Blessing, love, Midsummer, fertility. Ruled by the planet Venus and the elements of earth or water. Sacred to fairies, Freya, love goddesses, and mother goddesses. [1]
In parts of Bavaria, it was traditional come springtime to tie little bags or baskets of wild strawberries to the cows’ horns to appease the fairies and elves, and to protect the cows. [2]
Some of the fairies’ preferred gathering places at Beltane are “fairy rings’ – circles of wild mushrooms; as well as circles of lawn daisies, patches of wild violets, patches of wild thyme, and, most of all, swathes of wild strawberries. [2]
Strawberry Mythology
Some Native American Indian tribes have long associated wild strawberries with spring and rebirth, as they are the first wild fruits to ripen. They used them mixed with cornmeal to make strawberry bread, which whtie settlers transformed to strawberry shortcake, a traditional Memorial Day weekend dessert.
During meieval times, the strawberry signified perfection and righteousness and strawberry fruits also symbolized esteem, love, purity, passion, health, and perfection, and were a popular embroidery motif. In heraldry, depictions of strawberry leaves were sometimes used to denote rank.
Strawberries are one of Venus’s symbols, due to their red heart shape. Frigga, the Norse marriage goddess, was believe to smuggle dad children to heaven by hiding them in strawberry patches. Both Freya, the Norse goddess of love, and the Christian Virgin Mary have been associated with strawberries.
Dutch early surrealist artist Hieronymus Bosch painted one of his most famous works, the triptych The Garden of Earthly Delights, in the fifteenth century. It is now housed at the Museo del Prado in Madrid, Spain, and, if you are unfamiliar with Bosch’s work, it is wonderfully strange. The center panel, which represents a lustful earthly paradise, features many oversized strawberries. At the bottom right are two human-sized straberries, one bursting open to emit round blue balls, and the other being used as an exercise ball by a naked woman. One of the men is offering the woman a strawberry as big as a melon. Another giant strawberry, with fairy wings, rides on the back of a naked man, a spiny tail emergy from a slit on its side. [2]
Resources
[1] The Hearth Witch’s Compendium by Anna Franklin
[2] Llewellyn’s 2022 Sabbats Almanac: Samhain 2021 to Mabon 2022
Adana Luna 