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According to the popular calendar this day is considered the beginning of the new
economic year and thought to be an agricultural holiday mainly. Before the holiday
the peasants take the seeds for the soughing into the church to sanctify them.
They put ashes from the tree that they have burnt on the
Christmas Eve in the seeds.
In the morning on the holiday the women knead wheat dough and make
breads for the oxen and the buffaloes that will plough the fields.
Small ring-shaped buns are also made and they are put on the cattle's horns.
The man that will plough and sough are dressed up for the holiday
and the women walk by them and throw embers so that the work
could go well. After the first furrow is ploughed the ritual
bread is torn into four pieces - the first is thrown in the East,
the second is given to the buffaloes, the third is buried in
the field and the forth is eaten by the landlord.
The tradition demands that no one land anything and no one takes
anything out of the house on Simeonovden to "prevent from the
fertility going out of the house".
It is not allowed to cook, wash or
hang out the clothes. If the people that come to the house are
good, the harvest will be fertile.
The walnuts from the trees are usually shaken down on Simeonovden that is
why the holiday is sometimes called Simeon (Simon) that shakes down the walnuts.
Church Holiday:
St. Simon Stulpnik know to the Bulgarians as "Simon the ploughman".
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