Oh - Soul cakes. I know the Souling song.

CHORUS
A soul a soul a soul cake
Please good Missus a soul cake
An apple, a pear, a plum or cherry
Any good thing to make us all merry
One for Peter two for Paul, three for him who made us all

Go down into your cellar see what you can find
If your barrels are not empty we hope you will prove kind
We hope you will prove kind with your apples and strong beer
For we'll come no more a souling until this time next year

The lanes are very dirty my shoes are very thin
I have a little pocket to put a penny in
If you do not have a penny a ha'penny will do
If you haven't got a ha'penny, God bless you


The tune is a very simple one, worn down as an old penny. You can probably find it sung on the internet I expect.

But All Souls is in November and Halloween is October.

I think the old Harvest, the making of the first loaf from the new wheat is Lammas aka Marymass, at the full moon of August.

Samhein is the end of gathering, a cut off point where the Earth no longer provides. November is the blood month, when the unnecessary beasts were slaughtered as they could not be kept alive through the Winter. The rest had to manage on the hay cut dried and gathered into store until the grass began to grow again.

The tur part of turnip is the store or clamp in which they were kept (interred?) after harvesting, so they could always be got at even in the frost, they were originally called neaps, and tur-neaps became turnip. They revolutionised farming - along with the turnip chopper which turned them into small enough pieces for the beasts to eat.

Anne the Pleater :ootd: