Imbolc

Chief among the seasonal celebrations which recapitulate the theme of Aquarius is Imbolc (also called Saint Brighid’s Day), which is a Gaelic-Celtic festival held on 31st January to 1st February.

Imbolc is one of the four ‘cross quarter’ days; that is, one placed midway between a solstice and an equinox—in this case, between the winter solstice and the spring equinox. Its basic theme is the marking of an optimistic hope for the first anticipated signs of spring.

The name ‘Imbolc’ stems from the old Irish ‘i mbolg’ meaning ‘in the womb’, referring to the nascent growth of spring, such as that of pregnant ewes, with their new life still hidden. Celebrations often included the lighting of candles and fires to symbolise the increasing power of the Sun.

The time of Imbolc has been a focal point of such ritual seasonal observation from as early as Neolithic times, and some megalithic monuments from this era, such as the Mound of the Hostages on the Hill of Tara in Ireland, are aligned with the rising sun on this day.

Variations of the Imbolc festival with its basic theme of hopes and wishes for the return of the Sun’s light have been held in many Celtic lands, such as Scotland, Ireland and the Isle of Man, and also in Wales where it is known as Gŵyl Fair y Canhwyllau. The festival was associated with the Celtic-Irish goddess Brighid long before the emergence of Christianity. The influence of the pagan Brighid was so strong that the early Celtic Christian church in Britain felt obliged to assimilate her as ‘Saint Brigid’.

The figure of Brighid was associated with the return of the lighter half of the year. She was reputed to visit one’s house at Imbolc, and it was considered good luck to leave her food, drink and even a bed to sleep on. ‘Brighid’s crosses’, reminders of the four parts of the year demarcated by cross-quarter points such as Imbolc, were made from rushes; a figure of the deity was similarly fashioned and carried from house to house. Items of clothing would also be left outside on Imbolc for the goddess to bless, to be used later for healing and protection.

In keeping with Aquarius’s key description of the community’s ‘hopes and wishes’, Imbolc was considered a good time for groups to gather and engage in various forms of weather divination—to look forward hopefully to the future for signs of the coming spring. A favourite form of such weather divination was to see if animals such as badgers or snakes would come out of their winter dens. This practice is a forerunner of the more modern North American tradition of ‘Groundhog Day’, a social event where people look for the emergence from its burrow of the groundhog, whose choice of movements traditionally determines whether spring will come early or late.

Imbolc is virtually contemporaneous each year with the Christian festival of Candlemas, a term which traditionally referred to the blessing of candles by a priest, which practice may originally have been connected symbolically in the collective consciousness, like that of Imbolc, with the return of the Sun’s light and power.

— From: Signs of Life: The Origin of Astrological Symbolism and Its Relation to the Human Psyche