Roc Day or Saint Distaff's Day

Of course there was no such saint! St. Distaff's Day, the "first free day after Twelve-Eve Christmas," was a holiday of transition from Christmas revelries to the round of everyday work. It is suspected that St. Distaff was invented by the poet Herrick, who dedicated some lines to her:

Women did not spin during the twelve days of Christmas in old England and this was their day to get back to work.

They were not without their troubles, however, for the plowmen thought it sport to set fire to the flax and tow. Pails of water were kept handy and as fast as the farm hands started their fires, maidens put them out with liberal "bewashings." When the flax was scorched and men and maidens thoroughly drenched the day was properly observed. After that the farmwomen could spin without interruption.

English plowmen went back to work on the first Monday after the Twelfth -day. They took their time about resuming farm routine and spent their day in more boisterous foolery. If they arose betimes it was because they strove to bring their whips or plow staves to the hearth before the farm maidens could put on their kettles. If the plowmen succeeded the master owed them fine cocks at Shrovetide. Later they put on their white smocks, bedecked themselves with bright ribbons and, in groups of thirty or forty, went shouting and singing through the village, dragging the plow. One in each group was always dressed as an old crone and called ' The Bessy.' 'She' carried the moneybox. Another, garbed in bedraggled skins and with a dangling tail was called the 'Fool Plow' and amused everyone with this antics. As they sang at the top of their lungs, the plowmen performed a sort of' morris' or sword dance and 'Bessy' proffered her moneybox. It was best to drop in the coins when the plowmen shouted, "God speed the plow!", lest one's dooryard be plowed under. The coins were supposed to be for a fund to pay for 'plow-lights' -candles burned in the church to invoke blessings. Some of the fund seems occasionally to have gone for ale and beer for the Plow Monday Dinner too, although traditionally the master was supposed to attend to that. The Lord Mayor of London gave a Plow Monday Supper too, but did not entertain any plowmen. They got along nicely on the farms.

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Distaff A woman. Properly the staff from which the flax was drawn in spinning. The allusion is to the ancient custom of women, who spun from morning to night. (See Spinster.)

"The crown of France never fails to the distaff." - Kersey.

To have tow on the distaff. To have work in hand. Froissart says, "Il aura en bref temps autres estoupes en sa quenouille. "

"He baddëeore tow on his distaf Than Gerveys knew." Chaucer: Canterbury Tales. 3.772.

St. Distaff's Day. The 7th of January. So called because the Christmas festival terminated on Twelfth Day, and on the day following the women returned to their distaffs or daily occupations. It is also called Rock Day, a distaff being called a rock. "In old times they used to spin with rocks." (Aubrey. Wilts. )

"Give St. Distaff all the right, Then give Christmas sport good night, And next morrow every one To his own vocatiön." (1657)

"What! shall a woman with a rock drive thee away? Fye on thee, traitor' " Digby: Mysteries, p.11.