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Tuesday 8 March 2011

Pancake Day

Pancake Day
Shuttlecock Day
If you don't give us a holid'y
We'll all run away

My mother used to say this rhyme for us on Shrove Tuesday.  I hadn't really thought about the meaning of it until this year.  I looked on the internet to see if I could find out anything about the rhyme and the nearest I could find was from a history about Leicestershire.  Shrove Tuesday was traditionally a half holiday and school children would sing this to their teacher...

Pardon master, pardon,
Pardon in a pin,
If you don't give us a holiday
We won't let you in.

Then they'd sing

Pancake Tuesday is a very happy day,
If you don't give us a holiday
We'll all run away.

Much more used to be made of Shrove Tuesday, carnivals, eating rich food and games before Lent started.  The shuttlecock game was traditionally played and was called Battledore and Shuttlecock.  A battledore is the racquet that was used to hit the shuttlecock.  The racquet was usually made of wood and parchment, the shuttlecock was a cork with feathers stuck in it.

Anyone else know any local traditions about Shrove Tuesday?

2 comments:

Peggy said...

Morning Ann! are we the only ones in cyber space at this time of the morning?!
I have made the pancake batter and will leave it rest until this evening.I only have to make a small amount now compared to when everyone was at home and I spent an hour cooking pancakes, they would eat them as quick as I made them.
I think our tradtition over here was to empty the cupboards of anyhting sweet or anything that could be considered 'sinful' during the fast days of Lent!

Anonymous said...

Good day to you Ann, I learned about Shrove Tuesday from the the church I belonged to years ago! We had a pancake supper each year on Shrove Tuesday. So today I'll make myself blueberry pancakes for supper *smile*
There's not much I'd have to remove from my pantry for Lent. I rarely do sweets anymore and don't keep them myself. I could give up the computer for Lent...that would be a definite shock to my nervous system LOL! Thank you for sharing your history of Shrove Tuesday!