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Introduction
With roots in Germanic paganism, the maypole traditionally appears in most Germanic countries, Germanic country-bordering and countries invaded by Germanic tribes after the fall of the Roman Empire (such as Spain, France and Italy), but most popularly in Germany, Sweden, Austria, England, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Finland in modern times for spring, May Day, Beltane, Pentecost and Midsummer festivities and rites. What is often thought of as the "traditional" English maypole (a somewhat shorter, plainer version of the Scandinavian pole with ribbons tied at the top and hanging to the ground) is a relatively recent development of the tradition, probably derived from the picturesque, Italianate dances performed in mid-19th century theatricals. It is usually this shorter, plainer maypole that people (usually school children) perform dances around, weaving the ribbons in and out to create striking patterns.
Regional traditions
Denmark
Germany Sweden In Sweden and Swedish speaking parts of Finland, the maypole is usually called a midsummer pole, midsommarstång, as it appears at the Midsummer celebrations, although the literal translation majstång also occurs. The traditions surrounding the maypoles vary locally, as does the design of the poles, although the somewhat phallic design of a cross with two rings is most common nowadays. A perhaps more original incarnation is the one still in use in the Swedish landscape of Småland where the pole carries a large horizontally suspended ring around it, hanging from ropes attached at the top of the pole. This perhaps more original form of course strongly reinforces the procreation symbolism. The cross-arm may be a latter-day attempt to Christianize the pagan symbol into the semblance of a cross, although not completely successful. Common in all of Sweden are traditional ring dances, mostly in the form of dances where you are alternating dancing and making movements and gestures based on the songs, such as pretending that you are scrubbing laundry while singing about washing, or jumping as frogs during the song Små grodorna ("The little frogs"). The ring dancing is mostly popular with small children. The central part played by young children in the celebration emphasizes the procreation aspect of the celebration. Yet another pointer in this direction is the custom that young maidens expect to dream of their future mate if they pick seven different flowers and place them under their pillow when they go to bed on this day only.
England and Lowland Scotland In the 16th century, maypoles were communal symbols, being erected as group activities by a parish (or by several parishes in concert if they did not have the means to do so individually). They were often the focus of rivalries between villages, who would steal one another's poles. (In Hertfordshire in 1602 and in Warwickshire in 1639, such thefts led to violence.) Also, the timber was often taken from a forest without asking its owner. In 1603, the Earl of Huntingdon was furious to discover that his estates had been the source of the maypoles used in Leicester. Protestants grew hostile towards maypoles, first significantly during the Reformation of Edward VI, when a preacher denounced the Cornhill maypole as an idol, causing it to be taken out of storage, sawn up, and burned. Under Mary and Elizabeth I, this opposition to traditional festivities lacked government support, and Elizabeth is recorded as being fond of them. But Puritan pressure to remove maypoles, as a symbol of the mixed-gender dancing, drunkenness, and merry-making on Sundays grew nonetheless. From 1570 to 1630, maypoles were banned from Banbury, Bristol, Canterbury, Coventry, Doncaster, Leicester, Lincoln, and Shrewsbury; and there is no historical evidence for their use inside the city limits of London. Of the four Berkshire villages whose accounts still exist, three sold their maypoles between 1588 and 1610. But the trend was not uniformly towards the banning of maypoles. There are many records of their continued use in the 1630s, and Charles I and James I explicitly allowed maypole dancing on Sundays. That royal support contributed to the outlawing of maypole displays and dancing during the English Interregnum. The Long Parliament's ordinance of 1644 described maypoles as "a Heathenish vanity, generally abused to superstition and wickedness." The only recorded breach of the Long Parliament's prohibition was in 1655 in Henley-in-Arden, where local officials stopped the erection of maypoles for traditional games. Scholars suspect, but have no way to prove, that the lack of such records indicates official connivance in flouting of the prohibition. However, they are certain that the prohibition turned maypole dancing into a symbol of resistance to the Long Parliament and to the republic that followed it. When the Restoration occurred in 1660, common people in London, in particular, put up maypoles "at every crossway," according to Aubrey. The largest was in the Strand, near the current St Mary-le-Strand church. The maypole there was the tallest by far, reaching over a hundred and thirty feet, and it stood until being blown over by a high wind in 1672, when it was moved to Wansted in Essex and served as a mount for a telescope. In the countryside, may dances and maypoles appeared sporadically even during the Interregnum, but the practice was revived substantially and joyously after the Restoration. By the 19th century, the maypole had been subsumed into the symbology of "Merry England". The addition of intertwining ribbons seems to have been influenced by a combination of 19th century theatrical fashion and visionary individuals such as John Ruskin in the 19th century. Pairs of boys and girls (or men and women) stand alternately around the base of the pole, each holding the end of a ribbon. They weave in and around each other, boys going one way and girls going the other and the ribbons are woven together around the pole until the merry-makers meet at the base. There are also more complex dances for set numbers of (practised) dancers, (the May Queen dancing troupes), involving complicated weaves and unweaves, but they are not well known today. However, such dances are performed every Mayday around the permanent Maypole at Offenham, in Worcestershire. Temporary Maypoles are usually erected on village greens and events are often supervised by local Morris dancing groups. In some regions, a somewhat different Maypole tradition existed: the carrying of highly decorated sticks. The sticks had hoops or cross-sticks or swags attached, covered with flowers, greenery or artificial materials such as crepe paper. Children would take these hand-held poles to school on May Day morning and prizes may be awarded for the most impressive. This tradition is known as garlanding, and was a central feature of Mayday celebrations in central and southern England until the mid-19th century. After that time, it began to be replaced by formally organized school-centered celebrations. It still occurs from place to place but is invariably a reinstatement of a local custom that had lapsed decades earlier.
In 1780, Kilmarnock Council, now in East Ayrshire, paid Robert Fraser 2s. 6d. for dressing a Maypole, one of the last recorded examples of the rural festival of the first of May in Scotland, having been put down by Act of Parliament immediately after the Reformation in 1560. The tallest maypole in Britain may be found in the village of Welford-on-Avon in Warwickshire though one report of its height (65ft) would mean that the Maypoles in Barwick-in-Elmet, West Yorkshire (86ft) and Nun Monkton, North Yorkshire (78ft) are both bigger. Czech Republic The maypole is also still popular in the Czech Republic, in country villages. Villages compete to get taller maypoles than their neighbors, and during the night the youths of a village guard the maypole to keep ruffians from neighboring villages from knocking it over (while at the same time attempting forays into neighboring villages to knock over the maypoles of others). Greece In modern Greece people refer to the Maypole as Gaitanaki, and the Maypole dance is also performed. The Maypole, or Mayoksyl in Greek, also has a phallic symbolism. Greek Maypoles are made from the trunks of young cypress trees, and are decorated with yellow daisies and fruits. People traditionally gather wildflowers and make a wreath with them for the occasion. In Corfu island it is common practice to steal the flowers from gardens for the wreath. The wreath is then hung on the front door and burned in the bonfires of Midsummer, which is also a celebration of St. John the Baptist's birthday (June 25). In the south, especially in the island of Crete, May is traditionally the month of the dead. Because of this, Cretans avoid marriages in May, which would be considered unlucky. United States While not celebrated among the general public in the United States today, a Maypole Dance nearly identical to that celebrated in the United Kingdom is an important part of many Secondary or High School dances as part of a May Day celebration. Often the Maypole dance will be accompanied by other dances as part of a presentation to the public. The early colony of Merrymount, founded by Thomas Morton, outraged its Puritan neighbors by setting up a maypole. Since 1929, graduating seniors at Portales High School in Portales, New Mexico wind the Maypole. This school has performed this event for more than eight consecutive decades. Centralia High School in Centralia, II also has their graduating seniors wind a Maypole. This school has had this tradition for 98 years.
Early American Colonies "They set up a Maypole, drinking and dancing about it for several days at a time, inviting the Indian women for their consorts, dancing and frisking together like so many fairies, – or furies rather, – to say nothing of worse practices. It was as if they had revived the celebrated feasts of the Roman goddess Flora, or the beastly practices of the mad Bacchanalians. Morton, to show his poetry, composed sundry verses and rhymes, some tending to lasciviousness and others to the detraction and scandal of some persons, affixing them to his idle, or idol, Maypole. They changed the name of the place, and instead of calling it Mount Wollaston, they called it Merry Mount, as if the jollity would last forever. But it did not continue long, for, shortly after, Morton was sent back to England, as will appear. In the meantime that worthy gentleman, Mr. John Endicott, arrived from England, bringing over a patent under the broad seal, for the government of Massachusetts. Visiting their neighborhood, he had the Maypole cut down, and reprimanded them for their profaneness, admonishing them to improve their way of living. In consequence, others changed the name of the place again, and called it Mount Dragon!" Maypole dance Maypole dancing is a form of folk dance from Western Europe, especially England, Sweden, Galicia, Portugal and Germany, with two distinctive traditions. In the most widespread, dancers perform circle dances around a tall pole which is decorated with garlands, painted stripes, flowers, flags and other emblems[citation needed]. In the second most common form, dancers dance in a circle each holding a colored ribbon attached to a much smaller pole; the ribbons are intertwined and plaited either on to the pole itself or into a web around the pole. The dancers may then retrace their steps exactly in order to unravel the ribbons. The first kind of maypole dancing is probably extremely ancient and is thought by some to have Germanic pagan fertility symbolism, although there is a lack of evidence to support this conjecture. It is traditionally performed in the spring around the festival of May Day, but in Sweden it is during the midsummer festivities. The church of St Andrew Undershaft in the City of London is named after the maypole that was kept under its eaves and set up each spring until 1517 when student riots put an end to the custom. The maypole itself survived until 1547 when a Puritan mob seized and destroyed it as a "pagan idol". The second kind of maypole dancing originates in the 18th century, derived from traditional and 'art' dance forms popular in Italy and France. These were exported to the London stage and reached a large audience, becoming part of the popular performance repertoire. Adopted at a large teacher training institution, the ribbon maypole dance then spread across most of central and southern England and is now regarded as the most 'traditional' of May Day's traditional characteristics. According to the polemic anti-Catholic pamphlet, The Two Babylons, the origin of the maypole dance began in ancient Babylon during sex worship and fertility rites. A carved upright representation of the human penis was danced around by young females and woven with ribbons to ensure offspring. There is a lack of evidence to support this view, however.
From: http://en.wikipedia.org
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