Unlike both Easterns and Westerns, the Copts have placed the death and bodily resurrection of the Mother of God on the 16th January (21st Tybi). We find it so in the _Synaxarium_ of the ninth century in Mai, and in that of Michael of Atriba; while the older Calendar of saints belonging to the seventh century given by Seldenius has a “_Planctus Dominæ Mariæ_” on this day, which may well mean the same thing.[521] In not a few German and Sclavonic dioceses a blessing of the fruits of the field takes place on the 15th August. This is of ancient Germanic origin, but has been adopted into the Roman ritual. It seems to have arisen from some popular custom connected with harvest.[522] 5. _Institution and Spread of the Festival of the Immaculate Conception_ The two dogmatic definitions formulated during the pontificate of Pius IX. had this in common that they came as a surprise to many, although they only set at rest questions which had been ventilated for centuries. This is especially the case with regard to the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, for the discussion of the question had been prolonged during a thousand years. Bound up with the discussion was the contention whether the festival in question ought or ought not to be celebrated; and these two things, the theoretical treatment of the doctrine, and the fortunes of the festival, were most intimately connected with one another, and found at one and the same moment their final solution. Indeed, the festival has a longer history than the doctrinal controversy. For the observation that Church festivals required a long time from their inception—which is for the most part to be looked for in monasteries—until they obtained general approbation and acceptance from the ecclesiastical authorities, applies to many festivals; but none has had so long and changeful a history as the festival of the Immaculate Conception of the Mother of God. It has now, for the last fifty years, been celebrated as a festival of obligation throughout the Catholic Church, and has even been adopted in those countries which formerly set themselves most strongly against the increase of ecclesiastical holy days.