Jump to content
Join the Unexplained Mysteries community today! It's free and setting up an account only takes a moment.
- Sign In or Create Account -

The Mystery of April's fool day


Illyrius

Recommended Posts

The secret meaning of April Fools' Day surrounds the story of the old Gnostic, pagan celebrations, and Christ being Crucified. My research shows that it was created by the Church in order to fool and ridicule the followers of various rites that were celebrated on April 1st surrounding the competing cults of the Roman Saturnulia and the Druidical rites.

April Fool's Day is but a corruption of All Fool's Day; and that it is borrowed from the Roman “Festum Fatuorum," Feast of Fools, a Fool‘s Holiday.

A sort of foolish Christian propaganda they would employ to play jokes on who they may have thought were pagan fools.

 

https://gnosticwarrior.com/april-fools-day-2.html

  • Thanks 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

In some European countries it is a custom to put paper fishes on people and shout "April fish!"

A fish was a secret symbol of early Christians which is now known as "Jesus Fish".

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

48 minutes ago, Illyrius said:

In some European countries it is a custom to put paper fishes on people and shout "April fish!"

A fish was a secret symbol of early Christians which is now known as "Jesus Fish".

What striking similarities:

Ichthys (Jesus fish):

237px-Ichthus.svg.png

and

28qld4.jpg

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 minutes ago, MysticWolf said:

What striking similarities:

Ichthys (Jesus fish):

237px-Ichthus.svg.png

and

28qld4.jpg

The symbol's use among Christians had become popular by the late 2nd century, and its use spread widely in the 3rd and 4th centuries.[3] The symbolism of the fish itself may have its origins in pre-Christian religious imagery. For example, Orpheus was described as a "fisher of men" as early as the 3rd or fourth century BC.[4] The fish was used as a symbol in a number of other near-eastern religions as well, often as a sacred (or taboo) food.

http://www.forbiddensymbols.com/the-fish-ichthys/

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, Illyrius said:

The symbol's use among Christians had become popular by the late 2nd century, and its use spread widely in the 3rd and 4th centuries.[3] The symbolism of the fish itself may have its origins in pre-Christian religious imagery. For example, Orpheus was described as a "fisher of men" as early as the 3rd or fourth century BC.[4] The fish was used as a symbol in a number of other near-eastern religions as well, often as a sacred (or taboo) food.

http://www.forbiddensymbols.com/the-fish-ichthys/

Well they misunderstood now didn't they?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Kenemet said:

The tradition seems to be fairly recent - dating to around 1700 AD http://www.dictionary.com/e/fool/ and would seem to be secular in origin rather than religious.

There doesn't seem to be any record of it before then.

 

April Fools' Day began in the 1500s when the Gregorian calendar took over from the Julian. Those who forgot the change and attempted to celebrate New Year's (previously celebrated on the 1st of April) on the wrong date were teased as "April fools."

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/april-fools39-day-origins/

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, MysticWolf said:

Well they misunderstood now didn't they?

Dunno.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sorry, but no. Your research wasn't particularly in-depth.

It's well known that April Fool's are a result of the movement of the official/legal New Year from the beginning of Spring (from around Lady Day, March 25, to the beginning of April) back to January 1rst, when the church adopted the Gregorian calendar over the Julian one.

Never have heard a good explanation of why in France they called people April Fish, though.

--Jaylemurph

EDIT: The church's semi-official celebration of the Old Roman Festus Fatuorum were in Winter, in December. Depending on the specific region and time period, it was celebrated with a Boy Bishop, the Feast of the Ass, and others.

Edited by jaylemurph
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 minutes ago, jaylemurph said:

Sorry, but no. Your research wasn't particularly in-depth.

It's well known that April Fool's are a result of the movement of the official/legal New Year from the beginning of Spring (from around Lady Day, March 25, to the beginning of April) back to January 1rst, when the church adopted the Gregorian calendar over the Julian one.

Never have heard a good explanation of why in France they called people April Fish, though.

--Jaylemurph

What seems certain is that it is in some way or other a relic of those once universal festivities held at the vernal equinox, which, beginning on old New Year's day, the 1st of March, ended on the 1st of April, This view gains support from the fact that the exact counterpart of April-fooling is found to have been an immemorial custom in India.

The festival of the spring equinox is there termed the feast of fool, the last day of which is the 1st of March, upon which the chief amusement is the befooling of people by sending them on fruitless errands. It has been plausibly suggested that Europe derived its April-fooling from the French.

https://gnosticwarrior.com/april-fools-day-2.html

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, Illyrius said:

What seems certain is that it is in some way or other a relic of those once universal festivities held at the vernal equinox, which, beginning on old New Year's day, the 1st of March, ended on the 1st of April, This view gains support from the fact that the exact counterpart of April-fooling is found to have been an immemorial custom in India.

The festival of the spring equinox is there termed the feast of fool, the last day of which is the 1st of March, upon which the chief amusement is the befooling of people by sending them on fruitless errands. It has been plausibly suggested that Europe derived its April-fooling from the French.

https://gnosticwarrior.com/april-fools-day-2.html

See my edit.

I wrote my doctoral dissertation about this period and these celebrations (and they are indeed a Festum and not a Festus), so if needed, I can provide sources from the sixth century up to the current era to defend my readings. And there are no direct links between the medieval church ones and the original Roman ones*. Also, as I pointed out above, the actual historical feats of the Feast of Fools in Rome and in early Medieval Europe were in December, not Spring. The New Years Feats were something different.

*Although, if you'd like, there is the terribly outdated text The Medieval Stage by Chambers that thinks that. He was not a scholar by training and his historigraphical methodology is suspect in the extreme, hence the outdated-ness of his writing.

--Jaylemurph

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

7 minutes ago, jaylemurph said:

See my edit.

I wrote my doctoral dissertation about this period and these celebrations (and they are indeed a Festum and not a Festus), so if needed, I can provide sources from the sixth century up to the current era to defend my readings. And there are no direct links between the medieval church ones and the original Roman ones*. Also, as I pointed out above, the actual historical feats of the Feast of Fools in Rome and in early Medieval Europe were in December, not Spring. The New Years Feats were something different.

*Although, if you'd like, there is the terribly outdated text The Medieval Stage by Chambers that thinks that. He was not a scholar by training and his historigraphical methodology is suspect in the extreme, hence the outdated-ness of his writing.

--Jaylemurph

Feast of Fools, popular festival during the Middle Ages, held on or about January 1, particularly in France, in which a mock bishop or pope was elected, ecclesiastical ritual was parodied, and low and high officials changed places. Such festivals were probably a Christian adaptation of the pagan festivities of the Saturnalia. By the 13th century these feasts had become a burlesque of Christian morality and worship. In spite of repeated prohibitions and penalties imposed by the Council of Basel in 1431, the feasts did not die out entirely until the 16th century.

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Feast-of-Fools

  • Thanks 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

 
1 hour ago, Illyrius said:

In some European countries it is a custom to put paper fishes on people and shout "April fish!"

A fish was a secret symbol of early Christians which is now known as "Jesus Fish".

True, but this is not the universal practice across all Catholic countries (which would be the case if it was instituted by the Church).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

38 minutes ago, Illyrius said:

April Fools' Day began in the 1500s when the Gregorian calendar took over from the Julian. Those who forgot the change and attempted to celebrate New Year's (previously celebrated on the 1st of April) on the wrong date were teased as "April fools."

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/april-fools39-day-origins/

Snopes marks this as legend and not as fact, and offers several other versions.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

French were the first nation to adopt the new calendar in 1564, and feasts and gifts associated with first of april became moved to 1st of January there. In England the first of April was celebrated in a general way, but not until 18th century it wasn't known as an April's fool day.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

19 minutes ago, Goddess of the Mist said:

Well, this doesn't surprise me since other holidays (Christmas, for example) were basically created to appease pagans in their convertion to Christianity - this way they could keep celebrating their Yule, which occurred around the same time of year. 

Something similar occured in regard to holy places.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianized_sites

Edited by Illyrius
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.