The Rise of the Spurcalia: Medieval Festival and Modern Myth
Nathan J. Ristuccia
Multiple scholars over the last two centuries have argued that Germanic pagans celebrated a solar festival in February, called Spurcalia. While there is no consensus about purpose of this (with everything from divination, to changing seasons, ritual purification suggested), agree Spurcalia was major holiday, which died out only course early Middle Ages. A closer examination medieval sources, however, reveals never actually existed. Instead, legend holiday arose through series misunderstandings on part writers, modern scholarship compounded. The corrected history spurcalia makes polytheism even more mysterious, but it also illustrates how descriptions paganism reflected clerical ideas Christianization and nature religious worship.
Comitatus-a Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies