The young and beautiful springtime Goddess, awoke early one late Winter morning.
As a flower, arising from her sleep slowly, she saw a wounded bird on the ground.
In order to save the birds life, Ostara transformed it into a Hare.
But it was not a complete transformation.
The bird took on the appearance of the Hare, but retained the ability to lay eggs.
To show her eternal gratitude, the Hare would decorate these eggs and leave them as gifts to
Ostara
Re: Genesis of Ostara's Hare By: Brysing Moderator / Adept
Post # 3 Mar 09, 2015
This is very old Folk Lore; and is the origin of the Easter Egg. In old times it was very difficult to find where Hares live/sleep, because the hare sleeps in any sort of hollow in the earth,sometimes even scraping one.In those days, domestic fowl were not kept in coops except at night, so they roamed free during the day. Eggs were often found in the "hollows" used by Hares; so many people believed that the eggs were laid by Hares.
A nice story; but not true.
Re: Genesis of Ostara's Hare By: Nekoshema / Novice
Post # 6 Mar 09, 2015
Cute. I heard one once about a rabbit who found an egg and decided to decorate it in the spring goddesses colours. Upon presenting it to the goddess she liked it so much she wanted the rabbit to share the gift with the children.
I have heard a few stories about the 'Easter Bunny' probably because as a kid no one could ever answer the one question 'why is a rabbit giving me chocolate eggs'. My mom use to say it's a sweet treat after lent and a rabbit is an innocent animal, but that didn't answer the question why is a rabbit giving egg shaped chocolates? Lol, oh well, still a cute little something.
Thank you everyone for your comments, I thought this was a wonderful story, true or not, and wanted to share it. I believe it is important to keep folk stories like this alive for they too are part of our history.