History+of+May+Day

__**

MAY DAY **__

May Day is a celebration of Spring, and everything that comes with that such as fertility and birth, it is a day of political protests, it is a neopagen festival, and a day for organized labor.

**__ORIGINS:__** >>>
 * with a connection to an ancient pagan ritual **May Day** dates back to the days before the birth of Christ
 * __Druids__
 * to them May 1 was the second most important [[image:http://www.homeschoolviews.com/images/images-may05/sungod.jpg width="202" height="183" align="right" caption="Bel the Celtic God of the sun and fire"]] holiday of the year for it divided there year in half and it was the day that the festival of Beltane was held
 * Beltane was named after the Bel, the Celtic god of the sun
 * their **May Day** custom would be the lighting of the new fire and it was one of those ancient new year rites performed throughout the world
 * cattle would be driven through the fire to purify them
 * men and their lovers would pass through the smoke for seeing good luck
 * __Romans__
 * early may was a extremely popular feast time for the Romans [[image:http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d4/L._Abbema_Flora.jpg/636px-L._Abbema_Flora.jpg width="207" height="215" align="right" caption="Flora the Roman goddess of flowers."]]
 * it was committed principally to the worship of **Flora**, the Roman goddess of flowers
 * this was a five day celebration that came to be known as Floralia
 * it usually lasted from April 28 to May 2
 * when the Romans invaded the British Isles the customs and rituals of this Floralia gradually were combined with those of the Beltane
 * the combining of these two festivals to make a new one is similar to the way that the two German Leauges of Futball joined together to form the Bundesliga
 * __Development/ Puritans__
 * Though **May Day** observance was discouraged during the Puritans it was revived when they lost power in England though it lost much of its robust force
 * As time went on it became regarded more as a day of joy and merriment for children, rather than a day of observing ancient fertility rights that it had used to be
 * Just as the Puritans saw the Maypole as a vulgar image and the behavior of people on May Day as horrific, Savonarola saw Florence in the same light during the high Renaissance

Child Labor during the Industrial Revolution


 * Cartoons for the Cause**   For several years during the reign of the Puritains, Crane produced many cartoons in //The Clarion// which were socialist propaganda for the festival of  **  May Day.  **

**__Traditions:__**
 * __Maypole__
 * during the middle ages every English village had its own maypole
 * when the maypole was brought from the woods it was a great occasion accompanied with wild and abandoned merrymaking and celebration
 * possessing the largest maypole became a symbol a dominant town and towns began to compete with each other for the right to say they had erected the largest tree as their maypole
 * in smaller towns maypoles were erected for the day only but in London and larger towns they were erected permanently
 * In 1644 the maypole tradition and everything that came with that suffered a major setback when the **Puritans** and the **Long Parliament** stopped it for a couple of decades
 * the Puritans saw the maypole as a vulgar image and sought to purify such fe[[image:http://www.billboardproject.org/images/May_day.jpg align="right"]]stivals from their sexual connotations
 * despite their efforts many of **May Day's** traditions have still survived
 * __Other Associations__
 * wild and abandoned merrymaking
 * glorification of fertility
 * celebration of the bringing of spring
 * a parallel of Labor Day in many countries
 * international working class holiday
 * a chance to start anew
 * celebrations and dancing much like any festival
 * **May Day** and Guy Fawkes Day are two influential festivals held in England
 * __Modern Day:__**
 * as **May Day** spread to the United States it became to be interpreted as what is now commonly referred to as Labor Day. This became accepted in many countries
 * the U.S. changed Europe's outlook on this certain holiday, but it also changed the face of Europe with the development of Basketball
 * this tradition spread throughout the modern world and is now present in many countries today
 * labor day is a national legal holiday that is over 100 years old
 * over the years, it has evolved from a purely labor union celebration which was **May Day** to a general "last fling of summer" festival

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 * __Sources:__**
 * http://www.infoplease.com/spot/mayday.html
 * http://www.theholidayspot.com/mayday/history.htm
 * wikipedia- images
 * google- images
 * http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/5202/mayday.htm
 * http://beinecke.library.yale.edu/illustratedword/craneCause/08-09crane.html
 * http://www.homeschoolviews.com/articles/clever/clever-may-day-history.html