Search Results: Harvest festivals

Festivals in ancient Mesopotamia honored the patron deity of a city-state or the primary god of the city that controlled a region or empire. The earliest, the Akitu festival, was first observed in Sumer in the Early Dynastic Period (2900-2334...

The gods of the ancient Egyptians were always apparent to the people through natural events. The sunrise was Ra emerging from the underworld in his great ship, for example, and the moon was the god Khonsu traveling across the night sky. When...

Religious festivals have featured as a central aspect of civilization for thousands of years, the earliest thought to be celebrations of the New Year and the concept of rebirth and new beginnings that accompanied it. The first such festival...

Modoc Harvest Diorama from the Milwaukee Public Museum, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA. The Modoc are a Native American nation of the West Coast whose ancestral lands once included the regions of northeastern California and southern Oregon. Photograph...

An 1876 oil on canvas landscape, The Harvest at Montfoucault, by Camille Pissarro (1830-1903), the Danish-French impressionist painter. The artist in this period was particularly interested in capturing the bleached effect of colours in the...

The stone Kernos for food offerings of the collected harvest, the Minoan settlement of Malia, Crete (1650-1450 BCE).

This clay tablet describes the ceremonies in honor of various gods, as celebrated by the Hittite Kings at various sites. The Karahna festivals consist of 7 ceremonies, each one lasting 3 days. For instance, the 4th festival celebrates the...

The Ancient Roman Festival of Saturnalia began as a one-day festival in honor of the Roman god Saturn, but by the late Republic, it spanned over an entire week. The Saturnalia consisted of feasting, drinking, games and general merriment...

Pindar (c. 518 to c. 448/7 BCE) was an ancient Greek lyric poet, probably the greatest of his time. His works have been divided into 17 books of different types of poetry, but only those containing 44 choral victory songs composed for the...

For the Maya, reliable food production was so important to their well-being that they closely linked the agricultural cycle to astronomy and religion. Important rituals and ceremonies were held in honour of specialised workers; from beekeepers...