1. ISMA Secondary School
“Premjers”
Form 11“A”
Deniss Puzāns

2. Jāņi is a Latvian festival held
in the night from 23 June to 24 June
to celebrate the summer solstice
(Midsummer), the shortest night and
longest day of the year.
The day of Līgo (23 June)
and the day of Jāņi (24 June) are
public holidays, and people usually
spend them in the countryside.
The festival's eve Jāņu
vakars is held in the evening of 23
June and goes on all through the
night Jāņu nakts, where people Līgo
(sway) into the following day.

3. Jāņi is an ancient festival originally celebrated in honour of a Latvian
pagan deity Jānis, referred to as a "Son of God" in some ancient Latvian
folksongs. Jānis is also traditionally the most common of Latvian male
given names, everybody of the name Jānis holds a special honour on this
day.
The festival's current date has shifted a few days from 21 June/22 June
when the summer solstice actually takes place due to its somewhat
incongruous association with Saint John the Baptist's feast day, which falls
on 24 June. Still, traditions of Jāņi contain no reference to Christianity or
any Christian symbolism.

4. Jāņi is thought to be the
time when the forces of nature are
at their most powerful, and the
boundaries between the physical
and spiritual worlds are thinnest.
In the past, evil witches were
believed to be riding around, so
people decorated their houses and
lands with rowan branches and
thorns in order to protect
themselves from evil.
In modern days other
traditional decorations are more
popular, including birch or
sometimes oak branches and
flowers as well as leaves, especially
ferns.
Women wear wreaths
made from flowers; in rural areas
livestock is also decorated.

5. Another important
detail is fire: A festival fire
must be kept from sunset
till sunrise, and various
kinds of flaming light
sources are used; usually
these are bonfires, which
traditionally people jump
over to ensure prosperity
and fertility.

6. Jāņi also is thought to be the
perfect time to gather herbs, because it
is believed that they then have magical
powers on this day.
Other practices of magic in
Jāņi vary from fortune-telling to
ensuring productivity of crops, as well
as livestock fertility.
A well-known part of this
celebration is searching for the
mythical fern flower, though some
suggest that the fern flower is a symbol
of secret knowledge; today it is almost
always synonymous with falling in love
with somebody at Līgo night and
young couples traditionally search for
this flower.

7. Traditional food during
Jāņi is a special type of cheese with
caraway seeds, made out of curd,
and the traditional drink is beer.
Many people make the
cheese of Jāņi themselves; a few
also make their own beer.

8. This presentation has been made for the Comenius Multilateral Project
" Save the past, live the present, imagine the future" .
This project has been funded with support from the European Commission.
This presentation reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be
held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained there in.