THE AUTUMN EQUINOX: THE BALANCE OF LIGHT AND DARK

**THE AUTUMN EQUINOX: THE BALANCE OF LIGHT AND DARK**

“Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun…”
— John Keats, To Autumn (1819)

The Wheel of the Year turns once more. The brilliant heat of Summer is beginning to fade, as evening looms earlier. Among the trees, leaves blush gold, amber and crimson, the final crops are gathered, and a distinctive chill looms beneath the warmth of the afternoon sun. For those of us who live upon the Canadian Prairies, this beautiful season is often fleeting—golden leaves quickly give way to bare branches, frost,
and eventually snow.

Around September 22 nd /23 rd (depending on the exact location in the Northern Hemisphere) comes the Autumn Equinox. It is an astronomical moment when the Sun crosses the celestial equator, moving southward. Day and night exist in the liminal space of equal measure upon the Equinox, a powerful threshold between the light and dark halves of the year.

For modern Pagans and Witches, it is the second of three harvest festivals upon the Wheel of the Year, following Lughnasadh and preceding Samhain: a time of abundance, thanksgiving, and transition. The fields are emptying, flowers fade, migrating birds gather overhead, and Gaia prepares for Her long Winter sleep. The Druids call this time Alban Efed, “The Light of the Water.”

There is beauty here, and an eternal reminder: nothing remains unchanged forever.
HARVEST, FOLKLORE AND THE OLD WAYS Unlike Samhain, Beltane, Imbolc and Lughnasadh, we lack historical evidence that ancient Celts observed a festival during Autumn Equinox. What we do find throughout Britain, Ireland and Europe is a rich collection of harvest traditions throughout late Summer and Autumn.

The completion of the harvest itself was cause for celebration. In parts of Britain, the final sheaf of grain acquired particular significance and could be fashioned into a human-like figure, known as corn dollies. Older folklore surrounding the final sheaf is fascinating. Depending on the region, the spirit of the grain might be envisioned as Maiden, Mother, Crone, a spirit animal, or another mystical being. In Scotland, traditions existed surrounding both the young “Maiden” of the grain and the Cailleach, the Crone Goddess of the darker half of the year. The final grain was preserved through Winter, connecting one harvest symbolically with the planting of the next.

By the Christian era, many British and Irish harvest customs were associated with Michaelmas, the Feast of St. Michael the Archangel, celebrated on September 29th. Traditionally, the harvest was expected to be completed by Michaelmas. Geese fattened upon the stubble of harvested fields were served at the feast, while the last of the apples and blackberries were gathered.

According to British and Irish folklore, blackberries should not be picked after Michaelmas. One tale claims that when Lucifer was cast from Heaven, he landed in a blackberry bush and cursed the berries. In Ireland, similar mischief was sometimes attributed to the púca. Beneath the more recent Christian names we can still recognize something much older and deeply human: gathering the final food before Winter, feasting together, observing the weather, preserving seed, and giving thanks for what the land has provided.

BUT IS IT REALLY CALLED MABON?
Today, many Wiccans, Witches and Pagans know the Autumn Equinox as Mabon. Contrary to a surprisingly persistent modern myth, however, Mabon was not the ancient Celtic name for the Autumn Equinox. In fact, the usage of Mabon for this Sabbat is only around half a century, introduced into modern Paganism by American writer Aidan Kelly, when he created a Pagan calendar in the early 1970s. Kelly felt that the Solstices and Equinoxes needed names comparable to those already associated with other festivals upon the developing Wheel of the Year.

Searching mythology for an appropriate name for the Autumn Equinox, he turned to Welsh tradition and chose Mabon, after Mabon ap Modron. Kelly later sent his calendar to Oberon Zell, who began using the names in the influential Pagan publication Green Egg. From there, “Mabon” gradually entered the vocabulary of American Paganism and eventually became so familiar that many people assumed it must be the ancient name.
Who, then, is the real Mabon?
Mabon ap Modron is an important figure and deity in medieval Welsh literature. His name means essentially “Mabon, son of Modron”—the Divine Son of the Divine Mother—and scholars have connected Him with the earlier Celtic deity Maponos, known from inscriptions in Roman Britain and Gaul.

In the Welsh tale Culhwch and Olwen, Mabon is stolen from His mother mere days after His birth; later on, the heroes Cai and Bedwyr must find Him because only Mabon is capable of hunting the great boar Twrch Trwyth.
They seek the wisdom of increasingly ancient animals until finally the Salmon of Llyn Llyw remembers hearing Mabon’s cries from His imprisonment at Caerloyw (Gloucester). Arthur and his warriors eventually free Him, and Mabon joins the hunt.
It is a wonderfully mysterious story of the Divine Child, loss, imprisonment, ancient memory and liberation—but the surviving Welsh tale does not describe an Autumn Equinox festival dedicated to Mabon.

Calling the modern Pagan Autumn Equinox “Mabon,” is not necessarily wrong; traditions evolve, and modern Pagan traditions are traditions nonetheless. It is simply important that we distinguish modern Pagan history from ancient Celtic history. Mabon the deity is ancient; Mabon as the name of the Autumn Equinox is modern.

GODDESSES OF GRAIN, DEATH AND RETURN

Elsewhere in Europe, ancient mythology offers powerful imagery for the changing season. Perhaps the best known is the Greek story of Demeter and Persephone. When Persephone is taken into the Underworld by Hades, Her grieving mother Demeter—the Goddess of grain and agriculture—withdraws Her fertility from the Earth. Hekate, Goddess of the Crossroads, accompanies Demeter in Her search, and locates Persephone, guiding Her through the darkness. Eventually Persephone is permitted to return, but because She has eaten pomegranate seeds from the Underworld, She must spend part of each year there.

The myth became intimately connected with the Eleusinian Mysteries of Demeter, Persephone, and Hekate. While it may be tempting for modern Pagans to place Persephone’s descent precisely upon the Autumn Equinox in ritual, we should again distinguish contemporary Pagan symbolism from what ancient sources actually state.
Nevertheless, the imagery is beautifully suited to this season: the Daughter descending into darkness, the grieving Mother, the seed hidden beneath the soil, Hekate with Her torches as Companion to both Mother and Daughter, and the promise that what disappears from sight is not necessarily gone forever. Persephone exists in a liminal space, and the Autumn Equinox is a time of liminality.

For Eclectic Witches, similar themes are found among many Gods and Goddesses connected with grain, harvest, vegetation, death, descent and renewal. Some honour Demeter, Persephone, and Hekate; others work with Dionysus and the grape harvest, the Roman Ceres, the Norse Freyr, or Celtic and British figures associated with sovereignty and the land. Today practitioners may also honour Mabon and His mother Modron, while understanding that this is a modern devotional association rather than the reconstruction of an ancient Equinox rite.

AUTUMN UPON THE PRAIRIES
Here in Alberta, the arrival of Autumn has meanings rooted in a landscape very different from Europe, the UK, and Ireland. Long before European harvest festivals arrived in Canada, the Indigenous peoples of the Plains followed their own seasonal rounds, moving, hunting, gathering and preparing according to the rhythms of the land.
It is important not to confuse these traditions as Indigenous versions of “Mabon” or the Autumn Equinox. They are distinct traditions belonging to distinct peoples and cultures, and there is no need to force them onto the European Wheel of the Year in order to recognize their relationship with the changing season.

Among the Niitsitapi (Blackfoot) peoples, late Summer and early Autumn traditionally included gathering berries and hunting buffalo. Historical Blackfoot accounts preserved by Glenbow describe gathering chokecherries and moving camp as local resources changed. During late Summer and early Autumn, buffalo were particularly important: their meat could be cut into thin strips and dried to provide food through the Winter.
Gatherings were often held at a pisskan or buffalo jump, allowing large quantities of meat to be harvested and preserved. Hides likewise became warm Winter robes and useful materials.

This seasonal round reminds us of something easily forgotten in modern urban life: Autumn was not merely an aesthetic season of coloured leaves and cooler evenings—it was preparation. The work done during these weeks could determine how comfortably—or whether—a community survived the Winter.
Across Indigenous cultures, these seasonal relationships with land, plants, animals and food remain culturally specific, and many ceremonies and teachings belong to the peoples who hold them. For non-Indigenous Pagans and Witches, the greatest lesson is to know the land upon which we live.

We should try to learn about local plants, bird migration, and watch carefully for the first frost. Most of all, learning and acknowledging the names of the peoples who have cared for this land since long before our ancestors arrived, is paramount to truly respecting the spirits and the land itself.
The Wheel of the Year turns beneath our own feet, not only in the mythology of distant
countries.

THE MODERN WITCH’S EQUINOX
For many modern Pagans, Wiccans and Eclectic Witches, the Autumn Equinox has become a celebration of gratitude, abundance and balance.
Altars may be decorated with apples, grapes, pumpkins, squash, grains, acorns, fallen leaves, pinecones, and sunflowers. Candles reflecting the colours of the changing leaves are popular, as are offerings of bread, cider, wine, fruit and grain.
Apples are particularly suited to Equinox magick. Cut horizontally rather than vertically, the seeds reveal the familiar five-pointed star within the fruit—a natural pentagram hidden at its heart, and for those who follow the Avalonian tradition, a reflection of the Goddess. This is also an excellent time for Kitchen Witchcraft, such as baking bread, apple cakes and pies; preserving fruits and vegetables; making soups and stews from the garden harvest; brewing cider or seasonal teas; or preparing a feast to share with family, friends, spirits or the Gods.

Some Witches create gratitude jars or write upon fallen leaves the blessings they have received during the past year. Others perform prosperity magick, make offerings to local land spirits, tend ancestral altars, gather seeds for the following Spring, or simply take long walks to observe the changing Earth.
And because the Equinox stands upon the threshold between the bright and dark portions of the year, it is a wonderful time for reflection upon balance and Shadow Work.
-What have we harvested from the seeds we planted earlier in the year?
-What has flourished?
-What failed to grow?
-What should we preserve and carry with us into Winter—and what should we release?

Balance does not mean that our lives must contain equal portions of joy and sorrow, work and rest, darkness and light. Nature herself rarely exists in perfect symmetry. Instead, the Autumn Equinox asks us to recognize that all of these things belong to the same turning Wheel.
There can be no harvest without planting, no abundance without decay, no Spring without Winter, and no light that does not eventually surrender to darkness.
Soon the nights will become longer. The leaves will fall. Samhain will arrive, and with it the season of our ancestors, spirits and the dead. Beyond that waits the long darkness of Winter.
But not yet.
For now there are apples upon the trees, grain in the fields, berries upon the branches and golden leaves beneath our feet. The afternoon Sun is still warm upon our faces, even as the evening air whispers of frost.
Regardless of the way in which you choose to celebrate—whether you call it Mabon, the
Autumn Equinox, Alban Efed, the Second Harvest, or simply the first day of Autumn—may you take a moment to recognize what this year has given you.
Give thanks for what has grown. Remember what has been lost. Share what you have in
abundance.
And as the Wheel turns toward the dark half of the year, may you carry enough warmth within you to light the way through the Winter ahead.

Blessed Autumn Equinox.
— R.H. Winters

SOURCES & FURTHER READING
Kelly, Aidan. “About Naming Ostara, Litha, and Mabon.” Including Paganism, 2017. Kelly’s own explanation of why he selected the name Mabon for the modern Pagan Autumn Equinox.
The Mabinogion / Culhwch and Olwen. Various translations. The medieval Welsh source for the quest to find Mabon ap Modron.
Davies, Sioned, trans. The Mabinogion. Oxford World’s Classics, Oxford University Press,
2007.
Koch, John T., ed. Celtic Culture: A Historical Encyclopedia. ABC-CLIO, 2006. Reference
material concerning Mabon/Maponos and Celtic mythology.
The Homeric Hymn to Demeter. Ancient Greek account of Demeter, Persephone and the
division of the year.
Simpson, Jacqueline & Steve Roud. A Dictionary of English Folklore. Oxford University Press,
2000. British harvest, agricultural and seasonal folklore.

Main, Veronica. “Corn Dollies: Searching for the Seed of Truth.” Folk Life, Vol. 37, 1998, pp. 44–63. A useful scholarly examination of genuine harvest traditions and modern claims concerning the antiquity of corn-dolly designs.
Glenbow Museum. Niitsitapiisinni: Our Way of Life. Developed collaboratively by Glenbow and Blackfoot cultural knowledge-keepers. Material concerning the Blackfoot seasonal round, gathering berries, Autumn hunting, drying meat and preparation for Winter.
National Trust for Scotland. “St Michael’s Day and Michaelmas Traditions.” Material
concerning Scottish and Hebridean Michaelmas folklore and food traditions.
McGarry, Marion. “The Michaelmas Customs Associated with 29 September in Ireland.” RTÉ Brainstorm, 2026. Irish harvest, food, blackberry and Michaelmas traditions.
Keats, John. “To Autumn.” Written September 1819; first published in Lamia, Isabella, The Eve of St. Agnes, and Other Poems (1820).