POLISH children heralded the coming of spring with the burning of a Slavic goddess on Saturday March 19.
POLISH children heralded the coming of spring with the burning of a Slavic goddess at the weekend.
POLISH children heralded the coming of spring with the burning of a Slavic goddess at the weekend.
The Polish Saturday School in Tiverton held their customary ceremony where the 'Marzanna' was set alight and thrown into the River Exe.
The Mazanna is a Slavic goddess; not confined to present-day Poland, she is also evoked in folk customs in Slovakia and the Czech Republic.
She has for centuries been associated with winter and death, and it is by the practice of drowning or torching an effigy of her that the rebirth of spring can be said to begin.
A pupil at the school, Julia Kulczycka, 12, said: "Last Saturday we started making these. Today we're finishing them off and it will be great fun watching them thrown into the water. It's nice to come to England and continue the tradition."
