#Mummers

[willtheweaver]

Details below:

Mari Lwyd- Likely a holdover from Wales’s Celtic past, Mari Lwyd is a skeletal horse who goes door to door, challenging people to a duel of verses. Should the homeowner run out of poetry, they must let Mari Lwyd in and treat the specter to the best booze.

Yule Goat- This lone wanderer of Nordic origins takes the form of a goat and travels from house to house, telling rude stories, and hard truths about the people inside. The Yule goat and their ill words can be removed from the house with an offering of food and drink. Today most people will only encounter straw goat effigies, such as the Gavlebocken( which will likely not burn this year, but it is currently being devoured by birds)

Mummers- Masked vagabonds, Mummers communicate either with mumbles, or in song and rhyme. They would ‘entertain’ homeowners with music, or by playing rigged games (gambling with loaded dice is a popular option). These shadowy characters can be placated with food and drink.

Wren hunters- seeing a pattern here? Many of these figures associated with Christmas have their roots in Europe’s pagan traditions. These figures often are associated with death and darkness-two things in abundance in winter. Offerings are made in hope that they and all bad things will go away, and that brighter times will come .The wren hunters are no exception. Coming from Ireland, this would be a group of people who go out hunting for the ‘king of birds’. Afterwards, they go door to door singing and begging for a penny, and (you guessed it), food and drink.

Lord of Misrule- Enough with all the dark thoughts; this last Christmas figure is much more cheerful. Medieval and Tudor England had the tradition of appointing one individual to be in charge of the celebrations. Everyone, from the royal court to the humblest village would have a Lord of Misrule, and being appointed was a great honor (not to mention naughtily subversive in a time where the social hierarchy was strictly enforced)

[madcat-world]

Mummers - IrenHorrors

[rherlotshadow]

Mummers' Play: Green Man Festival

Bradford on Avon, Wiltshire

[fallbabylon]

The Ragadaziow (forefathers) Guisers performing the trial of the Beast of Bodmin- a mock trial in the style of a mummers play dating back to 1549. The Bodmin Play (An Gwary Bosvenna) sees the beast captured and paraded in the streets- St Petroc’s Ossery Casket watching over the event.

The Beast of Bodmin is not just a recent cultural reference but refers to the local tradition of a dragon at Halgavor. Legend states that St. Petroc removed a splinter from the creature’s eye and thus tamed it. Historical records of Riding Day Revels refer to people being tricked into searching for and fighting the dragon. - Bodmin, Kernow

[stairnaheireann]

Wren Day, also known as Wren's Day or the Day of the Wren (Lá an Dreoilín), celebrated on St Stephen's Day.

The tradition is very much on the wane now but in some few localities Wrenboys still go out in Ireland on St. Stephens Day. The central theme of the wrenboy visit is the wren, an effigy of which is carried about in a holly branch or in a box or cage. Previously it was hunted and killed prior to St. Stephen’s Day and a matter of honour for groups to have a real bird. Why, of all birds, is the…

[statecryptids]

Mummering is a popular Christmas tradition in Newfoundland and Labrador in Canada. People dress up in masks, rags, and mismatched clothes- including bras and underwear on the outside- and go door to door asking “Any mummers ‘lowed in?”

Once invited in, the mummers will sing, dance, play jokes, and improvise music, usually on a fiddle, accordion and an “ugly stick”- a decorated broom handle with a boot on one end that the player stomps on the ground.

The hosts who let the mummers in usually provide them with a little refreshment- cake and some alcohol. Then they must guess who each mummer is before the group moves on to the next house.

[aestheticofaccumulation]

Accumulation as unintentional quotation; art history as a practice of accumulation for narrative invention and canon-building. Phyllida Barlow (at Hauser & Wirth Somerset) as Marie Watt as Mummers.

Photos by author at Hauser & Wirth except:

Marshfield Mummers about to perform, Nigel Goldsmith, 2015.

[blatantescapism]

Just got back from opening night of midwinter Revels (Boston area)

This year’s show is excellent, a real classic

this is the context with which I say:

Laurel Swift is so talented, she makes an ass-length liripipe look genuinely menacing

[gameraboy2]

Best of the Mummers

[hepdenerose]

Sowerby Rush

Often away in the past during Sowerby Rush bearing, it was high time we witnessed the spectacle. We rode the bus to Tuel Lane Top and walked briskly down to Christ Church. After spending a few moments appreciating gargoyles depicted in the yellow York stone frontage, we entered to peruse the interior. A craft fair underway, the nave buzzed with community spirit. We bought flapjacks and candles…

[linkliminal]

Also known as mumming or janneying, it typically involves a group of friends or family who dress in disguise and visit homes within their community or neighbouring communities during the twelve days of Christmas. If the mummers are welcomed into a house, they often do a variety of informal performances that may include dance, music, jokes, or recitations. The hosts must guess the mummers' identities before offering them food or drink,

This Mummer should not have been invited into their home.

Merry Christmas.

[tinyshe]

[fallbabylon]

The Holly Man, Dancing Bear, Old Oss and the Devil perform at the Twelfth night wassailing- London, UK 

http://www.thelionspart.co.uk/twelfthnight/

[stairnaheireann]

Wren Day, also known as Wren's Day or the Day of the Wren (Lá an Dreoilín), celebrated on St Stephen's Day.

Wren Day, also known as Wren’s Day or the Day of the Wren (Lá an Dreoilín), celebrated on St Stephen’s Day.

The tradition is very much on the wane now but in some few localities Wrenboys still go out in Ireland on St. Stephens Day. The central theme of the wrenboy visit is the wren, an effigy of which is carried about in a holly branch or in a box or cage. Previously it was hunted and killed prior to St. Stephen’s Day and a matter of honour for groups to have a real bird. Why, of all birds, is the…

[griphinisgold]

Mummers Parade 2023/// Philadelphia, PA