master of revels (especially at Christmas time), also known as abbot of unreason (Archaic)
The Lord of Misrule, known in
Scotland as the Abbot of Unreason and in
France as the Prince des Sots, was an officer appointed by lot at
Christmas to preside over the
Feast of Fools. The Lord of Misrule was generally a peasant or sub-deacon appointed to be in charge of Christmas revelries, which often included drunkenness and wild partying, in the pagan tradition of
Saturnalia. The Church held a similar festival involving a
Boy Bishop. The celebration of the Feast of Fools was outlawed by the
Council of Basel that sat from 1431, but it survived to be put down again by the Catholic
Queen Mary I in England in 1555.
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