Walpurgis Night. Who is the Sabbath?

[SergeiSK]

"On the eve of May 1, as well as on the eve of November 1, opened the border between worlds, and the devil of all stripes gathered for their holiday. Because in the evening on April 30 everywhere in Europe, bonfires. Frightened and predators, which could devastate the herd (since May began pastoral season), and vermin.
And evil had their dance. The forces of evil fun everywhere, but was especially known German Valpurgisnaht, Walpurgis Night. Every year on the night of May 1 at the top of Brocken (and Bloksberg) in the Harz Mountains (from Hart - "wooded mountains, there are growing fir) flock of ceramic tile, vilah and box thousands of European witches."

"Walpurgis Night - April 30, May 1, germanskomu to popular belief, is an annual celebration of witches gathering in the night around their master, Satan, on high, inaccessible mountain Brocken, where they were celebrating their" Sabbath. "Believe it, derived and Goethe in the 1 st part of "Faust", happened near the end of VIII century, probably in the same manner as has arisen and spread the belief in witches and witches in general: since 1 st May, a special Celebration pagans (the first spring holiday, Beltayn), the older women and in general all those who could not immediately abandon the pagan rituals in favor of Christianity, despite the strict prohibition (under penalty of death) continued to gather in places inaccessible to a suitable manner, ie, singing and dancing, meet the 1 st of May. Furnishing (campfires, wilderness), and perhaps deliberately dissolves these secret pagan rumors (to get rid of unnecessary witnesses), it helped to spread among the people of stories about witches who get together that night in various inaccessible places. The name is derived from the coincidence with the celebration of May 1 St memory. Valpurgi (Valburgi), sister of St.. Willibald, canonized in 778 "



This is where all the details:
http://www.wedma.fantasy-online.ru/w....valpurgis.htm
Witch brooms prepared? Who flies? : D