Maundy Thursday or Black Thursday is the day when Easter eggs are dyed. What not to do today

Maundy Thursday of Passion Week is also called Black Thursday or Joimăriţă. On this day, the eggs are painted.

Passion Thursday is dedicated to the memory of four events in the life of Jesus: the washing of the disciples’ feet, the Last Supper, the bishop’s prayer before the Passion, where the emphasis falls on love, and the beginning of the Passion by selling the Lord Jesus Christ, writes News.ro.

• He who has not finished spinning, is still spinning. Joimarita punishes lazy women, beats their fingers and burns their unspun hemp.
• There is no work on this day.
• Borscht is made instead. The Maundy Thursday borscht lasts all year.
• Whoever sleeps on this day will be lazy and useless, that is, he will not be good at work, until the following year.
• Girls do magic to be liked by boys.
• On Maundy Thursday the eggs are painted. The red ones are called cranberries. The ones with patterns are called, from one area to another, speckled, inked, written, painted (painted with wax), worked, tormented eggs.

Irina Nicolau writes in the “Guide to Romanian Holidays” that “for the dead, bonfires are made from sticks broken by hand, uncut.” Chairs are placed next to the fire, bread and wine are placed, incense is burned. On this day the dead are preparing to come to earth, so they must be helped and welcomed. Water is poured on the graves and lit candles and wood chips are placed. The children walk around the village with a chopper and sing: Chop the stews,/ Thursday, Joimărelele./ Easter pop the cows/ On all the ogashele,/ Easter Sunday”.

On Maundy Thursday falls the Wedding of Nettles. From the moment they bloom, nettles are no longer good to eat. In some places there is the custom of “shouting over the village”, similar to the one in Lăsata Secului. The young people get together and, in a form that may remind a city dweller of the agitation brigades, they make public the mistakes of the sinners.

There are many legends about Easter eggs. The first test egg is called a “hoop”. Black eggs are also dyed, but less often. The names of the motifs on the eggs sound familiar: Poppy’s Girdle, Suveica, Tied Pot, Russian Cross, Chariot Wheel, Rolled Up Sleeve, Easter Flower, Christmas Tree, Lady’s Earring, Lentil, Carnation, Walnut Leaf, Snowdrop, Field Wheat, Stray Path, Butterfly, the fish, the spider, the goose’s paw, the fin, the ram, the goat’s claw, the rabbit’s ears, the rooster’s crest, the frog’s paw, the crab’s paw, the mole’s paw, the shepherd’s ring, the crutch, the star, the shepherd’s whistle, the German’s hat.

People who collide Easter eggs are believed to meet in the other world. The head collides with the head and the back with the back. On the first day of Easter, only head-to-head collisions occur. The youngest (in age, in importance) holds the egg and the eldest hits it: “Christ is risen!”, “He is truly risen!”. It also collides on the taken – the one who breaks the egg is allowed to take it, and if the partner refuses to give it, in the next world he will eat it spoiled and smeared with fuel oil. According to some, the eggs collide until the Ascension. Others believe that you can still do it on Great Sunday of Pentecost.

Read also: Holy Week or Passion Week. The services that are held from Florii to Easter

Read also: Holy Week. Traditions and customs, when to wash and what services are held daily

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