For the purpose of the education of the masses...
The Fall Equinox, or Mabon (pronounced several different ways, generally may-bon or mah-bawn), is the day where there is an equal amount of daylight and dark, and varies slightly from year to year because Earth wobbles slightly on it's axis. It is also called a myrid of other names such as Harvest Home, Alban Elved, or Winter Finding, The Second Harvest Festival, the Festival of Dionysus, Harvest of First Fruits, Wine Harvest, Feast of Avalon, Equinozio di Autunno (Strega), Alben Elfed (Caledonii), or Cornucopia. The Teutonic name, Winter Finding, spans a period of time from this Sabbat to Oct. 15th, Winter's Night, which is the Norse New Year. The Druids call this celebration Mea'n Fo'mhair and honor The Green Man, the God of the Forest, by offering libations to trees. The name Mabon comes from the Celtic God Mabon and means “son” in Welsh.
Historically, Mabon was celebrated on September 25th, since the equipment to accurately determine the true date of the equinox each year wasn’t perfected yet nor widely available. As was very common as the Catholic Church tried to stamp out paganism and convert the general population, the 25th became a holiday under the name of 'Michaelmas', the feast of the Archangel Michael. A bit of a tangent side-note is that the church also assigned the four cross-quarter days to the four gospel-writers, and for a while the vernal equinox was called "Gabrielmas". It must also be remembered that the Celts considered a day to be from sundown to sundown, so the September 25th festivities actually began on the previous sundown (our September 24th).
Mythically, Mabon is the day of the year when the God of Light is defeated by his twin and alter-ego, Goronwy, the God of Darkness. Autumnal Equinox is the only day of the whole year when Llew, light, is vulnerable and it is possible to defeat him. Using astrology as a guide, and a metaphor, Llew now stands on the balance of Libra/autumn equinox, with one foot on the cauldron of Cancer/summer solstice and his other foot on the goat or Capricorn/winter solstice. He is betrayed by Blodeuwedd, the Virgin (Virgo) and transformed into an Eagle (Scorpio).
Having defeated Llew, Goronwy takes over Llew's place, both as lover to Blodeuwedd, the Goddess, and as King of our own world. Although Goronwy sits on Llew's throne and begins his rule immediately, his formal coronation is not for another six weeks, occurring at Samhain (Hallowe'en), or the beginning of Winter, when he becomes the Dark or Winter Lord. He takes Blodeuwedd as his wife and she conceives, setting the stage to give birth at the Summer Solstice to Goronwy's son, who is really another incarnation of himself, the Dark Child.
Llew's sacrificial death at Harvest Home also identifies him with John Barleycorn, spirit of the fields. Therefore, Llew represents the sun's power and the sun's life in the corn. Often this corn spirit was believed to reside most especially in the last corner of the crop to be harvested, which was dressed in fine clothes, or woven into a wicker-like man-shaped form. This figure was then cut and carried from the field and usually burned.
Incidentally, this annual mock sacrifice of a large wicker-work figure (representing the vegetation spirit) may have been the origin of the misconception that Druids made human sacrifices. This charge was first made by Julius Caesar (who may not have had the most unbiased of motives), and has been re-stated many times since. Also, it is quite obviously a connection between religious beliefs and the practice of scarecrows in fields.
A short article about celebrating Mabon in modern times, when very few people have their own crops, etc, can be found here and a site with some food recipes and a basic example of a Mabon ritual can be found here. Also, for people with children who probably wont want to sit through all of the talking involved in a traditional ritual, here are some ideas for activities that you can do with them.
Happy Mabon!
