!!!Martini, 11. November

Martini (Martinmas, November 11), feast day of St. Martin of Tours, 
provincial bank holiday in Burgenland. Indicator day for weather 
forecasting according to folk lore. In the past St. Martin´s Day 
constituted a legally and economically important date in the farming 
year which signalled the end of the harvest season and the beginning 
of a six weeks´ period of fasting that ended on December 24 
(also called "old advent"). Martinmas was also a day celebrated with 
special customs by the peasants. Well into the 20%%sup th/%  century 
farmers living in the eastern parts of Austria still used to celebrate 
the evening before the start of the fasting period with special 
customs (e.g. people carrying lights and lanterns held processions, 
they cooked special dishes (roast goose ("Martinigans") and pastry 
("Martinigebaeck")), they went from door to door and asked for small 
gifts, they practised customs involving masks and fire, they played 
games and sang special songs ("Martinilieder") and asked for St. 
Martin´s blessing ("Martinisegen", "Martinigerte")). On St. 
Martin´s Day working contracts started or ended and it was the 
settlement day for wages. Today it is still common to celebrate 
Martinmas with roast goose. On November 11 parish priests bless the 
wine of the year ("Martiniloben") which can then be tasted for the 
first time. The former processions of peasants have now given way to 
those of small children carrying lanterns. In some places a person 
dressed up as a Roman soldier on horseback leads the procession of 
children (a custom called "Martinsritt" at Bregenz). Martinmas 
furthermore marks the beginning of carneval which starts on November 
11 at exactly 11 minutes past 11 a.m.

!Literature
E. Grabner, Martinisegen und Martinigerte in Oesterreich 
(Wissenschaftliche Arbeiten aus dem Burgenland 39), 1968; 
H. M. Wolf, Das Brauch-Buch, 1992.


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