St Ed's
The Website of
St Edmund's Parish Church
Roundhay, Leeds, England

---

Articles - Miscellaneous

May

If the arrival of May makes you feel a bit giddy and irrepressible, you are not alone. May was the month when the ancient pagans used to get up to all sorts! The Romans held their festival to honour the mother-goddess Maia, goddess of nature and growth. (May is named after her).

For centuries in "Olde England" the people went mad in May. After the hardship of winter, and hunger of early Spring, May was a time of indulgence and unbridled merriment. One Philip Stubbes, writing in 1583, was scandalised: "for what kissing and bussing, what smooching and slabbering one of another, is not practised?"

The Protestant reformers took a strong stand against May Day - and in 1644 Christmas and May Day were abolished together. Many May poles came down - only to go up again at the Restoration, when the first May Day of King Charles's reign was the "happiest Mayday that hath been many a year in England" according to Pepys. A truly enormous May pole went up that year in London 134 feet high, right where the church of St Mary lies near Westminster. It was the highest Maypole in history, but it disappeared in the interests of science: in 1717 Isaac Newton took it away to support the most modern and powerful telescope in the world.

May Day to most people today brings vague folk memories of a young Queen of the May decorated with garlands and streamers and flowers, a May Pole to weave, Morris dancing and the intricacies of well dressing.

There has never been a Christian content to May Day, but nevertheless there is the well known 6am service on the top of Magdalen Tower at Oxford where a choir sings in the dawn of May day.

http:/www.stedmunds.roundhay.org.uk/misc/maypole.htm
© St Edmund's Church, Leeds
Last Revised 26 April, 2002