The fourth Thursday of November in the USA is 'Thanksgiving', their fixed celebration of seasons, harvest and plenty. Based on ancient, pagan, seasonal celebrations. Now, high-jacked for religious / political gains, it wasn't always a fixed date. For millennia, early peoples would have been aware that the summer growing season was over and their journey into winter was beginning, and food stores would have to last them through the colder period. The global and solar reality of the Winter Solstice and the Northern Hemisphere return to Spring. This happens worldwide through history.
Early settlers from other lands brought with them the harvest rituals that they observed. In these new lands, the end of the growing season would vary in time and severity depending on location, the more northerly 'states' having an earlier and harsher onset of winter. Canadian Thanksgiving harvest rituals are much earlier. This movable feast, however, didn't foster the 'United' feeling that the 'States' were looking for. Abraham Lincoln fixed the date on which all the states would celebrate in order to a give the people a sense of unity (1863). Various tales and unsubstantiated myths
surround the modern version and its origins including the 1621 Pilgrims giving thanks for a good harvest but, in reality, it is another ancient celebration of human existence and seasonal change. Observing our place in the solar system through festivals and feasts .( For e.g ) Versions of a harvest festival came to the land, brought by travellers from Europe, Mexico, the north of the continent and further. These added to the rituals no doubt observed by the indigenous people. Thanks to be nature.
