pagan Gods
All Things Must Pass [DIGI-PAK edition]
Concert for Bangladesh
Brainwashed
Living in the Material World
Concert for George
Click to promote
your blog or website
another excellent
way we do
|
 International Day of Solidarity with the
Palestinian People
(UN)
I
am a black South African, and if I were to change the names, a
description of what is happening in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank
could describe events in South Africa.
Archbishop
Desmond Tutu, during Christmas visit to Jerusalem,
December 25, 1989
In 1977, the General
Assembly of the United Nations called for the annual observance of
November 29 as the International Day of Solidarity with the
Palestinian People (resolution 32/40 B). On that day, in 1947, the
Assembly had adopted the resolution on the partition of Palestine (resolution 181 (II)).
On December 3,
2001, the Assembly noted the
action taken by Member States to observe the Day, and requested them
to continue to give it the widest possible publicity (resolution 56/34).
Links
UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine
Refugees (UNRWA)
Feast day of St Blaise
Not the better known St Blaise,
Bishop of Sebaste.
Feast day of St Brendan of
Birr
Feast day of St Cuthbert
Mayne
St Cuthbert Mayne (1543
- '77) was a
Roman Catholic priest and martyr, one of
the group of prominent Catholic martyrs of the persecution who were
later designated as the
Forty Martyrs of England and Wales.
More
Feast day of St Demetrius
Feast day of St Denis of
the Nativity
Feast day of St Egelwine
Feast day of St Frederick
of Ratisbon
Feast day of St Gulstan
Feast day of St Hardoin
Feast day of St Illuminata
Feast
day of St Jutta of
Heiligenthal
Feast day of Our Lady of
Beauraing
Feast day of St Paramon
Feast day of St Philomenus
of Ancyra
Feast day of St Radbod,
Bishop of Utrecht, confessor
Feast day of St Redemptorus
of the Cross
Feast day of St Sadwen of
Wales
Feast day of St Sisinius
Feast day of St Walderic of Murrhardt
Click for Eastern Orthodox liturgical days Shop saints
The eve of St Andrew's
Day
Some
marriage-related superstitions have become part of Saint Andrew's feast
day, November 30, and some on the eve.
One German custom
is for single women who wish to marry to ask for Saint Andrew's guidance
on the Eve (November 29) of his feast, then sleep naked that night; they
will then see their future husbands in their dreams.
Another has it that
young women should note the location of barking dogs on Saint Andrew's
Eve: their future husbands will come from that direction.
In Poland, single girls would traditionally pour melted wax into a bowl of
cold water, and the hardened wax was then held up to the light. The
shadow it cast on the wall was supposed to prognosticate the girls'
marriage: if its shape resembled something used by a man, she would marry
within a year. The shadow might also reveal of the future husband his
personality, interests, occupation and so on. Another traditional
pastime was for the girls to fling their shoes into the middle of the
floor. The first shoe to go over the threshold would be that of the girl
who would be first to marry.
"In Germany
St. Andrew's Eve is a great occasion for prognostications of the
future. Indeed, like Hallowe'en in Great Britain, 'Andreasabend'
in Germany seems to have preserved the customs of augury
connected with the old November New Year festival. To a large
extent the practices are performed by girls anxious to know what
sort of husband they will get. Many and various are the methods.
"Sometimes it suffices to repeat some such rhyme as the
following before going to sleep, and the future husband will
appear in a dream:--
"'St.
Andrew's Eve is to-day,
Sleep all people,
Sleep all children of men,
Who are between heaven and earth,
Except this only man,
Who may be mine in marriage.'
"Again, at
nightfall let a girl shut herself up naked in her bedroom, take
two beakers, and into one pour clear water, into the other wine.
These let her place on the table, which is to be covered with
white, and let
the following words be said:--
"'My dear
St. Andrew!
Let now appear before me
My heart's most dearly beloved.
If he shall be rich,
He will pour a cup of wine;
If he is to be poor,
Let him pour a cup of water.'
"This done,
the form of the future husband will enter and drink of one of
the cups. If he is poor, he will take the water; if rich, the
wine.
"One of the most common practices is to pour molten lead or tin
through a key into cold water, and to discover the calling of
the future husband by the form it takes, which will represent
the tools of his trade. The white of an egg is sometimes used
for the same purpose. Another very widespread custom is to put
nutshells to float on water with little candles burning in them.
There are twice as many shells as there are
girls present; each girl has her shell, and to the others the
names of possible suitors are given. The man and the girl whose
shells come together will marry one another. Sometimes the same
method is practised
with little cups of silver foil.
"On the border of Saxony and Bohemia, a maiden who wishes to
know the bodily build of her future husband goes in the darkness
to a stack of wood and draws out a piece. If the wood is smooth
and straight the man will be slim and well built; if it is
crooked, or knotted, he will be ill-developed or even a
hunchback.
"These are but a few of the many ways in which girls seek to
peer into the future and learn something about the most
important event in their lives. Far less numerous, but not
altogether absent on this night, are other
kinds of prognostication. A person, for instance, who wishes to
know whether he will die in the coming year, must on St.
Andrew's Eve before going to bed make on the table a little
pointed heap of flour. If by the
morning it has fallen asunder, the maker will die.
"The association of St. Andrew's Eve with the foreseeing of the
future is not confined to the German race; it is found also on
Slavonic and Roumanian ground. In Croatia he who fasts then will
behold his future
wife in a dream, and among the Roumanians mothers anxious about
their children's luck break small sprays from fruit-trees, bind
them together in bunches, one for each child, and put them in a
glass of
water. The branch of the lucky one will blossom.
"In Roumania St. Andrew's Eve is a creepy time, for on it
vampires are supposed to rise from their graves, and with
coffins on their heads walk about the houses in which they once
lived. Before nightfall
every woman takes some garlic and anoints with it the door locks
and window casements; this will keep away the vampires. At the
cross-roads there is a great fight of these loathsome beings
until the first cock
crows; and not only the dead take part in this, but also some
living men who are vampires from their birth. Sometimes it is
only the souls of these living vampires that join in the fight;
the soul comes out through
the mouth in the form of a bluish flame, takes the shape of an
animal, and runs to the crossway. If the body meanwhile is moved
from its place the person dies, for the soul cannot find its way
back.
"St. Andrew's Day is sometimes the last, sometimes the first
important festival of the western Church's year. It is regarded
in parts of Germany as the beginning of winter, as witness the
saying:--
"'Suenten-Dres-Misse,
es de Winter gewisse.'
"The nights
are now almost at their longest, and as November passes away,
giving place to the last month of the year, Christmas is felt to
be near at hand.
"In northern Bohemia it is customary for peasant girls to keep
for themselves all the yarn they spin on St. Andrew's Eve, and
the 'Hausfrau' gives them also some flax and a little money.
With this they buy coffee
and other refreshments for the lads who come to visit the
parlours where in the long winter evenings the women sit
spinning. These evenings, when many gather together in a
brightly lighted room and sing songs and tell stories while they
spin, are cheerful enough, and spice is added by the visits of
the village lads, who in some places come to see the girls
home."
Clement A Miles,
Christmas In
Ritual and Tradition, Christian and Pagan,
T. Fisher
Unwin, London, 1912
Egyptian day (dies egypticus, dies ægypticus or
dies mala), unlucky day in
Medieval Europe. ("But, notwithstanding, I will trust the Lord"
was the associated saying.)
Last Saturday in
November (2003)
A note about the dating
of items in Wilson's Almanac
Last Saturday of November, Brotherhood of Goat Meat Eaters Festival,
Bellegarde-en-Marche, France
"In the tiny commune of
Bellegarde-en-Marche, they've got a bit of a thing about goats. Once a
year, the 'Brotherhood of Goat Meat
Eaters' assembles to induct new members, while the pride of the goat
fraternity are paraded through the streets in costume.
"Legend has it that in the Middle Ages, in one of their
interminable battles against the warlike English, the
inhabitants of this ancient village were saved by the sharpened
goat horns that they carried as weapons. Goat's meat may be an
acquired taste, but for the residents of Bellegarde-en-Marche,
it is also a lifelong passion."
Source
Day of Mawu, Africa
"Dahomey
Great Mother, creator of the universe from chaos."
(Source: The Phoenix and Arabeth 1992
Calendar)
1489
Margaret Tudor,
daughter of King Henry VII of
England, and queen of James IV of Scotland
1690 Christian
Augustus of Anhalt-Zerbst (d. 1747), father of
Catherine
II of Russia1762
Pierre-André Latreille (d. 1833),
French
entomologist 1797 Gaetano
Donizetti (d. 1848), opera composer 1803 Christian Doppler (d. March 17, 1853), Austrian
physicist most famous for the discovery of the Doppler
effect
1803 Gottfried
Semper (d. 1879), architect
1813 Franz von
Miklosich (d. 1891), linguist1816 Morrison Waite
(d. 1888),
7th Chief
Justice of the United States Supreme
Court
1832 Louisa May
Alcott (d. 1888), American novelist (Little
Women) 1849 Sir Ambrose Fleming
(d. 1945),
physicist, inventor of the wireless valve 1856
Theobald
von Bethmann Hollweg (d. 1921), German Reichskanzler
and Prime Minister of Prussia 1876 Nellie Tayloe
Ross (d. 1977), politician 1881 Julius
Raab (d. 1964), politician and Austrian
Bundeskanzler 1894 Lucille Hegamin
(d. 1970),
US singer and entertainer 1895 Busby Berkeley
(d. 1976),
film director, choreographer 1895 William Tubman (d. 1971),
president of Liberia 1896 Yakima Canutt
(d. 1986),
actor, stunt man 1898 CS Lewis (d. November 22, 1963), Irish scholar and author of science fiction,
religious books and children's stories, many about the mythical land
of Narnia. He was a relatively
orthodox Christian, although one website calls him an "indoctrinating
tool of witchcraft" and is critical of his allegedly
sympathetic treatment in his literature of the pagan deities Dionysus, Bacchus, Silenus and
the Maenads. Lewis's passing went relatively unnoticed by
the world, despite his fame, because his death was overshadowed by
that of US President
JF Kennedy
on the same day.
Wilson's
Almanac on Dionysus/Bacchus
1904 Egon Eiermann
(d. 1970),
architect1908 Adam
Clayton Powell Jr (d. 1972), US civil rights
leader and politician 1915 Billy Strayhorn
(d. 1967),
musician, composer 1917 Merle Travis
(d. 1983), country music
singer 1921 Dagmar
(d. 2001),
television
personality 1929
Berry
Gordy, American record producer who founded Tamla Motown, the first
all-black record company
1932 Jacques Chirac,
French political leader1932 Diane
Ladd, actress 1933 John
Mayall, English blues musician.
John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers was a
pioneering British blues
band that included such luminaries as:
Eric Clapton and Jack Bruce (both later in Cream), Peter
Green, John McVie and Mick Fleetwood (later all in Fleetwood Mac), Mick
Taylor (later in The Rolling Stones), Don Harris,
Harvey Mandel, Larry Taylor (Canned
Heat),
Aynsley Dunbar,
Dick Heckstall-Smith,
Andy Fraser (Free),
John Almond and Jon Mark.
Official Fansite
Wilson's Almanac Book of Days hip list
1939 Peter
Bergman, comedian
1940 Chuck Mangione,
musician
1942
Oberon
Zell-Ravenheart (born Timothy Zell), American wizard.
Zell-Ravenheart is
a transpersonal psychologist, metaphysician, naturalist, 'thealogian'
[sic],
shaman, author (Grimoire
for the Apprentice Wizard;
Dragonlore: From the Archives of the Grey School of Wizardry), artist, sculptor, lecturer and teacher. He is the
co-founder, with Richard Lance Christie, of the
Church of All
Worlds, a Neo-Pagan religious organization with
'Nests' and
'Proto-Nests' worldwide; Zell founded the church on April
7, 1962,
inspired by Robert Heinlein's 1961 science-fiction novel, Stranger
in a Strange Land.
Zell-Ravenheart considers himself to be a
Wizard, and is one of the founding faculty
members of the
Grey School of Wizardry. He has presented,
lectured, and led rituals at many Pagan festivals as well as other
religious events,
science fiction conventions,
Renaissance fairs, and similar types of
events.
An early advocate of
deep ecology, he was also founder and editor of
Green Egg magazine,
publishing 116 issues over 28 years. This came to an end quite
abruptly in September, 1996, when he was involuntarily removed from
all decision-making power by the Church of All Worlds Board of
Directors, of whom many were at that time also members of the
magazine staff. Publication
ceased in 2001.
Mythic Images - website of the
Zell-Ravenheart business
More
1946
Brian Cadd, Australian rock musician
 1947
Petra Kelly
(d. October 1, 1992), a founder of Germany's Green Party (Die Grünen), and author (Fighting
for Hope;
Thinking Green!).
Kelly was shot dead in mysterious circumstances.
The
charismatic and internationally famous Kelly was the first Green in
any parliament in the world and the first German female head of a
political party.
While working at the European Commission (Brussels, Belgium, 1971 -
83), she
participated in numerous peace and environment campaigns in Germany and other
countries. Kelly received the Right Livelihood Award (also known as
the Alternative Nobel Prize) in 1982 "...
for
forging and implementing a new vision uniting |
reetings from Australia.
How it works
Feast day
of St
Saturninus (Sernin; Saturnin; Saturnino; Cernin), Bishop of
Toulouse, France, martyr