Quote:
Originally Posted by Astromancer
Has anyone thought about widely celebrated holidays?
Did Christmas and Valentine's Day catch on? Is Slug Frying Day a major greeting card holiday?
Please, give us details.
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I have Departure and Homecoming for when the merchant fleet traditionally departs and arrives (a hangover from the on-planet trading season which depends on the whether as the off-world one does not). Both involve partying of all sorts though the later also involves a day of fasting in memorial to the year's casualties and gifts to the poor by the various Merchants' guilds. Mead is traditionally served on both occasions; that is a trader's drink (because bees are an animal that lives by "trading", goes on long voyages, lives in cities and defends it's cities to the death when attacked). These are not Imperial Holidays per se, but customs being contagious are often celebrated in the Imperial Enclave.
Christmas and Valentine's Day still remain. Traditionally Christmas Eve is a fast day and Christmas Day a feast day. Church takes place Christmas Eve, family presents are given Christmas Morn, and the evening of Christmas is for clan feastings.
Weekends are considered party time, and a little bit of tolerable wildness in youngweds is looked on indulgently. Hangouts, clubs, bazaars, etc of various kinds are expected to be full especially at nighttime. Jews of course party on Friday or Sunday rather then Saturday. Goyim, usually Christians but also Parsees, Sikhs, and Maar Zon(the last of whom arrived with the Imperium) party on Friday evening and Saturday. Christians rest and worship on Sundays as Jews do on Saturday though less stringently. Not everyone goes out on the town on the weekend and those who do don't on every weekend, it is just the city is more lively on weekends.
Each clan and each guild has their own feast and fast schedule as well as the ones known to everyone as does each religious sect. There are also days celebrating events of civic importance such as a city founding. Or an Antitriumph (described elsewhere). As well there are irregular, or semi-regular holidays like rites of passage, marriages, the ascension of a chief or what not that celebrate a single event rather then a specific date. One irregular holiday of note is the renaming of a prize taken in a successful privateering voyage (a ship isn't completely captured until it has a new name). While the characters culture are not a conquering culture in the sense of being Bonapartist, they are a warlike one by the need of living in a hard neighborhood and there is usually someone to take out a letter of marque on if only Vargr corsairs. And a successful war voyage is a source of celebration. So it is a fair guess that everyday someone is partying for some reason or none.
Traditions include such things as outdoor storytelling by a bonfire (or indoor at a coffeehouse or drinking house), dancing, gambling and so on. As I said before the only meat served on holidays is hunted, usually from a game park; stuff from a knacker usually is a desecration to holiday season though clans vary in how strict they keep that. Jewish clans capture the meat alive and then have it slaughtered in a traditional manner, the main point being that it had a fair chance to get away one way or another. It is the right of young virgin males to provide the meat, usually hare caught with Aslan firyehs when they are young, when they are older they can use a rifle and chase deer or antelope in either case hunted in packs of six. Other sports include jousting, polo, pigsticking, "Vantha hunts" (from an light flyer or ornithopter that is-I.E as close as humans can get to hunting like an Evantha), hawking, yachting and other such gentlemanly forms of outdoor entertainment. And the Gilda Vindicta(dualing guilds) allow spectators for both sporting matches and grudge matches as well as matches settling interclan disputes. Drinks include most kinds of alcohol and caffine but coffee is the favorite, and as I said Mead has a special place. The character's city is an autonomous Enclave of a diplomatic port therefore more formal celebrations than are fashionable in many settlements of their culture take place. Waltzes and ballets for instance are popular as well as reels. Ice dancing is also popular both by professionals and amateurs.
Militia exercises are treated as sport as well as training for war and gambling is rampant. I once wrote a story where the Imperial Chief of Station placed a bet locally on the assumption that the bookie would be less cautious with information if he thought of him as a patron then he would if he thought of him as a foreign intelligencer.
But no, there is no slug frying day. Although Departure usually comes just after the Springfish run so part of the fun is catching as many fish (and as many fellow predators too) as possible. In fact the other predators that gather for the Springfish run are some of the best parts; Springfish are only for eating but Lancers, which are sort of like Marlin, are considered a worthy catch and are usually taken with a combination of hook and line and harpoon. Lancer teeth are often made into jewelry as is their bill. In any case putting Departure after the fish run is a practical way of stocking on rations as well as being fun.