Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
ornamented and sometimes outlandish costumes, performing various types of music
and dancing, and were also associated with sporting and competitive events and
high levels of consumption. They included intricate displays designed with deliber-
ate symbolism to encapsulate the purpose of the event—displays that frequently in-
cluded special effects, such as mechanical aids and later fireworks. These dramatic
events were rarely spontaneous; they were usually choreographed and organized in
detail, taking weeks, sometime months, to prepare. As a result festivals have always
attracted skilled artists as performers, as well as the technical creators of the various
elements of the event, which often include building temporary structures that have
been the prototypes for more permanent buildings. As a result they transformed the
arts and cultural life of places, for the festivals needed the best creators of mechani-
cal devices, poetry, music, choreography and dance. Yet historic festivals were not
simply spectacles; most were carefully designed to provide symbolic representa-
tions that celebrated or reinforced particular beliefs or to create social, political or
religious solidarity within the groups involved. For example the major Hindu Deep-
avali festival is also celebrated by other religious groups in India for five days in
late October or early November, the dates depending on the Hindu calendar. It is an
event often called the Festival of Lights since lamps are lit to guide Lord Rama back
from his defeat of the forces of evil. So the event celebrates the defeat of darkness
and evil, with lights to bring back hope for humanity's future.
The presence of large numbers of people at these festivals usually attracted trad-
ers, providers of food and drink, in addition to entertainers of many types, who
moved from one festival to another, meaning that many festivals—other than those
linked to common religious practices, such as the Christian Lent—were deliberately
spaced in time within regions. Hence the initial religious festival often became the
stimulus for a commercial fair which outgrew its original function. Many evolved
into events with a particular specialism, such as the goose fair in Nottingham, or the
gingerbread event in Birmingham. The large ones, such as Stourbridge's festival in
the West Midlands of England, attracted traders with specialist goods from many
parts of Europe in addition to those from Britain. It led the diarist Defoe ( 1774 ) in
his description of travels in England to claim, dubiously, that it was the largest in the
world, not simply the nation. This association of festivals with commercial activity
mean that they played important economic roles within the larger region, in which
the limited demand for various goods was satisfied through the periodicity of the
festive period, rather than by the type of permanent establishments we find today in
the western world.
The spectacles of the festival and the associated feasting ensure that they also be-
came periods of conspicuous consumption, sometimes with food and drink provided
by the organisers of the event to reinforce their role as patrons and providers, thereby
rewarding and entertaining their subjects. Indeed the organisers and patrons of his-
toric festivals often believed that the more lavish the show, the greater the prestige
and value of the event in its main purpose. However, the anticipation, excitement,
pleasure and often awe that the festive spectacles produced among spectators was
not always positive. Some members of the crowds attracted to these events turned
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