Hock-Monday

Today, the Monday after Easter is Hocktide, (or more specifically the Monday and Tuesday after Easter), and was a traditional medieval festival where games and sports took place, or there would be ‘hocking‘. This was a custom where the women would capture men and only release them on payment of a ransom, which went to parish funds. On the Tuesday, the roles were reversed. Inevitably, things would often get out of hand, not least on the adherence to gender roles. One group of lads laid out a noose on the ground to trap a passer-by who bashed his head on the ground whist being hoisted up in the air. Such merriment¹Mortimer, Ian. “The Time Traveller’s Guide to Medieval England: A Handbook for Visitors to the Fourteenth Century”. Vintage Books. 2009. ISBN 978 1 8459 5099 6. In other villages, ropes were strung across roads to systematically halt carts and horses, the travellers were kidnapped and held to ransom before being released. Of course, the lads settled for a kiss in lieu of money from captured girls²Darlington and Stockton Times Staff. “This Now-Rare Herald of Spring Is a Mischief-Making Parasite.” Darlington and Stockton Times, Darlington and Stockton Times, 13 Apr. 2007, www.darlingtonandstocktontimes.co.uk/news/1328253.this-now-rare-herald-of-spring-is-a-mischief-making-parasite/. Accessed 12 Apr. 2021..

This time of the year was a slack one in the farming calendar when rents were traditionally due on Hock-Tuesday, but one folklore from Sussex is that Hock-Monday was originally held in remembrance of the defeat of the Danes in King Ethelred’s time³Wright, E.M., “Rustic Speech and Folk-lore”, lccn=14004537, H. Milford, 1913, https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=deWBAAAAMAAJ.

Sadly, well, sort of, the custom has now faded from our collective memory … except perhaps in Hungerford in Berkshire. There Hock-Tuesday is known as Kissing Day and the story goes that John of Gaunt gave the town its charter in the 14th-century after the townsfolks’ services in battle. Two ‘tutty-men’, selected from the tradesmen of the town, visit each house in the borough, and demand a tithe of a penny from each male, and a kiss from every female, plus liquid refreshment whenever they can get it. They each carry a staff about six feet long, bedecked with flowers and ribbons, the whole being surmounted with a cup and spike bearing an orange, which is given away to the women in return for their favours, and then replaced by another one. At the end of the day, both pennies and remaining oranges are thrown from the window of an inn for the children of the town to scrabble over⁴Wright, E.M., “Rustic Speech and Folk-lore”, lccn=14004537, H. Milford, 1913, https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=deWBAAAAMAAJ. Before the establishment of the county police, the tutty-men acted as constables, assisting in preserving order in the town⁵“The English Dialect Dictionary, Being the Complete Vocabulary of All Dialect Words Still in Use, or Known to Have Been in Use during the Last Two Hundred Years; Founded on the Publications of the English Dialect Society and on a Large Amount of Material Never before Printed”. In six volumes edited by Joseph Wright, 1898. Internet Archive, 2014, archive.org/details/englishdialectdi03wriguoft/page/188/mode/2up. Accessed 10 Apr. 2021.. However, by the 1960s the tutty-men had acquired a reputation for over indulging in the refreshments on offer such that the time honoured way home was inert, in a wheelbarrow⁶Robertshaw, U. “Easter Brings Spring Festivals and Customs.” Illustrated London News, 9 Apr. 1966, p. 14-15. The Illustrated London News Historical Archive, 1842-2003, link-gale-com.ezproxy.is.ed.ac.uk/apps/doc/HN3100407690/GDCS?u=ed_itw&sid=GDCS&xid=e757ecee. Accessed 12 Apr. 2021.‌.

Here is some interesting archive footage from 1955:

#OnThisDay 1955: Hungerford celebrated Hocktide, or Tutti Day, with some unusual customs. pic.twitter.com/NeETIDuKXc

— BBC Archive (@BBCArchive) April 25, 2017

But in these difficult Covid times, the festival has once again had to be cancelled⁷Craigie, Emily. “Hungerford Hocktide Celebration Where Two Men Kiss Every Woman.” BerkshireLive, 10 Apr. 2021, www.getreading.co.uk/news/berkshire-history/hungerford-hocktide-two-men-kiss-20359646. Accessed 12 Apr. 2021..

Apart from this relic in Hungerford, Hocktide festivities seems to have died out long before Victorian travel and folklore writing. But there must have been at least a residue in Yorkshire by the end of the 18th-century. An 1898 dictionary recounts:

“A Sheffield man, who was much respected by his neighbours, having died, an old lady, aged about 80, said, ‘They will not make hock-tide over him.’ Upon being asked what she meant, she said that when she was a girl it was occasionally the custom in Sheffield to keep the anniversary of a person who was disliked by having ‘sports’ on the day of his death, such as races, cricket, &c. The games were played as near as possible to the house in which the dead person lived.”⁸“The English Dialect Dictionary, Being the Complete Vocabulary of All Dialect Words Still in Use, or Known to Have Been in Use during the Last Two Hundred Years; Founded on the Publications of the English Dialect Society and on a Large Amount of Material Never before Printed”. In six volumes edited by Joseph Wright, 1898. Internet Archive, 2014, archive.org/details/englishdialectdi03wriguoft/page/188/mode/2up. Accessed 10 Apr. 2021.

This rather seems to have been a divergence from the original date of the first Monday after Easter.

Today’s photo is of upper Lonsdale looking towards Gribdale Gate. Another dusting of snow overnight.

• 1
  Mortimer, Ian. “The Time Traveller’s Guide to Medieval England: A Handbook for Visitors to the Fourteenth Century”. Vintage Books. 2009. ISBN 978 1 8459 5099 6
• 2
  Darlington and Stockton Times Staff. “This Now-Rare Herald of Spring Is a Mischief-Making Parasite.” Darlington and Stockton Times, Darlington and Stockton Times, 13 Apr. 2007, www.darlingtonandstocktontimes.co.uk/news/1328253.this-now-rare-herald-of-spring-is-a-mischief-making-parasite/. Accessed 12 Apr. 2021.
• 3
  Wright, E.M., “Rustic Speech and Folk-lore”, lccn=14004537, H. Milford, 1913, https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=deWBAAAAMAAJ
• 4
  Wright, E.M., “Rustic Speech and Folk-lore”, lccn=14004537, H. Milford, 1913, https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=deWBAAAAMAAJ
• 5
  “The English Dialect Dictionary, Being the Complete Vocabulary of All Dialect Words Still in Use, or Known to Have Been in Use during the Last Two Hundred Years; Founded on the Publications of the English Dialect Society and on a Large Amount of Material Never before Printed”. In six volumes edited by Joseph Wright, 1898. Internet Archive, 2014, archive.org/details/englishdialectdi03wriguoft/page/188/mode/2up. Accessed 10 Apr. 2021.
• 6
  Robertshaw, U. “Easter Brings Spring Festivals and Customs.” Illustrated London News, 9 Apr. 1966, p. 14-15. The Illustrated London News Historical Archive, 1842-2003, link-gale-com.ezproxy.is.ed.ac.uk/apps/doc/HN3100407690/GDCS?u=ed_itw&sid=GDCS&xid=e757ecee. Accessed 12 Apr. 2021.‌
• 7
  Craigie, Emily. “Hungerford Hocktide Celebration Where Two Men Kiss Every Woman.” BerkshireLive, 10 Apr. 2021, www.getreading.co.uk/news/berkshire-history/hungerford-hocktide-two-men-kiss-20359646. Accessed 12 Apr. 2021.
• 8
  “The English Dialect Dictionary, Being the Complete Vocabulary of All Dialect Words Still in Use, or Known to Have Been in Use during the Last Two Hundred Years; Founded on the Publications of the English Dialect Society and on a Large Amount of Material Never before Printed”. In six volumes edited by Joseph Wright, 1898. Internet Archive, 2014, archive.org/details/englishdialectdi03wriguoft/page/188/mode/2up. Accessed 10 Apr. 2021.