愚人节的由来英文

文章摘要：As it was called years ago, All Fools' Day is observed in many countries around the world。The origin of April Fool's Day remains clouded in obscurity。But what is clear is that the tradition of a day devoted to foolery had ancient roots。As we look back in time, many ancient predecessors of April Fool's Day are found。

As it was called years ago, All Fools' Day is observed in many countries around the world. The origin of April Fool's Day remains clouded in obscurity. But what is clear is that the tradition of a day devoted to foolery had ancient roots. As we look back in time, many ancient predecessors of April Fool's Day are found.

A French legendary

The closest point in time that can be identified as the beginning of this tradition was in 1582, in France. New Year's was celebrated on March 25 and celebrations lasted until April 1st. When New Year's Day as changed from March 25 to January 1st in the mid-1560's by King Charles IX, there were some people who still celebrated it on April 1st and those people were called April Fools.

Mythological roots

There have been quite a few attempts to provide mythological explanations for the rise of April Fool's Day.

One story dates back to Roman mythology, particularly the myth of Ceres (the Goddess of grain and the harvest) and proserpina. In Roman mythology pluto, the God of the Dead, abducted proserpina and brought her to live with him in the underworld. proserpina called out to her mother Ceres for help, but Ceres, who could only hear the echo of her daughter's voice, searched in vain for proserpina. The fruitless search of Ceres for her daughter was commemmorated during the Roman festival of Cerealia and believed by some to have been the mythological antecedent of the fool's errands popular on April 1st.

British folklore linked April Fool's Day to the town of Gotham. According to the legend, it was traditional in the 13th century for any road that the King travelled over to become public property. people in Gotham didn't want to lose their main road and spread a false story to stop the King. A messenger was sent to Gotham after King John learned the people's trick. But when the messenger arrived in Gotham he found the town was full of lunatics who were engaged in foolish activities such as drowning fish or attempting to cage birds in roofless fences. The King fell for the hoax and declared the town too foolish to warrant punishment. And ever since then, April Fool's Day has supposedly commemmorated their trickery.

Anthropological explanations

Spring is the time of year when the weather becomes fickle, as if Nature is playing tricks on man, and festivals occurring during the Spring traditionally mirrored this sense of whimsy and surprise. They often involved temporary inversions of the social order. Normal behavior no longer governed during the brief moment of transition as the old world died and the new cycle of seasons was born. practical jokes,trickery, and the turning upside down of status expectations were all allowed.

In addition,the linkage between April Foolery and the Springtime is seen in another story that traces the origin of the custom back to the abundance of fish to be found in French streams during early April when the young fish had just hatched. These young fish were easy to fool with a hook and lure. Therefore, the French called them 'poisson d'Avril' or 'April Fish.' Soon it became customary to fool people on April 1, as a way of celebrating the abundance of foolish fish.

Each country celebrates April Fool's differently. In France, the April Fool's is called "April Fish" (poisson d'Avril). The French fool their friends by taping a paper fish to their friends' backs and when some discovers this trick, they yell "poisson d'Avril!".