The Barrow-Downs Discussion Forum - What did Middle-Earthians celebrate?

The Barrow-Downs Discussion Forum (http://forum.barrowdowns.com/index.php)

- Novices and Newcomers (http://forum.barrowdowns.com/forumdisplay.php?f=10)

- - What did Middle-Earthians celebrate? (http://forum.barrowdowns.com/showthread.php?t=3471)

What did Middle-Earthians celebrate?

Or is it Middle-Earthlings? Anyway, did they have their equivilent Chrstmas, harvest festival, Easter or is it just not mentioned?

I don't recall there being any specific celebrations anywhere, except maybe in the Shire of course.There would have been one after the ring was destroyed I suppose and probably a New Year party as well. I wonder what elves would celebrate though...

I believe they celebrated YULE and the Dwarves certianly celebrated DURIN'S DAY, the first day of the Dwarves' new year which is the first day of the last moon of Autumn.

*Spoiler*The appendix D tells the calendar of Middle Earth. According to my book after the LOTR the elves celebrated Frodos Bday on September 22 with a festival.

In The Hobbit the Elves of Rivendell held a Mid-summer festival.

Didn't the Hobbit's celebrate their coming to the Shire every year? They also had a 'county fair' every 7 years didn't they?

Well, they certainly did celebrate birthdays . . . I wish I could be a hobbit just so I could celebrate my birthday in the Shire . . .

They certainly didn't celebrate Christmas or Easter, or anything similar, because it was set in a pre-Christian time. I don't have the appendices with me because I lent RotK out...ARGH! It's driving me crazy. 13 days till TT and I wanted to read the whole of LotR again...meow.

~*~Orual~*~

True enough, Merri, Hobbits did celebrate birthdays, but generally they gave rather than recieved gifts on their birthdays.

It was still a day of great celebration. Actually, it wasn't unlike Christmas in the way they looked forward to it, and with the giving of presents to everyone.

Quote:

They certainly didn't celebrate Christmas or Easter, or anything similar, because it was set in a pre-Christian time.

Before Christianity came along there was a mid-winter celebration, around the time of Christmas because winter's winter and you need something to cheer you up while you're half-way through. My mum always told me that was why Christmas was when it was.

Appendix D

Quote:

Every year began on the first day of the week, Saturday, and ended on the last day of the week, Friday. The Mid-year's Day, and in Leap-years the Overlithe, had no weekday name. The Lithe before Mid-year's Day was called 1 Lithe, and the one after was called 2 Lithe [naturally]. The Yule at the end of the year was 1 Year, and that at the beginning was called 2 Yule. The Overlithe was a day of special holiday, but it did not occur in any of the years important to the history of the Great Ring. It occured in 1420, the year of the famous harvest and wonderful summer, and the merrymaking in that year is said to have been the greatest in memory or record.

Quote:

The last day of the week, Friday (Highday), was the chief day, and one of holiday (after noon) and evening feasts.

Quote:

There is no record of the Shire-folk commemorating either March 25 or September 22; but in the Westfarthing, especially in the country round Hobbiton Hill, there grew up a custom of making holiday and dancing in the Party Field, when weather permitted, on April 6. Some said that it was old Sam Gardner's birthday, some that it was the day on which the Golden Tree first flowered in 1420, and some that it was the Elves' New Year. In Buckland the Horn of the Mark was blown at sundown every November 2 and bonfires and feastings followed.