Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: July 18, 2025
As late as 1633 the bishop of Bath and Wells could write to Archbishop Laud: "I finde that by Church-ales hertofore many poore Parishes have cast their Bells, repaired their Towers, beautified their Churches, and raised stocks for the poore." Wm. Prynne, Canterburies' Doome, etc. , 151. Cf. And they maintaine other extraordinarie charges in their Parishes besides."
In conclusion it should be remarked that church-ales seem to have obtained only in Central and Southern England. The huge and thinly populated parishes of the North did not favor the development of an institution so essentially social in its character.
He would like to stop the wakes, guilds, paternities, church-ales, and brides-ales, with all their rioting, and he thinks they could get on very well without the feasts of apostles, evangelists, martyrs, the holy-days after Christmas, Easter, and Whitsuntide, and those of the Virgin Mary, with the rest.
The people of Lancashire in the time of James I. were as devoted to sports and amusement as they are now; and when the king was making a progress through Lancashire, "he received a petition from some servants, labourers, mechanics, and other vulgar persons, complaining that they were debarred from dancing, playing, church-ales in a word, from all recreations on Sundays after Divine service."
The above account of church-ales has been derived partly from Stubbes and from a curious little pamphlet, edited by Rev. Fredk. Brown in 1883, entitled On some Star Chamber Proceedings, 34 Eliz. 1592; partly, also, from many churchwardens acc'ts, in particular the Seal Acc'ts in Surrey Arch. Expenses for all manner of provisions and delicacies, for minstrels and evidently, too, for a play occur.
And so with laughter and with song the feast ended, the evening shadows fell around, and the happy rustics retired to their humble thatched-roofed homes. The proceeds of these church-ales were often considerable.
This was somewhat new to me, this dinner in a church, and I thought of the church-ales of the Middle Ages; but I said nothing, and presently we came out into the road which ran through the village.
After May Day our villagers had not long to wait until the Whitsuntide holiday came round. This holiday was notorious for the "Church-ales," which were held at this season. These feasts were a means of raising money for charitable purposes.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking