Beltane Fire Festival: Raving the night away in celebration of May Day and the start of summer

Beltane is held each year on the last day of April

Bonfires, blazing torches, body-painted dancers, drummers, jugglers, musicians, fire-eaters, ancient Celtic rituals and a spectacular backdrop.

No, it’s not a scene from cult film The Wicker Man.

It’s what you can expect at the annual Beltane Fire Festival taking place in Edinburgh capital this week.

Beltane is held each year on the last day of April, continuing overnight into May Day, to mark the arrival of summer and celebrate new life and fertility.

The event, which first began in 1988 as a protest against rave laws and a way to reclaim green spaces, includes modern interpretations of rituals and customs with roots dating back to the Iron Age. And fire. Lots of fire.

The May Queen, as her name implies, presides over the show, guiding a procession of drummers and performers around the city’s landmark Calton Hill and acting out healing rites.

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Hundreds of people are expected to turn out on Edinburgh's iconic Calton Hill for the annual Beltane Fire Festival, which marks the birth of summer

During her journey she interacts with the Green Man in ceremonies symbolising the birth of summer.

The special focus of this year’s festival, chosen by current May Queen Alixandra Prybyla, is climate change and its impacts on nature’s cycles.

The issue has massive significance for Beltane’s reigning first lady, who by day is studying for a PhD in evolutionary biology at the University of Edinburgh.

She worries about phenological shift, when the timings of certain events in nature move – sometimes endangering their ecosystem.

The May Queen presides over the Beltane Fire Festive, leading performers and acting out rituals inspired by ancient Celtic customs

Problems arise when there is a mismatch with interacting species – such as when a flower blooms too early and its pollinator emerges too late, resulting in neither the plant breeding nor the bee feeding.

Getting nature back in synch is the key thread running through the Beltane performances.

Prybyla, originally from the US and only the ninth May Queen since the event began, says her thesis work, which focuses on the behaviour of bees, inspired the theme.

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Festival-goers can expect bonfires, blazing torches, body-painted dancers, drummers,musicians and ancient Celtic rituals in a dramatic setting atop Edinburgh's landmark Calton Hill

“I spend nearly every day in the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh,” she said.

“Because I’m there most of the year I have the privilege of watching as plants bud, leaf, come into bloom, fade and die or go dormant for the season.

“I have become so in tune with these cycles and their timing – something I cherish both as a researcher and as the May Queen.

“But even in the three short years I’ve been doing my work in the Botanics, I’ve noticed that some plants are budding, leafing and blooming at different times than they normally would.”

She added: “Many researchers are pointing to climate change as the culprit.”

Prybyla is enthusiastic about her Beltane role and takes her responsibilities seriously.

The main festivities take place on Calton Hill, around the iconic classical-style monument known as Edinburgh’s Disgrace – an unfinished memorial built to honour the dead of the Napoleonic wars, which stands atop the landmark

“The May Queen is the goddess figure of our modern Beltane Fire Festival, so in a lot of ways she’s at the heart of everything we celebrate on the night,” she said.

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“She’s the figure that turns the Wheel of the Year, the deity that moves us out of the colder, fallow period of Samhainn and into the rich, green months of spring and summer.

“Despite being a queen, I see her much more as the centre of a web of performers, stories, outreach and wider community, as opposed to a hierarchical monarch.

“Without her, the festival doesn’t work, but it is made great thanks to the community that makes it happen: it’s by no means a one-woman show.”