According to the folk calendar - Day of Fyodor Tyrone and Mariamna Kikimora

The day of Fyodor Tyrone and Mariamne Kikimora is celebrated according to the folk calendar on March 2 (February 17, old style) This name comes from Saints Theodore and Mariamne, whose memory the church honors on this day Theodore Tiron preached the Christian faith in the 3rd century in Amasia in what is now Turkey When the persecution of Christians by pagans began, Theodore was captured He was tortured and tormented, forcing him to change his faith, but the saint remained faithful to God For this he was burned at the stake Righteous Mariamne was the sister of Saint Philip, one of the 12 apostles Having taken a vow of chastity, she went with the apostles to spread the word about the deeds of Jesus Christ By order of the pagan emperor, she and her brother were imprisoned Philip was executed on the cross, and his sister was released, after which she continued to convert people to Christianity with sermons But, in contrast to the Orthodox vision, the people accepted Fyodor and Mariamne as negative characters Fyodor was considered a terrible tyrant, who, realizing that he was behaving incorrectly, had mercy on his people and even provided assistance They prayed to him for lost things, asking the saint to find them or return them in case of theft They also turned to him for help in finding a missing person Over time, the peasants called Mariamne a kikimora, imagining her as a short old woman with tousled hair, the wife of a brownie or a goblin With bad owners, the kikimora could do various dirty tricks: knocking objects at night, dropping them, disturbing children’s sleep If a kikimora sat down to spin yarn at night, she did it so poorly that the housewife had to redo everything in the morning Therefore, they prayed to Saint Mariamne so that the yarn would be even and smooth The day of Fyodor and Mariamne ended the period of winter weddings It was during this time that unmarried girls used it to tell fortunes about their betrothed They went out into the street at night and looked around If they met a woman first, then matchmakers were expected in a given year However, they avoided looking at the sky, because it was considered bad luck to see a star fall According to signs on the day of Mariamne and Fyodor, future weather conditions were predicted If the fog descended, the peasants prepared for a cool May Thin elongated clouds from the west foreshadowed rain in a day The return of birds from warmer climes promised the early arrival of spring The weather on this day showed what the summer season would be like