Tomorrow is April 30. It was my grandmother’s birthday, but, oddly enough, even on her birthday night, there was no way to get her out after dark. Shutters closed, doors closed, no way to dislodge her from her home. Why ? Because of Walpurgis night, well, rather because of the witches. A saying from the Rhine Valley basically says “wann dü in d’r Wàlpürgisnàcht e Silver Köijel in d’r Nàcht nin schiesch, keijt e Hax mìt gsàmtem Baase heràb”. If you fire a silver bullet at random into the sky on Walpurgis Night, a witch will fall from the sky stricken, with the broomstick and all.
Walpurgis Night (in German Walpurgisnacht or also Hexenbrennen), named in honor of the eighth-century saint Walburga, is a neo-pagan festival that takes place on the night of April 30 to May 1. Celebrated clandestinely throughout Europe since remote times, despite the prohibitions and excommunications of the Church, it has been identified with the witches’ sabbath.
It is above all the symbol of the end of winter, sometimes associated with the planting of the maypole or the kindling of large fires. This date also corresponds to Beltaine or Beltane, one of the eight festivals inscribed in the Celtic calendar or on the Wheel of the Year. In France, it is known as the “night of the Witches”, particularly in Moselle (Hexennaat in Moselle Franconian, Hexenaa(ch)t in Rhenish Franconian), as well as in Lower Alsace (Hexennacht) and Haute- Alsace (Haxafacht).
And it’s a mirror with Halloween, this night is located 40 days exactly after the equinox, like Halloween, where the dead pass the veil, here it is just before summer, this night smells of sulfur and therefore calls for a hell of a ball witches. For a few centuries, people didn’t believe in it too much, except my grandmother, and it was already a festival of pranks to make certain credulous people believe that a witch had cast a spell. Ich ben verhaxt, I am bewitched. It was a matter of moving more or less large objects, of making somewhat heavy pranks, in every sense of the word, I am thinking in particular of moving a beam and placing it against the front door, or of downright dumping manure in front of the house door.
Keep your eyes open this Saturday, after dark and until dawn on Sunday, you never know.
Especially in Bastberg, or Bollenberg, these are places where witches gathered in Alsace.