So we’ve reached the last day of July, and tomorrow is 1st August which is the modern date of the ancient festival of Lughnasadh, although we have to wait until next Monday (4th) for the corresponding Bank Holiday. Lughnasadh can be thought of as marking the onset of he harvest season, and is the pagan forerunner of the Christian harvest festivals I remember from when I was a kid.
As I learnt from this article, the last Sunday in July has been celebrated since ancient times as Garland Sunday, Bilberry Sunday or Reek Sunday. It was a day to mark the end of Hungry July (or in the article mentioned below, The Dead Month) and anticipate the harvest to come.
I hadn’t realized that July was a time of shortage in olden times. I’d always thought the summer months would be a time of plenty, but in July the stocks of food such as grain put aside at the last harvest would often be running low and people who usually depended on farmed produce would be forced to turn to berries, etc.
Anyway. here’s a blog post I stumbled across that says more about this
In the Dark 