Please forgive the title of this video - it's pure click bait.
There's a lot of misinformation about this subject on all sides. From those claiming Easter is entirely 'pagan' with a mere veneer of Christianity, to those claiming it's entirely Christian and has no 'pagan' elements in it whatsoever.
Obviously there is a lot of middle ground between these two extreme positions, and a lot of nuance always gets missed.
I'm in debt to historian Ronald Hutton, a leading expert on historical paganism, in this context and for making distinctions between 'Pagan Residues', 'Surviving Paganism' and 'Pagan Survivals'.
I'd like to touch on three main areas; The alleged Anglo-Saxon goddess 'Eostre', the Easter Bunny and Easter Hare, and the Symbolism of the Easter Egg, then I'll talk about the wider symbology of spring time festivities following the vernal equinox.
