ANST - Period holidays

[Mark.S Harris]

Meghann MacGuire asked:
>My niece just called me and asked if I knew what the medieval celebration for
>New Years was and about costuming for such an event.  She says she guesses it
>could be for any time period.  Anyone out there with the answers, cause I sure
>as heck don't have them. 

Then Gunnora answered:
>Many of our Yule and New Year's customs are derived from Germanic practice,
>deriving from the Anglo-Saxons, the Danelaw, and from Continental Germanic
>elements introduced to England by the British Royal Family after our period.

<snip of some good Yule traditions descriptions>

Part of the problem with answering this question and the reason it gets bound
up in Yule celebrations is that in medieval times that is what was celebrated
near the time we celebrate New Years. On most calenders of the Middle Ages,
New Years was celebrated later near April 1, not January 1.

I have pasted a message from my holidays-msg file below that explains this.
For those interested in more information and referances on medieval holidays,
for SCA events for instance, see these files in the CELEBRATIONS AND EVENTS
section of my Stefan's Florilegium:

12th-nite-msg      (8K) 11/ 6/97    12th Night celebrations.
Candlemas-msg      (9K)  1/31/95    Candlemas celebrations.
holidays-msg      (33K)  8/27/98    Halloween, Samhain, other Medieval holidays.
Yule-msg           (9K)  9/19/95    Yule celebrations.

For info on the calender changes over the years and different calenders used
within period, check these files in the TIME section:

calenders-msg     (72K) 10/17/96    Medieval calenders and saint's days.
med-calend-art    (23K)  5/ 5/95    Article on figuring out feast days.

My files can be found at: http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/rialto/rialto.html

Stefan li Rous
stefan at texas.net
============
From: jeffs at bu.edu (Jeff Suzuki)
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
Subject: Re: History of April Fools' Day?
Date: 21 Feb 1996 15:43:20 GMT
Organization: Boston University

Doug Brunner (doug_brunner at hp-corvallis.om.hp.com) wrote:
> Check me, I could be wrong, but -(now there's a lead in). Memory
> says that : April Fool's Day was once New Years. When either the
> Church or the King : changed it to January 1, some people still held
> onto the old ways. These : eventually became known as April
> Poisson(sp?), or April's Fish, in French.

I'd heard the same thing; Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable
gives the following explanation: March 25 (Ladyday) used to be the
first day of the year (it's right after the vernal equinox), and April
1 was the end of the "octave" (presumably, the end of the week) of
celebration of the new year and it was a traditional time to play
tricks on each other.

(In England, the beginning of the year didn't shift until England
switched to the Gregorian calendar, in 1752.  This led to some amusing
events, like Shakespeare and Cervantes dying on the same date...eleven
days apart.  April Fools, etc., is all tied up with "Thirty Days Hath
September, all the rest I can't remember..." and someday, someday...)

William the Alchymist
============================================================================
Go to http://lists.ansteorra.org/lists.html to perform mailing list tasks.