The God of Beginnings - Janus

January was established as the first month of the year by the

Roman Calendar.  It was named after the god Janus (latin word for door).

Janus has two faces which allowed him to look both backwards

into the old year and forwards into the new one at the same time.

He was the spirit of 'opening'

The Anglo-Saxons called the first month

Wolf monath

because wolves came into the villages in winter in search

of food.

It was an old Saxon belief that 2nd January

was one of the unluckiest days of the whole year.

Those unfortunate enough to be born on this day could expect

to die an unpleasant death.

On this date in 1770 a huge Christmas pie was baked for holiday

consumption in London, according to the Newcastle Chronicle,

it was made of two bushels of flour, twenty pounds of butter, four geese,

two turkeys, two rabbits, four wild ducks, two woodcocks,

six snipes, four partridges, two neats' tongues,

two curlews, seven blackbirds and six pigeons.

It was nearly nine feet in circumference and weighed

about 12 stones.

Capricorn (the Goat) December 22nd-January 20th

Capricorn is represented by a Goat with crooked horns and the hind

parts of a fish.  The goat is Pan, the lusty and licentious god

normally portrayed as a bearded, curly-haired human with legs, tail and

horns of a goat.  On plunging into the Nile to escape from the

might Typhon, the father of dangerous winds, his upper part

became wholly goat and the submerged parts changed into those of

a fish.  The story is remarkably like that of Pisces.