Europe
Festival of 1162 year! Thanks to the Venice Republic’s victory over Patriarch Ulrich of Aquileia who was their enemy. Another idea behind this is to celebrate the transition from winter to spring.
Celebration happens in the streets of Venice where locals gathered in Saint Mark’s Square (San Marco) to dance and salut their victory.
One of the oldest festivals that exists today, perhaps could be the oldest one that is celebrated in the same style since 16th century! In fact few times it was stopped… during the reign of Napoleon when Venice became part of the Austrian-held Kingdom of Lombardy-Venetia in 1797, thus roughly for 200 years Carnival disappeared…
Good job for bringing it back as the first thing that comes to mind about Venice is the Carnival! This event is truly deserved to be a city’s signature as thousands folks from around the world come to Venice to dress up or just witness this classy masquerade that is known for its impressive way to show the mix of tradition, history, and entertainment. What to wear? To be the one of Venetian you should wear a costume yourself, and thus expect people to making a pictures with you, otherwise join the public and enjoy the show.
Usually the event is held for 12 days and thus ends 40 days before Easter.
Apparently, this legendary festival started once upon a time when Portuguese immigrants came to Brazil and introduced the Entrudo in 1723. In fact it was not as sparkling, exciting, or full of shiny-smile shared happiness back then as it is for today. Back then on the streets people were soaking each other with buckets of water, perhaps smashing each other with mud and food, therefore usually ended up with street brawls and riots…so now who would doubt that 300 years back this even was nothing else but fighting someone.