Harvest celebrations are the oldest calendaric traditions in an agricultural society.The agricultural cycle of the year and a world view has united the whole of Europe at the time. The harvest and the beginning of the new year has been celebrated at autumn across Europe supposedly since corded ware cultures time. Halloween, which travelled to America with the Irish immigrants, and Kekri is thus the same feast with the common European roots.
The name Halloween (All Hallows Eve) came from merging the pagan autumnal harvest festival with the Christian fest All Saint’s Day.
The earliest equalent of Halloween is the Celtic harvest and New Year celebration, Samhain. Halloween’s Jack-O’Lantern, “trick or treat,” disguising as ghosts and other creatures relate also to the same millennia-old tradition of celebration in Autumn, and they have their counterpart in Kekri too.

End of the Harvest year feast
In Finland, the growing season is short. Living in a self-sufficient economy, it was important that the lands offerings were stored correctly to survive the coming winter. Kekri came, when the grains and vegetables were stored, cattle brought back home and autumn slaughters were done. Kekri was not celebrated on a fixed date, each homestead celebrated it depending on how the work was completed. In many locations, Kekri was celebrated for many days in a row, every house at a time. The custom of Kekri is to eat and drink profusely. It was done to ensure that the next harvest year became abundant.
”Seitsemän kertaa kekrinä syödään ja iltasetta maahan pannaan.” ” Seven times you eat in Kekri, and at night you lay down”
No one got to stay hungry, because it would have meant a lean crop for next year. We had many great dishes such as lamb, home-made sausages, vegetables, porridge and fresh bread. In some places it was customary that the first bread baked from the new grain was placed into the kitchen and kept there until the spring.

New Year feast
In Kekri we ate a lot of meat, so that the cattle would grow, and we drank a lot of beer for barley to grow. After the meal the lamb bones were taken to a sheep pen for the whole year to bring good luck. Such “new year spells” tell us that in the old days Kekri was also a change of the Year celebration. Prior to the current calendar, it was natural to start the new year where the previous crop year ended. Since kekri was the season celebration of the crop year, it was, of course, the year’s biggest celebration.
In Kekri we played, sang, and told stories. Since it was a fertility emphasizing celebration it was also considered the best time to find a husband or a wife.
It was a custom in Kekri, that the young people dressed as Kekripukki or Kekritär. Kekripukki was wearing an inside out turned fur, and a mask made of birchbark You could hang talismans on the fur, and you would use spoons or shears as horns. Kekritär would wear all white from head to toe, sometimes even covering the face with a light white fabric or paper. Usually Kekripukki was a male and Kekritär a female, but this time of the year it was allowed for a man to dress as a woman and vice versa. Kekripukki and Kekritär went from house to house, asking for hospitality. Since no-one was suppose to remain hungry, houses usually treated them very well. If a house refused to offer delicacies, it would pose a threat to the house, for example, breaking of the furnace.
Delicasies or a prank, trick or treat. Kekripukki could also ask for the house and hostess, whether work related to Harvest was done in due time. Kekripukki was making sure that all the work of the house was donein order to celebrate the feast in high spirits and cope with the coming winter.

Rememberance of the Ancestors
In addition to Kekripukki and Kekritär, people believed that there were invisible forces moving around, namely the ancestors.

Farming is beyond current generations. People thought that the land they cultivate and the space in which they live,
belong to the ancestors. In Kekri the dead would come and visit, and see if the land is kept well. One explanation of clothing style of Kekripukki and Kekritär is the dead and ghosts on the move. It was not appropriate in the time of the spirits for people to move around other than dressed as spirits.Ancestors were believed to protect their land, if they were kept happy. Therefore in Kekri,
ancestors was given a place and dishes on the table and a sauna was heated for them. In the Christian All Saints’ Day in Finland and Kekri’s ancestral remembrance naturally merged together. The merge began in the Catholic times, and the practice became established definitively in the 1800s. In 1955, All Saints’ Day was moved to Saturday The moving spirits and ancestors were not always pleasant or welcomed, they could ne malicious, so it was very important to have a fire outside the door to keep unwelcomed guests away. In the old days the lights were shingles and flares.
In Kekri some people made lanterns from hollowed turnips. Inside it you would place a stick dipped in lamb fat. It was called a miserable mans lantern due to the fact that it was relatively weak light source.

Magical sharing time
Kekri was a significant time for yet another reason, namely, the moon -And the solar cycle point of view. The so-called time-sharing is elemental to Kekri, it relates to the time before the current calendar.The exact timing of time-sharing varied, but it ranked in the turn of October and November, and in most cases began from Kekri. Sharing Time was needed, because one solar year, 12 lunar cycles, the lunar year, do not match exactly.
Between is a 12 days cycle, which has been called the Sharing Time. The time-sharing period was like living between the two years, it was different and significant period of time. In particular, omens were interpreted, which were believed to tell the coming years weather and the fate of human beings. The limits between the visible and the invisible world were thin, it was thought the Elves and the ancestors were on the move. During the Sharing Time it was important to spend a quiet time and refrain from doing the work. Thus, it was a natural time for the annual holiday to agricultural workers. They were able to visit the home on annual leave , and take some of fresh harvest with them. It was also a common time for labourers to change houses, leaving from one family to another. It was commonly known as a Kekri week,when labourers had their own feasts and gatherings.

A hole in Autumn in the modern days
Many of the traditions of Kekri transferred to Yule as it’s importance grew in Finland. Kekripukki became Santa Claus , spreading straw on the floor, making straw goats and himmels, and fertility symbols also transferred to Yule. The quiet time related to Kekri became known as Yule peace, and the profuse eating moved to Yule too. Even the very common Yule Ham was originally Kekri Ham.The Kekri traditions of New Year have also moved to the calendar change of the year.
In Finland we cast tin on New Year, which is a custom taken from Kekri. The new year had begun to be celebrated at its current location when the official calendar grew in importance in the urbanization and industrialization in Finland. Yet still in the 1800s it was largely local time for every village.
Kekri is not entirely forgotten in the modern Finnish culture. We have local feasts and gathering, and younger people are trying to revive the old culture. Halloween is not very popular here, so we have a clear space for a celebration in the Autumn. Kekri is all about rememberance of ancestors, eating well, keeping balance between work and play and the cycle of the year.

https://www.kekri.fi/kylalle/kylalle-kekritietoa

Translated to English by Arisa/ANW/ The Nordic Witch

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In our tool kit for survival, much of it commes from the olden. Getting that back when, there is hardly a trace.. is the challenge for people who have gone.. "a far way, tis". The Sami will say.. "What is the most difficult to get back is our "Sami thinking". The thought processes.. and world view that have been carried through the generations..by.. "Common sense, and what works ". Folks who have grown up in the cacophony, and whirl of modernity.. AKA "Abe McChicken".. will find that a "sea change " is required. We, of the human family are pragmatic, and what seems to be an advantage will be grasped..and that before.. let go of. Beyond basic instincts an qualitys.. face and body, not much is passed on through our DNA. it must be learned. The modern day, while it is wonderful in many ways, is, in the verre practical sense, "a bridge too far"... when we are presented with a situation that requires independence, and self sufficiency... Careful thought.. and, the best values?,.. ahh no.. just follow, conform and COMPLY.... Political and social theory and especially, "modern sensibilitys "?.. ahhh.. no. What is much ado right now, we have to turn our back on.. and reach for the echos, of things that..have kept us alive, fed, and secure.. since the dreamtimes. Our connections to and relationships with the 'Ear-th, Sea, and Sky for example, and, "everything that walks, slithers, swims, or flys". The true skills, for living.. rather than the frivolous, the vain.. of the plastic-chrome throwaway.. in and of, modernist consumerism. The old rifle, that once fed and defended a family.. at the hint of modernity.. soon had the stock off, and wass driven into the ground as a picket pin, for horses. Tools of all kinds, that were made to last and be handed doon ta the generations.. have now been replace by cheap, "stainless".. and with plastic handles that falls apart and.. are soon tossed in to the landfills. Efforts by manufacturers.. to not only include a fail part.. orrr parts, but to make sure that many components cannot be repaired.. so that there is no alternative but a new.. washing machine, dishwasher, ect. This is yet another kind of corperate, usury... never mind the banks. Anyways, I wont get into this too much.. a side glance at sixty, should suffice.
---------- A way of thinking, and world, view... to get that back, is the most difficult thing for indigenous folks... and yet all that is needed is the "Will".. "Where there is a "will" there is a "way".. as the saying goes. Illumination... transformation.. and.. "the light of the Godes".... LAUKR ALU *****Tom Joy

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