Return from Blockula
Good Friday morning is rough for witches in Scandinavia; fornicating with the Devil takes its toll, for that, Dear Reader, is what legend has witches do on Maunday Thursday night. Well, vigorous ones with the most stamina may be at it until Easter Day.
The origin of this belief can be traced to the 17th century witch hunts in the wake of the reformation. At Easter, as is commonplace around all the major Christian holidays, all sorts of creatures abound: gnomes, trolls, elves, and witches.
The witches travel by broom, always in the company of a cat – preferably black – riding pillion and a coffee kettle dangling from the broom handle in front of them. Witches clearly know what the important things in life are! Their desitnation is a place called Blåkulla, anglicized Blockula, meaning Blue or Black hill. Several physical places have been claimed as the site of the witches annual orgy, Blocksberg in Germany or the island Blå Jungfrun in Sweden. The place is neither here nor there, however, Dear Reader, for if you aren’t invited, you aren’t likely to find your way there anyway.
These days, we tend to leave the witches to fly about their business. We might wave at them as they fly by, we put them on Easter greeting cards, and children dress up as them. Sometime in the beginning of the 19th century the tradition of going påskkärring (lit. Easter hag) started. A few days before Easter Thursday are spent painting and drawing “Easter letters”, essentially drawings with Easter greetings, then on Thursday (sometimes Easter Saturday) one goes round knocking on neighbours’ doors handing them out. The reward is a few candies in one’s coffee kettle.
It is not the same as the American trick or treat custom at Halloween, because there is no trick or threat element involved. Our witches are way to nice for that.
Greetings from 1974.A proper Easter witch should be dressed in bright colours, have a kerchief about her hair, a broom, an old kettle, and typically mom’s lipstick smeared on her or his cheeks.
With that, Dear Reader, I’ll leave you to have a fabulous Friday. Me, I’m off to wash the travel dirt off my broom.
