sun spelln.1
/ˈsʌnˌspɛl/, U.S. /ˈsənˌspɛl/ rare.
A period of sunny weather.
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1883 W. Whitman Specimen Days in Specimen Days & Collect 149 Between Pueblo and Bent's fort, southward, in a clear afternoon sun-spell I catch exceptionally good glimpses of the Spanish peaks.
1969 C. Beaton Diary 25 Sept. in Beaton in Sixties (2003) 367 Today lowering skies after the sun spell gave me a foreboding feeling.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, January 2018; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
sun spelln.2
/ˈsʌnˌspɛl/, U.S. /ˈsənˌspɛl/ Anthropology.
A festival or ritual involving fire which is thought to be a means of propitiating the sun and ensuring a period of sunshine; = sun charm n. at sun n.1 Compounds 5a.Apparently coined by the Indologist Arthur Berriedale Keith (see quot. 1907) and frequently used by him and by later writers with reference to Sir James Frazer's interpretation of certain fire festivals and fire rituals as attempts to propitiate or the sun or provide it with fire (see sun charm n. at sun n.1 Compounds 5a).
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society > faith > worship > liturgical year > feast, festival > other seasons and feasts > [noun] > to propitiate god of the sun
sun charm1890
sun spell1907
1907 A. Berriedale Keith in Folk-lore June 222 The nocturnal festival of Sais..shows signs of being a sun spell.
1981 M. Mukhopadhyay Brahmanical Mythol. in Sanskrit Inscriptions iii. 168 A gold disc or plate was laid at the time of the piling of the fire-altar to represent the sun. The Pravargya ceremony is a sun-spell.
2016 M. Witzel in R. K. Payne & M. Witzel Homa Variations 372 It [sc. the agnihotra] is to be performed at sunset every night and at sunrise in the morning by all initiated brahmins who have installed the three holy fires (ahitāgni). Its original purpose was as a sun spell.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, January 2018; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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