New theme for a new cycle
The perfect time to change themes for me is in preparation for rebirth. Winter-solstice celebrations could well be the world’s oldest holidays. Such celebrations have been observed all over the world since ancient times.
Winter Solstice marks the Middle of Winter or the Beginning of Astronomical Winter, and although interpretation varies from culture to culture, most hold a recognition of Rebirth.
There are more known rituals associated with this solstice than for any other time of the year. Lighting fires to encourage the return of the sun on the longest night has been a universal tradition since prehistoric times.
Midwinter festivals and celebrations occurring on the longest night of the year, often calling for evergreens, bright illumination, large ongoing fires, feasting, communion with close ones, and evening physical exertion by dancing and singing are examples of cultural winter therapies that have evolved as traditions since the beginnings of civilization. Such traditions can stir the wit, stave off malaise, reset the internal clockand rekindle the human spirit.Winter Solstice
In Egypt, Osiris is said to have died and been reborn on Winter Solstice. In Greece, the winter solstice rites were called Lenaea, in which Dionysos was torn apart and then reborn. The Incas had their Festival of the Sun and the Pueblos and Hopis, as well as many other Native Americans, observed Winter Solstice with sun-centered rituals.
The Celts had their winter feasts too, of course. Deuorius Ruiri (Great Holy Feast of Winter) is marked on the Coligny Calendar, the oldest record of Celtic festivals. In Irish, midwinter is “Mean Geimrech”. At a megalithic site in County Meath, in the 5000 year old passage tomb known as Newgrange, the traditional winter solstice fire has faithfully rekindled each and every year since the most ancient of longest nights – by the sun itself.
The word solstice comes from the Latin solstitium — sol meaning “sun” and stitium “stoppage.” The winter solstice marks the shortest day and longest night of the year. From now on, the days begin to grow longer and the nights shorter. In ancient cultures, the winter solstice was an auspicious moment. It meant the end of declining hours of sunlight and provided a sense of renewal as the Sun began its daily climb higher in the sky.
Prior to the Christian era, Romans called this day Dies Natalis Invicti Solis, the Birthday of the Unconquered Sun. Earlier in Rome it was the time of Saturnalia, a notoriously wild holiday. In fact there were so many different Sun deities connected with Winter Solstice that the Roman emperor Aurelian (@270 AD) officially rolled them all into one single festival and proclaimed December 25 “The Birthday of the Sun”.
In 46 BC the winter solstice fell around December 25th. Despite calendar reforms, these celebrations — and the observance of Christmas by early Christians — remained locked to the 25th.
My husband and I have been celebrating the Summer and Winter Solstice as well as the Spring and Autumn Equinox for 25 years with friends. Do you celebrate Winter Solstice?
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13 Comments on “New theme for a new cycle”
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I do like this theme a lot. It’s very easy to read and the colours work well.
And no, I’ve never celebrated it, the thought never occured to me really. I didn’t realise just how much there is to it.
I prefer this theme to your older one. The picture is very striking too. :)
This theme is a very well done K2 modification with loads of built in very cool features and with lots of flexibility. You can read about it here http://diekretzschmars.de/wordpress/themes/dkret-theme/
Schemes – Schemes are CSS files that allow you to visually customize your blog, without ever touching the themes core files. Read the documentation for further information.
Header Settings – Choose the picture you would like to upload to the server and you are done. You can even upload multiple files and randomly circle through them if you enable ‘Show Random Header Picture.’
Sidebars – There are many and you can choose which ones you wish to use or not.
I’m really glad I found this theme and told Richard about it. Luckily he loved it too and he’s more “geeky” than I am so there will be lots of changes coming as we personalize our blogs.
What boggles my mind is that this GPL theme, which would delight the wordpress.com bloggers because it has the all flexibility features they want and ask for, has not been added to wordpress.com presentation themes. I’m assuming there must be some “mysterious” reason for that.
ditto nita’s words. but then i’m biased because i like mint green, heh.
you said this is a gpl theme, has it been suggested in the forums? perhaps they are not aware of it?
I’m glad you like the new theme and I’m pretty sure that if you tried it out you would like it too. The new theme was suggested in the wordpress.com forum and hopefully it will qualify for introduction because it’s GPL and it’s very easy to customize and personalize it.
My other theme will always be special to me. I was a part of its creation. I have it still and I may use it in the future but I can’t right now.
I love this theme too; great header image you chose.
I never used to observe the solstice till I dated a guy who celebrates the Winter solstice and, in fact, holds his company party that day. I love the symbolism associated with it and, living in a cold climate, I appreciate the fact that after solstice, every day will have a bit more daylight!
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WOW! Brightfeather! I go ‘underground’ to study, and when I poke my head up like a groundhog I am BLASTED with such a radically wonderfully new blog-o-yours!! How exciting!
AND I think that radically changing the appearance is exactly the right thing to shake up some locked in memories and associations!! YAY!
Well, I will HAVE to try to get ‘out’ more often. (This studying stuff is… hard.)
Happy New!!!!!
xxx
Welcome back stranger. I’ve been missing you – without obligation, of course … hehehe…
I’m not only going to ground but I will also blog my journey – without obligation.
You warm the bleary corners of my heart by missin’ me! I thank you thankyouthankyou!
I have MISSED YOU, too.. but that is my “fault”!
Go to ground, sweetness!! We get our strength there, don’t we!!??
And if I can figure out how to blog and simultaneously read EveryGallDarnBookOnDangThePlanet, I will tooo!! Blog about it that is.