Lithuanian traditions and holidays

Advent in Lithuania is a season of waiting for Christmas that joins church recollection with older customs of the dark part of the year. It includes fasting, avoiding weddings and loud entertainment, Andriejinės divinations, Advent-Christmas songs that survived longest in Dzūkija and eastern Aukštaitija, weekly Advent markets, wreaths in Lithuania Minor, and beliefs about wolf days.

Agotines on February 5 is the Lithuanian day of St Agatha, Gabija, and bread. Black rye bread is blessed in church and kept at home against fire, lightning, the evil eye, illness, and snakebite, while around Darsūniškis the local devotion to Agotėlė took on an especially vivid form.

Christmas is the main Lithuanian winter feast on December 25, joining the birth of Christ, the Christmas tree, gifts from Kaledu Senelis, and older customs such as kaledojimas, masked visitors, and dragging the blukis log.

Grabnycios on February 2 is linked in Lithuanian tradition with blessed wax candles called graudulines. They were kept at home, lit during storms, beside the sick or dying, and used for the protection of houses and beehives, while the day's weather was read for spring, crops, hay, and summer thunderstorms.

Kucios is the most important Lithuanian winter family meal on the evening of December 24: twelve fasting dishes, sharing the kaledaitis wafer, hay under the tablecloth, remembrance of ancestral souls, and calm reconciliation before Christmas.

In Lithuanian custom, New Year belongs to the in-between festive time from Christmas to Three Kings: families ate a richer evening meal, wished one another luck, predicted weather and harvest, and in some Samogitian places burned a straw sheaf to send off the old year.

Pusiauzemis, usually marked on January 25, is the middle of winter and a turn toward spring. People watched the badger or bear, checked stores of fodder, food, and firewood, shook apple trees, tapped beehives, and avoided work thought to bring worms or snakes.

Three Kings on January 6 closes the Christmas in-between season. In Lithuania the day is linked with blessed chalk on doors, the names Caspar, Melchior, and Balthazar, visiting kings, carrying a star, and house-to-house greetings for health and fertile years.

Andriejines at the threshold of November 30 mark the waiting before Advent and a quiet time of household divination. The best-known custom was to set a cherry or plum twig in water on the eve and watch whether it blossomed by Kucios, while marriage divinations with a well, hemp, poppy seeds, salt, and dreams let young people ask about their future fate.

Martynines on November 11 marks the end of autumn, the settling of hired workers' accounts, and the close of the grazing season. Beside it, Goat Day on November 12 had shepherds decorate a white goat, lead it around a birch, call for snow, fry a last twelve-egg omelet outdoors, while in Samogitia St Martin's goose and its breastbone were used to predict winter weather.

Mykolines on September 29, St Michael's Day, belongs in the Lithuanian autumn calendar with the older Dagotuves layer: sprouted winter crops, thanks at harvest's end, community meals, the beginning of potato digging, autumn and winter weather signs, and the turn toward the darker part of the year.

Velines is the Lithuanian remembrance of the dead observed around November 1-2. On All Saints' Day and Velines, people visit family graves, light candles, and quietly remember those who have departed.

Melagiu diena, or Aprilis, on April 1 was more than a joke day in Lithuanian tradition. It stood near the beginning of the spring farm year, when neighbors checked readiness for sowing, played harmless tricks, guarded household fire, moved poorly stored tools, and wished that the new work season would be abundant.

Ash Wednesday, or Pelene, is the Wednesday after Uzgavenes and the first day of Lent. Lithuanian customs mark a sharp turn from the rich meat-eating season into fasting: ashes are blessed, greasy dishes are cleaned, lean food is eaten, and in some places playful Uzgavenes endings still linger.

Easter is the spring feast of Christ's Resurrection and awakening life: marguciai eggs are decorated, people swing, roll eggs, wait for Velyku bobute, and on the second day lalauninkai visit the village with greeting songs.

Gandrines, or Bloviesciai, on March 25 marks a spring threshold and the return of the stork. In Lithuanian custom the stork brings good fortune, kicks out the ice, awakens seed and grain, while people bake stork cakes, share food with neighbors, avoid lending things, and read signs from the first stork they see.

Jore is a Lithuanian spring greenery festival marking the awakening of nature, the first force of growth, the light of Perkunas, community gathering, and the continuity of living tradition.

Jurgines is the April 23 spring feast when St George, guardian of fields and livestock, symbolically unlocks the earth. Livestock are driven to pasture for the first time, protective rites are performed, and people ask for a good harvest.

Kaziukas Fair is the early-March craft festival of Vilnius and Lithuania, growing from St Casimir's Day. It joins the memory of Lithuania's patron saint, the history of city trade, and living crafts: verbos, pottery, wicker and wooden goods, textiles, bagels, and gingerbread.

Palm Sunday is the last Sunday before Easter. In Lithuania it centers on blessed verbos: juniper, willow, pussy willow, or decorative Vilnius verbos; morning tapping for health; keeping branches at home; fumigation during storms; and livestock protection at Jurgines.

Sekmines is a late-spring feast of greenery and shepherds, celebrated on the seventh Sunday after Easter. Homes are decorated with birches, cows are crowned, shepherds are treated, and girls visit green rye asking for a good harvest.

Sestines is a movable spring feast on the fortieth day after Easter. In Lithuania it is connected with Christ's Ascension, the Kryziavos or Cross Days, visiting village crosses, walking around fields, the end of spring sowing, children and shepherds, the number six in food, and the name Swallow Day.

Uzgavenes is Lithuania's joyful winter-sending feast: the straw figure More is burned, Lasininis fights Kanapinis, masked visitors roam, sun-like pancakes are fried, and winter is loudly chased from the yard.

Devintines, the feast of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ, stands out in Lithuanian custom through greenery: churches decorated with birches, nine wreaths of rue and medicinal plants, blessed herbs kept at home, and their use for healing, protection from thunder, garden care, and the symbolism of nine dishes.

Jonines in Lithuania joins St John's Day, name-day greetings, and older summer-solstice customs: bonfires, wreaths, kupoles herbs, songs, and the legend of the fern flower.

Onines on July 26 stands beside Jokubines in the Lithuanian calendar and marks high summer, new bread, and the end of rye harvest. It is linked with fresh rye bread, cream, berries, first apples, cabbage care, the field sign jievaras, nuobaigos in eastern Aukstaitija, and pagynos in Dzukija.

Petrines, the day of Saints Peter and Paul on June 29, acts in Lithuanian custom as the second midsummer feast after Jonines. It is linked with water, strength games, fishermen and textile markets, the flax path, the cuckoo falling silent, ladybird divinations, haymaking, and the approach of rye harvest.

Rasos is the old Lithuanian summer solstice festival, centered on herbs, dew, bonfire, water, songs, and greeting the sun at dawn.

Zoline on August 15 is a feast of harvest and herbs. It is the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, when churches bless bouquets of herbs, grain, flowers, and medicinal plants, and people give thanks for summer's harvest.