One night in May 1950 a cacophony of clattering, banging, insults, and abuse erupted outside a small inn in the Basque country of northern Spain. Behind the shuttered windows, two lovers, each married to someone else, hid in shame: their guilty secret had been discovered. Eventually the din abated and the perpetrators dispersed in the darkness.
Rough Justice
By Mr Ghaz, July 13, 2010
Rough Justice
One night in May 1950 a cacophony of clattering, banging, insults, and abuse erupted outside a small inn in the Basque country of northern Spain. Behind the shuttered windows, two lovers, each married to someone else, hid in shame: their guilty secret had been discovered. Eventually the din abated and the perpetrators dispersed in the darkness.
This was more than local outrage at immoral behavior; it was part of a tradition that has survived for more than a thousand years in many rural areas of Europe.
Charivari, or “confusion of noises,” is a type of popular justice, the means by which members of a community register their disapproval of marriages of partnerships that threaten the values of their society. Targets include adulterers, men who are dominated by their wives, and windows and windows who remarry too hastily or who take a new, much younger partner.
A Chorus of Disapproval
The chorus of disapproval usually takes the form of a raucous symphony played on pots and pans, horns, bells, whistles, and drums, accompanied by coarse chants and by insults. Sometimes the victim is paraded through the streets sitting backward on a donkey, heckled by onlookers and occasionally even pelted with tripe.
A peculiar variation known as the Devon Stag Hunt has been recorded in the south of England. A man dressed as a stag is pursued by yelping companions dressed as hounds. When the “hunting party” reaches the house of the culprit, its members daub the doorstep with blood.
Originating in France as a noisy accompaniment to wedding celebrations, charivari has been practiced, in varying forms and under different names, in most European countries and has spread to Canada and the United States, where it is commonly known as shivaree.
The carnival pranks of charivari have their serious side. Passions often run high, sometimes with violent consequences. After the Basque incident, a farmer named Agarra took up his gun. He killed one man and wounded two others. Then he hanged himself. The police later discovered that Agarra himself had suffered the shame of charivari. On this occasion he had been provoked beyond endurance to see others punished with similar “justice.”
Mr Ghaz, well research of history, something new for most people, including me, the pictures are fantastic too. Keep it up.
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