1. Local holidays in Kujawy region.

2. Harvest festival, Crops festival, Garlands- a folk festival connected with the thanksgiving rites for the ending of harvest and field work. Nowadays it’s celebrated on one of September Sundays after the harvest. Traditionally a harvest festival was celebrated on the first day of autumn. That holiday was dedicated to that year’s crop of grains when people thanked gods for t he crops and asked them for better ones next year. A harvest festival was accompanied by the different rituals.

3. A Garland - harvest festival celebration was started with weaving a garland from ears of corn, clusters of rowan berries, nuts, fruits, flowers and colourful ribbons. Harvest festival garlands were usually in the shape of big crown or circle. In the past living (later artificial) cocks, ducklings, little geese were put in them because it would guarantee beautiful and healthy offspring. It was carried by the best female harvest worker on her head or hands, sometimes with the help of farmhands She was followed by the procession of male harvest workers dressed in their best and carrying cleaned and decorated with the flowers scythes and sickles on their shoulders. The garland was carried to church to be blessed A harvest festival garland was kept in the barn till next year.

4. Harvest festival changed in 1980s. Nowadays harvest festival has a religious as well as folk character. In our times people thank Christian God and Mother of God for the crops. At first harvest festival garlands made of ears of corn, fruits, vegetables and field flowers are carried in. Next symbolic gifts are presented, ie. the newest crops, tinned meat, fruits. They often make an exhibition of the achievement of local farmers. If a celebration has a religious character, a liturgical rite is performed. A harvest festival ends with the folk festivities most often.

5. Koza (Goat) is an old pagan rite the aim of which was to say goodbye to winter. It took place between Fat Thursday (the last Thursday of carnival)and Ash Wednesday. It survived till the mid-twentieth century in the folk tradition. However, walking with a goat is still celebrated in Kujawy, i.e Inowroclaw, Zakrzewo, Janikowo, Lubraniec and in the neighbourhood of Służewo. This Slavic rite involves walking of a group of dressed up people at the head of a goat symbolising health and fertility. However, in the neighbourhood of Krakow the goat sometimes walked only with an orchestra.

6. Even today there is a tradition connected with Shrovetide. During the last days of carnival one can meet colouful processions of dressed up people in masks of animals symbolising the power of life. Among them the most important character was and is a goat ( that is why this tradition is called walking with a goat). In the procession there are also other masks of animals such as a bear, a horse and a stork as well as the death and the devil, a chimney sweep, a young couple and a lot of other characters. In the past the scenes were played in which a goat was a leading character – the goat was sold to householders and it was cured when it turned over on the ground. The processions with the goat were believed to bring spring. The home that was not visited by the goat seemed to be unhappy. The party so-called podkoziołek was arranged in a pub at the end of this celebration. During the party girls bought dances by throwing money under the figure of the billy-goat standing on the table.

7. Wishes uttered by dressed up people: Where the goat goes rye grows Where the goat taps by its horn the stack of rye stands But where the goat doesn't go rye doesn’t grow.

8. St John’s Eve is a holiday celebrated on the night of 24th June when St John the Baptist’s Eve is. The date hasn’t been set by the Church accidentlly because it coincides with the date of Slavic Midsummer Night’s celebration connected with the summer solstice. The shortest night is usually on the 22nd June and just then some main rites connected with the celebration of that holiday took place. In Slavic tradition that holiday was considered to be the one of water and fire and also of love, fertility, Sun and Moon. Customs and rites cultivated on St John’s Night aimed at the guarantee of health and harvest.

9. St John’s Night celebration started with striking a fire made of ash and birch wood after having put all hearths out in the whole village. First of all the youth gathered around the fires. And marriageable girls in white dresses and with garlands made of herbs holding their hands with each other made dancing circles, danced and sang asking St John for the burning reciprocated love and happy marriage. Jumping over the fires and dances around them cleaned and protected from the powers of evil. Sometimes couples, boys and girls, jumped over the fire. A good jump with joined hands predicted a quick wedding ceremony and successful marriage. The herbs that had been picked the day before and blessed at church were thrown into the fire. Smoke from those herbs protected from the witches, spell and all evil.

10. St John’s Night also played such a role as contemporary St Valentine’s Day. On St John’s Night young girls plaited garlands from the flowers and herbs and next threw them into the water (river, lake). Boys tried to catch them. Girls told their fortune about marriage on the strength of whose garland had been caught and by whom, whose one had sunk, whose one had flown the furthest. Young couples were also allowed to go for lonely walks to the forest in order to find a fern flower. According to Slavic beliefs fern bloomed only on St John’s Night. A lucky finder of that flower could be pleased with coming happiness and wealth.