May

May. From a primitive period the revival of vegetation, which marks nature at this period, has been celebrated with various ceremonies. Hence the first of May has from time immemorial been a gala day in Britain, although like most of the festivals of the calendar it has suffered from the hand of time. It is no doubt a survival of the Floralia of the Romans, who in their turn, it has been suggested, derived their festival from India. The anniversary is still kept up by the Italians under the title of 'Calendi di Maggio'; young people sallying forth at daybreak to collect boughs with which to decorate the doors of their relatives and friends. A remnant of the May festival, as observed by the Druids, survives in the fires formerly lighted on this occasion—the day having been called by the Irish and the Scotch Highlanders Bealtine or Beltane (q.v.). In England, as we learn from Chaucer and Shakespeare and other writers, it was customary during the middle ages for all, both high and low—even the court itself—to go out on the first May morning at an early hour 'to fetch the flowers fresh.' Hawthorn (q.v.) branches were also gathered; these were brought home about sunrise, with accompaniments of horn and tabor and all possible signs of joy and merriment. The people then proceeded to decorate the doors and windows of their houses with the spoils. By a natural transition of ideas they gave the hawthorn bloom the name of the 'May'; they called the ceremony 'the bringing home the May'; they spoke of the expedition to the woods as 'going a-Maying.' The fairest maid of the village was crowned with flowers as the 'Queen of the May,' and placed in a little bower or arbour, where she sat in state, receiving the homage and admiration of the youthful revellers, who danced and sang around her. How thoroughly recognised, too, the May-day games, with the accompanying morris-dance, became in England may be illustrated by the fact that in the reign of Henry VIII. the heads of the corporation of London went out into the high grounds of Kent to gather the May—the king and his queen, Catharine of Aragon, coming from their palace of Greenwich, and meeting these respected dignitaries on Shooter's Hill. Another conspicuous feature of these festive proceedings was the erection in every town and village of a fixed pole—called the Maypole—as high as the mast of a vessel of 100 tons, on which each May morning they suspended wreaths of flowers, and round which the people danced in rings pretty nearly the whole day; the earliest representation of an English Maypole being that reproduced in the Variorum Shakespeare, as depicted on a window at Betley, in Staffordshire. A severe blow was given to these merry customs by the Puritans, who caused Maypoles to be uprooted, and a stop put to all their jollities. They were, however, revived after the Restoration, and held their ground for a long time; but they have now almost disappeared. In France and Germany too, Maypoles were common, and in some places are still to be seen, and festive sports are even yet observed. See Chambers's Book of Days, vol. i. pp. 569–582. With Catholics, since 1815, the month of May has been specially celebrated as the Virgin's month; and in Scotland, from some time at least before Mary's marriage to Bothwell (1567), as long before with the Romans, it has been deemed an unlucky month to marry in.