What Do You Call An Evil Turkey? .....A Poultry-Geist
- Em
- Oct 9, 2019
- 4 min read
I stole that joke from the internet, you're welcome.
It has reached that time of year. The beginning of the end of our tight pants. We gobble our way through Thanksgiving, ‘were’-wolf down eight pounds of Halloween candy, just to consume more Christmas treats than Santa does on Christmas eve. Let us not forget the literal river of beverages, whether alcoholic or not, that goes along with the smorgasbord of cuisine we inhale through the next three months. Oh, and don’t pretend that you don’t indulge in the above behavior. No one is falling for your kale smoothie for thanksgiving dinner Facebook/Instagram posts. (Side note: In the spirit of full disclosure, it took me approx. 5 minutes to spell the word smorgasbord…I’m not proud of it.)
I wish all of you the happiest of Thanksgivings, if you chose to participate in that tradition. I hope it is filled with family, and love, and togetherness, and relaxation, and pie…apple pie, pumpkin pie, sweet potato pie, cherry pie, lemon meringue pie…wait where was I originally going with this?
Oh right, the Thanksgiving Holiday.
I would like to talk about the origins of Thanksgiving. Not the heinous history that is the first American Thanksgiving. Although, if you have not researched that topic, I suggest you take a look. I want to go back even farther, back to ancient Greece, back to Rome, back to virtually everywhere in ancient history. What pagan roots does this holiday have and what customs have we adopted that we still use today?
There seems to be one commonality about all “thanksgiving” traditions. Everything is based on the harvest. Most commonly, the final harvest and celebrating the bounty of the crops and the brief reprieve after the hard work of the harvests of the year.
Let’s start in Canada, before the arrival of any European settlers, Canadian Indigenous groups had traditions of celebrating the fall harvests with feasts and community.
In the early 1600’s Samuel de Champlain arranged a series of feasts to combat the scurvy epidemic that had devasted crews years prior. These were called the Order of Good Cheer (Ordre de Bon Temps) and started in November. Certain Mi’kmaq families were also invited to share in these feasts. [i]
If we hop into our time machine and travel back to the Roman empire, we could witness the harvest festival Cerelia where tribute is paid to Ceres, the goddess of corn. Offerings of livestock and crops from the harvest were given to the gods. It was held in early October and people had parades, danced, played games/sports, ate and drank together.[i]
Buckle your seatbelts ladies and gentlemen because ancient Greeks celebrated their autumn festival for three full days. Thesmosphoria was a Grecian harvest festival to celebrate Demetor, the goddess of food grains. (Demetor is not the same as a dementor from Harry Potter…sorry guys). Each day different offerings were made to Demetor to ensure her blessing on the harvest. On the third and final day a large feast was prepared. [i]
There are so many fascinating harvest festivals. Many vary in date because what they are harvesting is different in various places around the world. While North American people celebrated the harvest of corn, Japanese culture celebrated the rice harvest, in Dutch culture the celebration included harvested grapes and roasted goose. Although celebrating different ways, at different times, and with different traditions the overarching idea is the same:
GIVE THANKS FOR WHAT WE HAVE, WHAT THE EARTH HAS PROVIDED US. BE MERRY, CELEBRATE AND PAUSE TO REFLECT FOR A MOMENT ON EVERYTHING THAT YOU ARE TRULY THANKFUL FOR.
That is a message that transcends continents, centuries, and cultural diversities.
In an effort to not make this blog 78 pages long, I encourage you all to take a look the website harvestfestivals.net, they share a fantastic list of festivals from around the world that you can examine one by one, if you are so inclined… I’ll show you.
Harvest Festivals from Around the World
See...? Told you.
I wish you and yours the happiest of thanksgivings, however you chose to celebrate, wherever you are.
~Em
P.S- Stay tuned for the bonus feature!
This is a great legend about the Cornucopia. Enjoy!
“According to ancient Greek mythology, Amalthea was a goat who nursed and raised Zeus from an infant, while in hiding from his father, Cronos, up in the mountains of Crete. She nursed him with her milk and ensured his safety in order for him to one day become a powerful god.
One day, while playing around, Zeus accidentally broke one of Amalthea's horns. In his remorse, he decided to repay her by using his godly powers to ensure the horn to be always filled with whatever Amalthea wished – eternal abundance. Hence the coining of the symbolic Horn of Plenty or cornucopia.”
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[i] Australianmedia.com. “Roman Harvest Festival”. Harvest Festivals from Around the World
http://www.harvestfestivals.net/romanfestivals.htm. Accessed 08 October 2019.
[i] Australianmedia.com. “Roman Harvest Festival”. Harvest Festivals from Around the World
http://www.harvestfestivals.net/romanfestivals.htm. Accessed 08 October 2019.
[i] Evens, Susanna. “Thanks Giving Around the World”. Cultural Intelligence. 29 November 2013. United Success
http://www.unitedsucces.com/cultural/383 . Accessed 08 October 2019.
[i] Australianmedia.com. “Roman Harvest Festival”. Harvest Festivals from Around the World
http://www.harvestfestivals.net/romanfestivals.htm. Accessed 08 October 2019.
[i] Mills, David et al. "Thanksgiving in Canada". The Canadian Encyclopedia, 05 July 2019, Historica Canada. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/thanksgiving-day. Accessed 08 October 2019.
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