Carnival
Rituals and festivals played a crucial role in traditional European life. Rituals, such as charivari ("riding the stang") allowed for the community to join together and have fun, teach lessons, and even make political statements. Festivals such as carnival, and that on midsummer night's eve allowed for the community to relax, release their burdens, join together, learn from one another, and, to the dismay of some, also served as a medium of propagating vices. Rituals were very important to the traditional European life. In some cases rituals linked people to ancient Greece and Rome - rituals were long standing. One of the earlier rituals, described by Brother Giovanni di Carlo, delineates sons going through the streets acting as their fathers, who were the leaders of the city. Brother Giovanni describes the magnificence that the sons performed and the enjoyment shared by the citizens, and, obviously, by himself. The Brother may have enjoyed these caricatures because of the animosity between the political leaders and the clergy in the fiftee
Festivals, also, had many purposes. The celebration of midsummer night was a festival of fun, honesty, and oneness. In it, servants and masters conversed and everyone is told their faults; however, no offense was taken - the celebration brought the community of Sally Island together, as Henry Bourne, an outsider, perceived it. Baltasar Rusow, a Lutheran pastor, commented on the drinking, "disorder, whoring, killing, and dreadful idolatry" that took place on a saint's feast day. Rusow may have taken the holiday more seriously than others because he obviously was a religious man, and may have exaggerated; however, vices tend to be displayed on holidays. This idea is clearly depicted in Brueghel's "Battle Between Carnival and Lent" where a man on a keg faces of against a nun. Brueghel comments on the irreverence and disregard for the meaning of Lent in this piece. John Taylor, an English wrier in the early 1600's, also discusses the "unmannerly manners" of carnival. He points out the destruction caused by these events. R. Lassels, a Frenchman, j
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Approximate Word count = 706
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
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