In Chapter Fifteen of The Chosen, Maria walks into a forest and finds a coven dressed in white. There is food, there are drinks, and there is a gigantic bonfire waiting to be lit.

Then the dead arrive.

I called the chapter Walpurgis Night. The name is real. The celebration is real. The witches flying through Maria’s fire belong to my novel.

Now, the history behind that name is rather interesting. Because the first surprise is that Walpurgis Night is named after a Christian saint. Yes, a saint. And somehow we ended up with witches dancing on a German mountain. Let me explain.

01 · THE DATE

What is Walpurgis Night?

Walpurgis Night, or Walpurgisnacht in German, is the night of 30 April to 1 May. Across parts of Europe, it is associated with bonfires, the arrival of spring, folklore about witches and celebrations that continue today.

Those things belong to overlapping histories, rather than one single tradition practised in exactly the same way everywhere.

In Sweden you will hear the name Valborg. In Germany, you may hear Tanz in den Mai, the dance into May. In German witch folklore, one mountain appears again and again: the Brocken.

And in my fictional coven, that same night becomes a celebration of freedom and belonging.

02 · THE SAINT

Who was Saint Walburga?

Saint Walburga, also called Walpurga or Walpurgis, was an English religious woman who travelled to what is now Germany in the eighth century. She became an abbess and was remembered in Christian religious tradition.

Her commemoration became associated with 1 May, giving the night before it the name Walpurgisnacht. The saint’s story belongs to Christian history. The witches belong to the folklore that became attached to the date.

So we have an English abbess, a German name, old seasonal customs and centuries of stories about witchcraft, all sharing the same night. History rarely bothers to keep its filing cabinet tidy.

03 · THE FIRE

Why did people light bonfires?

In different parts of northern and central Europe, fires around the end of April and the beginning of May marked a change in the season. They could bring a community together and, in older beliefs, offer protection against misfortune, harmful spirits or witches.

Some regional accounts also describe people ringing bells, making noise or praying as ways to keep supposed danger away. That is part of the background to Lúcia’s speech, not a rule followed everywhere in Europe.

Fire could also have a practical, very public purpose. People gathered, sang, ate, drank and welcomed longer days. Modern Swedish Walpurgis celebrations still bring crowds around bonfires to celebrate spring.

Here is the detail I find most interesting: some traditions used fire to keep witches away.

In Chapter Fifteen, Lúcia’s coven does the opposite. Their bonfire welcomes the witches, including those who have died.

“But while they feared us, we celebrated.”

That sentence is Lúcia speaking inside my novel. It is her interpretation of the night. The old belief is about keeping witches out. Her celebration is about bringing them together.

04 · THE MOUNTAIN

Where did the witches enter the story?

Meet the Brocken, the highest mountain in Germany’s Harz range. In legends it is also called the Blocksberg, a place where witches were said to gather and dance on Walpurgis Night.

We can trace the connection through historical records, but those records need to be read carefully.

In the records of European witch trials, people were accused of attending gatherings of witches. Many confessions were extracted under torture. As historian Owen Davies explains, those alleged meetings were not all placed on Walpurgis Night, or even on mountains. A trial record tells us what people claimed and feared. It does not prove that anyone flew to the Brocken.

A 1626 engraving shows how artists depicted the supposed gatherings. In 1668, Johannes Praetorius helped establish the Brocken as their legendary meeting place in print. Those are records of a belief, not proof that the gatherings took place.

And then literature did what literature does.

Goethe, Faust and a mountain that became famous

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe used the Brocken and its witch legends in Faust, Part One, published in 1808. His Walpurgis Night scene helped make the mountain and its witches famous far beyond the Harz.

This is one reason the imagery has lasted: people read the stories, retold them and passed them to new generations. A frightening legend eventually became part of popular culture, festivals, costumes and tourism.

05 · THE PEOPLE

The witch trials were real. The flying witches were allegations.

There is a serious part of this history, and I don’t want to turn it into a cute story about broomsticks.

During the early modern witch hunts, many people across Europe were accused of witchcraft, imprisoned, tortured or executed. Women were frequently targeted, although men were accused too. Historical accusations of meetings with the Devil or flight to nocturnal assemblies were part of the beliefs that surrounded those prosecutions.

Those victims should not automatically be described as members of a secret, organised pagan religion. The evidence does not support treating the people accused in witch trials as one continuous coven stretching back through the centuries.

When Lúcia remembers witches who died, witches who survived and those who came before her, she is speaking for the fictional community in The Chosen. Her words draw on a history of fear and persecution, but the coven’s supernatural ancestry is part of the novel.

06 · DIFFERENT TRADITIONS

Is Walpurgis Night the same as Beltane?

They fall at almost the same point in the calendar, and that is why people often discuss them together. But Walpurgis Night and Beltane are not interchangeable names for the same historical festival.

Beltane is a Gaelic seasonal festival associated particularly with Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man. Historical Beltane fire customs included lighting fires as people prepared to move livestock to summer grazing.

Walpurgisnacht is the name attached to the eve of Saint Walburga’s commemoration and to the body of continental European seasonal customs and witch legends surrounding that night.

The calendar connects them. Their histories are not identical.

What about Valborg in Sweden?

In Sweden, Valborg is still very much alive. People gather on 30 April for bonfires, music and spring celebrations. Stockholm’s Skansen open-air museum says it has marked Walpurgis Night since 1892.

Which means that, outside my fictional forest, people can attend a Walpurgis celebration without seeing a single spirit or mysterious throne. They can simply stand near a fire and sing.

07 · THE CHOSEN

What comes from history, and what comes from my imagination?

Chapter Fifteen takes place in Brazil. That matters for one simple reason: the end of April is autumn in Brazil, not spring. The date of the European tradition remains 30 April, but the seasons are reversed.

I gave Lúcia’s coven a ritual of its own, with people dressed in white, a forest clearing, a huge bonfire and Maria at the centre of it.

Here is how the references meet the story:

The bonfire

The bonfire has historical roots in European spring celebrations and beliefs about protection. In my story, it becomes the meeting place between living and dead witches.

The coven and the white clothes

A coven is a group of witches in the language of modern witchcraft and fiction. My coven’s white clothing is a visual and narrative choice. There is no historical rule that every Walpurgis Night gathering had to be dressed in white.

The spirits and the distance between worlds

Folklore has long connected certain nights with unusual supernatural activity. But the claim that Walpurgis Night always opened a literal doorway through which the dead could return is not an established historical fact. The spirits appearing in Maria’s bonfire are part of The Chosen.

The Master and the seven thrones

The seven thrones, the men seated on them, the Master and the power Maria experiences in their presence belong to the supernatural mythology of the novel. I have not borrowed a documented Walpurgis ceremony in which seven men sit on seven thrones.

And Zita? Well, Zita is Zita. Her story belongs to the book.

THE REASON I CHOSE IT

Why Walpurgis Night belongs in Chapter Fifteen

Maria enters a world that had existed long before she knew anything about it.

Walpurgis Night brings the date, the fire and centuries of stories about witches. Maria, Zita and the people waiting in the forest belong to the novel.

There is a point in the chapter when everybody stops looking at Maria as an ordinary girl. They know something she doesn’t.

I’m leaving that part where it belongs. In the story.

But the next time somebody tells you Walpurgis Night is simply an ancient witch festival, remember the saint, the mountain, the trials, the bonfires and the very different traditions that met along the way.

I wanted to know where those stories came from before I took Maria into the forest. Now you know too.

The research ends here. Maria still has questions.

RESEARCH & FACT CHECKING

Sources and further reading

The historical sections above draw on the following research and cultural institutions. The novel’s supernatural mythology is my own fiction.

1. Oxford University Press, Owen Davies, “Witches and Walpurgis Night”
2. Nordiska museet, “Walpurgis”
3. National Park Harz, “The Brocken in Harz National Park” (PDF)
4. German History in Documents and Images, “Walpurgis Night (1626)”
5. English Heritage, “Witchcraft: Eight Myths and Misconceptions”
6. National Museum of Ireland, “Traditions and Customs: May Day / Bealtaine”
7. Skansen, “Walpurgis Night Tradition”
8. Victoria and Albert Museum, “Walpurgis Night, the Witches’ Sabbath and the First of May”