The festival of Mohacs town
Let's get some knowledge about the festival of Mohacs and have a look at two explanations for the origin of this popular festival.
According to the first and most wide-spread explanation, the aim of the festival was to bury and expel winter. During the festival, people put on frightening clothes and hope that winter will get afraid of them and run away. At the end of the festival they burn a puppet made of straw, with which they symbolise the death of winter. In addition, people dressed in fearful clothes used to walk round the houses, the yards and the animals shouting "bao-bao" and making noise with horns and cattle bells (see on the photos).
Then they scattered ash at the house, and hoped that it would keep the evil spirits off. The highlight of this festival was the men's fight on the main square, which used to mean the ceremony of becoming a man.
According to the second story, the reason for this tradition was the Turks' continuous attack. In the 16th-17th centuries Hungary was under Turkish invasion. However, there was a region in the country that the Turks couldn't occupy. It was the Mohacs island, a swampy area, where people from the neighbourhood could escape on a secret path, and hide during the attacks. Once the Turkish soldiers found the secret path leading to the island, and wanted to attack the island. Then the people on the island, who didn't have any weapons, decided to put on fearful clothes and frighten the superstitious Turks away by wearing goat horns and making a very big noise with rattles and horns. Their plan was very successful: the enemy left the weapons on the island and ran away.
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Now let's see what happens during the festival today. The festive procession consists of three groups. The first group is formed by people wearing special wooden masks (see on the pictures above), fur coats which are turned inside out and sometimes white trousers stuffed with straw. They have rattles and they carry the only horn which is 2-4 meters long. People in the second group wear fancy dresses, but they haven't got masks. The third group includes the "jankels", who have smoky faces, and they carry the very important sack of ash. There's a very important rule: children mustn't come close to these groups, because then the magic will fail.
This festival, which takes place at the end of February, attracts a huge crowd, so a great number of onlookers are standing round the groups.
We hope that you like this old popular folk custom, and you'll come and visit this unique Hungarian festival.