We are planning a trip to Bavaria and Austria for late May/early June. We'd like to experience a rural Pfingsten/Pfingstmontag (Pentecost/Whit Monday) celebration (particularly the flower-bedecked cattle heading off to their summer pastures), but haven't been able to find any information online about where they are held. There's plenty of information about Almabtrieb celebrations in the fall, but everything we can find about the Pentecost weekend is too general to be useful in planning. Any suggestions for sources of information, or towns where we can see der Pfingstochse (Pentecost Ox)?
Posted by
Munich
560 posts
I do not know if anyboby still celebrating this. In church ok but never heard that any cows wearing flowers during Almauftrieb. During Almabtrieb the flowers are a sign that neither humans nor the animals got hurt during the summer.
Pfingst ox I know of course but never heard that a real ox is wearing flowers those days. In parts of Germany if somebody is overdressed we sometimes still say this person looks like a Pfingstochse.
So maybe in some villages they are doing more then a celebration in the church but no idea. Not finding specific info is already a bad sign. I know in one village in Germany there is a horse parade - Pfingstritt in Bad Kötzting.
But sure others might have better ideas. As a city girl all I had in common with pentecost was the 2 weeks school holiday in Bavaria.