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 Foto: Marie Andersson |
Midsummer 2010 June 25 - 27
Midsummer is one of the highlights of the year at Skansen. Our celebrations last for three entire days. Visitors help in making garlands of flowers for the maypole which they raise together with Skansen Folk Dance Team. Traditional fiddlers play for the ring dances which are followed by singing, games and dancing round the maypole. In the evening there is a folk dance display and you can dance yourself on Skansen's outdoor dance floors.
Midsummer Eve – Friday
The children binds their own garlands of birch-leaf at Orsakullen at 10.00 - 14.00.
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Midsummer concert in Seglora church at 16.00, 17.00 and 18.00.
 Foto: Anna yu |
Skansen Folk Dancers perform at the Tingsvallen stage at 19.00.
Outdoor dancing to traditional Swedish dance-music at Bollnästorget at 20.00 - 23.00.
Outdoor dancing to mixed/modern Swedish dance-music at the Galejan dance pavillion 20.00 - 24.00.
Folk music by Skansen Folk Musicians at the Mora farmstead 20.30-22.00 .
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The children binds their own garlands of birch-leaf at Orsakullen at 11.00 - 14.00.
Games and dancing round the maypole at Tingsvallen. Featuring: Skansen Folk Dancers, Ring-Dancing Children and Folk Musicians at 13.00 - 13.45
Midsummer - the folklore dress, dance and traditions: Skansen Folk Dancers, Ring-Dancing Children and Folk Musicians. At the Tingsvallen 14.00.
Games and dancing round the maypole. Featuring: Skansen Folk Dancers, Ring-Dancing Children and Folk Musicians at Tingsvallen 15.30 - 16.15.
Outdoor dancing to traditional Swedish dance-music at Bollnästorget 20.00 - 23.00.
Outdoor dancing to mixed/modern Swedish dance-music at the Galejan dance pavillion 20.00 - 23.00.
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Games and dancing round the maypole. Featuring: Skansen Folk Dancers, Ring-Dancing Children and Folk Musicians at Tingsvallen 13.30 - 14.15
Midsummer - the folklore dress, dance and traditions: Skansen Folk Dancers, Ring-Dancing Children and Folk Musicians. At the Tingsvallen 14.30 - 15.15.
Skansen Folk Dancers perform at the Tingsvallen stage 16.00.
Midsummer traditions
Midsummer at Skansen is highly popular and attracts a huge crowd every year. You can be certain of a lively time with traditional Swedish entertainments and plenty of fun. Midsummer's Eve is, with Christmas, the most popular festival in Sweden. Just as in other parts of Europe the festival centred round an ancient agricultural ritual involving the entire village. Elsewhere the villagers made a great bonfire but in these latitudes the lightest night of the year was not the right time for dancing around a fire! So the bonfires were replaced by another ancient summer tradition; that of the maypole. Maypoles are believed to be part of an old fertility rite, the pole being a phallus that "impregnates" Mother Nature. It was hoped that properly celebrating this rite would help to give a good harvest in the autumn.
Midsummer night was also believed to be a time of powerful and secret forces. Everything was animated: the dew, the flowers, the twigs of the trees and the water in the wells. People also claimed that if a young woman placed a bouquet of seven or nine different flowers (the traditions vary) under her pillow that night she would dream of her future love. She must remain alone while picking the flowers and observe total silence. A flower from the churchyard increased the magical powers of the bouquet, as did picking flowers from the banks of three different roads at a crossroads.
Midsummer today is a national holiday in Sweden. Families and friends meet and eat pickled herring and new potatoes washed down with schnapps and beer. Camping is a popular activity at this lovely time of the year while numerous people flee the cities for their summer cottages. Wherever people live they seek out a place where a maypole is raised and there is dancing and games – like the famous 'frog dance' (små grodorna) - for the children. Midsummer is celebrated in Sweden on the weekend closest to June 24 which is officially Midsummer's Day.