Other Names: Harvest Home, Alban Elued, Mean Fomhair.
Date: September 20, 21, or 22 (depending upon calendar); sun is at 1 degree Libra.
Meaning of the Word: “Divine Youth”.
Primary Focus: Second Harvest, offering of vegetable and fruit harvest, corn festival.
Age of Holiday: 3,000 B.C. or older.
Popular Mythos: Death of the Harvest Lord (although some attribute this to Samhain) King and Queen of the Harvest.
Astrological Sign: 1 degree Libra; air; cardinal.
Planetary Ruler: Venus.
Mabon is the second of the three harvest festivals concentration on the fruits and vegetables (as opposed to the grains of the first harvest).
Mabon is the second of the three harvest festivals concentration on the fruits and vegetables (as opposed to the grains of the first harvest).
A seventeenth century poet, Robert Herrick, in “The Hock-car, or Harvest Home”, depicts the cart carrying the last load from the fields, dressed up with all the country art, and followed by adults crowned with ears of corn and a whooping group of children accompanied by a piper playing a harvest-home song. “Some bless the cart, some kiss the kiss the sheaves; some prank them up with oaken leaves.”
Mabon Invocation
Mabon brings the scent of autumn
Golden glow and sun’s soft kiss.
Magick swirls and eddies onward
Season’s end demands all of this
The wheel is turning, ever forward
Calling for your act of closure
Fill the cauldron, light the fire
Cast the magick ever higher!
Find the laughter, make ye merry
Touch the heartbeat of our Mother.
Libra brings an air of beauty
Gracing all with harvest lore
Listen closely wisdom’s duty
Look within to find the door.
(repeat second stanza)
The fruits are heavy on the trees
Yellow, gold and orange leaves
Nature’s show of alchemy
Ever clear to you and me.
(Repeat second stanza)
Golden glow and sun’s soft kiss.
Magick swirls and eddies onward
Season’s end demands all of this
The wheel is turning, ever forward
Calling for your act of closure
Fill the cauldron, light the fire
Cast the magick ever higher!
Find the laughter, make ye merry
Touch the heartbeat of our Mother.
Libra brings an air of beauty
Gracing all with harvest lore
Listen closely wisdom’s duty
Look within to find the door.
(repeat second stanza)
The fruits are heavy on the trees
Yellow, gold and orange leaves
Nature’s show of alchemy
Ever clear to you and me.
(Repeat second stanza)
Magickal Ideas for your Mabon Sabbat Ritual
. Dip leaves in paraffin and use in your ritual. Bless them as give as gifts.
. Make a corn dolly.
. Perform your ritual in a harvested field.
. Visit a local orchard to find deity offerings.
. Thank a field for rendering its harvest.
