Merry Shrovetide is a festival of events about the medieval and early modern history of Pancake Day and Carnival in Britain.

Shrove Tuesday was a major holiday in medieval and Renaissance Britain, concluding a larger Carnival season of celebration known as Shrovetide. On the day before the fasting season of Lent began, a ‘Pancake Bell’ would ring, calling people to leave work behind and eat, drink and make merry on a grand scale.

This Festival brings to light many of the forgotten customs of Shrove Tuesday, some pleasant, some sinister, but all playful in some way. These included music, dancing, weddings, plays, masques, jousts, football, riots and bizarre animal blood sports like ‘dog-tossing’ and ‘hen-thrashing’. Each custom has its own history, and to understand them is to better understand the development of sport, theatre, popular protest, and worker solidarity in Britain. Through creative and engaging events, Merry Shrovetide explores and discusses the historical significance of the holiday, and the central importance of festivity in lives past and present.

The Festival sprang from my doctoral research at the University of Bristol, which examined the social and cultural history of Shrove Tuesday in medieval and early modern Britain, and how past peoples made use of Carnival customs to shape their lives and the wider society around them. It was created as a platform to share and co-produce some of this research with the public through workshops, concerts and exhibitions.

Festival partners have included early music ensemble Passamezzo, Colchester Early Music Festival, and community organisations such as the Easton Community Centre, Bristol Central Library, the Taibhsear Collective and the Churches Conservation Trust,

Passamezzo at ‘The Battle between Shrovetide & Lent’ Concert, with the titular characters at the fore. Part of Merry Shrovetide Festival 2018.