May Day

Mayday originated in pagan Europe. It was a festive holy day celebrating the first spring planting. The ancient Celts and Saxons celebrated May 1st as Beltane or the day of fire. Bel was the Celtic god of the sun.

The Mayday celebrations were eventually outlawed by the Catholic church, but were still celebrated by peasants until the late 1700's. Revelers, led by Diana, Goddess of the Hunt,(sometimes played by a pagan-priest in women's clothing) and Herne, the Horned God, would travel up the hill shouting, chanting and singing, while blowing hunting horns.

As European peasants moved away from hunting gathering societies their gods and goddesses changed to reflect a more agrarian society. Thus Diana and Herne came to be seen by medieval villagers as fertility deities of the crops and fields. Diana became the Queen of the May and Herne became Robin Goodfellow (a predecessor of Robin Hood) or the Green Man, also known as Puck.

Besides the selection of the May Queen was the raising of the phallic Maypole, around which the young single men and women of the village would dance holding on to the ribbons until they became entwined, with their ( hoped for) new love.

And of course there was Robin Goodfellow who was the Lord of Misrule for this day. Mayday was a celebration of the common people, and Robin would be the King/Priest/Fool for a day. Priests and Lords were the butt of many jokes, and Robin and his supporters would make jokes and poke fun of the local authorities.

In honor of our four year anniversary of being at war maybe it's time to poke fun at our own fearless leader, and what better way to do it than by using his own words? Here are some Bushisms from almost exactly four years ago:

"We've got hundreds of sites to exploit, looking for the chemical and biological weapons that we know Saddam Hussein had prior to our entrance into Iraq."—Santa Clara, Calif., May 2, 2003

"We ended the rule of one of history's worst tyrants, and in so doing, we not only freed the American people, we made our own people more secure."—Crawford, Texas, May 3, 2003

"I think war is a dangerous place."—Washington, D.C., May 7, 2003

I think Robin Goodfellow should have the last word this Mayday:


"Lord, what fools these mortals be!"
--Puck (Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream)