Old Michaelmas: Where Folklore Meets Fields, Fairs and Fine Print

Autumn on British farms is a season of resetting. Combines are parked up, seed drills are rolling, sheds are tidied, and cattle decisions are being made for the colder months ahead. The rhythm shifts. It always has. And sitting right in the middle of this turning point is a date with deep roots in rural life: Michaelmas. For centuries, it has been more than a feast day; it has been a marker for rents, tenancies, hiring, and handshakes. But then there’s Old Michaelmas. A second date, eleven days later, that still crops up in some agricultural leases and local customs. Why two dates? The answer is part folklore, part farming practicality, and part legal history.

Quarter Days: The Rural Year in Four Beats

For generations, English law ran on Quarter Days: four fixed points when rents were paid, agreements began or ended, and hiring fairs filled market towns. They were the year’s scaffolding: 

• Lady Day (25 March),
• Midsummer (24 June), 
• Michaelmas (29 September) and 
• Christmas (25 December). 

For farmers and landowners, these weren’t just diary entries; they were decision days. Michaelmas mattered most because it arrived after harvest. You had grain in the barn, accounts ready to settle, and clarity about the year just finished. Renew the tenancy, move on, adjust stock numbers, re-cast rotations: Michaelmas was made for it.

And it wasn’t only paperwork. Many places held mop or statute fairs at Michaelmas—once the hiring fairs for farm workers, now mostly funfairs with bright lights and hot dogs. Their origins linger in the names. In towns like Marlborough, where I grew up, the “Mop” still rolls into the historic high street each autumn.

The Calendar Tweak That Left a Legal Shadow

So why does Old Michaelmas fall on 10 October in some leases and traditions? Blame the calendar. In 1752, Britain ditched the Julian calendar for the more accurate Gregorian one. The Julian calendar had been drifting—by about 11 minutes a year—so by the 18th century it was running 11 days behind the sun. Parliament’s fix was decisive: after Wednesday 2 September 1752 came Thursday 14 September. Eleven days vanished overnight.

That shift moved all fixed feast days forward by 11 days. In effect, Michaelmas as people knew it fell on 10 October “old style,” even though the official date became 29 September “new style.” Rural customs can be slow to change, especially when harvest timing and tenancy cycles are involved. Many agreements and customs continued using the “old” date, either out of habit or because, depending on the farming method used and crops grown, it could be more practical, allowing a little longer in case of a later harvest.

Blackberries, Geese and Good Sense

Michaelmas is rich with stories. The best known is the blackberry warning: 

“On Michaelmas Day the devil put his foot on the blackberries.” 

In one version, Lucifer fell into a bramble patch after being defeated by St Michael and, in revenge, spoils the fruit each year on that date by spitting, cursing, stamping, or – if the Cornish lore is to be believed – by urinating on the brambles. Set aside the folklore and theology and you are left with a nub of sound common sense. After the first frosts and autumn rains, blackberries do turn sour, mouldy or infested. Folklore dressed up practical advice long before risk assessments existed.

In some regions, Michaelmas goose was the dish of the day in a nod to prosperity and a tidy market in birds and rents. Like many traditional feasts, it blended celebration with settlement: a good meal and the closing of the year’s books.

Why Old Michaelmas Still Matters in Law and Practice

For all its age, Old Michaelmas still pops up where land meets law. Many agricultural tenancies, especially those under the Agricultural Holdings Act 1986, have terms or notice periods tethered to the traditional quarter days. The actual date, whether 29 September or 10 October (or, sometimes, 11 October) can be critical. If your tenancy, grazing licence or seasonal agreement uses “Michaelmas” without spelling out which one, you could find yourself eleven days out at a key moment.

That gap can ripple through the practicalities. Livestock movements, sale dates, winter livestock housing or outwintering plans, rent due dates, rent reviews, or cropping timetables may all depend on precisely when an agreement starts or ends. If you inherit or purchase land with older paperwork, check what “Michaelmas” means in that context. Newer agreements usually state the exact date; older documents mostly do too but sometimes rely on custom. It is worth the read.

For rural professionals, this is more than quaint detail. Notice periods under legacy tenancies, rent review timings, and completion strategies around quarter days all draw on this inherited framework. A calendar reform from 1752 might feel academic, but it still shapes some of today’s deadlines.  Of course, on the subject of “academic” matters, the autumn term is also still frequently described as the Michaelmas term too, another near little historic echo. 

Where Custom Meets Contract

Old Michaelmas is a perfect example of how custom becomes law and law reinforces custom. Farming communities used the quarter days because they suited the cycle of the land. Lawyers and landlords used them because they offered clarity and common practice. Over time, habit and enforceable terms locked together. Mop fairs faded, BACS payments replaced rent purses, and yet the beats of the farming year still echo those old markers.

You can hear it in the language we use, see it in the hedgerows, and feel it in the way the season turns. After harvest, the mind resets; the farm resets; the paperwork resets. Michaelmas is the pivot.

A Practical Takeaway (and a Hedgerow Tip)

As the hedges thin and the nights draw in, the last blackberries will tempt you. Tradition says leave them after Michaelmas – and your taste buds will likely agree. And as 10 October passes, it is worth a glance at the dates that structure your agreements. If “Michaelmas” appears, make sure you know whether it means the new or the old. Eleven days can be the difference between smooth running and a scramble.

Old Michaelmas is no oddity. It is a line that connects folklore, farming and the law – a reminder that the calendar of the countryside and the calendar of the Court once turned together, and in many ways, still do.

Field Notes is Charles Russell Speechlys’ weekly agricultural law blog, sharing plain-English insight into the legal and policy issues affecting agriculture, agricultural land and rural business life. From hints and tips on avoiding agricultural disputes, pitfalls to keep an eye out when planning for tenancy or family agri-business succession, to the latest agricultural legislative or policy changes and the most interesting farm-related court decisions, Field Notes makes the complex more understandable, always grounded in the realities of life on (and off) the land.

Field Notes comes out every Wednesday. Previous editions of Field Notes:

• Planting Trees Today for Tomorrow’s Farms: New guidance, what a "Mast Year" is and why that matters in 2025
• Beyond Downton Abbey: the legal issues facing modern Landed Estates
• Agricultural Tenancies: Navigating Michaelmas and Anticipating Future Trends
• Unkept Promises: The Evolving Landscape for Proprietary Estoppel Post-Guest v Guest
• One Year On: Agricultural Holdings Act 1986 succession after the Agriculture Act 2020 reforms