B is for Blackberries vs. Winter (A to Z Challenge 2019: Fruit Folktales)

Blackberries have a thing with seasons. In English folklore, people say you shouldn't pick them after Michaelmas (September 29), because the Devil spits on them, tramples them, or pees on them. The Old Guy hates the little fruit so much because when he fell from Heaven he landed on a blackberry bramble. Ouch.

But that's not the story I wanted to write about today. Rather, I have been reading about the role blackberries (and other berries) play in Iroquois mythology, especially that of the Seneca Nation. In the stories where Winter is defeated, berries play an important part: The belief is that when the blackberries begin to bloom, Winter has no power over the world anymore.

In many stories, Spring taunts, wrestles, and defeats Winter in his lodge of ice and snow. He is a young, strong man helped by the warm South Wind and Thaw. According to the lore collected by Arthur Caswell Parker (an American folklorist of Seneca descent), Spring uses medicine made of blackberry juice to break Winter's resistance, throwing it into his face to counter his power. Another story, collected by Harriet Maxwell Converse (an American folklorist adopted into the Seneca Nation), Ha'tho', Frost, is deadly afraid of blackberries, and never visits the earth when they are in blossom; he has once been vanquished by a boy who mocked him by throwing blackberry juice into his face.

Martha Champion Randle, exploring the Waugh Collection of Iroquois Folktales (stories collected at the beginning of the 20th century), lists several versions of the same story. In these, Atu (Cold or Winter) is usually defeated in a contest by a mortal man. In one of them, a hunter is helped by a supernatural woman, who gifts him strawberry juice and strawberry vines, that help in defeating Atu. Randle notes that the Iroquois belief is that berries grow where snow lingers longest in the spring, therefore they are a symbol of the ultimate defeat of Winter. In another story, Thaw personified gifts the berry vines to the mortal challenged by Atu.

Do you grow blackberries in your garden? Are they blooming yet?

Have you ever tried blackberry juice?