The Drowning of Marzanna

[My Good Babushka]

In northern Poland, an effigy representing death or winter as a woman was built with braided sheaves of grain then thrown into a river or pond- a ritual performed by girls on the fourth Sunday of Lent, called The Drowning of Marzanna. In some accounts, everyone rushed quickly home and anyone who ripped and fell returning home would die within the year. In some accounts, the girls took newly green boughs of trees decorated with eggs and ribbons and went visiting the homes of friends and family.