Yule ritual 2/5, St Andrews Day, the Day of the Wolves and 3 weeks until Yule

In this week's piece, read about the link between St Andrew and Wolves and the second of 5 grounding rituals in the lead up to Midwinter in 3 weeks' time.

Briefly: Moontime, myths and medicines is now open for 2023 at the Early Bird Price /\ Registrations of interest for Ecoliteracy for Educators 2023 are now open /\ Learn about where the names for our months of the year came from /\ Give the gift of learning with one of my courses for Christmas.

Now here’s a question for you - what has today’s Feast of St Andrews got to do with wolves?! Well, as with many Christian celebrations, it doesn’t take much digging to find a link to a Pagan tradition, ritual or belief. Saint Andrew's Day (Scots: Saunt Andra's Day, Scottish Gaelic: Là Naomh Anndrais) is Scotland’s official national day and marks the beginning of traditional Advent. 30 November is also a national holiday in Romania but the origins of this important day reach much further back than St Andrew.

In researching the pre-Christian traditions celebrated on 30 November I discovered that the Dacians, ancestors of Romania, used to celebrate another divinity known as Sântandrei, the master of wolves, on this day which coincidentally was also the time when wolves form packs of 12 to hunt giving way to the name The Day of the Wolves. Suitably intrigued? Me too.