Online Talk: Lily-of-the-valley Customs: A Window on France

Date 5 May 2026 19:00 - 20:30

Location Online talk

Speaker Cozette Griffin-Kremer

Lily-of the-valley Customs: A Window on France

A Folklore Society online talk

by Cozette Griffin-Kremer

Tuesday 5 May 2026, 19:00 BST

Any popular practice may open windows onto broader local or national concerns, as lily-of-the-valley customs certainly do in France.

There is a wealth of customs associated with the lily-of-the-valley (Convallaria majalis L.) in France and this can only be a sampling that runs from the iconic plant’s botanical being, on to how it is associated with bringing good luck, and hence, with some of the famous people who have used the muguet to construct their own legends. This can go far beyond a kind of brand-marking to active construction of a sense of place and identity. Practices are practiced, after all, and doing so may at times be fraught with difficulties, some of them quite amusing, others less so. Among the examples: will there be lily-of-the-valley for May Day in 2050?

Cozette Griffin-Kremer is Associate Researcher, Centre de recherche bretonne et celtique, Brest, France. She took her doctorate in Celtic Studies at the Centre de recherche bretonne et celtique in Brest and an Advanced Research Degree (DEA) in the history of technology at the E.H.E.S.S. Paris (Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales), so she attempts to marry the two fields, especially concentrating on the calendar system, human-bovine relations and use of working cattle, the connections between ritual and work, museum involvement in intangible heritage, and food history.

Tickets £6.00 (£4.00 for Folklore Society members with the Promo Code)

Every ticket sold helps to support the work of The Folklore Society

Image: Photo C.Griffin-Kremer

Tickets £6.00 (£4.00 for Folklore Society members with the Promo Code--just log in to the Members area to get the Promo Code) from https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/lily-of-the-valley-customs-a-window-on-france-by-cozette-griffin-kremer-tickets-1983971344699?