Throughout the British Isles, Shrove Tuesday is celebrated by baking pancakes – a legacy of the days when Christian families used up their supplies of butter and eggs before the lean season of Lent. However, in the central England town of Ashbourne in the Derbyshire Dales, Pancake Day is celebrated with a little more enthusiasm.
The entire city is consumed every Shrove Tuesday and Ash Wednesday (this year, February 13 and 14) by an ancient and extremely chaotic ball game known as Shrove Tuesday football, in which the population is divided into two teams who attempt to maneuver a large ball across a field. a melee of hundreds of people to reach one of two objectives, three miles apart. The ‘goals’ are two stone monuments on the site of ancient mills, Clifton Mill and Sturston Mill; Players score by tapping the ball against them three times.
This is achieved by any means necessary – flying fists, kung fu kicks and even gnawed teeth are all possible prey inside the immense melee, known as “the embrace”. ”, which moves at will through city streets, rivers and muddy fields as each. The team fights for control of the ball. For two days only, the usual rules of society are suspended. This normally genteel town is engulfed in a deluge of violence, and colleagues, friends and family members become sworn enemies.
And they love it.
“In the days leading up to Shrovetide, you can see everyone sparkling with enthusiasm,” local Amy Fisher told me at the city’s Greenman Pub on the first morning of the 2023 celebration. even later in the day, she said, showing me a flask in her pocket. “Last time I kept going in and out of the hug to come back here to the pub,” she said. “But this year, I’m committing to it for the long term.
Fisher is an Up’ard, that is, someone from north of Henmore Brook, which runs through the town and is the geographic line along which Shrovetide’s football teams are divided. His friend Pinder Dayal, who works at the pub, is a Down’ard – someone from south of the creek. Despite the apparent animosity between the two teams, it is a sacred Ashbourne tradition and fiercely protected as such by local people. “Foreigners are welcome to watch, as long as they don’t get in the way,” Dayal said. “But as the chairman of the Shrovetide committee says, this is a local game for the local people.” Perhaps this is a clue to the purpose of Shrovetide football; although it seems to tear the city apart, it actually strengthens their collective identity.