Reformation, Carnival and the World Turned Upside-Down Author(s): Bob Scribner Source: Social History, Vol. 3, No.

3 (Oct., 1978), pp. 303-329 Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4284821 Accessed: 09/03/2009 06:57
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Bob Scribner

Reformation, carnival
turned

and

the

world

upside-down

This article seeks to explore the links between popular culture and the Reformation in Germany. It regards the Reformation as something more than a matter of individual belief, but as a manifestation of collective mentalities. How collectively did men make the transition from the old belief to the new in sixteenth-century Germany? What role did popular culture play in this major religious upheaval? Carnival, or Fastnachtas it was called in Germany, presents us with a distillation of many of the central features of early modern popular culture.' By examining the role of carnival in the German Reformation we may hope to trace out lines of enquiry along which more detailed study of these questions might be pursued. In what follows I want to describe and analyse some incidents linking carnival and Reformation, and then to consider some suggestions as to how they might be interpreted in terms of the wider questions posed above. I To date I have been able to trace twenty-four incidents in Germany involving carnival and the Reformation.2 These cover the period I520 to I543, although significantly
I Fastnacht to designate relation of carnivalto popular culture, see Peter can be used ambiguously inEarlyModern either the carnival period of festivity before the Burke, Culture Europe ( i978), Popular commencement of Lent, usuallythe six days before 178-204. The work touches many of the points or morepreciselyShroveTuesday. discussedin this article, but appearedtoo late for Ash Wednesday, I shall use it here to meanthe latterdate. Modern detailedreference to be madeto it. HoweverI would andof carnival in Germany liketo expressmy thanks investigation of Fastnacht forthe many to PeterBurke in general is of fairly recent origin. See Fasnacht fruitfuldiscussions we havehad on this theme. fur Fasnacht2 Some mentionmust be madehere of difficulties (Beitragedes TubingerArbeitskreises sforschung, Tubingen, 1964); D6rflicheFasnacht with the sourcesforourincidents.The mostfrequent Neckar undBodensee zwischen (Beitrage des Tubinger official arecouncilminutes,court sourcesforcarnival andcourt fur Fasnachtsforschung, Tubingen, records suchas listsof fines,interrogations Arbeitskreises des minutes, occasionally SpielundErnst (Beitrage entriesin accountbooks, and 1966);Masken zwischen Tubinger Arbeitskreisesfur Fasnachtsforschung, more rarely mentions in official correspondence. in the However some investigatorsregard these (mostly Tubingen, 1967)for an overviewof research sincethey record field. Investigation of carnival plays(Fastnachtspiele) very sparse)recordsas misleading, has been different in direction, following up the only the exceptional cases, see H. Berner,'Fasnacht literary aspects.See D. Wuttke(ed.), Fastnachtspiek und Historia', in Fasnacht, of the 44. Citingthefallacy des i5. undi6. Jahrhunderts(Stuttgart, 1973), 365-99 argumentquodnon in actis, nonest in mundo, they for a detailedbibliography on carnival plays.On the favour the 'regressivemethod' discussedby Peter

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nineteenof them occurin the yearsI520 to I525, when the Reformation canmostclearly

be calleda spontaneous andpopular movement. The earliest incident tookplacein Wittenberg on io December 1520.3 Thatmorning,
in the presence of university officials, Luther had formally burned the papal bull condemning him and the books of canon law. After lunch about a hundred students staged a carnival procession. They set up a float on which a giant papal bull was erected on a mast like a sail. The float was filled with students, one clad as a charioteer, another as a trumpeter, some as scholars, others as musicians who provided music for the procession. The trumpeter held a papal bull affixed to his sword, and another mock bull was stuck up on a stick. The charioteer caused great amusement as the float was taken merrily through the town, where it was greeted with much laughter. Accompanying students gathered firewood as they went, tossing it into the wagon along with books by Luther's opponents such as Eck, Emser and Ochsenfart. The float returnedto the embers of the morning fire, the students rekindled it and threw on the bulls and books. A procession was held around the fire, with the students singing a requiem, the Te Deum and a popular song 0 poor Judas.4 According to a report to the bishop of Brandenburg someone was dressed as the pope, and threw his tiara onto the flames.5 The second incident also occurred in Wittenberg, on Fastnacht, 12 February I52I. A figure representing the pope was carried about in the city and was pelted on the market place, presumably with dung. Along with 'cardinals, bishops and his servants', the carnival pope was then hunted through the streets in great merriment.6 Students also seem to have staged a Latin carnival play ridiculing the pope and indulgences.7 The following year saw six further instances of anti-Roman carnival activity. In Stralsund on Fastnacht, 4 March 1522, four monks pulled a plough through the streets to the accompaniment of satirical verses.8 There are reports of a carnival play in Danzig
Burke,'Obliqueapproaches to the historyof popular culture', in C. W. E. Bigsby (ed.), Approaches to Popular Culture of thesources forour (i976),79. Many incidentsare chronicles,usuallywrittensome time after the events they describe.Wherethey are not confirmed by evidence contemporary with these events, we face the problemof how much reliability we can attributeto their details.There is a danger that such chroniclereportsare mythor propaganda, in themselvesimportant for investigation of popular culture, but posingwhollydifferentquestionsfrom those discussedin this article.WhereI have been unableto verify incidentsin officialsources,I have been able to rely on the fact that two or more or chronicles confirmeachotherwithoutborrowing; waswritten thatthe chronicle withaccess byanauthor to officialrecords,mostlywithina generation or so of the incident;or that the chronicler was an eyewitnessto the event. incident are 3 The sources for the Wittenberg and J. Luther,'Ein neuer discussedin M. Peribach der Bannbulle', Berichtuber LuthersVerbrennung der WisAkademie derkonigl. preuss. Sitzungsberichte v (1902), 95-102. See also 0. Clemen, senschaften, durchLuther', derBannbulle Oberdie Verbrennung LXXXI ( 1908), 460-9. Theolog.StudienundKritiken, report, contemporary onthemostextensive 4 Based decretalium Exustionis Antichristianorum the pamphlet in two printededitions,see M. acta,whichappeared (Weimar, Luther, Werke.KritischeGesamtausgabe
1887ff., abbrev. WA), vii, 184-5; and WA Briefwech-

sel, 11, 269, note 19. and Luther,op. cit., 97; WABriefwech5 Perlbach sel, II, 269. 8 Luther to Spalatin, 17 February1521, in WA II, 266. Briefwechsel, See the text given in Clemen,op. cit., 466-9. 8 G. C. F. Mohnike and E. H. Zober (eds.), Chronik Stralsundische (Stralsund, Berckmann Johann 1833),33.

OctoberI978

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on the same day in which Luther confronted the pope, and of a similar play and a procession in Elbing. At another place in Prussia, not named by the chronicler, five pairs of monks pulled a plough and were followed by nuns with small children. Afterwards a carnival preacher held a mock sermon.9 In Strassburg in 1522 the Catholic polemicist Thomas Murner was the butt of a procession before his window with a carnival puppet.10 The Strassburg town council forbade a plan to carry around figures of a pope and a cardinal on Innocents' Day, 26 December 1522.11 In Nuremberg that year the town council prohibited performance of a carnival play in which a pope appeared, and forbade the use of a float which might cause offence to the clergy.12In the Nuremberg Schembart procession of 1523, one of the runners who accompanied the dancers in this carnival festivity wore a costume made of bulls of indulgence.13 In Berne in I523 two anti-Catholic carnival plays were performed, one on Parsons' Carnival (Pfaffenfastnacht),Sunday I5 February, the other on Peasants' Carnival (Alt-or Bauernfastnacht)a week later. In between, on Ash Wednesday, i8 February, a mock procession was held with an indulgence accompanied by satirical singing. The plays were written by Nikolaus Manuel and the town council gave a subscription to support the performance. The first play, Die Totenfresseror Devourers of the Dead, attacked the exploitation of death by Rome and the Catholic clergy; the second treated the contrast between Christ and the papacy.14In I524 there was a carnival play of Luther versus the pope performed in Konigsberg in Prussia, in which 'the knavery of the pope, his cardinals and his whole following was clearly revealed'. Angry monks tried to have the
o M. Perlbach,R. Philippiand B. Wagner (eds.), SimonGrunaus Preussische Chronik, 3 vols. (Leipzig, 1875-89), II, 646-7,664, 734. Grunauis the most suspectof our carnival sources,largelybecauseof his weakness for a fabulous tale and his sustained polemicsagainstthe newbelief.Onthe otherhandhe was a Franciscan who livedin Danzigand Elbingfor most of his life and knewthe localareawell. He had
12

H. U. Roller, Der Nurnberger Schembartlauf S. L. Sumberg,The Nuremberg Schembart Car-

(Tubingen, 1965), 140.

13

nival(New York, i94i), 07-8. The Schembartcarnival was basically a morris dance performed by the

Butchers' Guild which hadgrowninto a full procession, with the dancersbeingaccompanied by runners who acted as 'guards'. There were also grotesque a special interest in carnival and included many figures, and a float called the 'Hell', which was referencesto it in his chronicle.His accountof the stormedand destroyedon the marketsquareas the Danzigincident is confirmed byofficial sources, which climaxof the procession. at least increasesthe probability '" See V. Anshelm,Die Berner that his other two Chronik desValerius incidentsare reliablyreported. Anshelm,iv (Berne, 1893),261, 475, for the basic 10 P. Merker (ed.), Thomas Murners deutsche account,but the datinghasbeencorrected from 1522 Schriften, ix (Strassburg, 19X8), 313, interprets a to 1523by F. Vetter,'Uber die zwei angeblich1522 passage in Murner's 1522 satire Von dem grossen aufgefuhrten Fastnachtspiele Niklaus Manuels', Lutherischen Narren, lines 406-8, to mean that a Beitragezur Geschichte der deutschen Spracheund puppetof Lutherwas paraded beforehis windowto Literatur, XXIX (1904), 8o-0 17. See also C. A. Beerli, anger him. So far I have been unableto find any 'Quelquesaspectsdes jeux, fetes et dansesa Berne independent confirmation of this. pendantla premieremoitie du XVICsiecle', in J. " L. Dacheux(ed.), Les chroniques Strasbourgeoi- Jacquot (ed.), Les feies de la Renaissance, I (Paris, sesdeJacques Trausch etdeJean Wencker. LesAnnales 1956), 361-5. The texts of the plays are in F. Vetter de SebastienBrant(Strassburg,1892), 225, no. 3,470. (ed.), Niklaus Manuels Spielevangelischer Freiheit. Die Brant's'annales'are fragments of a council minute Totenfresser. VonPapstundseinerPriesterschaft 1523 book. (Leipzig, 1923).

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play prohibitedand those responsiblepunished,but were told that the citizenrycould not be deniedtheir customarycarnivalfestivities.'5 At the end of June 1524 a carnivalesque parodywas stagedin the smallminingtown of Buchholzin ErnestineSaxony. Duke Georgeof AlbertineSaxonyhad recentlyhad a new Germansaint createdin Rome, the eleventh-century BishopBennoof Meissen. In celebrationof the canonization,Benno'srelics were disinterredfor venerationin Meissen in mid-June. This event was celebratedsatiricallyin Buchholz. A mock procession was formed,with bannersmadeof ragsand some of the participants wearing sieves and bathingcaps in parodyof canons'berets. They carriedgamingboardsfor songbooksand sang aloudfromthem. Therewasa mockbishopdressedin a strawcloak, with a fish basketfor a mitre. A filthycloth servedhim as a canopy,an old fish kettle was used for a holy watervessel, and dung forksfor candles.This procession went out to an old mine shaft, precededby a fiddlerand a lautist. There the relicswere raised with an old grainmeasureand placedon a dung carrier,wherethey werecoveredwith old bits of fur and dung. A horse'shead, the jawboneof a cow and two horselegs served as relics, and were carriedbackto the marketplace. There the bishopdelivereda mock sermonand proclaimed the relics with the words: 'Good worshippers, see here is the holy arse-bone of thatdearcanonof Meissen,St Benno'- holdingupthejaw-bone. Much water was poured over the relic to 'purify' it, naturallyto no avail. The bishop to give their offerings proclaimed an indulgence,the faithfulwere admonished and the antiphon'Dear St Benno, attendto us' was intoned. Then the figureof the pope was taken up on the dung carrierand tossed into the fountain,alongwith his bearers.An eyewitnessreportedthat the spectatorslaughedso much that they could not stand.'6 There were severalincidentsin 1525. In Ulm a mockeucharistic procession was held on Fastnacht, withmuchabuseof the clergy.7 In Nuremberg around a crucifix wascarried
derisivety during carnival.'8 In Zwickau on the Tuesday and Wednesday of carnivalthere
15See 'Balthasar Gans Chronik', in F. A. sie erfaren wer der personen syennt, dy jungst in der Chroniken aus fassnacht in gleichnuss als tragen sie das heillig Meckelburg(ed.), Die Konigsberger 1865), 164, Sacrament gangen sein, das sie das meinen hern Albrechts (Konigsberg, derZeitdesHerzogs note 15.Ganswassecretary to theDukeof Prussia and Burgermaisteroder meinen herrn den funf annzeigen, by und das dy selben in thurm gelegt werden sollenn' (3 completedhis chroniclein 1547.He is considered March [525). C. T. Keim, Die Reformation derReicchsP. Tschackert, Urkundenbuch zurReformationsgeschici (Leipzig, 1890), 83, to stadt Ulm (Stuttgart,i8s5), 6i, mentionsthe abuse Preussens, htedesHerzogtums be generallyreliableand to have drawn on good of the clergy, and that the Sacrament was abused as a lazy God, since it had to be carried. Keim is not a sources.
16

Described in the 1524 pamphlet Von der rechten

in 0. Clemen(ed.), Bennonis einSendbrief, Erhebung i Jahren derReformation, Flugschriften aus denersten (Leipzig, 1907), 185-209, based on the eyewitness in Buchholz, preacher accountgivenby the Lutheran Friedrich Myconius. Myconius' original letter is reprinted in J. K. Seidemann, 'Schriftstuckezur diehist.TheoZeitschrift fiur Reformationsgeschichte',
logie, XLIV (i874), 136-8.
' 8, 125:'Allen Stadtarchiv Ulm, Ratsprotokolle, meinenherren den Ratist by iremaidegepoten,wann

reliable source, and I have not found the origin of his information. G. Bossert, Wurttembergische Kirchengeschichte(Stuttgart, i893), 277, also mentions the abuse of the clergy. My thanks to Kaspar von Greyerz, Institut fur europaische Geschichte, Mainz, for this latter reference. 18 See the Nuremberg council edict of 28 February 1525: 'Zu erfaren, wem in diss vassnacht gespotsweise ein crucifix sei vorgetragen', in G. Pfeiffer (ed.), Quellenzu Nurnberger Reformationsgeschichte (Nuremberg, 1968), Ratsverlass 36i.

OctoberI978

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307

was a mock hunt of monks and nuns through the streets, these finally being driven into nets 'as one was accustomed to do in the hunt'.19 In Naumberg there was a comic procession of a carnival pope, cardinals and bishops through the streets, while figures dressed as monks and nuns danced merrily in the procession.20 A less light-hearted incident occurred in 1525 at the small town of Boersch in Lower Alsace. On 6 January, the Feast of the Magi and an occasion for carnivalesque festivities, a procession of twelve youths from the town, led by a piper and drummer, went to the nearby foundation of St Leonhard. Known as the Pfeifferknabenor Piper Boys, they elected one of their number as their king and went from house to house, as was the custom, begging 'a gift for their king'. This year the canons of St Leonhard were especially unresponsive to their pleas, and when they knocked on the doors of the dean and steward and were refused a gift their attitude became threatening. They told the steward that if he did not give them money, food and drink they would take it themselves. He very prudently gave them something to drink, but they returned home with less to show for their efforts than in previous years. In revenge they strangled the chickens of the foundation and carried them off as booty. They threatened to return and to plunder and destroy the church, one even claiming that he would have the altar of St Leonhard for his table. The sequel to this affairtook place on the Saturday after Easter, 2I April. After one unsuccessful attempt in March during Lent, the townsfolk stormed and sacked the foundation. Stores were consumed, images and altars destroyed, church books torn up and burned, and all valuables stripped from the church, before it and its buildings were destroyed. There were carnivalesque features in this incident. Easter eggs were gathered during the sacking, some of those involved defecated on the altar, and church ceremonies were satirized in a Narrenspiel or mummery.2" In Basel there was an iconoclastic riot on Fastnacht, 9 February I529. Protestant citizens broke into the armoury on the night of 8 February, seized weapons and set up cannon in the streets. In the morning they forced their way into the town hall on the Cornmarket, and while discussion was still going on with the town council the cathedral was stormed and its images smashed. These were piled up and burned in a bonfire, and the same followed in other churches of the city. A large crucifix was taken from the cathedral and carried in procession through the streets to the Cornmarket. It had a long rope attached to it and was accompanied by boys aged eight to twelve singing 0 poor Judas. The crucifix was mocked with the words: 'If you are God, defend yourself; if you are man, then bleed!' It was then carried into the armoury and burned. The next day the council took charge of the remaining images, especially those from the churches
19 PeterSchumann's chronicle,in R. Falk,'Zwickauer Chronikenaus dem i6. Jahrhundert',Alt-

(Naumburg, was Jahre799bis16X9 I892), 193-4. Braun secretary-syndic of Naumburgin 1578 and mayorin Zwickau (1923), 8. Schumann's chronicle is fairly 1592,andusedofficial in compiling sources hisannals. reliable,and was writtenalmostcontemporaneously 21 H. G. Wackernagel, Altes Volkstum derSchweiz with the events. The relevant passages are also (Basel,1956), 25o-65: 'Die Pfeiferknaben vonBoersch mentioned in P. F. Doelle, Reformationgeschichtliches im Jahre 1525', based on official reports of the aus Kursachsen(Munster, 1933), 97. incidents. 20 M. Sixtus Braun, Naumburger Annalen vom

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in whichthesewere 'carnival bonfires' in Kleinbasel acrossthe river,and arranged

burned.22 In Goslar on I7 February I530 a carnival procession sang satirical songs against the clergy, expressing the view that 'the cathedral was a whorehouse'. In a mock palm procession, the Emperor was placed on an ass and the pope on a sow. The mass was formally interred on the marketplace, and satirical songs were sung against the Emperor.23In Munster on Fastnacht 1532 a carnival procession was staged by students, young journeymen and citizens in which clergy, monks and nuns were yoked to a plough which was then pulled through the streets. These figures were costumed journeymen, and as they went some of them sprayed the street with holy water and carried relics as the cathedral canons were accustomed to do in processions.24 A similar event occurred in Munster in 1534, as the Anabaptists were in the process of taking over the town. Some of the rebels celebrated Fastnacht with anti-Catholic satires. One lay on a bed as if sick, while another dressed as a priest, holding an asperger and a book, with glasses perched on his nose, read out all kinds of nonsense over the sick man. This scene was pulled through the streets by six persons dressed as monks, while the driver was dressed as a bishop. A smith dressed as a monk harnessedto a plough was also whipped through the streets. In a village outside the walls of Munster another mock procession with crosses, flags and ringing bells carried around a churchyarda figure lying on a bundle of faggots, 'just as the relics of the saints were carried around in their shrine with the highest reverence'. The last and most elaborate incident occurred in Hildesheim in 1543.25 The Reformation had been introduced there at the end of 1542, and in February the council decided to replace the feast of the Purification of the Virgin Mary (2 February) with a
chronicles Described in several contemporary and confirmed by officialsources:(i) 'Aufzeichnunaus der Reformationsgen einer BaslerKarthausers zeit', in W. Vischer and A. Stern (eds.), Basler Chroniken (Leipzig, 1872), x, 447-8. (2) 'Die Chronik des FridolinRyff'in ibid.,57. 88 (Ryffwasan official its of the weavers'guild in 1529, shortlyafterwards guildmaster). (3) 'Die Chronik Konrad Schnitts
Anabaptists, and his report is regarded as generally reliable. H. Moser, 'Stadtische Fasnacht des Mittelalters', in MaskenzwischenSpiel und Ernst, i9o, mentions this incident as occurring in 1535,but from the place in which it appears in Gresbeck's report it must have occurred in 1532. H. von Kerssenbroick, (Munster, zu Munster der Weidertaufer Geschichte i88i), 467, first published in Latin in i168, does not mention this case, but reportsthe 1534incident, which 15i8-33', in ibid., vi, ii6 (Schnitt was master of the andtowncouncillor painters' guildin 1530 153o-6).(4) is not referredto by Gresbeck. Kerssenbroickstudied der in Munster until 1533, but left before the Anabaptist zur Geschichte P. Roth (ed.), Aktensammlung iv (Basel, 1941), 70: Zeugenaus- rule. Later he taught at the cathedral school for BaslerReformation, 26 August1529. twenty-five years. His report is highly partisan and sagenvor Gerichtzum Bildersturm, desHans polemicizes against the Anabaptists, and is considered Chronik 23 G. Cordes(ed.), Die Goslarer Geismar(Goslar, 1954), 135. Geismar was born in 1522 to be less reliable than Gresbeck's - see R. Stupand livedmostof his life in Goslar.His fatherwasan perich's preface to the 1959 facsimile reprint of elder of the shoemakers'guild from 1503. U. Cornelius, op. cit. in Goslar 25 J. Schlecht, 'Der Hildesheimer Fasching 1545, derReformation (HanHolscher,Geschichte x fur christl.Alterhumskunde, quartalschrift nover, 1902), 53-4, misdatesthis incidentas 1528. Romische 24 C. A. Cornelius, Bernchte uberdas derAugenzeuge (1896), 170-7, a contemporary account by a Catholic MunsterischeTauferreich(Munster, 1853),9:' Meister observer, but the dating given by Schlecht must be HeinrichGresbecksBericht'.Gresbeckwas an eye- corrected to 1543, as this was the onlv year in which duringthe ruleof the carnival began with the Feast of the Purification. witnessof the eventsin Munster
22

October I978

Reformation and carnival

309

secularholiday.As luckwouldhaveit, it was alsothe dayon whichcarnival celebrations would beginthat year, so that the loss of the religiousfeastcouldgo unnoticedamongst the customary festivities.On the vigil of the Purification a feast and a dancewere held instead of the customaryfast. The next event took place on Sunday, 4 February, An imageof Christas the manof sorrowswas takenfromthe cathedral Pfaffenfastnacht. and carriedaroundto the tavernsof each of the guilds and confraternities. Heretoasts were drunkto the imageand it was challenged to returnthe favour.At the tailors'guild beer was flung over it when it did not respond. 6 February,a processionwas held in whichrelicsof the Virginandthe On Fastnacht foreskinof Christ were carriedthroughthe streets in a monstrance and mockedand abused. Someonedressedas a bishopwas led throughthe streetsand expelledfromthe city amid abuse and ridicule. On Ash Wednesday,7 February,a youth aged about seventeenled a procession throughthe town dressedas the pope in alb andpluvial,with a triple tiaraand gold rings on his fingers.He was coveredwith a canopyand attended by four personsdressedas bishops, and by othersdressedas deaconsand sub-deacons carryingcensers. This carnivalpope distributedhis blessingto all and sundry'as the pope was accustomed to do'. Otherswere dressedas monksand nuns, and the festival continued all day with great din and laughter. Some of those dressedas monks and secularclergywere led aroundby womenand then expelledfrom the city. On Thursday, insteadof the traditionalLenten procession,a figuredressedin rags was carriedabout, armsoutstretched in the mannerof a crucifix,with its headcovered by a hood. Othersfollowedbehinddressedin carnival costumes.Manycarriedcensers andpotsor jars,perhaps in parodyof reliquaries. Somewerecladas Carthusians or other religiousorders,and they carriedgamingboardsin place of prayerbooksand sangthe Kyrie from them. Finallythe mayorled the entirecrowdof revellingmen, womenand childrento the cathedral.They were refusedentryto the churchitself, but they led a dance throughthe cloistersand profanedthe gravesin the churchyard. II Preciseanalysisof the incidentsdescribedabove is difficult,given the indirectnature of the evidenceand the lackof significant detailin manyof the reports.The twenty-four cases used in this discussionrepresentonly the results of a preliminary investigation, and theremay be numerous othershiddenin archivesand sourcecollectionswhichmay be uncoveredby furtherresearch.The followinganalysis(see Table i) is only tentative therefore.Seventeenof the incidentsoccurred duringcarnival or on Fastnacht itself. The events in Boerschoccurredat times when carnivalesque festivitieswere customary,on the feast of the Magi and at Easter,and carnivalesque celebrations also seem to have takenplace in Strassburg at Christmas.26 In Goslar,wheretherewas no Fastnacht, the incident probably took place during a local festival linked to the town's mining
2f See Dacheux, op.cit., 225, no. 3,355(1,504): Item worden, und auf den Christtagausgeruffen.'On seind die spiel nach alten brauch jahrlich auff Christmas in Basel,whichmayhavebeen ceremonies Weihnachten(nacht vor dem Christtag)vorboten not dissimilar from those in Alsace, see E.

310

Social History
Table i. Analysis of carnival incidents
Form Case Participation

VOL 3: NO

Themes

0~~~~~~~~~~

j. Wittenberg I520 Wittenberg 1521 I 522 3. Stralsund 1522 4. Danzig 1522 5. Elbing 6. Prussia 1522 1522 7. Strassburg
2.

x
x
X X X
'

x
.
X X .
.

x
x
,

x
x
X X

x
.
X X
,

x
.
, ,

o
.
, ,

x
x
X X X ,

x
, ,

x
. XX X . ,

.
. X

X X

X X
, ,

.
.

.
,

O
,

X
X

,
,

,
.

.
.

, X

(Murner)

8. Strassburg
(December)

15s22 I 522

x x x X x x
X X
. ,

x x .
X

x x x
X

. . .
.

. .
X

0
+

. x
X

x x
X

9. Nuremberg
io. Nuremberg
i.
12.

1523
I1523

x x
X

.
.

Berne

x X x .
, , ,

K6nigsberg I . Buchholz 14 Ulm 1. Nuremberg i6. Zwickau 17. Naumburg i8. Boersch (Piper Boys) i. Boersch (Easter)
2o.
21. 22.

1524 15S24 1525

I1525 I1525

. x x
X

x x
,

. x .
.

x .
, ,

.
,

x
,

x x ..
,

x x
.

. .
X

x x

X X

1525
1525

x
X

.
,

x
X

x
,

x
X

.
,

x
.

o
-

x
X

15S25

Basel
Goslar

1529
1530
I1532

x
x
X

x
.
.

x
x
X

x
.
.

x x x

x
XX

x
.

o 0 -

x
x
X

x
x x x 10

x
,

.
,

.
,

.
.

.
X

. . x

Munster

23. Munster 24. Hildesheim

1534 '1S43

x x
21

x x i8

x x

. x
2

x
10

x x

. .

x x

21

14
-,

17 II1 7

2; Attitudeof the authorities: +, approval

8. io; o, connivance disapproval

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activities.27 Only three have no definite links to any feast or festival: the Wittenberg processionand book-burning of I520, the Bishop Benno parodyin Buchholz,another carnivalpuppet, which I have been unableto date mining town, and the anti-Murner precisely. featured play, whilea procession In sevencasesthe incidenttookthe formof a carnival arelinkedin threeinstances of the cases.Playandprocession in some formin twenty-one (the play and processionmentionedfor Nurembergin I522 were not connected).The three incidents which fell on dates without any festival associationswere clearly studentswereinspiredby Luther enactmentsof carnival.The Wittenberg spontaneous burningthe papalbull, the Buchholzcitizens by the events in Meissen, againstwhich It has been claimedthat the latterwas relatedto Lutherhad writtenin strongterms.28 the feast of the Boy Bishop, but this is not justifiedby the descriptionwe have of the We needto havemoreinformation eventandmustbe dismissedas a falseparallel.29 about the Murnerincidentto form any widerjudgment,but Murner's popularwritingsmade on him.30 the satiricattack frequentuse of the carnival themeandthis mayhavesuggested A specialfeatureof carnivalis maskingand travesty,the latterinvolvingdressingup in unfamiliar clothes, especiallythose of the opposite sex. Maskinghas been inferred by one historianof the Baseland Boerschincidents,but it is not explicitlymentioned
in the sources.3' If one were content to argue from analogy to normal carnival practice

from periodslaterthan the sixteenthcentury,it could also be inferredin severalother incident. But there is need for cautionhere- it is cases, includingthe first Wittenberg all too easy to confuse it with travesty,dressingup in costume.32 Our reportsmention the latterquite explicitly,but nowhereis thereany explicitmentionof masking.There is a very broadrangeof psychological and culturalovertonesassociated with masking,33 and it is wiser to accept its use only wherewe can show clearlythat it is involved.The same can be said of the use of effigy and carnivalpuppets. Often the sources are ambiguousabout whetherthe carnivalfigureis a puppetor merelya costumedplayer. Only in the Murnercase of 1522 are we told clearlythat a puppetis involved,and even
Hoffman-Krayer, im alten Baselund 'Neujahrsfeier 3' P. Wiedkuhn, 'Fastnacht-Revolte-Revolution', Verwandtes', in Kleine Schriftenzur Volkskunde Zeitschrift II (i1969), undGeistesgeschichte, furReligions(Basel, i946), 95-I25. 293. However,Weidkuhncan find groundsfor his 27 I am gratefulto the city archivist of Nordheim argumentin the use of masksin the Swiss area,see forthissuggestion andfordrawing myattention to the E. Hoffmann-Krayer, in 'Die Fastnachtsgebrauche Goslar incident. That such incidents could be der Schweiz', KleineSchriften zur Volkskund (Basel, connected to guildcelebrations, forexample, is shown i946), 57-8; H. G. Wackernagel, 'Maskenkriegerund by a I9 8 reportthat the shoemakers' in von 1499',AltesVolkstum apprentices Knabenin Schwabenkriege Strassburg 'had a bishop in their procession' on ii derSchweiz(Basel, 1956),247-9. January, Dacheux, op. cit., 237, no. 3,437. 32 In listing cases of travestyI have also included 28 See introduction to Vonder rechten Erhebung actors in the carnivalplays as involvingthe same Bennonis by A. Gotze,in Clemen(ed.), Flugschriften, phenomenon. 33 See R. Caillois, preface to Masques(Musee Guimet, Paris, i965), esp. 3-5; on masksin general, 89Ibid., 85 3 For examplein his Narrenbeschworung of 508. (Zurich,i17o);L. Schmidt, see A. Lommel,Masken On carnivalesque themesin Murner, see J. Lefebvre, Masken (Vienna,1955). in Mittekuropa Lesfols et la folie (Paris, 1968),171-212.
12 ASH

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the second Strassburg case of 1522 is ambiguous about this.34It thus seems wiser to adopt a minimal approach on this point and to accept most of our incidents as involving impersonation. In terms of the actors, there is little difference between impersonation within a play and within a procession, and some plays were performed in processional rather than stationary form.35Certainly, the account of the Elbing play suggests strongly that it was processional.36 Thus we can say that travesty was involved in eighteen instances. The sources are equally unsatisfactory about the number, age and composition of the participants. In ten cases the accounts make it reasonable to infer that there was a broad general involvement of the resident populace, if only as spectators. In most of these cases this participation seems to be more active than passive. If we take into account the fact that processions involve the spectators somewhat more than a stationary play, we could argue that there was a broad general involvement in all but five instances. The Piper Boys of Buchholz would have been limited to town youth, in Danzig the play was performed indoors, and in the two Munster incidents the chroniclers claimed, with what reliability we cannot tell, that only a minority took part in the carnival satires.37 For Konigsberg we do not have sufficient information. Women are mentioned specifically in two cases only. In Hildesheim they led those dressed as monks and clergy through the streets and expelled them from the town.38 At the storming of St Leonhard in Boersch, women with babes in arms were said to have been present, as well as two women dressed in armour.39Other specific groups of the community are mentioned in one or two cases. The play in Danzig in 1522 was staged by the confraternity of St Reinhart in the Artushof, and the guilds took a prominent role during the events in Hildesheim. We can also deduce that carnival societies would have staged the various carnival plays, and the Nuremberg runner who dressed in an indulgence costume would also have belonged to such a society.40 Most striking of all is the role of youth, which appears in fourteen of our cases. In Wittenberg it is as students, in Buchholz as a youthful crowd, in Zwickau as 'sons of citizens'. 41 In Goslar we are told that satirical songs against the clergy were sung by the pupils of the cathedral school.42 Youths are mentioned as participating in the procession with the crucifix in Basel, and in Hildesheim it is a seventeen-year-old who dresses up as the pope. The procession in Munster in 1532 was staged by young journeymen and
38 Schlecht, op. cit., I75. 34 Dacheux, op. cit., 245: 'eifnpabst und cardinal 3 Wackernagel, 'Pfeiferknaben', 254. oder fuhren'. umherschleiffen U For a discussionof this question, see A. M. On Danzig, see Simson, op. cit.; on Nuremberg, Religious Stage(New Haven, see Sumberg, op. cit., passim. Nagler, The Medieval

"' On Buchholz, Clemen (ed.), Flugschriften,203, line 3: iungespobets;on Zwickau, Doelle, op. cit., 597: op. cit.,647:'als [das 'etliche Burger und Burgersohne'. Schumann added PhilippiandWagner, Perlbach, kam. . .'. Spiel] vor das rahtthauss that some went through the streets singing wie die 37 In Danzig the plays wereusuallyperformed in micheiskinder,a reference to the children's feast on the Artushof, a kindof civic hall;see P. Simson,Der Michaelmas, 29 September, ibid., 597, note 138b. 42 Cordes, op. cit., 135. dieBanken Briderschaften, seine Artushof inDanzigund

*976), ch. 4. '3 This is the implicationin Grunaus reportin

(Danzig, i9oo),68.

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students. The processionof the Piper Boys of Boerschspeaksfor itself, and in the sack of St Leonhard's childrenagedten, twelve, fourteenandeighteenyearswerementioned by the official report as taking part.43 The Naumburg procession of I525 was excused by the town council as youthfulrowdiness,and the Danzig town council spoke of the Reinhartsbruder as young folk engagedin traditional frivolity.44 The attitude of the authoritiesto these incidents is another interestingpoint of comparison.They actively disapprovedof events in ten cases. The town councils of and Nuremberg Strassburg prohibited carnival plannedanti-Roman events in I522, and the latter institutedan investigation in I525 into who was responsiblefor the satireon the crucifix.45 In Ulm the council investigatedthe incident in I525 with the aim of punishingthose behindit, and in IS26 prohibited carnivalaltogether.46 In Buchholzthe local Saxon officialbrokeup the proceedingsafter the Lutheranpreacherhad spoken to him of his fears that the satire would be regardedas a disturbancearoused by In Goslarthe carnival evangelicalpreaching.47 incidentswereregarded as a disturbance by the council.48The two Munster cases formed part of the unrest leading to the Anabaptist rule of the town. In two casesthe authorities activelyencouraged events, in Berne and Hildesheim. In eight others it can be argued that they connived at the incidents. In Naumburgand Danzigthey offeredexcusesfor them, in both Wittenberg, casesthey wereregarded with good humour,and in Nuremberg it seemshighlyunlikely that the indulgencerunnerof 1523 wouldhavebeen allowedwithoutsometacitapproval by the council. In Basel the events certainlyformed part of a rebellionagainstthe council'sauthority,but it could be said that by takingchargeof the burningof images they acceptedwhat had occurred.In Konigsberga complaintby monkswas ignored, and in the unnamedPrussian incidentthe procession reachedits climaxoutsidethe town hall, indicatingsome measureof connivanceby officialdom. The themes of the incidentsare fairlydiverse.They weredirectedlargelyagainstthe clergy(in seventeencases)and the pope (elevencases). Cardinals and bishopswerealso attacked (seven times) and indulgences (five times). Luther appearsonly in three instances,while the attackon the Emperorin Goslaris a unique example,althoughit mayhavebeeninfluenced by the clearhostilityhe hadshownto Protestantism in 152930. Imagesfeaturethree times, relics four times. In ten casestherewas parodyof religious ceremonies.In Wittenberg the 1520 bonfirewas said to mock the Eastereve ceremony through the procession around the fire. It may also have been a parody of the of a hereticto the flames.49 condemnation The Danzig carnivalplay featuredthe pope
Wackernagel, 'Pfeiferknaben', 235. of the Polishchancellor, Report BishopMatthias vtonLesslau,S February1523, cited in J. Bolte, Das
Danziger Theatreim i6. und 17.Jht. (Hamburg, 1895),
2.
45

Dacheux, op.

Cit.,

245; Pfeiffer,op. cit., Rats267.

verlass 361.

4 Stadtarchiv Urm, Ratsprotokolle, 8, 125,

47

see here a significant difference betweenthe printed accountand Myconius' originalletterdescribing the incident. The formersuppressesthe fact that Myconius reportedto the Saxon official, substituting instead the version thatit wasdonebysome'whowere still weakin faith'. ^ Cordes,op. cit., ,35. 4 See WA,vii, i85, line34,on the Easter parallel.
12-2

Clemen (ed.), Flugschriften, 204,

209,

note 14. We

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banning Luther with bell, book and candle, while the Prussian incident contained a mock sermon. Buchholz parodied the elevation of the new saint in Meissen, while Basel and Hildesheim both saw parodies of religious processions. Goslar parodied the Palm Sunday procession, where Christ was seated on an ass. Only in Boersch is the natureof the parody left unspecified, although it was doubtless a parody of the mass.

III
Why should expressions of evangelical feeling be so often linked to carnival? To understand this question we must understand the role of carnival in the collective life of the time, a task which will pose more problems than it solves in the scope of this essay. Research on the meaning of carnival is still in an unformed state, and there are serious questions of method and approach as yet unresolved.50 In part this is because the lines of investigation cut across the boundaries of any one discipline, involving questions of folklore, social anthropology, social psychology and philosophy. The researchertied to one discipline, certainly the mere historian, may easily lose his bearings in such unfamiliar territory. In what follows I want to examine six different approaches to carnival to see what light they cast on links with the Reformation.

x. Youthful high spirits

This is suggested by the prominence of youth in the events we have described, especially by the explanation given by the magistrates of Naumburg and Danzig. We could regard this as an excuse to ward off the displeasure of ecclesiastical authorities, but it is also possible that our examples are no more than instances of youthful exuberance overflowing into one of the prominent issues of the day. The festive calendar had its high points at which allowance was made for the licence of youth. Adolescents were here permitted that kind of unbridled behaviour which at other times of the year would bring them up on a charge of breach of the peace. The Feast of Fools is said to exemplify this 'safety valve' approach to youth within the framework of church discipline.5' Carnival, with its 'trick or treat' customs presented it within the secular sphere. Within the semi-autonomous world of student groups, such behaviour was also regulated into predictable forms such as mock disputations and initiation ceremonies.52 However
50 For someof these,see the literature citedin note Lefebvre, op. cit., 43-7; E. N. Welsford, The Fool and I, as well as M. Bakhtin, Rabelaisand his World his History (London, x935),200-2. This feast was more Berce,Feteet prominent in France than Germany. For a wider range Yves-Marie Mass., 1968); (Cambridge, du X Ve au X VIIl populaires of French references, see N. Z. Davis, 'The reasons revolte. Des mentalites (Paris, of misrule: youth groups and charivaris in sixteenthLe carnaval siecle(Paris, i976);C. Gaignebet, century France', Past and Present, I -971), 42, note 1974).

'Narren5' On the Feastof Fools,see H. Bohmer, fur prot. Theologieund feste', Realencyclopedia op. cit., Kirche, xiii (Leipzig,1903), 650-3;Gaignebet,
42-3; Berce, op. cit., 24-36; E. K. Chambers, The Medieval Stage, I (Oxford, 1903), chs. 13-15; J.

2. 52 See F. Zarncke, Die deutschenLUniversitaten im Mittelalter (Leipzig, 1857), 4-1o, on initiation ceremonies; 49-154, for examples of mock disputations.

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students were less socially integratedinto a widercommunity,and there was alwaysa dangerthat studenthigh spiritswouldoverflowinto disorder.There is strongsuspicion that the 1521 Parson Storm of Erfurt, regardedas the first violent outbreakof the was such an outburst,involvingas it did organized Reformation, groupsusing a secret password, a classic sign of a secret youth group.53The spontaneityof the student processionin Wittenbergin 1521 exemplifiesthe same kind of student exuberance, celebration. One reportsuggeststhat detachedas it was fromany occasionof communal the studentsborrowed some featuresof theirdemonstration frominitiationceremonies. It states that studentson the wagonwere clad in 'that state of indecentundress'which new studentswore for their initiationinto the schools.54 Spontaneityis also a featureof the behaviourof the Piper Boys of Boersch,and of the iconoclasticoutbreakin Basel in 1529. The lattercase is less relevanthere. Peter Weidkuhnhas assertedthat this is an exampleof youthfulspontaneousrevolt, similar to the events in Parisin May i968,55 but there is little evidencefor this. We knowthat 56 youths were involved from the testimony of one witness, but not exclusivelyso. Moreover,except for the date on whichit took place,thereis little to justifycallingthe initial attackon the cathedrala 'carnivalesque event'. There is no evidenceat all that the iconoclastswere masked,as Weidkuhnassumes,and elements of carnivalentered only later. The Piper Boys are more interestingfrom this point of view, for they show howeasilythe line betweenfestivespiritanddisorder wascrossed.Theirdisappointment at being refusedtheir customary treatquicklymovedthem to threatenviolence,and to take revengeon the canons'poultry.Their actionis perhapsnot too far removedfrom the Erfurt Parson Storm. There may, therefore,be some grounds for acceptingthe argumentthat youthfulhigh spiritscan explainsome of our incidents. Natalie Davis has shown in her discussionof youth groupsthat the argumentmust none the less be taken a step further.57 Youth behaviourdoes not occur in a vacuum, but is a manifestation of the social and culturalvaluesof the communitiesin which it is found. Davis refersto the ideas of S. N. Eisenstadt on the natureof 'youth culture', and we could usefully considerone or two of these. First, adolescence and youth can be regardedas a period of transitionfrom childhoodto full adulthood.It is thus an important phasein which one passesfromthe restricted socialmilieuof the child to full involvement in society. In this periodof socialization one is confronted withthe fullrange of establishedvalueswhich are normative for the adult world. The youth tests himself
5 The Erfurt ParsonStorminvolvedthe storming of clericalhouseson two successive nights, i x and 12 June 1521, by students,journeymen andcountryfolk in town for the weeklymarket,describedin a contemporary balladby the studentGothard Schmalzin Clemen(ed.), Flugschriften, 369-76.On secretyouth groups, see H. G. Wackernagel, 'Das Trinkelstierkreigvom Jahre 1550', Altes Volkstum der Schweiz, 222-43; 'Maskenkrieger', ibid.,247-9; E. HoffmannKrayer, 'Knabenschaften und Volksjustizin der

Schweiz', Kleine Schriften zur Volkskunde,124-59. 5 WA, vii, i85, lines 5-6. 5 Weidkuhn, op. cit., 292-3.
6 See the testimony of ConradGanser,in Roth, op. cit., 70: 'Das er an der altennvasznacht nechstverschinen zu St. Theodormitanderen knaben daselbe die bilder hinwegzu thun ze sachenn,gangen'(my emphasis).

" Davis, op. cit., esp. 54-7.

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againstthese valuesand, in society'stermsat least, is expectedto assimilate andintegrate Butthereis an elementof ambiguity theminto his personality. as well. Forif socialvalues are being presentedfor acceptance,they are also being put to the test, and there is a dangerof revolt againstthem, that the youth will begin to forgehis own valuesagainst those of society. The other side of the coin is that youth can becomea vanguard of establishedvalues, reaffirming them and recallingan adultgeneration to live out fully valuesto which they only pay lip service. It has been suggestedthatthis was the social in ruralsociety, in regulating functionof charivaris the socialrulesaboutmarriage and
remarriage.58

Van Gennep, who formulatedthe concept of the 'rite of passage',identifiedsuch of established transitionalstages as highly dangerousto society.59 The disaggregation valuesthey involvedcouldeasilybe followedby a destructive dissolution of thosevalues. For this reasonsuchtransitional stagesareritualized andcontrolled by society,especially in initiationceremonies.We need to study such phenomena in moredetailin the early modern period in order to identify them more closely, although Natalie Davis has in the formof secretyouthorganizations, carnival pointedto severalsuch manifestations societies and journeymen's associations.To these we might add studentgroups. Both in view of their are especiallysignificant student groupsand journeymen's associations thatmagistrates werealwaysopposed autonomous positionin society. It was no accident of journeymen's or soughtto extendtheirjurisdiction associations over to the formation universities.60 These were socially dangerousgroups preciselybecausethey resisted into establishedpatternsof ritualizedbehaviour. incorporation Whatdoes this imply in termsof the Reformation? StephenOzmenthas pointedout found adherentsprimarilyamongstthe young and the socially that the Reformation of all thosesoberrespectable the importance mobile.61 This mayseem to underestimate thanthe youngand the ideaswith no less enthusiasm burgherswho took up evangelical of youth in spreading Reformation displaced.However,it does indicatethe importance for views and ideas. The young might be alloweda measureof tolerance unorthodox the liberty of voicing disquiet with the establishedreligiousorder. Or they could take liberties,for the volatilityof youthwassuch thatit couldnot alwaysbe confined by social
58 S. N. Eisenstadt, 'Archetypal patterns of youth', in E. Erikson (ed.), Youth: Changeand

59 A. van Gennep, The Ritesof Passage(ig6o), 114. For a retrospective assessment of the concept, see M. Gluckman,Essayson the Ritualof Social Relations
(Manchester, i962), 1-52. 6i On journeymen, see G. Strauss, Manifestations

Challenge (New York, 1963),

24-42,

esp. 27; ibid.,

toGeneration (NewYork,i966),31-2. From Generation and For similar notions see also M. Mead, Culture A Study Gap(London, Commitment. of theGeneration Davis, op. cit., 53-4; I970), esp. 3-4 On charivaris, E. P. Thompson, "'Rough music": Le Charivari anglais', Annales ESC, XXVII (1972), 285-312. A for the study of youth as a theoreticalframework subculture, using Marxianand Gramscianideas, findingsin the early could perhapsyield interesting (eds.), modernperiod,see S. Hall and T. Jefferson Youth Subcultures inpost-war Resistance through Rituals.
Bnrtain(London, 1976).

on theEveof theReformation in Germany of Discontent

(Bloomington, 1971), I30-8; also N. Z. Davis, 'A trade union in sixteenth-century France', Economic History Review, ser. ii, xIx (1966), 48468; on universities, the case of Cologne in R. W. Scribner, 'Why was there no Reformation in Cologne', Bulletin of the XLIX (i976), 225S-. Research, of Historical Institute 61 S. E. Ozment, The Reformation in the Cities (New Haven, 1975), 123: 'the ideologically and sociallv mobile'.

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strategems. In a community little inclined to the new ideas, it could contradict established religious values. Where the community was alreadysympathetic, it could serve as a vanguard, to hasten along those who might otherwise 'tarry for the magistrate'. The overwhelming dominance of male youth in our cases of carnival and Reformation shows that here, as in other areas, youth groups were acting as 'the uproarious voice of the community's conscience'. 62 It was natural for this to be expressed through carnivalesque activity, for carnival was the supreme celebration of youth against age, of the new repudiating the old, epitomized in the contest of carnival and Lent. It is not surprising that the young should have fitted the contest of old and new religion into this format, so deeply embedded in the collective life of the age.

2.

Play and game

There are two very stiking features of the examples of carnival described in the first section of this essay. The first is the festive spirit of most of the incidents. Violence and damage to property are involved only on two occasions, in Basel and in Boersch. The tone is otherwise one of merriment and gaiety. The second feature is the recurrence of parody and satire. One could argue that this suggests a closer link with pre-Reformation carnival spirit than with evangelical enthusiasm. The Reinhartsbruder in Danzig, for example, had a tradition of performing anti-clerical satires,63 and there are numerous other instances from the period before the Reformation. In Cologne in I44I an innkeeper prepared a mock shrine aided by four friends and a servant woman, and carried it through the streets with a puppet and flags.64 In Frankfurt in I467 seventeen citizens were punished for parodying a religious procession. Several youths were punished in Augsburg in 1503 for a carnival float in which a mock priest baptized a goat.65 As late as I5 i8 shoemakers'apprentices in Strassburg satirized a bishop in a festive procession." Satire and parody were of course a constituent element of medieval festivals. The classic type is the Feast of Fools, where not only was a Boy Bishop elected, but a parody of the mass was held in church. In another variation, the Feast of the Ass, asinine masses were celebrated, where each part of the mass was responded to by comic braying.67That such satire was not without its limits is shown by the growing number of mandates at the end of the fifteenth century directed against parodies of ecclesiastical ceremonies and against impersonation of monks and nuns.68 Whether this reflects a growth of anti-ecclesiastical satire, or merely a change of attitude on the part of authority, is unclear.
6i2 N. Z. Davis, 'Some tasks and themes in the study of popular religion',in C. Trinkaus and H. A. Oberman(eds.), The Pursuitof Holiness(Leiden,

and clerics; Simson, op. cit., 68.

' J. Klersch, Die k6lnische Fastnachtvon ihren bis zur Gegenwart Anfangen (Cologne, ig6i), 32.
65 Moser, op. cit., 176. ' Dacheux,op. Cit., 237, no.
67

1974), 323. See also R. C. Trexler, 'Ritual in Flo-

rence:adolescence andsalvation in the Renaissance',

in ibid., 200-64. 3 In 1516and 1522 the town councilissuedprohi-

Bakhtin,op. cit., 78. " Moser, op. cit., 163-4.

3,437.

bitionsagainstcarnival playswhichoutraged laymen

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of carnival parodyandsatireif we set them We can betterunderstand these traditions in the broadercontext of play and game, and its culturalsignificance.In his seminal work Homoludens JohannHuizingastressedthree essentialelementsof play. First, he with saw it as creatinga world apartfrom reality. Second, this world was permeated own as the as within its context thatof non-play world. a fundamental seriousness, earnest This has been criticized Third, it was agonistic- play was alwaysa matterof contest.69 as too limited a view. Not only can play be conceivedundertypologiesother than the as agonistic- for example, as a matterof change or mimicry- it can also be regarded The to notion that playis an a continuumrangingfrom controlled spontaneous play.70 from realityhas also been questioned,for playcan be seen as another activityseparated A similar world.7' formof reality,none the less realforbeingset apartfromthe non-play approachhas been to see play as a real mode of behaviourembodyinga symbolic of being.72MikhailBakhtinagreeswith this line of representation and re-enactment argument,seeing carnivalas an alternativeworld to officialcultureand society, as a This latterfeaturewill be discussedlater. Important here 'second life of the people'.73 is the elementof autonomyinherentin such a play world. Gatheringup some of these ideas in relationto carnival,we can say that it is an autonomous world in which symbolic actions are performedwhich have all the reality.It is similarto youth as compulsionof reality- one might call it an alternative a state in oppositionto the establishedstructuresof society, and for the same reasons worldwerecarefullypoliced. betweenit and the non-play,non-carnival the boundaries sense of the need to preserve There are two anecdoteswhich illustratecontemporaries' these boundaries.One is in the 1526 EnglishcollectionA Hundred MeryTalysandtells of a playerwho did not removehis devil's costume after the play. He causeda panic SimonGrunau's on his way home amongfolk who mistookhim for the devil himself.74 has a similartale fromThorn in WestPrussia Chronicle duringthe i44os, where Prussian one of the carnivalprankswas the hunting of old women by devils who carriedthem off to hell. A carterarrivingat the town saw such a carnivaldevil chasingan old man outsidethe walls. Intrepidly,he leapt down fromhis cartandsmote in the devil'shead with an axe. When chargedwith murder, he claimed to have no knowledgeof this carnival custom and believed that he had been saving the woman from a demon. went out laterto collect (Typical of Grunau'schronicleis the sequel: when attendants the corpse,they found nothingbut a pile of emptyclothesand an unbearable stench!75) These anecdotesexpressa fear that the carnivalworldand the non-playworldmight
A Studyof thePlay J9 J. Huizinga,HomoLudens.
Element in Culture(ig7o), 26-30.
72 E. Fink, 'The oasis of happiness:toward an ontologyof play', Yale FrenchStudies,XLI (1968),

(Paris, 1967) 19-30, esp. 24. 70 R. Caillois, Les jeux et les hommes 73 Bakhtin,op. cit., 9. of play: competition, gives a fourfoldcategorization 74 Cited in V. A. Kolve, The Play calledCorpus chance, mimicryand vertigo. J. Ehrmann,'Homo Ludens revisited', Yale FrenchStudies, XLI (i968), 31, Christi (i966), 21. 75 Peribach, Philippiand Wagner,op. cit., 137-8. sees play as a continuumfrom controlledto sponc. 1443. taneousplay. The incidentsupposedly occurred 71 Ehrmann, op. Cit., 33.

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merge, and they are highly relevant to our discussion of satire and parody. The latter were permitted in the world of carnival because their implications were set apart from the mundane world. None the less there was a growing fear that the boundary could no longer be so effectively policed. The importance of this boundary can be seen if we consider the enactment of popular justice found in many carnival festivities. Within the context of the play world, popular retribution of those regarded as having escaped their just punishment was merely carnival fun. Enacted in the real world, even in carnival forms, it became rebellion.76By the end of the fifteenth century satire of the church and the clergy was no longer confined to the world of carnival. On the other hand, it is difficult to see when and where the line was crossed. As late as I515 Erasmus was excusing his attacks on scholastic theologians in the Praise of Folly in terms of the licence allowed to the fool. Folly had made the criticism, not Erasmus, and no one should feel offended by it.77 This is a classic invocation of the separation of the world of play from non-play. What is surprising is that it should have been thought to have any force in 1515 applied to criticism in churchly affairs. It is tempting to argue that our examples of carnival and Reformation are evidence of the abolition of this dividing line, that men were now acting out in the mundane world what was previously permitted only in the world of play. Yet it is significant that in most of our cases evangelical fervour kept within the limits of the play world. One enacted in play the hunting of monks, nuns and clergy in Zwickau and Hildesheim, one did not hunt them in reality. Here it could be said that carnival fulfilled once again a 'safety valve' function and inhibited popular passions. But even where the events were detached from the format of carnival, as in Wittenberg in 1520 or in Buchholz, the world of play still seemed to impose its own order. Only in Wittenberg was there any subsequent disturbance, at some distance in time from the carnival events. In Basel and in Boersch at Easter the carnival elements entered later into an existing pattern of violence. In Munster, the events seem to represent play within the framework of rebellion, rather than crossing from one to the other. In the case of the Piper Boys, the violence and threats were not so much an extension of the carnival spirit as a throwing aside of it.78 3. Containment of discontent The two features of carnival discussed so far suggest our third theme, that carnival acted as a means of containing discontent. Although carnival was an uninhibited time of licence and permitted anarchy, it was contained within its own time and space separated from the non-play world. More than this, the very nature of carnival can be seen to
76 See Davis, 'Reasons of misrule', 69; Wacker- (Oxford, 1910), 96-7, 104-5. nagel, 'Trinkelstierkrieg'; Hoffmann-Krayer, 78 For an interesting examinationof the links 'Knabenschaften'. For Englishexamples,see E. J. between carnival and rebellion, see Berce, op. cit., chs. Hobsbawmand G. Rude, Captain Swing(173), 39 1-2. Carnival can be a dangerous time, especially for thosewhorefuseto joinin its laughter, butrarely leads 40, 45-6. " Letterto Martin Dorp, May15I5,in P. S. Allen to rebellion.That rebellionoften assumescarnival (ed.), Opus epistolarumDes. Erasmi Roterdami, iII formsis a different matter.

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performan inhibitingfunction. Here we must referto Gluckman's notionof the ritual of rebellion.This describesceremonieswhich openlyexpresssocialtensionsand allow of subjects to state their resentmentof authority.It even allows a ritualoverturning authority,especiallyin electionsof a mock king at New Year, or of a slave king in the old RomanSaturnalia. Gluckmann sees this institutionalization of rebellionas working throughits cathartic effect,as an emotional purgingof discontent.The ritualof rebellion thus reaffirms the unityof the socialsystemandstrengthens the established order.There are two further features of the ritual of rebellion. First, it occurs only within an established and unchallenged socialorder,and does not involveany notionwhichmight aimat altering it. Thus it is rebellion whichis institutionalized, notrevolution. The rebels are those seekingto appropriate positionsof authorityfor themselves,not to challenge the basis of authority;they are contenders,not revolutionaries. The socialorderkeeps whichthusemphasizes of conflicts this withinboundsby allowinga symbolicenactment the socialcohesionof the systemwithinwhichthese conflictsexist. Second,suchrituals cannotsettle conflict,whichis built into sociallife by the natureof the socialrules.They may serve only to createa temporary truce by sublimating these conflictsor obscuring
them.78

Those carnivalceremonieswhich involvethe electionof a mockkingor rulermight be said to exemplifythis principle.Significantly,in episcopalcities the mock king is involvesan inversion replacedby a mockbishop. The ritualof rebellionalso frequently or reversalof roles. Thus the mock ruler is often a fool or a child. Otherversionsof the ritualof rebellioncould be discernedin the customof stormingthe townhallduring courtsin whichpopular carnival and deposingthe council, or in the carnival justicewas meted out to those held to have offendedagainstthe community,but to haveescaped officialjustice.80 MikhailBakhtin's view of carnivalwould agreewith this in as far as intentionby carnivalreflects official culture. Moreover,he stressesthe conservative pointingout that officialculturelocates changesand momentsof crisis very firmlyin to the pastanduse the past. The officialperspective of carnivalwas to look backwards it to consecrate the present.8" The Nuremberg Schembartlauf, often taken as prototypicalof German carnival, providesa more specificexampleof the ritualof rebellion.All officialaccountsof this procession agreethat it was a privilege awarded to the Butchers' Guildin returnfortheir loyaltyto the town council duringthe revoltof 1348.They were grantedthe privilege of holdinga specialdanceat Fastnacht, and wereone of the few groupsallowedto wear masksduring carnival.82 Here one might commentthat if carnivalwas a ritualmeans of containingdiscontent, the authoritieswere unwillingto rely on its catharticeffect alone. The fear of rebellionwas expressedtowardsthe end of the fifteenthcenturyby
fur Jahrbuch See F. Gluckman, Rituals of Rebellion in South- brauchender Oberpfalz',Bayerisches der Volkskunde (1955), 68-9; ibid.,'Die Geschichte in FasFasnachtim Spiegelvon Archivforschung', (Tubingen, i964),28. Politics,Law and Ritualin TribalSociety(Oxford, nacht 82 Bakhtin, op. cit., 9. i965), ch. 6, esp. 258-9. 'OSee H. Moser, 'Archivalisches 82 zu JahreslaufSumberg,op. ci't, 33.
east Africa (Manchester, 1952); also Essays on the Ritualof SocialRelations (Manchester, 1962), 46, and
"I

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allowing only the runners who formed the guard for the butchers' dance to carry staves and to wear masks, and the grotesque figures who accompanied them were scrutinized by the council.' In Germany as a whole during the same period there was a swelling chorus of prohibitions of masking during carnival, all in the interests of good order.84 In Nuremberg the Schembartlauf increasingly from the middle of the fifteenth century fell into the hands of the patricians, who purchased the right of performing the dance and who supplied an increasing number of runners.85It does not seem to have been a conscious policy of the patrician government to bring the carnival so carefully under the control of the ruling elite, but such a development would not have been unwelcome to them. The Nuremberg council's nervousness about the possibility of disorder inherent in carnival was shared by the magistrates in many other places, and it seems to weaken arguments about its role as a ritual of rebellion. Gluckman, in his original ideas on rituals of rebellion, did leave as an open question the matter of the efficacy of these rituals and, in speaking of African tribal societies, he saw them as most successful in stationary or repetitive societies. In another work he states that they did not provide an effective long-term catharsis for anger or ambition.86 None the less, the notion seems highly relevant to some of our instances of carnival and Reformation. Even where they supported the Reformation, magistrates were always nervous about popular expressions of evangelical feeling. Any public demonstration of opposition to the established church could lead to disturbance which might go beyond mere matters of religion. Where the magistrates were tardy in introducing the Reformation matters could be worse. In Basel the council's reluctance to act against Catholicism led the evangelical party to radical measures. Direct action at Easter 1528 forced the council to remove images from the five churches which already had Lutheran preachers, and from autumn 1528 a committee was formed to put further pressure on the council.87 The parallels with the action committees formed during earlier urban revolts is too obvious to require further comment.88 By Christmas I528 twelve to fifteen guilds supported the evangelical party, and the committee held its meetings at the Gardiner's Guildhouse almost as a shadow government. By the eve of the iconoclastic riot on 9 February I 529 this committee was presenting political demands as well. Twelve Catholic councillors were to be removed, especially those from the patrician guilds. More pointedly, the master and councillor representing each guild were to be elected by the guild as a whole, not by the guild executive. The Small Council, the actual ruling body of Basel, was to be elected by the Great Council, not nominated by the outgoing
government.89

One cannot agree with Weidkuhn that events in Basel did show unambiguously
83 84

Ibid., 57.

vol. II (Basel, 1942), 17-18.

88 K. Kaser, Politische und sozialeBewegungen im deutschen zu Beginn desi6. Jht. (Stuttgart, Burgertum

'o Gluckman,Ritualsof Rebellion, 24, 3'; Essays, 46. 87 P. Burckhardt, Die Geschichte der Stadt Basel,

Moser, 'Stadtische Fasnacht', 147, 163. 85 Sumberg, op. cit., 6o-i.

8gg), 62, 167, 17389

Burckhardt, op. cit., 19.

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features of the ritual of rebellion,90 although it is worth noting that wider political demands were thrown aside once the council accepted the Reformation.Fear was perhapsmore significant,leading town councils to seek means of divertingreligious Danzigand the rulersof Zwickau,Naumburg, channels.Certainly fervourinto harmless feelingoff from Konigsbergwould have welcomedany meansof hedginganti-Catholic wider issues. Hildesheim is perhaps the best test case, particularlyas calls for
Reformation in I 532 had been linked to social and political demands.9' The anti-Catholic carnival of 1543 involved a ritual expulsion of the Catholic clergy and, significantly, of the bishop. This tactic was used elsewhere to distract attention from other internal conflicts,92and at least this feature can be regarded as a ritual of rebellion. It is certainly a relevant concept which may yield useful insights when applied to a broader range of examples.

4. Carnival as an alternative mass medium

The three approaches considered so far have regarded carnival as a means used by those in authority to affirm and uphold the existing order. Natalie Davis has expressed doubts about the 'safety valve' approach to popular culture, and accepts Bakhtin's notion of it as a 'second life of the people'.93 In this view it does not sanction and reinforce the given pattern of things, but presents an alternative, a 'utopian realm of freedom, equality and abundance', to quote Bakhtin.94Under this aspect the mockery, mimicry and parody of official life, culture and ceremonies seeks to overturn the official world by exposing it to ridicule. The process is twofold: exposure of the official world, and robbing it of its dignity.95 I want to consider this process as a form of communication, to regard carnival as an 'alternative mass medium'. An important characteristic of carnival is the way in which it abolishes the social distance between those whom it brings into contact. It creates freer forms of speech and gesture, and allows a familiarity of language outside the limits of social convention. These include the use of profanities and oaths, and images of what Bakhtin calls 'grotesque realism'. The latter involves the lowering of all that is high, spiritual, ideal or abstract to a material level, to the sphere of the earth and the body. Above all it is associated with basic bodily functions, with eating, drinking, defecating and sexual life. Bakhtin regards this as an integral part of carnival humour and parody.96 This freer form of contact can be regarded, within the carnivalcontext, as a mass medium, as a means of mass communication. It corresponds to Zygmunt Baumann'sidea of a mass medium: the communication of the same information to many people at the same time, without any differentiation according to the status of the addressees; communication in
90 Weidkuhn, op. cit., 293, 301-2.
91 X der Stadt Hildesheim, J. Gebauer, Geschichte
LXVI (1975), 29-60, esp. 39. PastandPresent, 93 9

(Leipzig, 1922), 311-12. 92 See, for example, the case of Erfurt, R. W. Scribner, 'Civic unity and the Reformationin Erfurt',

Davis, 'Reasons of misrule', 41, 49. Bakhtin, op. cit., 9.

9 Ibid., 19,21. "6 Ibid., 1(t-21.

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an irreversible direction; and the persuasiveness of the information passed on, because of the conviction that everyone is listening to the same message.97 I have also labelled it an alternativemass medium. Partly this is because it flows out of the second life of the people; partly because it also seeks to expose and degrade the values and style of official culture, to submit it to observability. It has been pointed out that a primary characteristic of a power elite is its relative degree of secrecy. The reduction of observability of those holding power enables them to plan and follow out strategies for preserving it.98 Opposition movements at the beginning of the sixteenth century seem to have been aware of this principle, for a common feature of urban revolts of the period is the attempt to submit ruling elites to greater observability.99Carnival was another popular form of observability. The cult of the church was removed from its position of mystery and placed in the common gaze in ridiculous terms. Similarly, tournaments, the transfer of feudal rights, the initiation of knights, justice, rule itself '10 were in turn deprived of their mystery and reduced to the level of grotesque realism. Communication was in two directions: the community spoke to itself, and to its rulers. Examined in this light, our carnival incidents become a form of propaganda for the Reformation. This is most clearly the case in Munster in I532 when the bishop was being pressed to introduce the Reformation, and in 1534 as the Anabaptists sought to seize control. The propagandist function is confirmed by the response of the chroniclers who reported the incidents as examples of Protestant shamelessness. In some cases, they are the earliest recorded expressions of support for the Reformation - in Wittenberg, Danzig, Naumburg and perhaps in Elbing. In Danzig the carnival play of the St Reinhart society can be seen as publicity for the Reformation. In 1523 they were accused by the Polish chancellor of being Lutherans and of mocking monks, cardinals and indulgences to the scorn of God and his saints. These Lutheran associations were confirmed in 1524 when they were admonished from Wittenberg to hold fast to God's Word.'0' Their use of carnival to disseminate the Reformation seems to have borne some fruit, for in July 1522 the first evangelical sermon took place in Danzig, and the bishop of Lesslau wrote during the year to complain of ecclesiastical innovation.'02In Naumburg, too, the carnival events were followed later that year by the appointment of a preacher, while in Zwickau the carnival hunt of monks and nuns was followed by the expulsion of the Franciscans from the town.'03 It is certainly not suggested that these were the results of the carnival incidents. It was the case, however, that the Reformation was usually introduced as an expression of some form of communal consensus.'04 What is being suggested here is
9 Z. Baumunt, 'A note on massculture:on infrastructure',in D. McQuail(ed.), Sociology of Mass

Simson, op. cit., 68. P. Simson, Geschichte der Stadt Danzig, ii Communications (1972), 64-5. (Danzig, 1913), 50-I. 103 F. 9 F. Alberoni, 'The powerless elite', in ibid.,82. Koster, 'Beitrage zur Reformationsge" Through the demandto havetowncouncils give schichte Naumburgsvon I525 bis 1545',Zeitschrift an annualaccounting xxii (x901), 149; Doelle, op. of their rule to the assembled fur Kirchengeschichte, commune,see Kaser,op. cit., i83. cit., 102. 100 Bakhtin, op. cit., 104 Ozment, op. cit., 1 25. 5, 7.
102

101

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that the carnival incidents may have contributed to forming that consensus, or to expressing it publicly once formed. We find a very clear example of this aspect of carnival in the Nuremberg Schembart procession of I539. The procession had not been held during the years 1524-38, possibly because of Protestant disapproval of festivities which seemed close to superstition. The leading Nuremberg preacher, Andreas Osiander, was a sober and puritanical man, and the Nuremberg citizenry clearly held him responsible for restrictions on their carnival life. In a float in the form of a Ship of Fools, Osiander was shown surrounded by fools and devils, holding a gaming board. He complained to the council, which arrested the carnival organizers and prohibited the Schembartonce more. In retaliation a crowd stormed Osiander's house.'05 In this case, as in our other examples of carnival, there is no doubt that carnival communicated the popular will to the magistrates as effectively as a popular vote. The connivance of the rulers in so many cases at such expression of popular feeling may well be taken as evidence that they had got the message.

5. Ritual desacralization I now want to take up in more detail the role of degradation and grotesque realism in carnival. Bakhtin sees this as the means through which the ideal, the spiritual and the abstract are reduced to the level of material reality.'06 In particular, parody of the cult of the church places it outside the realm of religiosity. This is perhaps an oversimplified view, regarding popular culture as essentially materialist, while religious and idealist world-views are something imposed from above. This scarcely allows any scope for carnival as an expression of a fervent religious spirit aroused by the Reformation, and begs many questions about the dialectical relationship between popular and official 107 culture. Bakhtin's argument may have some force if we regard our examples as expressions of anti-clericalism in which religious fervour plays a subsidiary part. The representation of the pope, cardinals, bishops, monks and nuns in our carnival incidents certainly shows that these figures have been removed from any elevated position and reduced to that of the mundane. And in some cases the degradation goes even further: to the level of beasts who may be hunted, or that of the outcast who is pelted with dung. If we had more information on the use of effigy, we could add that they had been reduced to the level of puppets, straw men.108All this is a form of desacralization, something more evident in the case of mockery of images and relics. This goes beyond mere anti-clericalism, and is designed to show that these objects do not possess any efficacious power. By virtue of their role in religious cult and ritual, they inhabit a sacral realm which gives them
108 It was a common term of abuse to call Catholic K. Drescher, Das Nurnbergische Schonbartbuch preachers'carnival puppets' (Fastnachtsbutz):see, for (Weimar, 1908), Ix, 3b; the float is depicted on 75b. 106 Bakhtin, op. cit., 19. example, Ulm where an angry crowd hurled the term 107 See also the commentsof Davis, 'Tasks and of abuse at a priest in 1524 who wished to open his themes', 307-9, on the categories in which popular sermon with an Ave Maria, Stadtarchiv Ulm, Ulmiensten 5314, 2oa. religionis discussed.
105

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numinous associations. In carnival they are reduced from this status to being once more mere material objects. There are two stages in this process. First, they are challenged to display their power, and when they cannot do so, their materiality is demonstrated by smashing them.109 This applied not only to images, but to such matters as the profanation of the host (the reverse process, one notes, to host miracles, in which the material bread is shown to have supernatural associations), and to a lesser degree to the challenging of papal bulls or indulgences. Luther's burning of the papal bull condemning him also had this character. The discussion thus far accords with Bakhtin's view, but ultimately I suspect that we must go beyond his simple materialism and seek our explanation in terms of social relations and their ideological expression. We could interpret carnival as acting out a desire to overthrow the existing social hierarchy, but it is significant that this so often remained at the level of acting. Only in the case of Munster do we find any attempt to accompany social degradation in carnival with a broader social change. The noticeable feature is the ritual characterof the actions. Social anthropologists regard ritual as a form of symbolic action basic to the existence of society because it aims at creating harmony and structure in the social order. In particular, it depends on its efficacy in creating a ranked and ordered world in which all play their appointed roles. The social system thus established recognizes positions of authority as endowed with explicit spiritual power to bless or curse. Disorder enters this structure where any ambiguity or anomaly exists within it, creating a sense of danger because of the threat to the completeness and wholeness of the system.'10 Mary Douglas argues that holiness is a question of such wholeness or completeness, and that such anomalies thus present a spiritual threat. The response to such perceived threats is a ritualized reaction - there is a ritual reordering and restructuring to remove the anomaly.1"' This looks suspiciously like the structuralist-functionalist assumption of an ever self-stabilizing social system, but it does appear to have a certain explanatory value for the Reformation, where religious change did not lead to radical social change.112 A world structured around the efficacious power of Catholic cult and ritual becomes for the evangelical believer both an anomaly and a danger to the world as a whole. The restructuring of this world is a necessity, most effectively carried out with the removal of the old religious order and the establishment of a new. The reordering of matters such as images, relics, the church hierarchy, etc., both removed them from their position of authority and demonstrated the effective loss of their spiritual power. They took their place within a structure of being where they were symbolically indifferent. In this sense
'09On these themes, see M. Warnke, 'Durchbro- Renaissance, xIx (1972), 7-41. 1 M. Douglas,PurityandDanger chene Geschichte? Die Bildersturme der Wiedertsu(i96), 39-40. 1 Ibid., 4o. fer in MIunster1534/1535',in M. Warnke (ed.), 112 This leaves aside the interpretation Bildersturm. Die Zerstorung desKunstwerks (Munich, of the 1973), 65-g8;also H. Bredekamp, 'Renaissancekultur Reformation as 'earlybourgeois revolution', someof als "Holle": SavonarolasVerbrennung der Eitel- the problemsof which I have indicatedelsewhere: keiten', in ibid., 41-64; R. C. Trexler, 'Florentine see my reviewarticle'Is therea socialhistoryof the religiousexperience: the sacredimage',Studies in the Reformation?', SocialHistory,IV(1977),484-7.

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Stephen Ozment has seen the Reformation as involving a secularization of daily life.113 This reordering or desacralizationwas often acted out ritually, and carnivalseems to have What seems evident from our examples been one of the contexts in which it occurred.1"4 is that it was initiated from the side of popular rather than of official culture.'15To see why it went no further, we must turn to our last approach to the interpretation of carnival.

6. The world turned upside-down

This is perhaps the most important of all the aspects of carnival we have been discussing, if only because the world turned upside-down is so frequent and universal a theme in late-medieval culture. It is manifest in a variety of forms, although not always in terms of a top-to-bottom inversion. The German term verkehrteWeltcaptures more effectively the variations of a world topsy-turvy, inside-out, inverted or reversed in which it appears. E. R. Curtius called attention to it as a stock topic of medieval literature. He saw it as going back to a classical principle of stringing together impossibilities, in terms such as the ass on the lyre or the blind leading the blind. Virgilian versions of such paradoxes were well known in the middle ages, and medieval literature carried the principle to the point of inversion. The twelfth-century Mirror of Fools spoke of the present as standing the entire past on its head, and the CarminaBuranagave it a popular formulation in a song beginning 'Once studies flourished, now all is turned to tedium'. This becomes a lament for the dominance of youth over age, frivolity over seriousness, inexperience over wisdom. Curtius saw the struggle of youth versus age, of moderns against ancients as a classic formulation of the notion."16 This theme enters the world of carnival in the contest of carnival and Lent, but Bakhtin sees carnival itself wholly as a world turned upside-down."7 Inversion is found everywhere. The youth or the fool is made king, folly and licence rule in place of wisdom and order, the high and the sublime are degraded, the serious is made comic and the revered is mocked. Travesty is another sign of this inversion, the exchange of clothes signifying the reversal of roles, especially where it involved dressing in clothes of the opposite sex. Bakhtin invests these inversions with a cosmic significance. Carnival presents an alternative world which upturns established authority and truth. These pretend to be ageless and immutable; carnival sets them firmly in the context of time and impermanence, showing them up as carnival dummies which can be destroyed inthe marketplace.118 Bakhtin sees carnival, of course, as an image of revolution, and indeed revolution can take on a carnivalesque spirit - this led Weidkuhn to compare Basel in 1520 with Paris in I968.
113 114

Ozment,op. cit., I16-20. N. Z. Davis,'The ritesof violencein sixteenth-

century France', Past and Present, LXIX (0973), 81-3,

discussesthis elementin religiousriotsin France. "I The officialritualformof such reordering was or of votes withintowns the holdingof disputations

as a formal means of introducing the Reformation, the outcome of which was usually known in advance. Latin andthe Literature 116 E. R. Curtius, European Middle Ages (1953), 94-8.
117

Bakhtin,op. cit., II.

"'8 Ibid.,. 2I3.

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Another form of verkehrteWelt is religious - the principle of inversion is an intrinsic theme in Christianity. In this form, the world in which we live is an inversion of reality. The here-and-now is the world upside-down, true reality its inversion. The Gospels abound in examples of inversion: the last shall be first and the first last (Matthew 19:30); he who humbles himself shall be exalted and he who exalts himself shall be humbled. The parable of Lazarus and the rich man Dives also exemplifies this inversion principle, interestingly enough, the most popular New Testament parableof the later middle ages. "9 This embodied an idea of compensatory justice, which could be used conservatively to sanction an established hierarchy. Related to this conservative outlook, in which everything has its appointed place in this world, is a pessimistic view of the verkehrteWelt.The world is upside-down because that which should never have been allowed to happen has come to pass. The natural order has been upturned, and this is a sign of decline. It was a common view at the end of the fifteenth century, and is found in Sebastian Brant's Ship of Fools, which expresses a doom-laden sense of inversion in its concept of folly. The world is full of decay because it is full of disorder, where all is out of place.'20 This pessimistic view of the world upside-down reflects a prophetic and ultimately chiliastic view of inversion. The verkehrte Welt is a sign of the last days. It is expressed in inversions of nature, in signs and wonders in the heavens, in rains of blood or of crosses, and in the birth of monsters.'2' Such reversals of nature doubtless had biblical roots, but they were popularized in the prophetic literature at the end of the middle ages. The Tiburtine Sybil, part of one of the most widely read of the popular prophecies, gave a particularlyforceful exposition of the concept.'22 The truly chiliastic outlook, of course, did not regard the thought of the verkehrteWeltwith gloom or foreboding, but with joy. The world turned upside-down was exactly what one wished to see, for it meant the attainment of true reality. The most compelling form of inversion known to the middle ages was perhaps the figure of the Antichrist, who was the complete reversal of everything that Christ was for Christian salvation history, and whose personal history was a black parody of that of Christ. By drawing on this figure and so successfully identifying him with the pope, or rather the papacy, Luther assimilated the verkehrteWeltinto his religious movement in one of its most powerful forms.'23 It would not be too much to say that the evangelical movement became the inheritor of the prophetic and chiliastic notions of inversion so prevalent in the later middle ages. This gave the opposition of the old and new belief a cosmic significance it might otherwise have lacked - it made it a contest of true and false belief in a total sense. Catholicism was thus not merely a mistake or a delusion, it was the very antithesis of true belief. Thus the acceptance or rejection of the Gospel
"9 T. S. R. Boase,Deathin theMiddle Ages (1972), 28-35, 45.
120
121

weissagung, facsimileedition in A. Ritter(ed.), Collectio Vaticinorum (Berlin, 1923).

123 H. Preuss, Die Vorstellung vom Antichrist im spateren Mittelalter, beiLuther undinderkonfessionellen lyptische Saeculum undLuther Polemik (Leipzig, i9o6), 10-27 on the natureof the (Hamburg,i948), 225. 122 See Die dreizehest Sibylla, in Zwolff Sibyllen Antichrist,85-179on Luther'suse of the figure.

Lefebvre, op. cit., &8-". W. E. Peuckert,Die grosseWende. Das apoka-

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had to be total, there could be no half-measures. In this sense, the evangelical movement itself was a world turned upside-down. Given the extent to which carnival was also an inverted world, it seems to be a natural mode of expression for the new belief. It witnessed both the sense of total inversion of the old order, as well as the true believer's sense of joy at attaining the 'correct' world. We have said that the verkehrte Welt was a near universal theme in the later middle ages. Indeed, it can be regarded as running through all those aspects of carnival we have already discussed, and can be taken as a unifying theme. The role of youth was to invert the values of the previous generation, play and game inverted the mundane world, the ritual of rebellion upturned the structure of rule and hierarchy; carnival presented an alternative form of communication to that of the established order (the edict, the sermon, even the printed word), and ritual desacralizationoverthrew the given hierarchyof sacred persons and objects. These were all forms of collective behaviour which could be appropriated for the new belief in differing ways and with varying results. In fact, we can discern two possibilities running throughout our discussion. These collective forms might serve to integrate the Reformation into existing structures, and use it to reaffirm them, or it might lead it to challenge them, to overturn them. We know that the latter did not occur. Whether this was primarily because of the nature of the evangelical movement itself, or because of the nature of late-medieval collective mentalities must remain at this point an open question.'24 More importantly, when the new belief sought to express itself collectively it turned not only to new forms of collective expression it had created itself, such as the hymn-singing community.125 Prior to this, it turned to modes such as carnival which were deeply embedded in the cultural experience of the people. As such, carnival can be said to have met a collective psychological and social need of the new faith in its early stages. For the individual believer such a radical change of opinion would not have been possible without extreme tensions and mental stress. By drawing on the collective resources of the community, carnival made possible the transition from the old to the new. Social anthropologists see such transitions as fraught with the danger of destruction - the disaggregation of values involved need not be followed by any reintegration of values.126 One may argue that carnival facilitated this transition - the world turned upside-down but it was seen as liberating, but not destructive. Of course, carnival was only one of the means through which this was done,
124 Important here is E. P. Thompson's concept of the 'moral economy' of the pre-industrial crowd, see 'The moral economy of the English Crowd in the L (1971), 76-136. eighteenth-century', PastandPresent, As Thompson points out, the popular ideology was both formed under the influence of that of the rulers, but also broke decisively from it, not least in seeing direct action as legitimate. Natalie Davis has discerned this kind of ambivalence in religious riot in France, wvhere the crowd saw direct action as justified, but saw

itself as carrying out the roles in which their magistrates had failed. As I have suggested throughout, carnival shares this ambivalence, and it is certainly a central feature of the Reformationregarded as a popular movement. It requires a separatedetailed investigation. Protestant printing 125 See N. Z. Davis, 'The et workers of Lyons in 15ii', Travaux d'humanisme renaissance,xxviii-xxix (19574), 251. 126 See Gluckman, Essays, 3.

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and we need to look for other popular cultural forms and their role in the Reformation before we can understand it fully as a manifestation of collective mentalities. Study of our limited range of examples reveals, however, the need for methodological caution. Like other popular cultural phenomena of the pre-industrial period, such as prophecy or millennialism, carnival is ambivalent in its purposes and expressions.'27 As such, it witnesses the richness and complexity of popular culture, and the movements to which it gave birth.

Portsmouth Polytechnic
E. J. Hobsbawm, Primitive Rebels (Manchester, kindsof millennialism need leadto such movements, see M. Reeves, Joachimof Fiore and the Prophetic in socialprotestmovements, millennialism but notall Future (1976), vii.
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1959), chs. 3-6 called attention to the importance of