Walpurga- Germanic FigureMortal
Also known as: Walburga, Walpurgis, and Sankt Walpurga
Description
An English nun who crossed the sea to help Christianize Germany, whose feast day became the great witch-night of European folklore. On the eve of May 1, the night that bears her name, bonfires burn on hilltops while witches fly to the Brocken to dance with the Devil.
Mythology & Lore
The Saint
Around 748, Walburga left the monastery of Wimborne in Dorset and sailed to Germany to join Boniface's mission among the pagans. She became abbess of the double monastery at Heidenheim, governing both monks and nuns, and was known for her medical skill as much as her learning. She died in 779. At her shrine in Eichstätt, Bavaria, an oil seeps from the rock beneath her tomb between October and February. Pilgrims have collected it for centuries. They carry it home in small vials as a cure for illness. Her relics were translated on May 1, 870, and that date became her feast day.
The Night
May Day was already ancient when the Church placed Walburga's feast on it. The eve of May 1 kept its older associations. By the sixteenth century, April 30 had become Walpurgis Night, when witches rode enchanted goats or broomsticks to the Brocken, the highest peak of the Harz Mountains. There, in Praetorius's telling, they feasted at the Devil's table and danced with demons until dawn.
Communities answered with fire. Bonfires blazed on hilltops and at crossroads, and blessed branches guarded thresholds against whatever flew overhead.