Hecate's Night on 16 November: The Deipnon, the Crossroads and How to Observe It
There is a quiet festival between Samhain and Yule that a growing number of witches keep and almost nobody outside the practice has heard of. Hecate's Night, 16 November, is a night for the goddess of the crossroads, the keys and the torch, the one who walks with the dead and stands at every threshold. It is a modern date on an ancient goddess, and it is one of the most useful nights in the dark half of the year.
This guide covers what Hecate's Night is and where the date comes from, what the older monthly Deipnon is, and a crossroads rite that can be done by one person with a candle and a plate.
Who she is, briefly
Hecate is Greek, older than the Olympians in some tellings, and Hesiod gives her honour over earth, sea and sky. She carries torches, keys and sometimes a dagger; she is accompanied by dogs; she is three-formed, facing three ways at the crossroads. In late antiquity she became the goddess of witchcraft and the restless dead, and that is the Hecate most modern witches work with. Our Hecate, triple goddess of witchcraft piece is the fuller portrait, and the Hecate wheel explains her most common symbol.
Hecate's Night: 16 November
Keys, wheels and torches
Honesty first: there is no ancient source for 16 November. The date appears in modern pagan calendars from the late twentieth century, probably by analogy with the Roman habit of fixing festivals mid-month, and it has stuck because it fills a real gap. Samhain has passed, Yule is five weeks off, and the nights are at their darkest and longest before the solstice turns them. A night for the torch-bearer in the middle of that stretch makes sense whether or not the Greeks kept it.
What people do
Light a candle at the door or at a crossroads. Leave an offering. Ask for guidance through the dark months, or for protection at a threshold you are about to cross: a move, a job, a diagnosis, a decision. Some keep a vigil; most keep an hour.
The Deipnon: the dark moon supper
This one is ancient. At the dark of the moon, the last night before the new crescent, Athenians left a meal for Hecate at a crossroads or at the household shrine: bread, eggs, garlic, fish, cakes with candles. The meal fed the goddess and the dead who followed her, and it cleansed the house of the month's wrongs; sweepings from the hearth went out with it. The poor ate the food afterwards, which the comic poets found funny and which modern practitioners read as the point.
Deipnon dates for late 2026
The Deipnon falls on the night before each new moon. For the dark half of 2026, check a lunar calendar for the exact new moon dates in November and December and keep the supper the evening before; our moon phase 2026 guide lists them. The November Deipnon lands within a week or two of Hecate's Night, and a lot of people combine the two.
A crossroads rite for one person
More for her altar
What you need
A candle, ideally black or white. A plate with a small meal: bread, an egg, a clove of garlic, honey. A key, any key. Something for the dogs if you can, since hers are always hungry. If you have a Hecate piece, a wheel pendant, a key, a torch image, wear it or set it on the plate; the Hecate collection has wheels, keys and suncatchers for exactly this.
Where
A real three-way crossroads is traditional and, in most towns, impractical after dark. The threshold of your home is the accepted substitute; the front step, the door, the place where inside meets outside. A window ledge facing the street works in a flat.
What to do
At full dark, light the candle at the threshold. Say her name three times, one for each face. Say what you are asking, plainly, in your own words; she is not fond of ornament. Set down the plate. Turn your back and walk away without looking round, which is the one instruction the ancient sources are firm about. Do not retrieve the food. Let the candle burn down if it is safe to; otherwise snuff it and bury the stub.
Afterwards
Sweep the hearth or the kitchen floor and put the sweepings out. Wash your hands. This is the cleansing half of the Deipnon and it is worth keeping.
Hecate and the dead
She leads the restless dead, which is why her night sits so naturally in the ancestor season that runs from Samhain to Yule. If you keep an ancestor altar through November, a key or a torch on it acknowledges who guides them. Our ancestor veneration guide and the Samhain altar piece both work here, and Hecate and the moon covers her lunar side.
Wearing the key
A lot of devotees wear a key or a wheel year round and add nothing for the night itself. The Hecate necklaces are mostly wheels and keys in silver with amethyst or obsidian, both stones with a long association with her. If you are buying one as a gift for a devotee, this is the night to give it; see our witchy gift guide for the wider question of gifting deity pieces.
Her symbols on the altar
If you keep a permanent space for her, the objects are consistent across most modern practice. Keys, ideally old iron ones. A torch or a pair of candles. The strophalos, her wheel, drawn or cast. A dog figure, or a bowl for the offering that stands in for one. Garlic and a dish of salt. Black, silver and deep red for cloth and candle. A suncatcher with her wheel in the window catches the last light of these short days and makes the threshold visible from outside, which is not a bad thing on her night. Keep the space at or near a door if you can; she prefers edges to centres.
What not to do
Do not bargain. Do not promise what you will not deliver; she is a goddess of oaths and thresholds and she keeps accounts. Do not take the food back. Do not do the rite for someone else without their knowledge. And do not be surprised if the dogs in the street start up when you set the plate down. That is traditional too.
One piece for the crossroads
Frequently Asked Questions About Hecate's Night
When is Hecate's Night?
16 November each year. The date is modern, adopted in late twentieth-century pagan calendars, and it fills the gap between Samhain and Yule at the darkest stretch of the year.
What is the Deipnon?
The ancient Athenian supper left for Hecate and the dead at the household threshold or a crossroads on the night before the new moon. It included bread, eggs, garlic and cakes, and the house was swept and cleansed at the same time.
What do you offer Hecate?
Bread, eggs, garlic, honey, fish, small cakes, wine, and something for her dogs. A key or a candle is a fitting non-food offering. Leave it at a threshold, walk away, and do not look back or take it home.
Can I observe Hecate's Night alone?
Yes. A candle at the door, a plate of food, her name spoken three times and a plain request is a complete rite. Nothing about her worship requires a group or a temple.
The torch, the key and the crossroads are the whole of it. Stand at the door on the sixteenth, light the candle, say what you need, and walk away without looking back. She has been keeping that threshold for a very long time.
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