April Fools' Day

Since it is the first of April, I did a little research on the whole "April Fools' Day" holiday. It's a rather vague celebration; feast periods that are characterized by practical jokes and such date back to the Romans and their Saturnalia (December 17-December 23), but the origin of the actual celebration of April Fools' Day is cloudy.

Saturnalia seems to have been the most popular of the Roman holidays - and no wonder, because it was basically a time of eating and drinking and making merry. And - let's face it - periods of feasting are always more popular than ones of fasting. It was ostensibly a time of honouring Saturn, the god of agriculture and of the harvest, but after the priests offered sacrifices in the Temple of Saturn, the festivities began. It was a common practice for slaves and masters to switch roles during these days, which may have been something that carried over into the Medieval Feast of Fools.

The Feast of Saturnalia was so popular that it was probably difficult to banish after the rise of Christianity, so, like many of the pagan celebrations, it seems to have been "adapted" to fit the Church. This is more than likely the origins of the Feast of Fools that was so popular in the Middle Ages (and well-known through The Hunchback of Notre Dame). Ironically enough, the Roman Catholic Church's attempt to sanction this pagan holiday backfired, as the feasts often included someone to play a mock bishop or pope and the clergy were very much mocked.

The merriment and the excess of just about everything continued in this newer holiday; the word "fool" then was used in the context of silliness and merriment - hence the naming of the feast itself. After the Church put an end to the Feast of Fools, the jollity no doubt carried over into a celebration on the first of April. It is possible that April Fools' Day originated from Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, in which Chauntecler is tricked by the fox on a date that most took to mean April 1, but it is unclear.

April Fools' Day, like the feast of Saturnalia and the Feast of Fools, had a switching of roles by the higher and lower people and also was characterized by the practical jokes and pranks that we now have today. Fortunately, however, our April Fools' is somewhat less wild than Rome's was...