Lammas

Lammas [said to be derived from a custom by which the tenants of the Archbishop of York were obliged, at the time of Mass, on the 1st of August, to bring a live lamb to the altar. In Scotland they are said to wear lambs on this day. It may be corrupted from latter-math. Others derive it from a Saxon word, signifying loaf-mass, because on that day our forefathers made an offering of bread composed of new wheat], the gule or 1st of August, and the second of the four cross quarter-days of the year, Encyc. Londin.; Wheat. Com. Pr.