Carnival
 Carnivals in Malta, as we know them now, were first organised shortly after the Knights of St John came to the Island in 1535. The first that really broke out into the general jollification was probably the Carnival of 1560, when a massed Christian Armada was harbour-bound in Malta before sailing to Tripoli. The Grand Admiral sent his men ashore while Grand Master La Valette sanctioned the wearing of masks in public, which no doubt helped to ease their inhibitions. This was a marked contrast to the action of Grand Master Lascaris, who in 1639 prohibited the wearing of masks by women under penalty of their being whipped. By the middle of the 18th Century, Carnival in Valletta was in its heyday. From 1751 onwards a rival Carnival attraction took place in Floriana a few weeks before Carnival proper and it too, involved a defile of masks and carriages. The Order encouraged the craze by staging extra Carnivals called "Mad Carnivals" for special occasions. During that period it was usual for the Grand Master's carriage to head the Carnival Procession and it would be flanked by cavalry marching to the beat of the drums. For many years now Carnival in Malta has been re-established as a season of general jollification. Today, Carnival is one of the main Cultural events in the Maltese cultural calendar. Carnival is organised prior to the Catholic period of Lent which comes prior to the religious festivities of Easter Sunday. The main activities are held in the streets of the Maltese capital Valletta and Floriana, but other activities are held in various villages in Malta and in Gozo. Carnival In Gozo In the villages of the island of Gozo, the people used to make up the carnival carts themselves. They used to decrorate their horse-carts with palm leaves and other types of leaves, and anything which they managed to find around in those exciting pre-Carnival days. Ready-made costumes were hard to find and expensive to buy, therefore, they used to make up their own costumes out of sheets, blankets and other every-day clothes. At sunset, the maskarati (people wearing a mask and clothes to disguise themselves), used to come out into the streets, shouting, whistling and doing things which would be regarded as strange, during the normal days of the year. Sometimes, they used to throw sweets, while those who could afford them, used to throw sweet almonds. At those times, the streets of Gozo used to be poorly lit. This helped in encouraging these maskarati to put aside their habitual shyness and throw themselves along with the others, enjoying the outraging happiness. This was to be the Carnival of the past, a Carnival with no set of rules and organisation. But it was a spontaneous Carnival, a Carnival inspired from the psychological needs of the people who used to live a very hard life, full of restrictions and limitations. Fortunately this type of Carnival has set roots in several villages of Gozo and one can still enjoy them at Nadur, Xaghra and Sannat. The Gozitan village of Nadur is the World's Carnival City 2004/2005. The grotesque and macabre Carnival in Nadur is a unique experience and has become one of the biggest spontaneous events which take place in the Maltese Islands. Origions of Carnival  Carnival is the oldest festival in the world. Some authors even suggest it originated around 10,000 BC, from the seasonal farming rituals of the ancient peoples. They would greet the return of the spring solstice with singing and dancing. At the festivals to the Egyptian goddess Isis and the bull Apis, and the Teuton goddess Herta, there were already signs of such behaviour. These practices were reinforced in the Roman and Greek bacchanalia, saturnalia and lupercalia feasts. The festivals, between December 16 and 18, in the northern hemisphere, marked the return of the sun to the fields. The Catholic Church initially repudiated the pagan festivals of the primitive peoples but as it found it impossible to eliminate them, it incorporated them to the Julian - Gregorian calendar adapted by Pope Gregory XIII in 1582. When another two months (July and August) were added in homage to the Roman emperors, Carnival dates, which should have coincided with December 16 to 18, were moved forward. Carnival dates for Christians were fixed according to the Catholic Easter. The festival of Christ's resurrection, the Church's sacred dogma, was marked as follows: To avoid coinciding with the Easter of the Hebrews (Pessat) - which on the fixed date of Nissan 15 (the first month of the Jewish calendar, the start of springtime), the Catholic Easter was set fourteen days after the first new moon after March 21 (start of Spring among the Jews and Romans). So the Catholic Easter Sunday varies between March 22 and April 25 and Carnival Sunday always occurs seven Sundays before Easter, between February and March. This includes the Brazilian Carnival.
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