Predicting weather has always been a serious, essential task. The modern world spends a great deal of money and expends vast technologies to get it right because errors when it comes to weather prediction can be devastating - for crops and lives.

The pre-modern world was no different in wanting to be able to predict weather but approaches to predicting the weather sometimes relied less on technology than on folk belief. It did not mean they were taken any less seriously. These methods may not have the accuracy of today's predictions (although many complain about how far off the mark today's predictions are), but they could at least give people some peace of mind about a subject that could seem volatile and out of their control.

Today, we have the folk prognostication of the groundhog’s shadow. Embedded within is what is called a “blind motif,” namely a core, forgotten belief that once inspired this means of weather prediction. Northern Europeans often explained hibernation among some animals as being a deal struck between the species and the underworld: the animal was allowed to forego the worst of winter by sleeping underground in a near death state. It could emerge in spring, but the price to be paid was that it must leave its soul underground.

The groundhog emerges and can go about its business if it cannot see its shadow. This is in a way counter intuitional. One would think that a bright sunny day on February 2 would mean that spring was on hand, but the opposite is true. The reason is that the shadow is a sign that the animal has brought its soul to surface, violating the compact. It must, then, retreat underground and wait until its soul is ready to bid farewell to the animal once the true spring has arrived.

Did people really believe this was what was occurring on February 2? Perhaps some did and some did not; every society has its skeptics. Belief is terribly hard to evaluate. Even for one person, belief can vary from moment to moment and year to year.

Regardless of believing in this question of the animal’s soul, there is the question of whether people thought the prognostication of sunny versus cloud-covered mornings on February 2 represented a reliable predictor of weather. As indicated, people may have understood the issue of the hibernating animal and its soul, but at one point, this was largely forgotten. That did not mean, however, that people tossed the predictive tool. Some may have trusted it to be reliable while others were, again, skeptical.

Where I live, people claim that a foggy day in December will be matched by a rainy day 90 days afterwards – a foggy December means there will be a rainy March. Do people believe this to be true? Many do. Is it accurate? I haven’t seen the science on this, but I doubt there is any meteorological analysis to support it. It is a folk belief, and it helps people – especially the local farmers – bring order to their world.