Green Thursday (Maundy Thursday) was the traditional day when people would cleanse themselves. They would always wash themselves with running water, as they believed that the running water was alive.
Girls who longed for beautiful skin, without freckles or spots, would bathe in a running spring, before sunrise on Green Thursday. The villagers also believed that if they wanted to avoid getting toothache they needed to rinse out their mouths with water on this day.
Another tradition that the villagers did was to clean up a spring of water, so that the running water was clear and safe to drink. If you cleaned out a spring on this day it was believed that you would stay healthy throughout the year. In the same way, it was thought that if you cleaned out all the milk urns and jugs thoroughly with water, you would enjoy a high milk yield that year.
Green Thursday got its name from the fact that on this day a lot of food from green vegetables was made. People would eat this food in order to remain strong and healthy – they would also drink blood on this day for the same reason.
One of the more unusual traditions on Green Thursday was that people believed it was possible to achieve yearlong happiness, as well as an abundance of food, by bringing an anthill, with ants in it, into your house. There was one important proviso. You could not carry the anthill over water; else your efforts would all be in vain.
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