A Gŵyl Mabsant ( Welsh for "Feast of the

Patron Patronage is the support, encouragement, privilege, or financial aid that an organization or individual bestows on another. In the history of art, art patronage refers to the support that princes, popes, and other wealthy and influential people ...

"), also known as the patronal festival or Wake of a

parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christianity, Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest#Christianity, priest, often termed a parish pries ...

,Baring-Gould, Sabine & al
''The Lives of the British Saints: The Saints of Wales and Cornwall and Such Irish Saints as Have Dedications in Britain'', Vol. I, pp. 64 ff
Chas. Clark (London), 1908. Hosted at Archive.org. Accessed 18 Nov 2014. is a traditional Welsh festival held annually in commemoration of the

patron saint A patron saint, patroness saint, patron hallow or heavenly protector is a saint who in Catholicism, Anglicanism, Eastern Orthodoxy or Oriental Orthodoxy is regarded as the heavenly advocate of a nation, place, craft, activity, class, clan, fa ...

of a

. Prior to

1752 In the British Empire, it was the only year with 355 days (11 days were dropped), as September 3–13 were skipped when the Empire adoption of the Gregorian calendar, adopted the Gregorian calendar. Events January–March * January 1 ...

, the corresponding fair was reckoned by the Saint's Day according to

tradition A tradition is a system of beliefs or behaviors (folk custom) passed down within a group of people or society with symbolic meaning or special significance with origins in the past. A component of cultural expressions and folklore, common e ...

or to the official

Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

Anglican Anglicanism, also known as Episcopalianism in some countries, is a Western Christianity, Western Christian tradition which developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the ...

Calendar of Saints The calendar of saints is the traditional Christian method of organizing a liturgical year by associating each day with one or more saints and referring to the day as the feast day or feast of said saint. The word "feast" in this context does n ...

; following the shift to

New Style Old Style (O.S.) and New Style (N.S.) indicate dating systems before and after a calendar change, respectively. Usually, they refer to the change from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar as enacted in various Europe, European countrie ...

dating, however, the fair was reckoned eleven days later. (For example, St. Teilo's Fair in

Llandeilo Llandeilo () is a town and Community (Wales), community in Carmarthenshire, Wales, situated where the River Towy is crossed by the A483 road, A483 on a 19th-century stone bridge. At the 2021 United Kingdom census, 2021 census the community had ...

was originally held on 9 February but came to be held on the 20th.) By the 19th century, the fair often began on the following

Sunday Sunday (Latin: ''dies solis'' meaning "day of the sun") is the day of the week between Saturday and Monday. Sunday is a Christian sabbath, day of rest in most Western countries and a part of the Workweek and weekend, weekend. In some Middle Ea ...

and then lasted between three days and a week. By that time, the

Reformation The Reformation, also known as the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation, was a time of major Theology, theological movement in Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the p ...

had already removed the religious solemnities formerly observed and replaced them with programmes of recreational activities. Owing to the combination of betting, feasting, and

drinking Drinking is the act of ingesting water or other liquids into the body through the mouth, proboscis, or elsewhere. Humans drink by swallowing, completed by peristalsis in the esophagus. The physiological processes of drinking vary widely among ...

, parish festivals built up a reputation for their rowdiness.Jones, T. Llew. "Gŵyl Mabsant" in ''Llafar Gwlad'' (Winter 1997), pp. 10–11, & (Spring 1998), pp. 8–9.Suggett, Richard. "Festivals and Social Structure in Early Modern Wales" in ''Past & Present'', Vol. 152 (Aug 1996), pp. 79–112. The local, rural nature of the fairs also occasioned many variations in the rules of the contests, leading to disagreements between parishes. The fairs had mostly died out by the 1860s.

Customs

Cockfighting Cockfighting is a blood sport involving domesticated roosters as the combatants. The first documented use of the word gamecock, denoting use of the cock as to a "game", a sport, pastime or entertainment, was recorded in 1634, after the term ...

: Birds were specially trained for the contest and the owner of a victorious cockerel was held in high esteem; large amounts of money could be wagered on the outcome of the fights. *Grinning Matches: For old women *Eating Hot Pudding *

Bando Bando (, ) is a defensive unarmed martial art from Myanmar. Bando is sometimes mistakenly used as a generic word for all Burmese martial arts, but it is only one martial art; Burmese fighting systems collectively are referred to as ''Thaing (bu ...

: A team sport, similar to the modern game of field hockey; teams used clubs to strike a ball towards a goal. It continued in some areas until the late 19th century and was particularly popular in

Glamorgan Glamorgan (), or sometimes Glamorganshire ( or ), was Historic counties of Wales, one of the thirteen counties of Wales that existed from 1536 until their abolishment in 1974. It is located in the South Wales, south of Wales. Originally an ea ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gwyl Mabsant Patronal festivals in Wales

Customs

See also

References