Jāņi

Today, June 24, is celebrated as Midsummer in many northern European countries. In Latvia, the day is known as Jāņi and it is also the name day of Latvian men named John (Jāņis in Latvian).

Name days are big deals in some European countries. Right now I'm looking at a Norwegian calendar that carefully notes the name days for every day of the year, and as one might expect, today is the name day for people named Johannes, Jon or Hans.

In the Catholic church, today is the feast of St. John the Baptist.  As Christianity spread  through Europe and/or was forced on the various Pagan tribes, many of their traditional celebrations were brought indoors, baptized, so to speak, and made into celebrations of saints' feast days. Certainly this is what happened to the summer solstice, which is celebrated -- albeit under other names -- on June 24 in many countries.

I've always wanted to see a Jāņi celebration in Latvia. Women wear crowns of daisies, men wear wreaths of oak leaves, they hold big bonfires and sing ancient folk songs in praise of the sun. Some of the songs mention Saule, the Baltic sun goddess, wearing a garland of red flowers and dancing on the hillsides in silver shoes.  The Baltic nations were the last in Europe to be Christianized, and many of the pre-Christian folk beliefs are kept alive in the dainas, which are Latvian folk songs.

The songs are so important that Latvia's single greatest cultural treasure is a piece of furniture built to house dainas lyrics collected in the late 19th century by Krisjanis Barons.  He did for Latvian folk music what Elias Lönnrot did for the Finns by collecting the Finnish and Karelian folktales that became the foundation of the ``Kalevala.'' This cabinet of dainas contains more than 300,000 dainas quatrains and is housed in the Krisjanis Barons Museum in Riga. The cabinet has been designated in the Memory of the World registrar kept by the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).

Today is my friend John Dauns' birthday and name day. He was born Jāņis Drinks in Latvia. When he emigrated to the U.S., he was teased unmercifully about his name, with kids calling him ``Janice Drinks, Janice Drinks.'' So he Anglicized his first name and changed his family name as well. But he never lost his connections to Latvian culture, of course.

Over the years he gave me a few special things from Latvia. I have a small string of Latvian amber beads he bought on his last trip to Riga. And he ordered for me one of the big white shawls with an hand-embroidered border that are worn with many Latvian folk costumes. He knew how much I like to wear oversized shawls and how they're the perfect weight for our San Francisco weather.

The biggest treasure is a bracelet that was made for his mother when they were in the displaced person's camp. It's a cuff bracelet made of steel, pierced in a geometric design and set with small pieces of amber. It now belongs to my middle daughter, of whom John was very fond. And I know she will treasure it as a memento of a kind man with whom she shared some winter adventures from the Christmas she spent in New Orleans when she was about 12 years old.

Last year John sent me the URL for a huge collection of photos from Latvia's Song and Dance Festival that is held in Riga every five years. It's an enormous event and celebration, with thousands of Latvians in folk costumes marching in a parade, folk dancing, and singing the dainas in one huge performance in a massive stadium. The most recent festival was held in 2008, and I do plan to go to Riga for the 2013 festival if I can.

I found a YouTube video of the final night of the 2008 festival with the massed choirs singing the song ``Saule Perkons, Daugava,'' which just gives me shivers. Saule is, of course, the Baltic sun goddess, Perkons the thunder god, and the Daugava is a river that flows through Latvia to the Baltic Sea. It seems this is a great favorite song in Latvia, an expression of national pride and unity.  In the video you can see women with beautiful head wreaths and some of Latvia's many folk costumes, which seem to rival Norway's bunads in variety and quality of hand workmanship. Whenever I watch the video, I see many faces that are younger versions of John's.

I thought of John at our solstice ritual, and when I invoked all the sun goddesses, and I included Saule, in his memory. I know he thought my Pagan enthusiasm were a little on the strange side, but he very carefully read everything he could find out about Paganism, and certainly enjoyed meeting all my Pagan friends. He also kept track of all the holidays on the  Pagan wheel of the year and loved to remind me in an email that the next day would be Imbolc or Beltane.

I had planned to give John a pocket watch for his birthday this year. For years he had an old wristwatch he wore on his belt because it seemed irrational to him to wear it on his wrist, where it could easily get broken.  I'd spent some time sleuthing various websites, looking for a watch that he would consider sturdy enough and that I would find aesthetically pleasing.  Of cousre once he told me he had inoperable cancer, the plan went out the window, as I thought the gift of a watch to someone with such a diagnosis would be only too cruel a reminder of how little time he had left.

I think what I will do instead is buy a silver bracelet in a particular Latvian design and wear it as a remembrance. There's an old story about Namejs, the leader of the Semigallian tribe during the time that German crusaders were attempting to subjugate the tribes and force them to reject their old religion. Namejs had to flee to Lithuania, but left his distinctive three-strand ring with his young son, so he'd be able to recognize the son on his return. The crusaders found out about the ring, and went looking for it with the aim of kidnapping the son, forcing his father's return and his subjugation and acceptance of Christianity. So all the Semigallian men and boys had identical rings made as a way of protecting Namejs and his son. And to this day, most Latvian men will wear a Namejs ring, and women may wear bracelets, rings or earrings designed along the same lines. I've found several Baltic import shops online and will order a Namejs bracelet from one of them.

Tomorrow morning I head off to the Pacific Northwest for a joint memorial service for an aunt and uncle. Seems like a lot of death is surrounding me these days. It's always sad to lose these dear people, even if their deaths mean an end to their physical suffering or come at the end of a long long life. What is remembered lives.

Comments

[Philip]

I always learn so much from your posts. Thank you!

[Deane Webb]

Thank you for sharing John with me. Had the amazing opportunity to spend time with him at the end of his journey. Forever touched by the universal gifts he was granted of grace, honor and the most effortless way he had to make me feel at ease although I was the care taker. Thanks again for your insight to a beautiful soul.