The Germanic Feast of Sigrblot
The first day of summer and the start of trading, planting crops and raiding.
It may not feel like it but today is the first day of summer in the old Germanic lunisolar calendar. Known as Sigrblot, this sacrificial feast corresponded with the third full moon after the Yule moon which this year took place on the 25th to 27th January 2024.
Unlike the neo-pagan Wheel of the Year consisting of eight festivals, the old Germanic calendar only had three major sacrificial celebrations. Yule began on the first full moon after the first new moon after the winter solstice, Sigrblot at the start of summer followed three full moons after and six full moons after that was the moon of Winter Nights and the start of the cold half of the year as our Germanic ancestors only had two seasons; summer and winter. These three feasts are listed in Ynglinga Saga, chapter 8 (1225 AD).
‘Odin established the same law in his land that had been in force in Asaland…On winter day (first day of winter) there should be blot for a good year, and in the middle of winter for a good crop and the third blot should on summer day (first day of summer) a victory blot.’
Sigrblot is also mentioned in Olafs Saga Helga, chapter 77.
‘In Sweden there was an ancient custom, as long as heathendom lasted there, for the chief sacrificial feast to be held at Uppsala during Goi. Sacrifices had to be offered for peace and victory for their king. People had to attend the feast from all over Sweden. There was also to be an assembly of all the Swedish people. At the same time there was a market and meeting of traders which lasted a week. After Christianity came to Sweden the legal assembly and market still continued there. But now since Christianity had become universal in Sweden, the kings stopped having their residence at Uppsala and the market was moved to Candlemas. That has continued ever since and now it lasts no more than three days. The assembly of the Swedes is held there and is attended by people from all over the country’.
The Saxons, Danes, Geats, Swedes, Norwegians and Icelanders all celebrated Sigrblot which means victory blot or victory sacrifice. In England, the Frisians, Jutes, Angles and Franks called this time Eosturmonath. In his book ‘Pagan Goddesses in the Early Germanic World’, the author Philip Shaw demonstrates through linguistics and archaeology that Eostre or Ostar was only known in North Frankia, Frisia and the south east of England. Alex G. Garman, author of The Cult of the Matronae in the Roman Rhineland also shares the same evidence. To learn more about Eosturmonath, the elusive goddess Eostre and the Cult of the Matronae you can read my article here.
The Indiculus Superstitionum et Paganiarum is an index containing condemnations of superstitions and pagan beliefs found in northern Gaul and Old Saxony during their Christian conversion and subjugation by Charlemagne. In prohibition 21 it mentions the ‘Victory Moon’ in reference to the Saxon pagans.
The moon during which this blot took place was called Goa in Iceland. The Icelandic Law Assembly known as the Althing, circa 970 AD, changed the pre-Christian Germanic calendar by moving the moons forward one month and changing the calendar to a fixed solar one which had twelve months of thirty days. A leap week of either five or six days was added every year depending on the year.
In Egil’s Saga, chapter 49 it says, ‘That spring, a huge sacrificial feast was arranged for the summer at Gaular, where there was a fine main temple. A large party attended from Fjordane, Fjaler and Sognefjord provinces, most of them men of high birth. King Eirik went there too’.
As well as Sigrblot, the term Varblot was used for the feast that took place at the beginning of summer. Varblot was a sacrificial spring feast that took place on the first full moon after the first new moon after the spring equinox. Very much like the early days of the Christian festival of Easter before it was moved to the Sunday.
The Romans celebrated an agricultural festival called Fordicidia on 15th April in honour of Tellus Mater, a Roman earth goddess who was a personification of the productive power of the earth. A pregnant cow was sacrificed to her in each of the thirty wards (curiae) of Rome and one on the Capitoline Hill (the heart of the state religion) to promote fertility of cattle and the fields. The unborn calves were burnt and the ashes were used by the Vestal Virgins in a purification rite during the festival of Parilia on 21st April for the purification of sheep and shepherds. Tacitus, a Roman historian mentions a ritual procession and sacrifice in his ‘Germania’ (an historical and ethnographic work on the Germanic peoples, circa 98 AD) for the Germanic goddess Nerthus (Mother Earth). The time of year is not mentioned, but we could postulate that the fourth lunar month was a possible date for her sacrificial feast.
A debate is still ongoing as to the actual meaning of the word ‘victory’ in this context. Does it refer to the ships of traders and raiders setting off on their journeys now that the seas were much calmer or does it refer to the life sustaining success of the next harvest? Some scholars have expanded on its meaning by translating the word as ‘victory in battle’ or ‘victory in war’. Or it could just simply mean the victorious return of the sun conquering the death of winter and the folk who had escaped its grasp.
What would the Sigrblot celebrations have looked like? Animal sacrifices such as sheep or horses would have been made to the gods the day before the feast which was held on the day of the full moon. Agricultural produce or even weapons and tools could also have been given as sacrificial offerings. The feast would have been held in the great hall of the local lord or ruler with copious amounts of ale and mead being passed around the long tables where guests were seated, silhouetted by the light of burning torches and roaring flames of the central hearth. Toasts were made to their ancestors and gods as well as to future victories. Heavy drinking which was often competitive was common. A man could not refuse the drinking horn if it was passed to him unless he was old or sick. If he refused he would be forced to drink an extra cup! Music, poetry, storytelling and boasting accompanied all of this merrymaking.
Wishing you all a merry Sigrblot, What future victories will you be toasting today?
Brightest blessings, Elissa
The following are links to previous articles I have written that are relevant to this one.
The Origins of Christmas and Yule (Part 2) The Yule Feast The Old Germanic Lunar Months Eostre and the Matronae Cult
DATES IN 2024/25 FOR THE HISTORICAL GERMANIC FEASTS
YULE 25th January-27th January 2024
ALTHING OR MARKLO 25th March 2024
SIGRBLOT 23rd April-25th April 2024
WINTER NIGHTS 17th October-19th October 2024
YULE 13th January-15th January 2025
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The Sagas of the Icelanders, Penguin Deluxe Edition (2000)
The Dictionary of Roman Religion by Lesley Adkins and Roy Adkins (1996)
Viking Age by Kirsten Wolf (2013)
The Lunisolar Calendar of the Germanic Peoples by Andreas E. Zautner (2001)
Robert Sass’ website aldsidu.com (A fantastic resource for historical Old Saxon Heathenry)
This was really great! So comprehensive. I learned a lot.