{"id":33578,"date":"2025-12-16T17:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-12-16T07:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.suzilove.com\/?p=33578"},"modified":"2025-12-15T20:02:39","modified_gmt":"2025-12-15T10:02:39","slug":"christmas-lord-of-misrule-christmas-holidays-traditions-customs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.suzilove.com\/?p=33578","title":{"rendered":"Christmas: Lord Of Misrule #Christmas #holidays #Traditions #Customs"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Lord of Misrule was generally a peasant, or sub-deacon, and the revelries followed the Pagan tradition of Saturnalia and was a time of drunkenness and wild partying. The Church\u2019s festival with a Boy Bishop, the leader of children\u2019s festivities in choir schools, was similar, but was abolished by Henry VIII in 1541, restored by the Catholic Queen Mary, but again abolished by Protestant Elizabeth I. On the Continent, the Council of Basle suppressed it in 1431 but the custom was revived in some places from time to time, even as late as the eighteenth century. After the death of Edward VI in 1553, the English court stopped appointing a Lord of Misrule.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">From A Survey of London by John Stow: Reprinted from the text of 1603.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u2018\u2026in the feaste of Christmas, there was in the kings house, wheresoeuer he was lodged, a Lord of Misrule, or Maister of merry disports, and the like had yee in the house of euery noble man, of honor, or good worshippe, were he spirituall or temporall.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">During the late medieval and early Tudor periods in England, Lord of Misrule, also called Abbot Of Misrule, or King Of Misrule, was appointed to manage the Christmas festivities held at court, in the houses of great noblemen, in the law schools of the Inns of Court, and in many of the colleges at the universities of Cambridge and Oxford.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">His reign lasted anywhere from 12 days to 3 months and his role was to direct the masques, processions, plays, and feasts. Although this was mostly a British custom, in ancient Rome from the 17th to 23rd of December, a Lord of Misrule took on the guise of Saturn for the feast of Saturnalia and the ordinary rules were changed so that masters became slaves and the offices of state were held by slaves. The Lord of Misrule presided and could command anyone to do anything. Our contemporary Christmas holidays seem to have originated from this idea of festive holidays.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The custom began in December 1551 when the Duke of Somerset, Edward VI\u2019s uncle Edward Seymour, was in the Tower of London awaiting execution. He sent a note to the Master of Revels to appoint George Ferrers as Lord of Misrule. Ferrers was a courtier and poet who later contributed to A Mirror for Magistrates, described by Scott Lucas as a \u201ccompendium of tragic monologues\u201d by a series of historical personages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Scotland had the Abbot of Unreason (suppressed in 1555) as their equivalent to the Lord of Misrule and scholars believe both ideas came from the \u201cking\u201d or \u201cbishop\u201d who presided over the earlier Feast of Fools.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full is-resized\"><a href=\"http:\/\/books2read.com\/suziloveHOCP\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.suzilove.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/Misrule_LordOfMisrule_Christmas-History_Sml.jpg\" alt=\"Xmas_Lord Of Misrule\" class=\"wp-image-36416\" style=\"aspect-ratio:0.7828522958101743;width:287px;height:auto\"\/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n<span class='bctt-click-to-tweet'><span class='bctt-ctt-text'><a href='https:\/\/x.com\/intent\/tweet?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.suzilove.com%2F%3Fp%3D33578&#038;text=Christmas%3A%20Lord%20Of%20Misrule%20Custom%20%23Christmas%20%23holidays%20%23Traditions%20%23Customs.%20books2read.com%2FsuziloveHOCP&#038;via=SuziLove&#038;related=SuziLove' target='_blank'rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Christmas: Lord Of Misrule Custom #Christmas #holidays #Traditions #Customs. books2read.com\/suziloveHOCP <\/a><\/span><a href='https:\/\/x.com\/intent\/tweet?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.suzilove.com%2F%3Fp%3D33578&#038;text=Christmas%3A%20Lord%20Of%20Misrule%20Custom%20%23Christmas%20%23holidays%20%23Traditions%20%23Customs.%20books2read.com%2FsuziloveHOCP&#038;via=SuziLove&#038;related=SuziLove' target='_blank' class='bctt-ctt-btn'rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Share on X<\/a><\/span>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large is-resized\"><a href=\"https:\/\/books2read.com\/suziloveHOCP\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"571\" src=\"https:\/\/www.suzilove.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/HOCP_D2D_Link-1024x571.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-33062\" style=\"width:389px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.suzilove.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/HOCP_D2D_Link-1024x571.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.suzilove.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/HOCP_D2D_Link-600x335.jpg 600w, https:\/\/www.suzilove.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/HOCP_D2D_Link-300x167.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.suzilove.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/HOCP_D2D_Link-768x428.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.suzilove.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/HOCP_D2D_Link-1536x857.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.suzilove.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/HOCP_D2D_Link-640x357.jpg 640w, https:\/\/www.suzilove.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/HOCP_D2D_Link.jpg 1836w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Christmas: Lord Of Misrule Custom #Christmas #holidays #Traditions #Customs https:\/\/books2read.com\/suziloveHOCP<\/p>\n <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.suzilove.com\/?p=33578\"><span class=\"more-msg\">Continue reading &rarr;<\/span><\/a>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[576,616,662,985,497,466,1033,469,498],"tags":[742,755,745,321],"class_list":["post-33578","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-australia","category-canada","category-christmas","category-customs","category-england","category-europe","category-history-of-christmases-past","category-suzi-love-images","category-u-s-a","tag-christmas","tag-customs-and-traditions","tag-history-of-christmases-past","tag-pastimes"],"featured_image_src":null,"author_info":{"display_name":"Suzi Love","author_link":"https:\/\/www.suzilove.com\/?author=1"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.8 - 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