The origin of April fool's day

April 1 day is April Fool's Day every year, which is a traditional folk festival in the West and the United States. April Fool's Day originated in France. 1564, France first adopted the newly reformed Gregorian calendar (now the universal solar calendar), with 65438+ 10/as the beginning of the year. However, some old-fashioned people oppose this reform and still stubbornly celebrate the New Year by giving gifts on April 1 day according to the old calendar. Advocates of reform laugh at these old-fashioned practices. Smart and funny people gave them fake gifts on April 1, invited them to a fake wine party, and called the deceived conservatives "April Fools" or "Fish on the Hook". From then on, people fooled each other on April 1 day, which became a popular custom in France. /kloc-At the beginning of the 8th century, the custom of April Fool's Day spread to Britain, and was later brought to the United States by early British immigrants.

On April Fool's Day, people often organize family gatherings and decorate rooms with daffodils and daisies. The typical traditional practice is to decorate a fake environment, which can decorate the room like Christmas or New Year's Day. When the guests come, it is unique and interesting to congratulate "Merry Christmas" or "Happy New Year".

April 1 fish feast. It is also unique. Invitations to colorful banquets are usually colored fish made of cardboard. The dining table is decorated in green and white. There is a fish tank and a small fishing rod in the middle. Each fishing rod is tied with a green ribbon and hung with a gift for the guests, a delicate celluloid fish or a fish basket full of candy. It goes without saying that all the dishes at the fish feast are made of fish.

There is also the custom of cooking fake dishes at April Fool's Day parties. Someone once described a typical April Fool's Day recipe: first, it was a "salad" with green peppers on the leaves of lettuce, but after uncovering the leaves, it was discovered that it was an oyster cocktail underneath; The second course is "baked potato", in fact, there are sweet bread crumbs and fresh mushrooms below; Since then, there have been roast chicken disguised with crab meat and raspberry ice cream buried under tomato salad. After dinner, guests can also take candy out of the pill box.

However, the most typical activity of April Fool's Day is that everyone plays jokes on each other and plays tricks on each other with lies. Some people tie their wallets to the street with a thin thread and pull the other end in the dark. Once someone finds a wallet, they will suddenly drag it away. Others put bricks under the broken hat in the middle of the road, waiting to see who will kick them. Children will tell their parents that there is a hole in their schoolbags or a black spot on their faces. When adults bend over to see it, they will shout "Happy April Fool's Day". Run away with a smile. In a word, on April Fool's Day, zoos and aquariums will also receive many phone calls to Mr. Yu and Mr. Cheng Leon, which often leads staff to cut off telephone lines in order to reduce trouble.

The origin of April fool's day

It is said that April Fool's Day originated from a famous Greek myth and legend.

Demeter, the goddess of agriculture, is known to all Greek women and children. She has infinite magic power, which can make the land fertile and the grain abundant, and can also make the countryside barren and everything wither. Among the Greek gods, she is also one of the most revered goddesses. Zeus, the king of the gods, is her brother and husband. This identity alone is enough to make the gods fall at her feet.

However, the life of this power goddess is not perfect. Zeus, by virtue of his position as the king of the gods, created many troubles and brought endless troubles to Demeter. The only thing that can make her enjoy life is her daughter Persephone, who was born with Zeus. She is a smart, beautiful, naive and lively girl, and no one will be sad with her.

On this day, Hades drove around Sicily and was just seen by Aphrodite, the god of love and beauty walking in the clouds. At the same time, she saw Persephone walking in the field and her companion Athena, the goddess of hunting.

Aphrodite was furious when she saw these people. These men and women never talk about love or marriage. Do they still have the status of loving God? Athena and Artemis are famous chastity goddesses, both of whom are famous for their martial arts and divine power. Better not mess with them. But for this little girl Persephone, you're welcome.

So Aphrodite, with a sacred aura on her head, called her son little love god urrows and said to him, "Look, how do these people treat love? How can we rule the world if people and God learn from them? Come on, shoot an arrow at Hades and let him fall madly in love with Persephone! "

Urrows is a good marksman. He drew his bow and shot an invisible arrow of desire, stabbing Hades in the heart. Then, he followed Aphrodite and roared off, waiting for the performance.

Sure enough, Hades had an unforgettable love for Persephone after he was shot. But he knows very well that this well-known beauty will never give up the sunny earth and sky and go to the dark underworld with him. So he found his brother Zeus, the king of the gods, and asked him to decide to marry his daughter to Hades.

"Well ... I can't be the Lord," said the Lord of the gods thoughtfully. "You know, Demeter is difficult to deal with. However, if you have the ability to take Persephone away, I have no objection. "

With the acquiescence and hint of the God King, Hades was filled with joy, and he immediately returned to the ghost land to rob his relatives.

One day, when Persephone was bending down to pick a wild flower in the field, a big crack suddenly opened in the earth. Then, a glittering golden car rushed to the ground, driven by the majestic Pluto. He jumped, picked up Persephone, put it on the seat beside him, shouted, and the carriage sank into the ground at an unpredictable speed. The cracked earth suddenly closed, and it was still sunny. In full of green, nothing seemed to happen except Persephone's cry for help echoed in the sky. Demeter in the distance heard her daughter's heartbreaking cry for help. But when she flew back as fast as she could, her daughter was gone. She only knew that her daughter had been robbed by "robbers", but she couldn't find any clues about who the robbers were. The gods who knew the whereabouts of Persephone were silent. They know the background of this matter, Zeus and Hades are not easy to mess with, and no one wants to get burned. A few gods were forced to worry, and they were also pulling east and west, pulling south and pulling north. According to their instructions, the goddess ran headless like a fly. Needless to say, all this has become a futile trek.

However, the love for her daughter made Merte look for it endlessly. No matter what God says, she is convinced. Although it turned out that those were outright lies. In desperation, she lit two Song Ming in the unfathomable Mount Etna crater, illuminating the whole world. Since then, neither the goddess of dawn nor the goddess of night has seen her sit down and rest.

In this way, Demeter traveled all over the world. However, her daughter seems to have been swept away by the wind, melted by the sun, or turned into steam and clouds, and still disappeared. The gods gradually turned from sympathy to disgust for her. Because this "crazy woman" is looking for her daughter, there is no moment of peace in the world. The more they took her up, the more they pointed east and west, just to send her away and lead a quiet life in a few days.

Finally, Demeter had to drag himself back to Sicily, where Persephone disappeared. After running around for many days, no one knows who the culprit is, and the goddess' anger can be imagined. So, she vented all her grievances on the peasants in Sicily. She killed all the cows on the island, ordered the land to be as hard as steel, sealed the seeds in the land, and made all the plants turn yellow and wither. Let this huge island be naked and hungry everywhere.

Zeus saw her make a scene and kindly advised her to look elsewhere and not to take it out on innocent farmers. Dmitry didn't know there was fraud, so he set foot on a shopping trip again. This is a terrible thing. I don't know how many places have become barren because of the anger of the goddess, and there is a desperate atmosphere of hunger and famine everywhere.

When she realized that she was her husband's freshman year again, she calmed down and thought about what to do in the end. Inadvertently, she looked up and saw Helius, the sun god, patrolling the vast space in a golden carriage. It suddenly occurred to me that only he was above, radiant and observant. Nothing in the world can escape his eyes. This just holding a torch, fly to the front of Helius, ask him for advice.

The great sun god pities the goddess, but he is not afraid of the power of hades. Moreover, he didn't want Demeter to make such a fuss again, embarrassing the gods and suffering the people. He described the kidnapping of Hades. Demeter suddenly realized, but it was too late. At this moment, Persephone became a noble queen under the coercion and inducement of Hades, and could never reunite with her mother on the ground. Besides, no matter how powerful Demeter was, he could not take his daughter away from Hades.

Demeter knew that he had been deceived and fooled by the gods, and his anger and irritation deepened. She simply gave an order to let all the plants in the world wither together, all the crops died, and there was no trace of green on the earth. I hid in a remote place and never appeared again.

Gal, heaven and earth all messed up. People have no food, and thousands of people starve to death every day. Crowds of dead people crowded into Hades, making a noise, which upset Hades and disturbed him. The gods are yellow, emaciated and hungry because they can't get human sacrifices and gifts. Zeus had no choice but to live in Jean Patel's hades 1/3 years, return to earth for 2/3 years, and serve his mother. From then on, whenever Persephone stayed in the land of ghosts, Demeter was very sad and the land fell into depression. Once the daughter is reunited with her, the goddess will smile, and the world will reproduce the vitality of vegetation and flowers.

Obviously, Demeter is a complete fool in this story. She doesn't know the trick of cupid, and she doesn't know her husband and Hades' accomplice. After the incident, she was fascinated and repeatedly cheated and teased. Since then, people have set up April Fool's Day to warn those who think they are smart with white lies, and don't make people laugh and be generous because of credulity.

In addition to the above story, there is also a legend about the origin of April Fool's Day. In the Middle Ages, most Christian countries used the julian calendar to celebrate New Year's Day from March 25th to April 1. According to the custom, on April 1 day, people will exchange gifts to congratulate each other. In 1752, the Gregorian calendar was promulgated, and the New Year was moved to 1+0. However, people are still willing to give gifts to others in April 1. This "new year" itself is fake. Later, some pranksters simply turned the gifts into fakes. Said to send a box of snacks, maybe stones. He claimed to visit, but kept his host waiting for a long time. The deceived person is not reconciled, but also takes medicine according to the prescription and retaliates. Over time, April Fool's Day was formed.

Today, April Fool's Day has developed into an international festival, which is almost popular in Europe and North America. Scotland calls the deceiver of this day "cuckoo", which seems to be related to the goddess of agriculture. The French call it "April fish", probably because the April fish just hatched, muddled through the bait and easily swallowed it.

As time goes by, the tricks of April Fool's Day are also bringing forth the new and bringing forth the new. For example, a newly married wife may receive a letter accusing her husband of disloyalty, a mediocre civil servant may receive a promotion order, and a son may receive a telegram about his father's death. On April 1 a certain year, the British Daily Mirror published a photo of a man who looked like the president of a country, holding an almost naked beauty in one hand. If you believe all these things, you will be taken in. Of course, if you are really fooled, you don't have to be as furious as Demeter. You'd better be a gentleman and laugh it off, which is in line with the true meaning of April Fool's Day and be kind to others.

April Fool's Day is one of the oldest weird festivals-on this day, pranks are encouraged, newspapers write absurd stories and radio stations tell unreasonable lies. 1957, BBC News reported a story about "planting" spaghetti, and played a video of Swiss farmers pulling spaghetti from branches. A large number of viewers called to ask how to grow their own spaghetti, and the BBC responded that they should "put a piece of spaghetti in a can of tomato sauce and hope optimistically." 」

The tradition of April Fool's Day can be traced back to ancient Rome, but many strange festivals have only recently emerged. They usually start with someone's clever ideas and then spread quickly around the world on the Internet. This is how we ended the' no housework day' (April 7); "Thank the Postman Day" (February 4th); There is also' Weird People's Day' (September 13). It is not clear how many people really know about these festivals, let alone celebrate them.

The tradition of April Fool's Day can be traced back to ancient Rome, but many strange festivals were invented only in modern times. They usually start with someone's clever idea and quickly spread to all parts of the world through the Internet, which is why we later have "No Housework Day" (April 7), "Thank the Postman Day" (February 4) and "Blame Others Day" (September 13). We don't know how many people know about these festivals, let alone celebrate them.

The list of bizarre holidays may be longer than you think. If you are bored, try reading it online and see what you can celebrate to add a little fun to your day. There are many choices; National Honesty Day, Similarity Day, Embrace Australia Day. This is only in April.

The list of weird festivals may be longer than you think. If you are bored, try to find something to celebrate online to add a little fun to your life. There are many choices: National Integrity Day, which looks like a day, and Australian Hug Day, which is only in April.