Easter Monday

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Easter Monday is the day after Easter Sunday and is celebrated as a holiday in some largely Christian cultures.

Formerly, the post-Easter festivities involved a week of secular celebration, but this was reduced to one day in the 19th century. Events include egg rolling competitions and, in predominantly Catholic countries, dousing other people with water which, at one time, had been holy water blessed the day before at Easter Sunday Mass and carried home to bless the house and food.

Easter Monday on the Catholic liturgical calendar is the second day of the octave of Easter Week.

Though not largely observed in the United States the day remains informally observed in some areas such as the state of North Carolina Template:Cite-needed.

1 Specific traditions
2 Official holiday
3 External links
4 References

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Specific traditions

Dyngus Day or Wet Monday (Polish Śmigus-dyngus, Lany Poniedziałek, Polewanka or Oblewanka) is the name for Easter Monday in Poland. In the Czech Republic it is called Velikonoční Pondělí or Pomlázka. Both countries practice a peculiar custom on this day.

In Poland, traditionally, boys will awaken girls early in the morning and douse them with water and strike them about the legs with long thin twigs or switches made from willow, birch or decorated tree branches (palmy wielkanocne). This practice is possibly connected to a pre-Christian, pagan fertility rite, that seems in line with the Ancient Roman Lupercalia, although the earliest documented records of Dyngus Day in Poland are from the 15th century, almost half a millennium after Poland adopted Christianity.

Early in the Polish evolution of the tradition, the Dyngus custom was clearly differentiated from Śmigus: Dyngus was the exchange of gifts (usually eggs, often decorated like pisankas), under the threat of water splashing if one party did not have any eggs ready, while Śmigus (from Śmigać, to whoosh, ie make a whipping noise) referred to the striking.

Later the focus shifted to the courting aspect of the ritual, and young unmarried girls were the only acceptable targets. A boy would sneak into the bedroom of the particular girl he fancied and awaken her by completely drenching her with multiple buckets of water. Politics played an important role in proceedings, and often the boy would get access to the house only by arrangement with the girl's mother.

Throughout the day, girls would find themselves the victims of drenchings and leg-whippings, and a daughter who wasn't targeted for such activities was generally considered to be beznadziejna (hopeless) in this very coupling-oriented environment.

Most recently, the tradition has changed to become entirely water-focused, and the Śmigus part is almost forgotten. It is quite common for girls to attack boys just as fiercely as the boys traditionally attacked the girls. With much of Poland's population residing in tall apartment buildings, high balconies are favourite hiding places for young people who gleefully empty entire buckets of water onto randomly selected passers-by.

In the Czech Republic (and in parts of Slovakia), instead of splashing water, a special handmade whip decorated with ribbons called pomlázka (Slovak: korbáč) is used on females in the morning. The boys usually accompany the whipping with a special Easter carol and then are given a decorated hard-boiled egg (a ribbon, or possibly a snifter of liquor). In the afternoon, females can douse males with cold water. In some other parts of Slovakia boys use water or perfume to splash the girls and then girls whip boys on Tuesday.

In the United States, Dyngus Day celebrations are widespread and popular in Buffalo, New York and South Bend, Indiana. In Buffalo's eastern suburbs, Dyngus Day is celebrated with a level of enthusiasm that rivals St. Patrick's Day. In South Bend, the day is often used to launch the year's political campaign season (particularly among Democrats)- often from within the West-Side Democratic Club, the Falcons Club or in local pubs, where buying drinks is favored over handshaking.

For Easter Monday in Hungary, perfume or perfumed-water is used. The girls would reward the boys who sprinkle with coins or Easter eggs.

In Guyana, people fly kites, which are made on Holy Saturday.

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