A kindly rabbit left a bundle of scats (rabbit droppings) on my front lawn. In North East England, scats were, and maybe by some still are, often referred to as carlins. Passion Sunday, the 5th Sunday in Lent, was known in North East England in the recent past as Carlin Sunday. Carlins, not scats of course, was a delicacy consumed on that day.
A forgotten tradition
Carlins are small peas, sometimes known as pigeon peas. They were soaked overnight and boiled the next day. Some people fried them in bacon fat but added salt and vinegar, sometimes putting them into a cone-shaped piece of greaseproof paper. Carlin Sunday was somewhat referred to as ‘Carlin Sunday, pumping Monday’. Although they were very tasty, the practice of eating carlins appears to be no longer with us.
Legend has it that the practice began in 1644 during the Civil War when Royalist Newcastle was besieged by the Scots and the people on both sides of the Tyne were starving. Carlins staved off hunger when a French ship, probably captained by a Captain Carlin was stranded at South Shields. The ship’s cargo, a huge amount of pigeon peas, was washed ashore and salvaged by the locals. The peas helped the people to survive, so to celebrate this apparent miracle, the custom of eating carlins on the Sunday before Palm Sunday was adopted.
Holy week
Palm Sunday is the beginning of Holy Week. It commemorates the entry of Jesus riding into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey, rather than a war horse. Crowds gathered welcoming his entrance, waving palms and shouting Hosanna. This event is celebrated in many churches with the congregation receiving palm crosses and often singing the hymn, ‘All Glory Laud and Honour.’ In York Minster the custom is a procession led by a donkey and the blessing of the palm crosses outside the Minster before the congregational enters the building for the service.
Holy week ends with Easter Sunday, known in the North East as ‘Paste Egg Day’, the giving of decorated eggs to children, now chocolate eggs rather than paste eggs. Paste originated from the Celtic word for Easter, Pasche. Lent was a time of fasting and prayer. Dairy produce and eggs were amongst the foods not to be eaten during fasting beginning on Ash Wednesday. It was necessary to use up all forbidden food the day before on Tuesday, hence the origins of Pancake Tuesday.
Giving eggs
Paste Egg Day meant the giving of eggs, often dyed brown with onion skins and decorated by first using a candle to make patterns of flowers or leaves before boiling. Later cochineal, coffee or other dyes could be used. The white shell could also be painted with designs and patterns. Oddly enough most eggs bought from the supermarkets have brown shells and it is surprising to open a box of eggs with white shells. The tradition of dying, painting and giving of paste eggs in the North East appears to have disappeared today.
The giving of eggs is associated with Easter. The date of Easter is not fixed. In AD 325, at the First Council of Nicaea decided that the date of Easter should be on Sunday after the first full moon after the spring equinox which means that it always falls between March 22nd and April 25th. Eggs could then be eaten as the fasting was over, but eggs were seen as a symbol of new life after Jesus emerged from the hard shell of his tomb, resurrection and new life. They were given as gifts. In 1290 King Edward 1st gave each of his 450 households a decorated egg as a present.
Giving eggs in Northern Europe
But the giving of eggs hailed back from celebrations of pagan festivals where eggs were considered a symbol of Spring and renewal. Ostara or Eostre was the goddess of Spring. In Northern Europe she was linked to hares and rabbits. In German folk belief the hare could lay eggs. The bird had been trapped in a frozen bush and Ostara transformed her into a hare so that she could escape. When Ostara’s Festival Day of Spring arrived, the hare had laid her brightly coloured eggs in gratitude for saving her life.
One could say that hares build nests. The mother scrapes a depression in the ground to create a form where she gives birth to her leverets. They stay hidden, still and quiet, waiting for their mother to return once a day usually at night so she could feed them. She hides them so well to protect them from predators.
The origin of the Easter Bunny
The hare was also the symbol of the moon, so it has links with the moveable feast of Easter. The Easter Bunny has German connections linked with these pagan beliefs. The Oester Haar is almost as important as Santa Claus as it gives good children sweets and eggs that it had hidden that the children had to find. The custom was carried across to America by German settlers in the 1770’s. Children had originally constructed ‘nests’ out of old hats or paper. This was transformed into a basket. The hare mutated into a rabbit. Real eggs became chocolate eggs.
In England, the first chocolate egg was made by Fry in 1873, followed by Cadbury in 1875. These were made from dark chocolate with Cadbury introducing Dairy Milk in 1897. Searching for chocolate eggs left by a Bunny Rabbit with a basket of eggs has now become a tradition in England, especially in special events in country houses.
New clothes, especially for children, is an old tradition, widespread from Medieval times. This too began as a symbol of new life. In Medieval Europe Easter bonnets were simple straw or woollen bonnets decorated with ribbons, flowers or greenery. By the 18th and 19th Centuries, the wealthy had progressed to decorating bonnets with feathers, silk, lace or even jewels. The New York City Easter Parade began in the 1870’s in Fifth Avenue, with Irving Berlin’s song in 1933 being used in the 1948 film ‘Easter Parade’. Today, especially in many schools, there are celebrations of Easter bonnets decorated with chicks, baby rabbits, eggs and flowers. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone but I would say enjoy your hot cross buns and if you are lucky enough, a large chocolate egg.
Back to carlins and bunnies.
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