1.april fools' day or all fools' day, though not a holiday in its own right, is a notable day celebrated in many countries on april 1. the day is marked by the commission of hoaxes and other practical jokes of varying sophistication on friends and neighbors, or sending them on fools' errands, the aim of which is to embarrass the gullible. in some countries, april fools' jokes (also called "april fools") are only made before midday. [1] it is also widely celebrated on the internet.
2.origin
the origin of this custom has been much disputed. many theories have been suggested.
what seems certain is that it is in some way or other a relic of those once universal festivities held at the vernal equinox, which, beginning on old new year's day, the 25th of march, ended on the 1st of april.
it has been suggested that europe derived its april-fooling from the french [2]. france was one of the first nations to make january 1 officially new year's day (which was already celebrated by many), by decree of charles ix. this was in 1564, even before the adoption of the gregorian calendar (see julian start of the year). thus the new year's gifts and visits of felicitation which had been the feature of the 1st of april became associated with the first day of january, and those who disliked or did not hear about the change were fair game for those wits who amused themselves by sending mock presents and paying calls of pretended ceremony on the 1st of april. french and dutch references from 1508 and 1539 respectively describe april fools' day jokes and the custom of making them on the first of april.
though the 1st of april appears to have been anciently observed in great britain as a general festival, it was apparently not until the beginning of the 18th century that the making of april-fools was a common custom. in scotland the custom was known as "hunting the gowk," i.e. the cuckoo, and april-fools were "april-gowks," the cuckoo being there, as it is in most lands, a term of contempt. in france the person fooled is known as poisson d'avril. this has been explained from the association of ideas arising from the fact that in april the sun quits the zodiacal sign of the fish. a far more natural explanation would seem to be that the april fish would be a young fish and therefore easily caught.
the dutch celebrate the 1st of april for other reasons. in 1572, the netherlands were ruled by spain's king philip ii. roaming the region were dutch rebels who called themselves geuzen, after the french "gueux", meaning beggars. on 1 april, 1572, the geuzen seized the small coastal town of den briel. this event was also the start of the general civil rising against the spanish in other cities in the netherlands. the duke of alba, commander of the spanish army could not prevent the uprising. bril is the dutch word for glasses, so on 1 april, 1572, "alba lost his glasses". dutch people find this joke so hilarious they still commemorate the first of april.
the french traditionally celebrated this holiday by placing a dead fish on the back of friends. today the fish is substituted by a floppy kerk.
chaucer's story, the nun's priest's tale, written c.1400, takes place on 32 march; that is, 1 april; it is chanticleer and the fox, a story of two fools.
3.well-known hoaxes
alabama changes the value of pi: the april 1998 newsletter of new mexicans for science and reason contained an article claiming that the alabama legislature had voted to change the value of the mathematical constant pi to the "biblical value" of 3.0. this claim originally appeared as a news story in the 1961 sci-fi classic "stranger in a strange land" by robert a. heinlein.
spaghetti trees: the bbc television programme panorama ran a famous hoax in 1957, showing the swiss harvesting spaghetti from trees. they had claimed that the despised pest the spaghetti wevil had been eradicated. a large number of people contacted the bbc wanting to know how to cultivate their own spaghetti trees.
[关于愚人节的英文介绍]