Going into Winter - Primstav for Modern Times with Kari Tauring

Using the Primstav, the ancient calendar stick of Norway, can help arrange our priorities, inspires new celebrations, and leads us into the dark half of the year with new insights. Winter starts on October 14 on the Primstav calendar. The symbol is always a mitten. Learn about the two winter solstices and why a drinking horn always marks Christmas.

ThePrimstave has been a rudder in these changing times for teacher Kari Tauring. Much like in Norway in the 1300’s, our modern times are full of culture changes, political upheavals, pandemics, and a changing climate.

This transitional calendar stick marked the church and saint days of the new religion and also preserved land-based rituals and lore relied upon by wool workers, keepers of the farmsteads, and fishermen of ancient Scandinavia.

The oldest examples of these calendars date to the 1300’s. Symbols,saints, and lore was widely different in different areas of Norway and between Norway and Sweden. It is a tool meant to shift and change with the needs of the people and the land.

Students will receive directions to make a paper template for a primstav.

We will explore the symbols and pre-Christian lore and ritual held within.

Bring a notebook!

Please note: Norway House does not issue refunds. Be sure you can attend on the day for which you registered.

Major Resources:

“The Primstav Explanations: Norwegian legend, lore, and history” by Alfred

Miller, 59 Nick Road, Middlebury, CT 06762 (2006) - No longer in print. A

learning pdf is available to students.

Kari’s primstav poetry book: “The Day Begins at Sunset: Primstav

Poetry” (2023) will be available to purchase KariTauring.com

Primstav Project Norway: Questions about climate and culture

https://www.uib.no/en/calendars-project/139057/making-primstav-

today#:~:text=The%20primstav%20is%20a%20perpetual,Alver%201981%

2C%20Kismul%201979).

Primstav: Time, Land, and Unsettling Ourselves

Learning Group on Facebook was begun in 2019 specifically for this study.

Sara Axtell continues to lead the group as we discuss the relevance of

primstav lessons in our lives as European Americans.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/2354134371472956/Kari Tauring is a

founding member and frequent contributor.

Host or Publisher Edvard Grieg Society of Minnesota - Norway House