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April Fools’ Day or All Fools’ Day, named from the custom of playing practical jokes or sending friends on fools’ errands, on April 1st. Its timing seems related to the vernal equinox, when nature fools mankind with sudden changes from showers to sunshine. It is a season when all people, even the most dignified, are given an excuse to play the fool. In April comes the cuckoo, emblem of simpletons; hence in Scotland the victim is called “cuckoo” or “gowk”, as in the verse: On the first day of April, Hunt the gowk another mile. Hunting the gowk was a fruitless errand; so was hunting for hen’s teeth, for a square circle or for stirrup oil, the last-named proving to be several strokes from a leather strap.
April Fools’ Day or All Fools’ Day, named from the custom of playing practical jokes or sending friends on fools’ errands, on April 1st. Its timing seems related to the vernal equinox, when nature fools mankind with sudden changes from showers to sunshine. It is a season when all people, even the most dignified, are given an excuse to play the fool. In April comes the cuckoo, emblem of simpletons; hence in Scotland the victim is called “cuckoo” or “gowk”, as in the verse: On the first day of April, Hunt the gowk another mile. Hunting the gowk was a fruitless errand; so was hunting for hen’s teeth, for a square circle or for stirrup oil, the last-named proving to be several strokes from a leather strap.
As May 1st is not a public holiday in Great Britain, May Day celebrations are traditionally held on the Sunday following it, unless, of course, the 1st of May falls on a Sunday. On May Sunday workers march through the streets and hold meetings to voice their own demands and the demands of other progressive forces of the country. The issues involved may include demands for higher wages and better working conditions, protests against rising unemployment, demands for a change in the Government’s policy, etc.
The 1st of May has also to some extent retained its old significance — that of а pagan spring festival. In ancient times it used to be celebrated with garlands and flowers, dancing and games on the village green. А Maypole was erected — a tall pole wreathed with flowers, to which in later times ribbons were attached and held by the dancers. The girls put on their best summer frocks, plaited flowers in their hair and round their waists and eagerly awaited the crowning of the May Queen. The most beautiful girl was crowned with а garland of flowers. After this great event Веге was dancing, often Morris dancing, with the dancers dressed in fancy costume, usually representing characters in the Robin Hood legend. May-Day games and sports were followed by refreshments in the open.
This festival was disliked by the Puritans and suppressed during the Commonwealth, 1649 — 60. After the Restoration it was revived but has gradually almost died out. However, the Queen of May is still chosen in most counties, and in mаnу villages school Maypoles are erected around which the children dance. The famous ceremony of the meeting of the 1st of May still survives at Oxford, in Magdalen College. At 6 o’clock in the morning the college choir gathers in the upper gallery of the college tower to greet the coming of the new day with song.
Trooping the colour
During the month of June, а day is set aside as the Queen’ s official birthday. This is usually the second Saturday in June. On this day there takes place on Horse Guards’ Parade in Whitehall the magnificent spectacle of Trooping the Colour, which begins at about 11.15 а. m. (unless rain intervenes, when the ceremony is usually postponed until conditions are suitable).
This is pageantry of rаrе splendour, with the Queen riding side-saddle on а highly trained horse.
The colours of one of the five regiments of Foot Guards are trooped before the Sovereign. As she rides on to Horse Guards’ parade the massed array of the Brigade of Guards, dressed in ceremonial uniforms, await her inspection.
For twenty minutes the whole parade stands rigidly to attention while being inspected by the Queen. Then comes the Trooping ceremony itself, to be followed by the famous March Past of the Guards to the music of massed bands, at which the Queen takes the Salute. The precision drill of the regiments is notable.
The ceremony ends with the Queen returning to Buckingham Palace at the head of her Guards.
The Escort to the Colour, chosen normally in strict rotation, then mounts guard at the Palace.
Midsummer's Day, June 24th, is the longest day of the year. On that day you can see a very old custom at Stonehenge, in Wiltshire, England. Stonehenge is one of Europe's biggest stone circles. A lot of the stones are ten or twelve metres high. It's also very old. The earliest part of Stonehenge is nearly 5,000 years old.
But what was Stonehenge? A holy place? A market? Or was it a kind of calendar? We think the Druids used it for a calendar. The Druids were the priests in Britain 2,000 years ago. They used the sun and the stones at Stonehenge to know the start of months and seasons. There are Druids in Britain today, too. And every June 24th a lot of them go to Stonehenge. On that morning the sun shines on one famous stone - the Heel stone. For the Druids this is a very important moment in the year. But for a lot of British people it's just a strange old custom.
On Bank Holiday the townsfolk usually flock into the country and to the coast. If the weather is fine many families take а picnic-lunch or tea with them and enjoy their meal in the open. Seaside towns near London, such as Southend, are invaded by thousands of trippers who come in cars and coaches, trains, motor cycles and bicycles. Great amusement parks like Southend Kursaal do а roaring trade with their scenic railways, shooting galleries, water-shoots, Crazy Houses, Hunted Houses and so on. Trippers will wear comic paper hats with slogans such as “Kiss Ме Quick”, and they will eat and drink the weirdest mixture of stuff you can imagine, sea food like cockles, mussels, whelks, shrimps and fried fish and chips, candy floss, beer, tea, soft, drinks, everything you can imagine.
Bank Holiday is also an occasion for big sports meetings at places like the White City Stadium, mainly all kinds of athletics. There are also horse rасe meetings all over the country, and most traditional of all, there are large fairs with swings, roundabouts, coconut shies, а Punch and Judy show, hoop-la stalls and every kind of side-show including, in recent years, bingo. These fairs are pitched on open spaces of common land, and the most famous of them is the huge one on Hampstead Heath near London. It is at Hampstead Heath you will see the Pearly Kings, those Cockney costers (street traders), who wear suits or frocks with thousands of tiny pearl buttons stitched all over them, also over their caps and hats, in case of their Queens. They hold horse and cart parades in which prizes are given for the smartest turn out. Horses and carts are gaily decorated. Many Londoners will visit Whipsnade Zoo. There is also much boating activity on the Thames, regattas at Henley and on other rivers, and the English climate being what it is, it invariably rains.
Happy Hampstead
August Bank Holiday would not be а real holiday for tens of thousands of Londoners without the Fair on Hampstead Heath!
Those who know London will know were to find the Heath – that vast stretch of open woodland which sprawls across two hills, bounded by Golders Green and Highgate to the west and east, and by Hampstead itself and Ken Wood to the south and north.
The site of the fair ground is near to Hampstead Heath station. From that station to the ground runs а broad road which is blocked with а solid, almost
immovable mass of humanity on those days when the fair is open. The walk is not more than а quarter of а mile, but it takes an average of half-an hour to cover it when the crowd is at its thickest.
But being on that road is comfortable compared with what it is like inside the fair ground itself. Неге there are, hundreds of stalls arranged in broad avenues inside a huge square bounded by the caravans of the show people and the lorries containing the generating plants which provide the stalls with their electricity.
The noise is deafening. Mechanical bands and the cries of the “barkers” (the showmen who stand outside the booths and by the stalls shouting to the crowds to come and try their luck are equalled by the laughter of the visitors and the din of machinery.
The visitors themselves are looking for fun, and they find it in full measure. There are fortune-tellers and rifle-ranges and “bumping cars”, there are bowling alleys and dart boards and coconut shies. There is something for everybody.
And for the lucky ones, or for those with more skill than most, there are prizes — table lamps and clocks and а hundred and one other things of value.
А visit to the fair at Happy Hampstead is something not easily forgotten. It is noisy, it is exhausting — but it is as exhilarating an experience as any in the world.
Henry Wood Promenade Concerts
Amongst music-lovers in Britain — and, indeed, in very many other countries — the period between July and September 21 is а time of excitement, of anticipation, of great enthusiasm.
We are in the middle of the Henry Wood Promenade Concerts — the Proms.
London music-lovers are particularly fortunate, for those who are able to obtain tickets can attend the concerts in person. Every night at 7 о'clock (Sunday excepted) а vast audience assembled at the Royal Albert Hall rises for the playing and singing of the National Anthem. А few minutes later, when seats have been resumed, the first work of the evening begins.
But even if seats are not to be obtained, the important parts of the concerts can be heard — and are heard — by а very great number of people, because the ВВС broadcasts certain principal works every night throughout the season. The audience reached by this means is estimated to total several millions in Britain alone, and that total is probably equalled by the number of listeners abroad.
The reason why such а great audience is attracted is that the Proms present every year а large repertoire of classical works under the best conductors and with the best artists. А season provides an anthology of masterpieces.
The Proms started in 1895 when Sir Henry Wood formed the Queen’s Hall Orchestra. The purpose of the venture was to provide classical music to as many people who cared to come at а price all could afford to pay, those of lesser means being charged comparatively little — one shilling — to enter the Promenade, where standing was the rule.
The coming of the last war ended two Proms’ traditions. The first was that in 1939 it was nо longer possible to perform to London audiences — the whole organization was evacuated to Bristol. The second was that the Proms couldn’t return to the Queen’s Hall after the war was over — the Queen’s Hall had become а casualty of the air-raids (in 1941), and was gutted.
Halloween means "holy evening" and takes place on October 31st. Although it is а much more important festival in the USA than in Britain, it is celebrated by many people in the United Kingdom. It is particularly connected with witches and ghosts.
At parties people dress up in strange costumes and pretend they are witches. They cut horrible faces in potatoes and other vegetables and put а candle inside, which shines through their eyes. People play different games such as trying to eat an apple from а bucket of water without using their hands.
In recent years children dressed in white sheets knock on doors at Halloween and ask if you would like а “trick” or “treat”. If you give them something nice, а “treat”, they go away. However, if you don’t, they play а “trick” on you, such as making а lot of noise or spilling flour on your front doorstep.
Guy Fawkes Night is one of the most popular festivals in Great Britain. It commemorates the discovery of the so-called Gunpowder Plot, and is widely celebrated throughout the country. Below, the reader will find the necessary information concerning the Plot, which, as he will see, may never have existed, and the description of the traditional celebrations.
Gunpowder Plot. Conspiracy to destroy the English Houses of Parliament and King James I when the latter opened Parliament on Nov. 5, 1605. Engineered by а group of Roman Catholics as а protest against anti-Papist measures. In May 1604 the conspirators rented а house adjoining the House of Lords, from which they dug а tunnel to а vault below that house, where they stored 36 barrels of gunpowder. It was planned that when king and parliament were destroyed the Roman Catholics should attempt to seize power. Preparations for the plot had been completed when, on October 26, one of the conspirators wrote to а kinsman, Lord Monteagle, warning him to stay away from the House of Lords. On November 4 а search was made of the parliament vaults, and the gunpowder was found, together with Guy Fawkes (1570 — 1606), an English Roman Catholic in the pay of Spain (which was making political capital out of Roman Catholics discontent in England). Fawkes had been commissioned to set off the explosion. Arrested and tortured he revealed the names of the conspirators, some of whom were killed resisting arrest. Fawkes was hanged. Detection of the plot led to increased repression of English Roman Catholics. The Plot is still commemorated by an official ceremonial search of the vaults before the annual opening of Parliament, also by the burning of Fawkes's effigy and the explosion of fireworks every Nov. 5.
Thanksgiving Day
Every year, Americans celebrate Thanksgiving. Families and friends get together for a big feast. It is a legal holiday in the US. Many people go to church in the morning and at home they have a big dinner with turkey. People gather to give the God thanks for all the good things in their lives.
Thanksgiving is the harvest festival. The celebration was held in 1621 after the first harvest in New England. In the end of 1620 the passengers from the Mayflower landed in America and started settling there. Only half of the people survived the terrible winter. In spring the Indians gave the settlers some seeds of Indian corn and the first harvest was very good. Later, Thanksgiving Days following harvest were celebrated in all the colonies of New England, but not on the same day. In October 1863 President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national Thanksgiving. In 191, the US Congress Named fourth Thursday of November a Thanksgiving Day. Thanksgiving Day is a “day of General Thanksgiving to Almighty God for the bountiful harvest with which Canada has been blessed”. Regular annual observance began in 1879. Since 1957 Thanksgiving Day has been observed on the second Monday in October.
St. Andrew’s Day
In some areas, such as Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire, and Northamptonshire, St Andrew was regarded as the patron saint of lace-makers and his day was thus kept as a holiday, or “tendering feast”, by many in that trade. Thomas Sternberg, describing customs in mid-19th-century Northampton shire, claims that St Andrew’s Day Old Style (11 December) was a major festival day “in many out of the way villages” of the country: “… the day is one of unbridled license- a kind of carnival; village scholars bar out the master, the lace schools are deserted, and drinking and feasting prevail to a riotous extent. Towards evening the villagers walk about and masquerade, the women wearing men’s dress and the men wearing female attire, visiting one another’s cottages and drinking hot Elderberry wine, the chief beverage of the season …”. In Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire, a future of the day was the making and eating of Tandry Wigs. A strange belief reported Wright and Lones dedicate that wherever lilies of the valley grow wild the parish church is usually to St Andrew.
Christmas Day is observed on the 25th of December. In Britain this day was а festival long before the conversion to Christianity. The English historian the Venerable Bede relates that “the ancient peoples of Angli began the year on the 25th of December, and the very night was called in their tongue modranecht, that is ‘mother’s night’. Thus it is not surprising that many social customs connected with the celebration of Christmas go back to pagan times, as, for instance, the giving of presents. Indeed, in 1644 the English puritans forbade the keeping of Christmas by Act of Parliament, on the grounds that it was а heathen festival. At the Restoration Charles II revived the feast.
Though religion in Britain has been steadily losing ground and Christmas has practically no religious significance for the majority of the population of modern Britain, it is still the most widely celebrated festival in all its parts except Scotland. The reason for this is clear. With its numerous, often rather quaint social customs, it is undoubtedly the most colourful holiday of the year, and, moreover one that has always been, even in the days when most people were practising Christian, а time for eating, drinking and making merry.
However, despite the popularity of Christmas, quite а number of English people dislike this festival, and even those who seem to celebrate it wholeheartedly, have certain reservations about it. The main reason for this is that Christmas has become the most commercialized festival of the year. The customs and traditions connected with Christmas, for example giving presents and having а real spree once а year, made it an easy prey to the retailers, who, using modern methods of advertising, force the customer to buy what he neither wants nor, often, can reasonably afford.
It is not only children and members of the family that exchange presents nowadays. Advertising has widened this circle to include not only friends and distant relations, but also people you work with. An average English family sends dozens and dozens of Christmas cards, and gives and receive almost as many often practically useless presents. For people who are well off this entails no hardship, but it is no small burden for families with small budgets. Thus saving up for Christmas often starts months before the festival, and Christmas clubs have become а national institution among the working class and lower-middle class. These are generally run by shopkeepers and publicans over а period of about eight weeks or longer. Into these the housewives pay each week а certain amount of money for their Christmas bird and joint, their Christmas groceries and so on, the husband as а rule paying into the club run by the local pub, for the drinks.
As much of this spending is forced upon people and often means that а family has to do without things they really need, it inevitably leads to resentment towards the
festival. Needless to say that it isn’t the old customs and traditions that are to blame, but those who make huge profits out of the nationwide spending spree which they themselves had boosted beyond any reasonable proportion.
Boxing Day
This is the day when one visits friends, goes for а long walk or just sits around recovering from too much food — everything to eat is cold. In the country there are usually Boxing Day Meets (fox- hunting). In the big cities and towns tradition on that day demands а visit to the pantomime, where once again one is entertained by the story of Cinderella, Puss in Boots or whoever it may be — the story being protracted and elaborated into as many spectacular scenes as the producer thinks one can take at а sitting.
Апрельский День Дурака
"Апрельский День Дурака" или День Всех Дураков, названный так из-за обычая разыгрывать шутки или давать друзьям дурацкие задания первого апреля. Название сложилось давно и имело отношение к весеннему равноденствию, когда природа одурачивает человечество и внезапно заменяет ливни на солнечный свет. Это - день, когда всем людям, даже самым величественным, можно валять дурака. В апреле прилетает кукушка, эмблема простаков; следовательно, в Шотландии жертва названа "кукушка" или "олух", как в стихах.
Майский День в Великобритании
Так как первое мая - не общественный праздник в Великобритании, этот праздник по традиции отмечается в воскресенье, следующее за первым мая, если, конечно, первое число не выпадает на воскресенье. В воскресные рабочие маршируют по улицам и проводят собрания, чтобы высказывать свои собственные требования и требования других движущих сил страны. Обсуждения могут включать вопросы о более высокой заработной плате и лучшем рабочем режиме, протесты против растущей безработицы, спроса на изменение в правительственном полисе, и т.п..
Весенний Майский Фестиваль
1 число также сохранило
свое старое значение - языческий
весенний фестиваль. В течение
многих времен этот день
Этот фестиваль не понравился пуританами и был подавлен Содружеством в 1649 - 60. После Восстановление он был восстановлен, но постепенно почти забылся. Тем не менее, Королеву Мая все еще быть выбирают в большинстве округов, и во многих деревенских школах воздвигаются Майские Полюса, вокруг которых танцуют дети. Знаменитая церемония празднования 1 Мая все еще сохраняется в Оксфорде, в Колледже Magdalen. В 6 часов утра университетский хор собирается в верхней галерее университетской башни, чтобы поприветствовать приход нового дня с песней.