The folklore of many cultures offers encouraging words on how to ward off supernatural powers or harness them to one’s advantage. These encouraging words with specific instructions on what to do at the stroke of midnight. In the folk beliefs of Nordic (Scandinavian) cultures, for example, an unmarried woman could see the face of her future spouse by peering into a well at midnight on Midsummer’s Eve. According to 19th-century Irish poet and folklorist Lady Jane Wilde, a number of Irish love charms and rituals against harm involved tonics taken at midnight or visits to graveyards or churches at that particular time.
