Cold?? It's the Frost Saints

Surprised about the spell of cold and rainy weather?? No need!

The Ice Saints take place from May 11th till May 13th or 12th to 14th depends on the country. The Ice Saints is a name given to St. Mamertus, St. Pancras and St. Servatius in the folklore of some Europe countries. They are so named because their feast days fall on the days of May 11, May 12, and May 13 respectively.

The period from May 11 to May 15 was noted to bring a brief spell of colder weather in many years.

My grandmother grew up in Austria with that being the rule and has instilled it on at least two more generations. In Hungary the saints are the Ice Saints are St. Pancras, St. Servatus and St. Boniface of Tarsus was said to have feasts that fell during the last possible cold snap of the year before autumn. Exactly which saints are included in the group depends on where you live. So if you waited to plant until after their feast days, you were generally considered safe, in fact, Saint Sophia with her feast day on 15 May, became one of the "Ice Saints". She is known as kalte Sophie "cold Sophia" in Germany, and in Slovenia as poscana Zofka "pissing Sophia" or mokra Zofija "wet Sophia" and traditionally she wash away the cold spell!

According to The Big Book of Catholic Customs and Traditions, this tradition stems from the idea that these saints played a trick on the people by bringing a frost. In the fifth century, Archbishop Mamertus began a tradition rogation days, prayer and processions around the crops, orchards and animals, asking God to protect them from the saint’s wrath.

A 2013 article from The Guardian says that as late as the seventeenth century, Galileo and his students were studying the Ice Saints and weather patterns around their feasts. They found the legends of the cold naps to be accurate. However, it also states that more recent studies aren’t so certain.

I Love Winter!

it is a simple matter of fact that I love winter…it is never too cold. You can always wear another layer of clothes

In Hungary winter is really magic, in the countryside you can smell the wood burning fire, nature is waiting for spring. It is like being on a suspended time frame.

Winter in Orseg, Hungary

If you like my picture you can freely download it from Unsplash

These are 8 reasons I love winter:

• When the first snowfall hits and you’re left gaping at the sky in wonder, captivated by the Earth’s ability to turn water into these icy sprinkles.

• The blast of cold air that washes over you when you open your front door, filling your lungs, and you, with a renewed appreciation for that “fresh air” your mother was always telling you about.

• The moment you step in from the cold and feel your skin tingle with appreciation.

•  The desperation you feel when you’re sprawled out on your porch in nothing but a sweaty loincloth during a summer heat wave, wishing that winter would come early and relieve you of this slow and painful death.

• The happiness you experience from the temporary mass extinction of bees, that allows you to frolic across fields and hang out in your backyard without fear (but with a couple of extra layers).

•  The freedom to wear ugly-yet-comfortable sweaters without shame is enacted every time the temperature drops below 40 degrees. Let those singing reindeer shirts see the light of day, for once.

•  The irrational feeling of success you experience when you cup two handfuls of snow together and feel them crunch into place, creating the perfect snowball.