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Article: Wassailing into the sunset Twelfth Night - 6 January - used to be a festival both of riotous fun and religious importance. But Britons are fast forgetting such traditions, writes Sophie Goodchild
- Article from:
- The Independent (London, England)
- Article date:
- January 3, 1999
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 1999 The Independent - London. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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THE DAYS of guise dancing and supping from wassail bowls are over.
Twelfth Night, once so popular that Shakespeare wrote a play about
it, has all but lost its place in British tradition.
Dozens of local customs which were enacted for centuries to
celebrate Twelfth Night and the Epiphany, on 5 and 6 January, have
vanished over the past decade.
The festival has dwindled from one of the most important events in
the calendar to merely an occasion for people to take down Christmas
decorations to ward off bad luck. Others ignore even the tradition
and dump the tree on 1 January.
The fact that Twelfth Night marks the visit of the Three Wise Men
to the infant Jesus has almost been forgotten and is ...