Januar 2025: Have you sneezed today?

Have you sneezed on New Year's morning? If yes, good news! According to a superstition listed in the second volume of Icelandic Legends, this means that you will live through 2025. Why exactly, or what happens if you don't, is unfortunately not explained. (Icelandic Legends Vol. 2, p. 648)

There are other, more sinister superstitions relating to the turn of the year, mostly relating to elves, rising dead, and seeing the future. On New Year's Eve, the “Rising of the Churchyard” takes place. All of the dead bodies in a churchyard come out from their graves in their grave clothes and enter the church, while their graves stay open. Inside of the church, they perform religious rites, after which they return to their graves to rest. Even though the story is chilling, they are not malicious and only want to visit the church. (Icelandic Legends Vol. 2, p. lxx–lxxi)

Together with those who have died, the ghosts of those who will die in the following year will appear in the churchyard of their parish. People who are “clear-sighted” or “ghost-seers” will be able to see them if they wait in the churchyard or the church itself. Their own ghost will be among them if they are going to die within the next year, but they will not usually recognize it. (Icelandic Legends Vol. 2, p. lxxxv)

Unfortunately, the Icelandic Legends only explain this superstition in general, but a creepy story from the collection Íslenskir sagnaþættir og þjóðsögur published by Guðni Jónsson in the 20th century illustrates it more vividly:

Once, there was a man named Brynjólfur, a farm hand at Stóri-Núpur, who was both clear-sighted and fearless. One New Year’s Eve, the people of the farm were arguing about the truth of the belief that those who are fated to die in the parish during the coming year gather in the church. They persuaded Brynjólfur to spend the night in the church by bribing him with brennivín, which he was fond of.

Brynjólfur went to the church with a single candle and chose a seat in the third row from the pulpit. He dozed off, but was startled awake near midnight, when a man from the parish, whom he knew well, entered the church. The man walked to the pulpit and back without saying a word to Brynjólfur. As dawn approached, Brynjólfur grew sleepy again but was awakened once more when two small children walked through the church in the same manner as the man had before.

In the morning, Brynjólfur told the others what had happened and predicted that the man would die during the summer, and two children would die at the end of the year. Both prophecies came true: the man passed away that summer, and twin babies were born later in the year but died shortly after birth.

(Guðni Jónsson, “Kirkjuseta á Nýársnótt.” Íslenskir sagnaþættir og þjóðsögur Vol. 3, p. 68-70, https://ismus.is/tjodfraedi/sagnir_aevintyri/6230)

I hope you stayed away from churches and graveyards this New Year's Eve. Make sure you sneeze (smell some pepper or tickle your nose, if necessary), and you will be good for the New Year!