Fortune telling in the hay - divination in the hay and other ways to see the future

Today, Christmas divination is a bit of a forgotten custom, but in the past, especially in rural areas, it was very popular. Here are Christmas predictions that were supposed to predict the future.

Fortune-telling, like St. Andrew's fortune-telling or New Year's fortune-telling, most often concerned young brides and grooms who wanted to know will they get married soon.

The last night before Christmas was always important, and everything that happened on it was considered fortune-telling, according to the principle "As on Christmas Eve, so throughout the year. New underwear on Christmas Eve cannot be hung on a rope, you must also remove what was on the eve, because it foreshadowed death.

However, divination on Christmas Eve, unlike what Christmas superstitions are, required deliberate action. So it wasn't enough to say that whoever didn't kiss under the mistletoe was out of luck.

Fortune telling on Christmas Eve - a prophecy with hay about marriage

This simple divination requires nothing more than some hay hidden under a tablecloth. To find out if you have a wedding, pull the stem from under the tablecloth. If the pulled hay is:

• green: wedding coming soon
• yellowed: it will not be soon,
• turned black: never will.

Christmas divination - health divination with hay

You can read from the hay pulled out from under the tablecloth not only to find out if you will get married soon. By divination in hay, you can find out if you have a long and healthy life:

• green: a long life awaits you, you do not have to worry about your health,
• separated and crooked: trouble awaits you,
• dry and yellow: prediction of illness or death.

Wood divination - wood divination

This old folk divination can still be used today, for example, in houses with a fireplace. 

You should bring a basket of logs to the fireplace or stove and only then count them. If the number of forests is odd, don't count on kinship. Even, in turn, portends a quick life for the couple.

Christmas Eve - a fortune of coins, bread, coal

To do this, prepare:

• 4 pots
• 1 coin
• 1 shower cap,
• 1 piece of coal
• 1 slice of bread.

Place all products on the table and cover with pots. Then everyone chooses one vessel and checks what is under it. If it is bread, next year you will not be poor. A coin portends wealth, coal portends death, and a hat portends a quick wedding.

Christmas divination - divination from salt and nutshells

Once very popular and practiced by housewives, today it is completely unknown. In the evening, fill the shells with salt - one for each household.

If in the morning it turns out that the salt in one of the shells has dissolved, this is a sign of death.

Waffle Christmas Divination

Although today the combination of a wafer with divination seems somewhat abstract, in the past it was a way to predict the future.

In houses the wafer was broken into as many pieces as there were households. Each of them dipped his host in honey and glued it to the window. The one that broke off the glass foreshadowed the death of its owner within the next year.

Bow on Christmas Eve

This Christmas Eve prediction is to predict which months of the coming year will be rainy.

Divide the onion so that it is cut into 12 pieces of approximately the same size. Put them side by side and sprinkle with salt.. The ones that get moldy the fastest will be the rainiest.

However, Christmas Eve is an evening full of magic. omens and superstitions can make you laugh. You may or may not believe in old Christmas predictions, but they are worth knowing, as are the traditions and customs that have shaped us.