Plough Monday
12 January 2026 · movable holiday — Come on, ploughmen, pull the plough – the new year awaits its furrow!
Plough Monday is an old English folk festival held on the first Monday after Epiphany (6 January). It marks the end of the Christmas season and the return to work on the land after the winter break. Traditionally, villagers dragged a decorated plough through the village and collected gifts. They often dressed in colourful clothes, sometimes with painted faces, and some places also had sword dancers or morris dancers (performers of a traditional English dance with bells and sticks). Those who refused to give risked having the ground in front of their door ploughed up as a punishment. On the Sunday before, known as Plough Sunday, the plough was taken into church for a blessing in some parishes. Today many village dance groups, especially in East Anglia, revive the custom with processions and dances. The day belongs to the farming calendar: in January the days are slowly lengthening after the winter solstice, and thoughts turn to the coming ploughing and sowing. In spirit it resembles the Bulgarian kukeri customs, where masked men also drag a plough in a ritual ploughing for fertility.
Flying across the sky: An ethereal, bluish-silver figure made of bright dots and lines, like a constellation: a group of dancing ploughmen in festive garb pulling a decorated plough across the night sky
Sources
Positions in Astronativa are astronomically exact. The interpretation is for inspiration. · Glossary · Terms · Privacy · Thank you