In the Val di
Ledro (Tyrol) on the last day of the Carnival a figure is made up of
straw and brushwood and then burned. The figure is called the Old
Woman, and the ceremony "burning the Old Woman."
3. The Easter Fires
ANOTHER occasion on which these fire-festivals are held is Easter
Eve, the Saturday before Easter Sunday. On that day it has been
customary in Catholic countries to extinguish all the lights in the
churches, and then to make a new fire, sometimes with flint and
steel, sometimes with a burning-glass. At this fire is lit the great
Paschal or Easter candle, which is then used to rekindle all the
extinguished lights in the church. In many parts of Germany a
bonfire is also kindled, by means of the new fire, on some open
space near the church. It is consecrated, and the people bring
sticks of oak, walnut, and beech, which they char in the fire, and
then take home with them. Some of these charred sticks are thereupon
burned at home in a newly-kindled fire, with a prayer that God will
preserve the homestead from fire, lightning, and hail.
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