Many of the holidays celebrated to this day have pagan roots. We are talking about both the holidays celebrated in Russia and other Orthodox countries, and in Europe and the rest of the world.
The pagan roots of Christian holidays in Russia
Most significant Christian holidays are somehow tied to the dates of pagan festivities. And, I must say, the religious calendar for the most part coped with its task, firmly replacing the ancient origins of most holidays in the public consciousness. True, some of their elements still remain.
For example, in many Russian villages, especially in the south of the country, the custom of caroling at Christmas has been preserved. This tradition is similar to the Western one, tied to Halloween - mummers (mostly children) go from door to door and beg for food. True, in Russia one is supposed to sing for a treat. And this custom goes back to an ancient holiday celebrated in honor of Kolyada - one of the incarnations of the Slavic sun god. Of course, the tradition of fortune telling during this period also remained from pagan times.
Another hypostasis of the sun is summer, Kupala. Once the Kupala day was tied to the summer solstice. It was customary on this day to guess, walk, dance, collect herbs, weave wreaths and jump over the fire. This is one of the brightest pagan Slavic holidays, which is celebrated by many to this day. True, the sun-Kupala turned into Ivan. In Christianity, this holiday was tied to the birth of John the Baptist.
Shrovetide in Christianity is a "cheese week" preceding Great Lent.
And one more holiday that has remained practically unchanged since pagan times is, of course, Maslenitsa. This is an ancient Slavic custom of seeing off winter and meeting the spring sun. It is the sun that symbolizes the pancakes that are supposed to be baked on Shrovetide. And, of course, a completely pagan custom, which is observed to this day in many Russian cities and villages, is the burning of a scarecrow of winter.
Pagan holidays in Europe
Of course, pagan traditions have survived not only in Russia. True, in Catholic countries, they are similarly supplanted and replaced by Christian holidays, in the ritual of which one can trace the ancient sources.
For example, Halloween today is celebrated as the Eve of All Saints' Day, everyone knows a holiday when children dressed as monsters go home and ask for food … But it is also the eve of the day that the ancient pagan Celts called the day of the dead, the only day when the spirits of the dead return to land and you need to appease them with a treat - in a word, the eve of Samhain.
One of the traditions of Lupercalia was that girls wrote their names on notes and threw them into a special urn, and the young men then pulled out the names of their future lovers.
Valentine's Day, the holiday of lovers, which is celebrated on February 14, also has its pagan roots. In Rome, Lupercalia, the day of love and fertility, was celebrated on this day.
