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This course paper tells about traditions and customs in Great Britain, the origins and the way of celebration these holidays and different festivals.
Every country and every nation has its own holidays, customs and traditions. British people are very proud of their traditions, cherish them and carefully keep them up, because many of them are associated with the history and cultural development of the country.
Britain is a country governed by routine. It has fewer public holidays than any other country in Europe. The British also seem to do comparatively badly with regard to annual holidays. These are not as long as they are in many other countries. In fact, about 40% of the population do not go away anywhere for their holidays. The task and the purpose of my course work is to describe the main British holidays, making a note of their national, religious or state aspect. Thus in this research work traditional and religious holidays of Britain are studied. The main information on the subject is collected. The gathered material is divided into three parts:
a) British ceremonies;
b) Traditional holidays;
c) Religious holidays.
Each of these parts is described in detail. English traditional and religious holidays are classified according to their types and features.
The main national holidays are:
New Year is not as widely or as enthusiastically observed as Christmas. However the type of celebrations varying very much according to the local custom, family tradition and personal taste;
St. Valentine's Day is a day when boys and girls, sweethearts and lovers, will exchange greetings of affection, undying love or satirical comment;
All Fool's Day is a day when any person may be made an April Fool;
Halloween is a very special holiday — a combination of holidays. It is time for games, fun and fortune telling, for ghost stories and making mischief;
Guy Fawkes Night, November 5, it commemorates the discovery or the so- called Gunpowder Plot and is widely celebrated throughout the country;
British people are proud of ceremonies of the national capital- London. They include daily ceremonies and annuals, Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace, Ceremony of the Keys in the Tower, Remembrance Day, Mounting the Guard at the Horse Guards square are the most popular daily ceremonies.
Religious holidays are:
Pancake Day is the popular name for Shrove Tuesday, the day preceding the first day of Lent;
Mothering Day is a day of small family reunions, when absent sons and daughters return to their homes, and gifts are made to mothers by their children of all ages;
Easter is also a time when certain old traditions are observed, whether it is celebrated as the start of spring or a religious festival.
Christmas is a religious holiday and many church services are held to celebrate the birth of Jesus. In December, as Christmas gets closer, carols are sung in churches and schools, often at special concerts, and also, though less often than in the past, by groups of people who go from house to house collecting money for charitable causes.
Also there are different traditions and holidays in different regions. In Scotland and northern England, the custom of First-Footing in the early hours of January 1st is still kept up with great vigour. He brings symbolic gifts of food or fuel or money as tokens of prosperity in the year that has just begun.
Some British traditions are known all over the world. Britain is full of customs. There are a lot of English songs, sayings and superstitions. There is a long menu of traditional British food as well. They are a part of the British way of life. A lot of them have very long histories. Some are funny and some are strange. But they are all interesting.
Introduction…………………………………………………………………………. 4
1 BRITISH CEREMONIES………………………………………………………... 6
1.1 Poppy Day…………………………………………………………………….....6
1.2 The Lord Mayor’s Show………………………………………………………...7
1.3 Changing the Guard…………………………………………………………......8
1.4 The Ceremony of the Key……………………………………………………….9
1.5 Trooping the Colour…………………………………………………………….11
1.6 Engagement and the Ceremony of Wedding……………………………………12
2 TRADITIONAL HOLIDAYS…………….………………………………………15
2.1 New Year………………………………………………………………………...15
2.2 St. Valentine’s Day ……………………………………………………………..16
2.3 April Fool’s Day………………………………………………………………...19
2.4 May 1 – Day of Solidary………………………………………………………..20
2.5 Merry England and London May Queen Festival …………………………..…22
2.6 August Bank Holiday……………………………………………………………23
2.7 Halloween………………………………………………………………………..24
2.8 Guy Fawkes Night……………………………………………………………….26
3 RELIGIOUS HOLIDAYS………………………………………………………...29
3.1 Christmas………………………………………………………………………..29
3.2 Mother’s Day……………………………………………………………………30
3.3 Easter…………………………………………………………………………….32
3.4 Pancake Day……………………………………………………………………..35
Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………..37
Bibliography………………………………………………………………………...38
3.4 Pancake Day
Pancakes are associated with the day preceding Lent because they were a way to use up rich foodstuffs such as eggs, milk, and sugar, before the fasting season of the 40 days of Lent. The liturgical fasting emphasized eating plainer food and refraining from food that would give pleasure: In many cultures, this means no meat, dairy, or eggs.
In Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, Ireland and New Zealand among Anglicans, Lutherans, some other Protestant denominations, including ethnic British communities, as well as Catholics, this day is also known as Pancake Day, as it is customary to eat pancakes as a dessert.
In England, as part of community celebration, many towns held traditional Shrove Tuesday "mob football" games, dating as far back as the 12th century. The practice mostly died out in the 19th century, after the passing of the Highway Act 1835, which banned playing football on public highways. A number of towns have maintained the tradition, including Alnwick in Northumberland, Ashbourne in Derbyshire (called the Royal Shrovetide Football Match), Atherstone (called the Ball Game) in Warwickshire, Sedgefield (called the Ball Game) in County Durham, and St Columb Major (called Hurling the Silver Ball) in Cornwall.
Shrove Tuesday was once known as a "half-holiday" in England. It started at 11:00am with the ringing of a church bell. On Pancake Day, pancake races are held in villages and towns across the United Kingdom. The tradition is said to have originated when a housewife from Olney was so busy making pancakes that she forgot the time until she heard the church bells ringing for the service. She raced out of the house to church while still carrying her frying pan and pancake. The pancake race remains a relatively common festive tradition in the UK, and England in particular, even today. Participants with frying pans race through the streets tossing pancakes into the air, catching them in the pan whilst running. The winner is the first to cross the line having tossed the pancake a certain number of times. Traditionally, when men want to participate, they must dress up as a housewife (usually an apron and a bandanna). In Olney today, a pancake race still takes place every year on Shrove Tuesday.
In 2012, children from various schools in Leeds, UK were all invited to the City Centre to participate in one of the first big activities for Leeds. Some of the activities held included 'How many pancakes can you eat in a minute' and 'who can make the largest pancake'. Some of the children were also invited to the Millennium Square, the heart of Leeds, Where they had a large ice skating rink available. Children were able to go ice-skating whilst eating pancakes and seeing who could stay up the longest.
Scarborough celebrates by closing the foreshore to all traffic, closing schools early, and inviting all to skip. Traditionally, long ropes were used from the nearby harbour. The town crier rings the pancake bell, situated on the corner of Westborough (Main Street) and Huntress Row.
The children of the hamlet of Whitechapel, Lancashire keep alive a local tradition by visiting local households and asking "please a pancake", to be rewarded with oranges or sweets. It is thought the tradition arose when farm workers visited the wealthier farm and manor owners to ask for pancakes or pancake fillings.
The world's biggest pancake was cooked in Rochdale in 1994, it was an amazing 15 metres in diameter, weighed three tonnes and had an estimated two million calories.
In conclusion I'd like to say Great Britain is famous for its old
traditions. Some of them existed in ancient times and survived through
centuries. Some of them appeared when Christianity came to British Isles.
Speaking about religious holidays one can't but mention Easter, Pancake
Day and some other holidays. The dates of these holidays aren't strict;
they depend on the date of Easter that varies every year. Pancake Day
is the popular name for the Shrove Tuesday, the day before the first
day of Lent. The most common form of celebrating this day in the old
times was the all town ball game or tug-of-war, in which everyone was
tearing here and there, trying to get the ball or rope into their part
of the city. Today the only custom that is observed throughout Britain
is pancake eating. For the English people the best-known name for the
fourth in Lent Sunday is Mother's Day. For 3 centuries this day has
been a day of small family gatherings when absent sons and daughters
return to their homes. Easter is one of the most important holidays
in Christianity. In England it's a time for giving and receiving presents,
mostly Easter eggs. Nowadays there are a lot of chocolate Easter eggs,
having some small gifts inside. But a real hard-boiled egg, decorated
and painted in bright colours, still appears on breakfast tables on
Ester Day. For most British families, Christmas Day is the most important
holiday of the year. It is a combination of the Christian celebration
of the birth of Christ, and the traditional winter holidays. This is
the day when many people are going home to be with their families on
Christmas Day. Everyone in Great Britain is waiting and enjoying this
holiday very much!
Conclusion
This course paper has showed the importance of traditions and customs, the origins of the holidays in Britain and the way of celebration different holidays and festivals. There are many religious and public holidays such as: Christmas Day, Boxing Day, New Year's Day, Easter Monday, August Bank Holiday.
Christmas is a religious holiday and many church services are held to celebrate the birth of Jesus. Many people go to Church on Christmas Day than at any other time. On Christmas Day one is wakened in the morning by one's children excitedly opening their stockings that have been hung over the end of the bed with great ceremony and expectation on Christmas Eve. Boxing Day is the day when one visits friends, goes for a drive or for a long walk or just sits around recovering from too much food. Easter is a time when certain old traditions are observed, whether it is celebrated as a start of spring or a religious festival. May Day is popular with May spring Festival and Maypole. Post offices, factories and shops are closed. These are the days on which people need not go in to work.
All these holidays have their traditional food. The Easter egg is by far the most popular emblem of Easter. Eating hot cross buns at breakfast on Good Friday is a custom which still flourishes in most English households. The Christmas bird, nowadays usually a turkey, is being prepared and stuffed, the pudding is inspected and the cake is got out of its tin and iced. On Pancake Tuesday, the day before Ash Wednesday, people eat lots of pancakes. These are made from flour, milk, eggs, and fried in hot pan.
Besides these holidays different regions in Britain have their own holidays and customs. The first visitor to enter a house on New Year's morning is commonly known in Great Britain as the First Foot. In Scotland and northern England, the custom of First-footing in the early hours of January 1st is still kept up with great vigour. New Year's Eve is a more important festival in Scotland than it is in England, and it even has a special name - "Hogmanay". Egg-Rolling is a traditional Easter pastime which still flourishes in northern England, Scotland, Ulster and the Isle of Man.
British people are very proud of their traditions, cherish them and carefully keep them up, because many of them are associated with the history and cultural development of the country.
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