Solstice

The Magic of the Longest Night ....

Suddenly, the dark and cold are with us ... we have snow, we have overcast skies and when we look at a clock face, we're surprised to learn that it is still afternoon and not well into the evening.
Even though we've been noting the low hanging southern pathway of the Sun's travels across the sky these days, we seem always to be caught by surprise when the darkness comes.

Because we live with artificial lighting it is easy to lose track of the darkening winter days, even when the skies are not overcast. Daytime, or night, if we're urban city dwellers it is difficult to remember to watch the stars because we live encased in concrete and neon. Our northern hemisphere ancestors lived so close to nature that they were often able to take the measure of the seasons and of time by observing the animals and the flora about them ... but there was nothing that was as sure a indicator to point the way as the northern constellations of the night skies.

North Star Poem

Constellations come,
and climb the heavens, and go,
And thou dost see them rise,
Star of the Pole!
and thou dost see them set,
Alone, in thy cold skies,
Thou keep'st thy old unmoving station yet.

Although it is true that the North Star appears never to change its position, it is also true that for those of us who live in the northern hemisphere there are certain circumpolar constellations which never "set" but appear to circle the North Star on a seasonal basis. The constellations are Ursa Major (The Big Bear), Ursa Minor (The Little Bear), Cassiopia, Cepheus, and Draco, the Dragon. The Indians of the North American plains knew that near to the Solstice they could see all of the "sacred constellations" which circled the Pole Star, and believed that the constellations laid out a map or a chart of the locations of the sacred places in the Black Hills of what is now North Dakota. Modern scholars debate the importance of astronomy to the Lakota peoples of America, in spite of the existence of the great Medicine Wheels which are found in the northern planes of the US and further north in Canada. There can be no doubt of the importance of the positions of the stars to European peoples however - and it appears to be true that the great pillars of Stonehenge are placed in patterns which seem to be related to those of the North American medicine wheels. Ancient mound builders erected small mounds to mark the rising of certain seasonal stars in known constellation. Currently, however, some scholars propose that the bitter cold of northern winters "kept people inside at night" and therefore, the winter skies were of little importance.

Northern Circumpolar Constellations

Because I grew up on the Mid-Western plains in a family of farmers, and hunters who were blessed with native American ancestors, it is very difficult for me to imagine that either the Northern Plains Indians or my Northern European Ancestors were kept "inside at night," by the cold and knew nothing of the Winter Skies. I have no scientific basis for my belief that Northern Plains Indians understood the mapping of the night time winter skies, but my experience of winter nights in the Rocky Mountains tells me that the beauty and mystery of those deep, endless skies is too great not to have drawn my ancient ancestors outside into the cold darkness to look up and wonder ... and to learn to look for those signposts that are set to guide all of us the way home, and the way through the seasons. Many of my friends have spoken recently of an instinctive sense of the mystic properties of fire which they seem to be discovering. The same intuitive curiosity or "race memory" is what draws us to wonder about the blackness of those unending night time skies, and it has always been so - the same memory, so dim in some of us now, is the instinctive need that pulled our ancestors out side their lodges to gaze up into the glittering skies of the longest night.

If you are blessed to live in an area where you can still see the night skies, on this most magical of all nights go outside, into the beautiful cold dark of the Solstice, and look up. Look straight up. If the view is good, and there is not a great deal of interference from the appliances of civilization, you will see the "circle" of the Polar Constellations. Then, light a fire - even if it is just a candle, and drink a toast to our ancestors.

(courtesy of "Candle Grove" Website)

Through the longest night, rings out the song,

"Praise be to the distant Sister Sun,

joyful as the silver planets run."
Solstice Bells, Jethro Tull

From the coldest places of the frozen north, to the milder climes of the Northern Hemisphere, fires burn, halls are decked, dancing and feasting continue, all in the hope and the faith that the
"distant Sister Sun" will return, even as the silver planets revolve in their appointed orbits ... and faithful to her Children the Mother does appear. In many ways, in many places, even now, we
are aware of the promise of the Sun.

A Nast Santa watches for the sunrise from his North Pole Balcony

A character from Justin Thomas "Mythticklers" welcomes the sun following the Long Winter Night