# When is midsummer's eve celebrated?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-midsummers-eve-celebrated/543886>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [June 20, 2010, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-midsummers-eve-celebrated/543886 "2010-06-20T17:50:20Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![Floater](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/dc4da7/32.png) [@Floater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Floater)\
**Post date:** [June 23, 2010, 7:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-midsummers-eve-celebrated/543886/21 "2010-06-23T07:51:41Z")

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> [@njtt](#):
>
> You think that not attending someone’s party, and celebrating at your own home instead, is showing them respect? :dubious: This gets odder.

> [@jjimm](#):
>
> At the risk of hijacking this thread irreparably, and with the minimum of information at hand, this sounds like a honking great pile of bollocks.
> 
> The person’s convenience or that of _all_ the guests? What if people had to drive miles to attend? How did the centurion in question take it? Did they mind? Were they pleased you got in a snit and decided not to turn up?

I don’t think a person who’s been dead for over forty years minds much. It was to celebrate his memory.

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**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\
**Post date:** [June 23, 2010, 9:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-midsummers-eve-celebrated/543886/22 "2010-06-23T09:11:59Z")

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In France like apparently in many other countries, it celebrated on June 24 (St John).

I say celebrated, but actual celebrations have become rare. In the small village in southern France where I was raised up, it’s still done, but I couldn’t tell whether it’s common or rare in the countryside in general.

Everybody gathers and a whole tree is burnt at night, and people jump above/through the fire when it’s possible. I can’t even remember what such jump is supposed to bestow. Luck? Marriage? Mostly done for the fun, anyway. There’s often some wine to drink.

I remember that when I was a kid, my grandmother would take a small bit of coal from the fire and would draw a cross with it on the doorstep of the house. I don’t know and I think never thought to ask why she did so exactly.

Also, it seems that in some towns there’s a firework during the weekend closest to june 21. Not particularly common, though.  
So, contrarily to northern countries, celebrations aren’t nearly as important here, when they even take place. I’d bet a large part of the population isn’t even aware they exist.

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**Author:** ![Walther\_Ego](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8dc957/32.png) [@Walther\_Ego](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walther_Ego)\
**Post date:** [June 23, 2010, 9:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-midsummers-eve-celebrated/543886/23 "2010-06-23T09:35:14Z")

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The fires in Finland are usually tall enough that even the people most drunk don’t try the jump. I’ve never even heard about jumping as a custom in Finland.

The fire sounds like a pagan more than Christian tradition, particularly at a specific astronomical date. This is a really stupid date to have a bonfire anyway because the night is not dark at all.

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