Traditionally autumn starts at the autumnal equinox, which falls on the 23rd of September this year, ‘equinox’ meaning ‘equal nights’ as the day and night are of equal length.
This event is highly significant to many cultures, to the Pagans it has the name Mabon, after the Celtic sun-god, to the ancient Greeks and the Romans who emulated them in many ways it was known as the Festival of Dionysus, also known as Bacchus, the god of wine, beer, fruit, the harvest and fertility.
Nowadays called Thanksgiving or the Harvest Festival the names might have changed over time like autumn foliage but the heart-wood, the true meaning, of the festival is as solid as it always has been, it is a time to show gratitude for the year’s harvest and produce which will hopefully keep us going through the cold, dark winter months.
Harvest Festival
The Earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it… ‘He makes grass grow for the cattle, and plants for man to cultivate – bringing forth food from the earth: wine that gladdens the heart of man, oil to make his face shine, and bread that sustains his heart.’ Psalm 104, 14-15
This psalm is commonly read in the harvest festivals held in chapels, churches, community halls and schools throughout the country at this time of year, this year’s (2023 as of writing) Harvest Festival is on the 1st of October, the psalm reflects the story of genesis, in which god draws back the waters of the great flood to reveal land for humanity to grow crops and raise cattle upon.
Shorter days
Meteorologically speaking autumn starts on the 1st of September, this is simply because it is convenient to have a set date to compare statistical data over time, the season is important to meteorologists as many climactic changes occur, the main one being that day-length rapidly shortens, by about 1 minute a day, which adds up to half an hour a month.
From today til the Winter Solstice, on the 22nd of December, we will have lost around 3 hours and 4 minutes of daylight, so the shortest day will only last about 7 hours and 49 minutes, from the Summer Solstice to the Winter Solstice the difference is 8 hours, 49 minutes.
Less sunlight
Shorter days naturally mean less sunlight and lower temperatures and this has a profound effect on the natural world, many creatures will simply leave these shores to visit warmer climes. As the British isles are situated in temperate latitudes we experience an influx too, with birds and beasts migrating to our skies and seas to shelter.
Our flora adapts to the negative changes by slowing down or even retreating from the world entirely. Most Deciduous trees cease producing Chlorophyll, which is a green pigment that allows Chloroplasts, a form of plant cell, in the leaves to process sunlight into energy.
This famously causes the foliage of plants to change colour as underlying compounds called Carotenoids and Anthocyanins are revealed, these appear yellow, orange and red to our eyes. Stresses experienced by the plant through the course of the year, including frosts, droughts, mineral shortages and increased acidity will have led to the creation of more anthocyanins, which appear orange and red, so a ‘bad year’ ends with a dramatically colourful autumn, or ‘Fall’.
The Fall
Historically autumn in Britain was known as ‘fall’, (which is still used in the US) simply due to the seasonal leaf-fall, this term fell out of common use in the 1600’s to be replaced with ‘autumn’ which derives from the Latin word autumnus. The origins of this are vague but could come from the Roman word augere ‘to change’, the Egyptian god Atum, who has connections to the sun-god Heliopolis and presides over the ideas of pre and post-existence, the Etruscan word ‘autu’, ‘passing of the year’ or several other roots, it seems that no-one is entirely sure.
Signs of change
This fall, or autumn, I’ll write about some of the signs of change we can observe in the natural world, such as bird migration, a bit about hedgerow foraging, the challenges autumn brings to farmers and as we approach Halloween, when our nights really start to draw in, there will be a series of stories about some of the spookier and more notorious moments in the history of Northwest England.
To Autumn
Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-evesrun;
To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For summer has o’er-brimm’d their clammy cells.
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap’d furrow sound asleep,
Drows’d with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.
Where are the songs of spring? Ay, Where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.
John Keats (1795–1821)
I hope you look forward to these articles as much as I enjoy writing them, here’s hoping that your harvest is fruitful and bounteous wherever you may be in the world.
A B-H
Northwest Nature and History 