House snake

In Belarus, when storytellers want to emphasise that something happened long time ago, they would say "in the old days, when people kept snakes in their houses"...

In the records from the 16th century, Yan Lasitsky says this about house snakes in Belarus: 

"...In Belarusian lands, many people kept pet snakes in their homes and fed them...In large families, during meals, children were fed separately from adults, sitting on the floor around a large bowl of food. When the food was served, the house snake would crawl out of its hiding place and would eat together with the children...Children often pushed the snake away, hit it on the forehead with spoons 🙂, but the snake never got angry nor did it bite them. Belarusian peasants put an uncovered jug of milk on the ground of the house, so that the house snake could feed freely when it wanted...If the house snake lived in a barn, it sucked milk directly from the cows. The house snake was the guardian of the household both magically, and practically, by killing rodents that disturbed animals and brought disease...Therefore, it was forbidden to kill or chase away the house snake..."

The house snake, the protector of the house and the family, was also the thing among Balkan Slavs and the Balts...

That comes directly from the belief that the house snake contains the spirit of the first ancestor that died in the house. The protective spirit...That belief was preserved among South Slavs...

I talked about this in my posts "Stones with narrow bottom bowls" and "New house"...

One other interesting thing. Dabog, old Serbian supreme god, was the sun god. Dabog is also found in Belorussian folklore where they also equate him with the sun...I talked about this in my post about the last megalithic ritual in Europe from Belarus...

Serbian ethnographer Cajkanovic, believed Dabog was also the god of the underworld, god of the dead...Later he was replaced by St Sava, Serbian Patron Saint...

And snakes, being solar animals, follow Sun (Dabog) wherever he goes...It is in our world when sun is here (day, hot half of the year) and it is in the underworld when sun is there (night, cold half of the year)...I talked about it in my posts "The Chthonic animal", "Enemy of the sun", "Letnitsa treasure"...

Which is why snakes are also "Chthonic" animals, and why Slavs believed that house snake contains the spirit of their ancestors...

And why the house snake lived under the hearth/stove...Where the dead gathered too... How old is this belief in the Balkans? Very old...

In Mesolithic - Neolithic Lepenski Vir culture (9000-6000BC) from Serbia, the dead were buried under the floor of the houses, near or under the hearth. The people from Lepenski Vir culture literally "lived with their dead"...

Jani

Greeting of "Jāņi children" by the house owners during Jāņi (Yanee) day, Latvian summer solstice festival. Pic: Leonid Vladimirovic.

There is something strange about this Latvian holiday. It has part of what we find in Slavic mid summer rituals and part of what we find in Slavic beginning of summer rituals all mixed in one...

For instance, Gathering the fern flower ritual is in Slavic countries performed during mid summer Ivan dan (Jāņi dan) celebrations, just like in Latvia.  

Bonfire lighting which is done in Latvia on the eve of the Jāņi day, is another ritual which is in Slavic countries done on Ivan dan. Pic: Jāņi bonfire 

I talked about this Slavic custom in my post "Slavic pyramids" 

But, gathering flowers and making flower wreaths is in Latvia done on mid summer, Jāņi day.

While in Slavic (Balkan) countries this is done at the beginning of the summer, in late April, early May...I talked about this in my post "Flower girls"...

And particularly interesting is the belief in Latvia that "medicinal herbs picked on Jāņi day have special powers and are particularly potent". In Slavic (Balkan) countries the belief is that the "medicinal herbs picked at the  beginning of the summer have special powers are are particularly potent". Which is when medicinal herbs are gathered...I talked about this in my post "Herb Friday"...

Finally, Latvian belief that"girls should, on Jāņi day, wash their faces with the morning dew, so their face will always be white and beautiful" is in Slavic (Balkan) cultures and in Celtic (Gaelic) cultures is done at the beginning of summer. I talked about this in my post "Morning dew"...

I wonder if this is an example of customs and rituals, which as they moved up north, to the colder parts of Europe, were moved from the beginning of summer to the middle of summer, to fit with the local climate (medicinal herbs flowering later and dew appearing later)...

The reason why I believe flower wreath, medicinal herbs and morning dew rituals didn't originate in Latvia, and were originally performed at the beginning of summer, is because both the Irish and Serbian traditions agree when dew face wash should be done (beginning of summer)

As we know the Irish and the Serbs didn't really have much cultural contacts in say, few thousand years...🙂 So we could be pretty sure that this is an ancient custom preserved by both people independently, and not borrowed from each other recently...

Anyway, very interesting I think and worth further research...