At this time is Saturnalia, an historic Roman vacation with an extended custom right here on the Volokh Conspiracy, which we are actually persevering with at our new residence with Cause. Admittedly, it is s custom solely in as far as I’ve put up a submit about it each December 17 for the final a number of years. However, by blogosphere requirements, that is a very historic custom, certainly!
The Encyclopedia Romana has a useful description of Saturnalia:
In the course of the vacation, restrictions had been relaxed and the social order inverted. Playing was allowed in public. Slaves had been permitted to make use of cube and didn’t must work. . . Inside the household, a Lord of Misrule was chosen. Slaves had been handled as equals, allowed to put on their masters’ clothes, and be waited on at time for supper in remembrance of an earlier golden age thought to have been ushered in by the god. Within the Saturnalia, Lucian relates that “Throughout My week the intense is barred; no enterprise allowed. Ingesting, noise and video games and cube, appointing of kings and feasting of slaves, singing bare, clapping of frenzied palms, an occasional ducking of corked faces in icy water—such are the features over which I preside.”
As is often the case, we’ve no scarcity of sturdy candidates for the place of Lord of Misrule. Loads of politicians in each main events qualify.
Completely satisfied Saturnalia to all the chums, Romans, and Volokh Conspiracy readers on the market!
NOTE: A lot of this submit is adopted from Saturnalia posts from earlier years.