January 1 and New Year's Eve
Winter
Christmas in-between season, rich Kucios, wishes, divinations, weather signs, straw sheaf, turning of the year
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.
New Year in the Lithuanian Calendar
In Lithuanian ethnographic tradition, New Year belongs to tarpusvente, the time from Christmas to Three Kings. VLE stresses that village New Year customs did not stand apart from the wider winter cycle and should be read together with Kucios, Christmas, and the January 6 boundary. January 1 as the year's start did not settle immediately: according to VLE, in Europe the new year began at various times on March 1 (ancient Rome, the Frankish state until the 8th century), March 25 (Florence and Pisa until 1749), September 1 (Byzantium), or even December 25 at Christmas (in some medieval Western European lands).
The feast was not empty. Imbrasiene's material shows New Year's night and day as a sensitive time when wishes, dreams, weather, behavior, and even first return from church could predict the order of the coming year.
Rich Kucios and How It Differed
On New Year's Eve, even in the early twentieth century, many places held a family meal called rich Kucios or kuceles. It resembled Kucios because the table invited talk about future and family luck, but the food was no longer fasting food and could include animal products.
Around Kupiskis, a custom was recorded of keeping a remnant of some food from Kucios until New Year. This small action was read as a sign of luck, but it also carries a practical lesson: a safe household is one that can save and keep stores.
Why Anger and Bad Words Were Avoided
On New Year's Day people tried to behave as they wished to live all year. Around Tverecius it was said that cursing or quarrelling could make work fail, while a cheerful, orderly day promised a happier year.
The logic is simple: the first day becomes an example for the time ahead. The feast encouraged self-control, good words, giving, and kindness more than public noise. Even gifts to the poor near Tverecius church were understood as a sign for future harvest.
Weather, Harvest, and First Signs
New Year weather was used to judge spring, summer, and harvest. A starry night or sunny day was favorable, frost on trees could promise good barley, and someone falling into snow on the way could in some places be linked with good flax.
These predictions show how the peasant calendar taught people to observe. A person watched snow, trees, birds, animals, and everyday actions because work, food, and family security depended on them.
Divinations and Young People's Anxiety
As at Kucios, many New Year's Eve divinations concerned marriage. Imbrasiene mentions practices from Kalesninkai, Tverecius, Alanta, and other places: dreams, coals in water, wax or tin castings, a comb under the pillow, and signs sought in mirrors.
These customs should not be romanticized as a light game only. They grew from real anxiety: after marriage a young woman left for another household and kin group, while remaining unmarried meant depending on other family members. The desire to know the future was social as well as personal.
Sending Off the Old Year
In some Samogitian places, a straw sheaf was burned while greeting the New Year. The fire was read as a way to send off the evil, misfortune, and failure of the old year. It is close to wider winter images of fire and returning light, but not an all-Lithuanian custom.
In twentieth-century Aukstaitija, the change of years was also dramatized: Old Year appeared as a tired old man, New Year as a quick young man with a bag of gifts. Today the tradition can be marked calmly: give thanks for the past year, light a candle, wish one another well, and choose the first words of the year carefully.
