Some Forgotten Ash Wednesday Traditions in Poland

Ash Wednesday in the Polish language is called  Środa Popielcowa or simply Popielec. Sometimes it is called Wstępna Środa. i.e., Introductory Wednesday, because it introduced the beginning of Lent. 

There was a time in Poland when the season of Lent was introduced by the ringing of the church bells at midnight into Ash Wednesday.  The bells signaled that all frivolity associated with the carnival period was to stop and be replaced with prayer and penance. It began with attending mass and receiving ashes.

The use of ashes as a sign of penance, as a way of preparing for Lent, became a churchwide practice. In 1091, Pope Urban II introduced the rite of sprinkling the head with ashes on Ash Wednesday as a binding liturgy in the Catholic Church. At the same time, it was established that the ash itself would come from burning the palms that had been blessed on Palm Sunday of the previous year. 

Photo:  On the Sunday preceding Ash Wednesday, at the Parish of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Włoszczowa in southern Poland, last year's Easter palms are burned for use on Ash Wednesday. https://www.diecezja.kielce.pl/podpatrzone-w-parafii-spalenie-palm-na-popielec

     Father Jędrzej Kitowicz(1724-1804), Polish priest, historian and memoirist, described the Ash Wednesday service in Poland in his  “Opis obyczajów i zwyczajów za panowania Augusta III, (Description of Customs and Traditions during the Reign of August III" (18th century).  "On this day, people were given ashes in church, that is, when kneeling before the high altar or another side altar after the Holy Mass.  The priest would sprinkle their heads with ashes from palms blessed on Palm Sunday (not from dead bones, as ignorant people understand it), reminding people in this way that one day they will return to dust… that they should do penance during Lent for excesses and licentiousness. All Catholics would come to church, even the greatest lords never omitted it.” 

Julian Fałat, Popielec, 1881. The painting depicts the tradition of sprinkling dry ashes on the hair on crown of head which is typical in Poland. Other countries, make a mark with ashes on the forehead. 

Sprinkling hair on crown of head with ashes in today's times in Poland. https://koscian.naszemiasto.pl/dzis-sroda-popielcowa

Whether a king, a lord, peasant or beggar, all approached the altar to receive the symbolic ashes to remind them “you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”  The historian added another interesting note, something that is not practiced today: “Since not everyone was able to receive this rite on the initial Wednesday, it was given a second time in village churches on the first Sunday of Lent. Such was the piety of the Poles under the rule of Augustus III in the early years that even the sick, unable to receive the ashes in church, asked for it to be brought to their bedside.”

Other historians and ethnographers noted another form of practice in old Poland that perhaps enabled the bedridden at home to receive ashes on this day: only the senior member of the family would approach the priest at the altar, only his head would be sprinkled, and then the priest would pour some ashes into his prayer book. After coming home, in a solemn and serious manner, the head of the family would sprinkle the heads of his loved ones.
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Ash Wednesday marked the first day of Lent- a time taken very seriously.  The women in the villages put away their colorful aprons and bright coral beads for more somber colors. The men often gave up drinking alcohol and even smoking tobacco. Children also experienced the rigors of Lent. Sometimes, toys were hidden from them during Lent, leaving only the most modest or the most damaged ones, and at bedtime, instead of fairy tales, children listened to the lives of the Saints.

Additional information about Ash Wednesday and Lenten period in Poland: Polish Customs, Traditions and Folklore, Hippocrene Books, Inc. 2024

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