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Carnival - from the Italian equivalent words: “carnevale”, “carnovale”, “carnasciale” and “carnesciale”. The etymology is explained differently. Ducange (in Glossarium mediae et infimae latinitatis) considers it to be a compound of “carn-aval” (carne – meat and avallare – to swallow greedily) or from carn-a-val” – “meat goes away”, i.e. the meat eater ends; the first is, as it were, confirmed by the words “carnesciale” and “carnasciale” (from “carn” and “scialare” - to excess, to carouse), indicating the binge on meat before fasting. Others see here a distorted medieval “carne-levamen” - “renunciation of meat”, similar in meaning to another ancient name for this season - “carnis privium” (Greek ἀπόκρεως) - and reminiscent of the “Cheese Week” that once existed in the West (cf. Spanish - “El Domingo ante carras tollendas” - “Sunday before leaving meat”, corresponding to our “meat emptying”). Many people find in it “carne-vale” - “goodbye meat!” Finally, in "Dizionario della lingua Ital." N. Tommaseo e B. Bellini (Torino 1865) rejects all such interpretations and “carnevale” is derived simply from “carne”, like “manovale” - “hand” from “mano” - “hand”, etc., in the meaning of “meat” (meaning “season”), or “meat-eater”. In Western Europe, carnival generally refers to the entire time from Christmas to Pentecost, when the population is especially keen on balls, masquerades and other amusements; in the proper sense - only the last days of this season, when the height of street masquerades and all kinds of folk entertainment occurs. Its more precise duration is determined differently in different areas. In Venice, for example, it begins on December 26, in many cities - on January 6, in Spain - on January 20; in Rome it lasts only 8 days, on the banks of the Rhine one week; in Belgium, France, Austria and Southern Germany - only three days. Everywhere it stops on the “Wednesday of Ashes”, which begins the Western Pentecost and when in churches the priests, having dipped their index finger in special (sprinkled with holy water after reading the penitential psalms) ashes, depict a cross with it on the foreheads of those praying, or simply sprinkle it on their heads - with the words: “Memento, homo, quia pulvis es et in pulverem reverteris”, i.e. e. “Remember, man, that you are the earth and you will return to the earth.” In Italy, this day is also called “carnevalino”, because many people do not immediately lag behind the revelry. Only the Milanese carnival, starting on January 6, ends four days later than usual, according to the “Rule of St. Ambrose" ("Rito Abrosiano"). For these extra 4 days, called “carnevalone”, or “carnevale di S. Ambrogio”, restless revelers from neighboring cities and even states come to Milan. Most scholars consider the carnival to be a remnant of ancient pagan spring festivals: Osiris in Egypt, Dionysus in Greece, Saturnalia and Lupercalia among the Romans and similar festivals among the northern peoples. It especially resembles Saturnalia (celebrated at the end of December) and Lupercalia (at the beginning of February) both in season and in the type of entertainment, among which, among the ancient Romans, the main role was played by camouflage, which allowed one to indulge in revelry with greater freedom. The customs of these celebrations persisted for a long time among Christians of the first centuries, supposedly even in Constantinople. Cathedrals and St. Church fathers and teachers made every effort to eradicate them. Tertullian, for example, complained that Christians celebrated the “Saturnalia” (De idol., cap. 14). Rule 39 of the Council of Laodicea prohibits them. The saints fought a lot with them. Ambrose of Milan and Blessed. Augustine (for example, in word 215 de tempore). According to the testimony of the Venerable Beda, to Pope Gelasius, at the end of the 5th century (March 1, 492 - November 19, 496: see. "Enz." IV), with great difficulty it was possible to cancel the “Lupercalia” in Rome, replacing them with the festival of “Candlemas” (in Catholic “Purificazione”), in which a special religious procession through the city with lit candles was organized (hence the popular name of the holiday “Candelara”, or “Candelja”), canceled only recently, along with other religious processions, because embittered fanatics - anti-clericals - began to throw bombs. But, prohibited in their purely pagan form, these unbridled celebrations continued to exist, changing names and sometimes even hiding behind a rude ecclesiastical character. They lasted especially long in Spain, Italy, England, and mainly in France and Belgium, in the form of an extravagant Yuletide folk-religious “Feast of Fools” (“Festum stultorum s. fatuorum”), during which class barriers were temporarily destroyed and equality was established between all classes, for participation in common unbridled processions, masquerades, songs and dances, under by the superiors of a temporarily chosen, by lot, “Bishop of Fools”, or “Pope of Fools”, or “King of Fools”. Masters had to wait on their servants. The common slogan was: “The world is upside down.” Some ceremonies are sacrilegious imitation of worship and were performed in churches. There were even special books (some of which have survived to this day) that described the order of the ceremonies. According to the time of celebration (December 25, 26, 27, 28, January 1, 2, 6 and 14), it is in undoubted connection with the Saturnalia (“Calendae Januarii”). One of its episodes was the “festum asinorum,” established in memory of either the donkey on which the Mother of God and Child fled to Egypt, or the one on which the Savior made His entry into Jerusalem; therefore, he celebrated on Christmastide or, less often, on Palm Sunday. The “donkey festival” in the city of Beauvais [Beauvais in northern France in the department of Oise] was especially famous: on January 14, the most beautiful girl in the city with a baby in her arms rode on a donkey covered with clothes, accompanied by a priest and a huge crowd, to the church of St. Stefan; here they fed a donkey while singing a special Latin hymn with the refrain: “Né, Sire Ane, Né!”; then indecent details followed. The entire “Feast of Fools” was celebrated especially diligently by clergy, deacons and even priests of some churches. From the acts of the Council of Basel (1435) it is clear that the participants in the holiday, dressed in papal attire, gave blessings like bishops; others dressed as kings, dukes, or disguised themselves for stage performances. The district letter of the doctors of the Parisian Faculty of Theology (1444) to all the prelates of France, regarding the destruction of this shameful custom, clearly mentions that the clergy and priests chose from among themselves the “bishop of fools”, or the “pope of fools” - they dressed up in fancy costumes and masks, entered the church and began to dance and sing indecent songs; near the altar on which the mass was celebrated, they ate meat, played dice and fumigated it with the smoke of old skins, the scraps of which were placed in a censer. A scholar of the same Parisian faculty, Belet (1182), mentions that the “feast of subdeacons,” or “fools,” was sometimes celebrated on the day of Circumcision, sometimes on Epiphany. Durand, Bishop of Manda [Mende in the south of France in the department of Lozère] reports that on Christmas Day, after Vespers, the deacons danced in the church and sang in honor of St. Stefan; on St.'s day Stephen (Dec. 26), the priests did the same in honor of St. John the Evangelist; on St.'s day John the Theologian (Dec. 27), the clergy performed the same in honor of “Innocenti” (Dec. 28); the subdeacons celebrated this on Circumcision, or on Epiphany, and that their holiday was mainly called the “Feast of Fools.” O. Theoph. Raynand (1650) confirms that at the Mass of this holiday, on St. Stephen, a hymn was sung to the donkey participating in the ceremony. In Paris in the 14th century. it was celebrated even in Notre Dame": on the day of the Circumcision, priests and clerics, disguised, ran with all sorts of antics through the streets of Paris - then returned to the cathedral, climbed onto the thrones and with their outrages carried everyone to unbridled debauchery; on Epiphany, after many ceremonies, hymns and honors to the donkey in the middle of the cathedral, the whole procession went to a special open theater in front of the doors of the cathedral; here, in full view of the crowd, everyone imagined something of their own choosing; others appeared naked and amused the audience with shameless body movements; Finally, the actors were doused with water from buckets. Some scholars, citing Anstasius, Patriarch of Jerusalem (who was at the council of 860), considered this custom brought to the West from the Greeks; others see in it a connection with the pagan custom of the Romans - to disguise themselves on January 1st. in animal skins. Since 633 (Council of Toledo), popes, bishops and councils have constantly fought against it, but achieved success only in the 17th century. By the way, in 1198 Eudes de Sully, Bishop of Paris, twice prohibited this sacrilegious custom and instead introduced a particularly solemn celebration of Circumcision in Paris. Interestingly, in Germany before the Reformation, the last day of the carnival (“Fastnacht”) was also called “Narrenfest”, or “Narrenkirchweih”. The era of humanism and renaissance, when a mixture of pagan and Christian ideas prevailed, helped the carnival to firmly and for a long time gain a foothold as a purely popular riotous holiday, first in Italy (which is therefore considered its birthplace in its modern form), and then in other countries of Western Europe. The government itself supported him, arranging rich symbolic triumphs of pagan deities, sometimes copying the ancient Saturnalia and Lupercalia, and thereby artificially reviving them. In noisy street folk masquerades, full scope was given for the continuation of ancient pagan, bizarrely comic and not too bashful mimic dances and performances, from which improvised common Italian comedy and its numerous permanent types, representatives of different cities, with their original costumes and masks gradually developed, all the rich variety of which, invariably appearing in modern European carnivals, is almost entirely due to the ingenuity of the Italian genius. The only exceptions are “Pulcinello”, or “Polcinelle” (Neapolitan type), and Harlequin (Bergamo type), which existed among the ancient Greeks and Romans, judging by the drawings in Pompeii and on Etruscan vases. There is also a mask of the “carnival” itself in the form of a red-cheeked, cheerful fat man. In the 15th century, throughout Italy, individual cities and republics competed with each other in the splendor and features of their carnivals. The most famous was Venice, which, in addition to the general, “big” carnival, also celebrated the “small” carnival that followed the Ascension, on which, until 1796, the “Betrothal of the Doge to the Adriatic Sea” was celebrated. People from all over Europe came here to admire the magical spectacle: thousands of gilded and decorated gondolas filled with masks moved along the canals; the squares were filled with “Herculean games” (pyramids of living people) and other spectacles; the walls of the palaces were decorated with expensive carpets hanging from windows and balconies; the proud aristocracy itself mingled with the cheerful crowd of people; St. flags flew from bell towers and triumphal masts. Mark and the allied states, and all this was accompanied by such general unbridled debauchery that by the 17th century there was almost no family home here. During the era of the decline of Venice (18th century), the Roman carnival emerged, which is still considered one of the most fun and characteristic in Italy. Only recently did its original racing, decorated with colored ribbons, horses without riders (“corso dei barberi”) along the main street – “Corso” – stop on the last day of the carnival. They were immediately followed, and on the same street, by the final “festa dei moccoletti”: taking advantage of the onset of dusk, each lit his own wax candle (“moccoletto”) and, holding it high above his head, tried to extinguish the candles of his neighbors, while at the same time protecting his own. This fun, which has survived to this day, continues until 1 am. Florence was famous, especially in the Medici era, for its slender, masked processions, for example, of hunters, jesters, angels, cupids, devils; symbolic triumphs of glory, death, ancient pagan deities (Bacchus, Minerva), etc. Each procession sang poems especially composed and set to music. Lawrence the Magnificent himself, taking care of the variety of popular entertainment, came up with plans for them. The current widespread custom of throwing colorful paper rain and paper ribbons also originated from Florentine teenagers who threw pebbles, plaster and chalk balls (“confetti” and “coriandoli”), and sometimes fruits at each other and at passersby during the carnival. Now the government is banning this unsafe, and for many, unpleasant, fun. The carnivals of Ivrea were wonderful. Every year a handsome, distinguished young man was chosen as a representative (“abba”) in each parish. Armed with swords with an apple or an orange at the end, mounted on horses, these “abbas” formed the core of the most crowded masquerade processions, followed by outlandish (sometimes in the form of sea vessels) triumphal chariots. On the last day, a wooden pillar lined with flammable substances and fireworks (“Scarlo”) was solemnly burned. Order was observed by specially chosen ones: “commander-general-in-chief”, “adjutant-general” and “colonels”. In 1808, even a special book appeared that outlined the order of the processions and was kept by the “secretary” of the holiday; An act on the holiday was annually recorded in it, with the signatures of the commandant and the city syndic. Those who refused the position of "abba" were punished by burning their effigy. It is believed that this carnival was established on September 24, 1229 in memory of peace between the inhabitants of the city and the surrounding knights, or in memory of the deliverance of Ivrea from the despotism of the Marquises of Monferrato. In the southern Italian Tyrol, a bundle of straw and firewood is ceremoniously burned in the main village square, as the personification of carnival; Harlequins fight with other masks around the fire; special carnival cakes are cooked right there (Schneller, Mӓrchen und Sagen aus Wӓlschtirol, 1857, pp. 232–235). In general, nowadays Italian carnivals are becoming less lively every year and losing their former glory. In France, the carnivals of Paris are noisy. During the revolution they were interrupted, but on February 23. In 1805 the people demanded their restoration. The Prefect of Police then issued a special 12-member program for the ceremony “du boeuf gras”: the boy representing Cupid must ride a fat bull, decorated with multi-colored ribbons, with gilded horns, led to the slaughterhouse by 12 butchers, who must carry all the accessories of their craft. This copy of the ancient Egyptian spring procession of Apis carrying Horus was, until recently, the most brilliant procession of the Parisian carnival. “Descente de la Courtille” is also characteristic: on the last day, the common people are accustomed to going to one of the city suburbs - “Courtille” for a revelry; after him the upper classes went to watch the returning drunken, sometimes falling, revelers, the procession of which, lasting until the afternoon of “Ashes Wednesday,” is called “the exit from Curtil.” In recent years, Nice has been famous for its carnivals, where the rich of all countries compete with each other in organizing original masquerade processions, huge symbolic chariots, etc. In Portugal, beans and peas are thrown during carnival; the unwary are sprinkled with flour and doused with water. In Lima (Peru) people are also doused with dirty water. In Spain, the carnivals of Madrid and Seville are especially lively. In Germany, the carnival found ready soil in local ancient pagan processions with a plow, with chariots in the form of sea ships - as a sign of the newly opening navigation (so some tried to derive the name itself from “carrus navalis”). In the Middle Ages it was known here under the name "Fasching". In the XIII–XVII centuries. the carnival is accompanied here by sideshows and interludes (“Fastnachtsspiele”: interludes by Hans Foltz, Hans Rosenplit, Hans Sachs). The Reformation and the 30 Years' War almost drowned it out. Only at the beginning of the 19th century did the French bring it here from Italy. In the Rhineland cities, special carnival societies were founded to develop and carry out masquerade programs. Cologne has earned almost the same fame that Venice once enjoyed in Italy. Brilliant carnivals in Aachen, Trier, Mainz, Dusseldorf, Koblenz, Munich, Nuremberg. Since 1868, even Protestant cities like Leipzig, Hamburg, Berlin and others have been trying to make carnival masquerades public entertainment. The customs of some guilds, such as the "Schäfflertanz" ("shepherd's dance") in Munich, the "Bӧttchertanz" ("cooper's dance") in Frankfurt am Main and the "Metzgersprung" ("butcher's dance") in Munich, are considered the last remnants of ancient pagan national festivals. Now practiced in many cities, especially in Paris and Milan, the custom of celebrating the middle of Lent with carnival entertainment (“Mi-carême,” our “break of Lent”) is probably also an echo of carnival. Literature. Prof. Sun. F. Miller, Russian Maslenitsa and Western European Carnival, Moscow 1884; – Review of his book in “Zhurn. Min. People. Enlightened." 1884 No. 12. Fahne, Der Karnaval, Köln 1853. Reinsberg-Düringsfeld, Das festliche Jahr, Lpzg 1863. H. Taine, Voyage en Italic, 2 vol., Paris 1866. – “Tutti trionfi, carri, mascherate o canti carnevaleschi andati per Firenze dal tempo del Magnifico Lorenzo Vecchio déMedici ecc. fino a quest' anno presente 1559" (ed. Lasca 1559 r.). Manzi, Discorso sopra gli spettacoli, le feste ed il lusso degl'Italiani nel sec. XIV, Roma 1818. Muraturi, Dissertazioni. Artega, Rivoluzioni del teatro etc., Venezia 1783. Beftinelli, Del risorgimento in Italy (Bassano 1775), cap. VI. Juan Ruiz, Guerra de Don Carnaval y de Donna Quaresma (an interesting satirical description by a 14th-century Spanish priest of “the war between Mr. Carnival and Lady Pentecostal”). Lively descriptions of Florentine carnivals in Firenzuola, Varchi, Buonarotti, Berni: also in “Capricci del Bottajo״. Descriptions of Venetian carnivals in Voyage de Presid. Des Brosses"; in the memoirs of Gozzi, Goldoni, Casanova, Amelot, Saint Didier, De la Houssaye. – Paintings by the artist Tiepolo. T. Tillot, Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire de la fête des fous, Lausanne 1741. Morice Sande, Masques et Bouffons, comédie Italienne 2 vol., Paris 1862 (with illustrations). Magnin, Histoire des Marionettes. [Cp. also F. Lichtenberger, Encyclopédie des Sciences religieuses II. p. 648. Brockhaus and Efron, Encyclopedic Dictionary, semi. XXVIII, p. 560].