worldculturenet.com

Easter Monday: Angel’s Monday, Wet Monday, Dyngus Day

Easter Monday is the day after Easter Sunday. It is an official holiday in many largely Christian cultures in Europe, Africa and Central and South America. It is sometimes called Angel’s Monday, because it is the day that, according to Christian traditions, the angels gave the message of Christ’s resurrection to the women that had hastened to his tomb. In the Eastern Orthodox Church, it is called Bright Monday.

Easter Monday is celebrated with a broad range of secular post-Easter festivities, such as egg rolling contests. Many Easter Monday traditions are similar to spring celebrations in other, non-Christian cultures. In Italy, it is a day on which people leave the cities and head to the country for picnics and other outdoor activities, similar to the 13th day of Norooz, the Persian New Year festival. One Italian town, Panicale, celebrates with a cheese rolling contest, the Ruzzolone.

In some cultures, such as Poland, Romania, Slovakia and the Czech Republic, Easter Monday involves a soaking of water, a boisterous tradition that originally involved holy water blessed the day before at Easter Sunday Mass–compare this to the boisterous water fights enjoyed on the streets of Thailand around Songkran, the Thai New Year. And, similar to the Pakistani celebration of Basant, people in Guyana fly kites that they have made on the Saturday before Easter.

Wet Monday, or Dyngus Day

In Poland, the day is called Dyngus Day or Wet Monday, and it has some peculiar customs that are also followed in Romania, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Hungary. Boys throw buckets of water at girls, and swish them about the legs with long thin twigs of willow or birch, or hand-made “whips” decorated with ribbons – a peculiar custom that some sources say is connected to a pre-Christian fertility rite. An earlier version of this custom focused on an exchange of gifts, usually consisting of colored eggs, with a threat of water splashing if no eggs were forthcoming. Later the focus shifted to the courting aspect of the ritual, in which boys targeted young unmarried girls for a drenching. In some places, the girl’s parents conspire with the young man, who is allowed to throw the water on his victim while she is still in bed in the morning.

Recently, the tradition has taken on a more equal opportunity quality, with girls attacking boys just as fiercely. People who want to avoid a soaking are strongly advised not to walk under the balconies of Poland’s tall apartment buildings! In Hungary, the water is perfumed before being sprinkled on other people. It is traditional for girls who are splashed reward the boys with coins or Easter eggs.

Popularity: 8% [?]