In February 1580, a Feast Tuesday Carnival was held in Romand, a small town in the Dauphiné province in southeastern France. This carnival, which was originally held every year, was "even more grand than usual, but it turned into a bloody ambush of small town dignitaries on the craftsmen. The leaders of the craftsmen were either killed or thrown into prison." , Why did the colorful festival turn into a "bloody feast" in an instant? Although nearly five hundred years have passed since then, there is an outstanding master of micro-history who is unwilling to let this matter remain silent. He decided to draw out the story from "Romang's fifteen-day history, which is just two weeks." Residents on both sides of the Isere first dressed up and then fought with each other... fifteen days of restlessness, color and bloodshed." He is Emmanuel Le Valadourie, professor of the history of modern civilization at the Collège de France. The origins of the Carnival were once described in detail in "Montailyou", a historical ethnography of a mountain village in southern France in the 14th century; and in "The Thoughts and Methods of Historians", an anthropological perspective was used to examine the "18th century". "The Burgundian Countryside" Le Valladurie moved his writing from the countryside to the city, and gave way to the subject of writing from history to religious folklore. Obviously, it was not to describe people's extreme carnival in the "Carnival", but to describe people's extreme carnival. It is to use people's feigned carnival and revelry in these short two weeks to reflect the projection of the larger political-economic background in the way human culture interacts. In addition, the author's ambition is not limited to the special events that occurred at a carnival in the French countryside in the 16th century. Although there were still more than 200 years before the "French Revolution" at the end of the 19th century, the author, who was deeply influenced by the French "Annals School", patiently restored this small event limited to one corner, believing that it would trigger the turmoil two hundred years later. , the trajectory of the butterfly wings that once flapped in the frenzy of the times. As the author quoted Marx as having to admit in the article "The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte": "The French revolutionaries from 1789 to 1799 wore the clothes of the Roman Republic and Rome a long time ago. The old clothes of the empire." To understand how a folk festival in a small town in the 16th century was constructed as the beginning of a long "butterfly effect", we must first understand that although there are many variations of "carnival" in other cultures, it is A particularly prominent holiday in Christianity. “Carnival is an event before Lent, but it is very different from Lent, which makes Carnival the greatest distance from Christian teachings,” Leroy Ladurie explained. Just because “Lent is supposed to be about fasting, abstinence, and showing noble virtues... it is a time of peace, God’s truce.” Carnival is the complete opposite of this. “It promotes crime, food, and Dirty language, gluttony, sexual indulgence, group dancing, electing 'kings' and 'queens', potential sexual assaults and threats to rich beauties." Such different festivals are one of the most infectious themes in Christian culture. The reason why this festival exists in Christianity is because it has a very interesting origin. "Carnival is a folkloric, rural and even pagan behavior", and its metaphorical purpose is to "bury the days of irreligion" , "Thus, it directly replicates some of the winter festival activities of unbelievers before Christianity came into being." Therefore, the Carnival, in the form of an annual festival, reproduces the "historical memory" of the ancient inhabitants of Gaul in the Roman Empire, the "barbaric" and "free" life before Christianity, "but this joy must be celebrated during fasting" When the time comes, drive them all away," Leroy Ladurie summed up the historical background of the Carnival. Although Carnival is an integral part of Christianity, it has undeniable pagan origins. More importantly, the pre-Christian era that Carnival strives to present is not so much a scene of "crime, food and obscene language, gluttony... …” is an absurd scene. Rather, it metaphorically expresses a recollection of the “egalitarian” traditions of the Celtic and Germanic periods in pre-Christian times by breaking down the roles played by people in their daily lives. Economic Factors Behind the Struggle So, when we return to the small town of Romans in February 1580, on this carnival day, how did the festival that was originally a festival where the poor and the rich put aside their daily identities and sit at the same table again evolved? What about a "bloody massacre"? Although Leroy Ladurie only mentioned it briefly, we can still capture it. He said, "The rise in prices was an uninterrupted phenomenon during the entire 16th century." The reason behind it comes from "importation from South America." The impact of precious metals on currencies.” The import of precious metals led to continued price increases, which was "the real reason why the Roman consuls requested an increase in taxes in 1576." Contrary to the rise in prices, a small number of people "turned from bourgeois who owned large amounts of land and real estate to aristocrats" due to the influx of external wealth. With the acquisition of the status of "new aristocrats", they have achieved the same status as the old aristocrats. The privilege of being exempt from paying taxes—taxes were increasing, but the number of third estates bearing taxes was decreasing, while incomes did not increase significantly—“in the Romans region and the adjacent Vienne region…the robed nobles, The land occupied by the sword-bearing nobles and ecclesiastics accounted for nearly two-fifths of the total local land," and these lands enjoyed tax-free privileges. Almost as two hundred years later, the Third Estate bore all tax responsibilities while having no power of their own in Parliament.

What happened next was somewhat logical. "The main target of the farmers' attack was the tax privileges enjoyed by the lords and non-lord nobles. The taxes exempted by the nobles were passed on to the third estate, thus stimulating the peasants to resent this unfairness." However, what made the third estate even more angry was the king's edict in 1556, "Whether it is the real estate of the new or old nobles, whether it is newly acquired by the nobles or not, all the properties of the nobles will continue to be enjoyed." Tax-free privileges”. The king's edict showed the failure of the representatives of the third estate to appeal to the king. "Since negotiation is no longer effective, then resort to force," because this has been a certain tradition in France since the Huguenot Wars of Religion. Here Leroy Ladurie grasps two key points of convergence: people's growing demands for equality (fairness), and a ritual that metaphors equality. The man who combined the two was a wealthy tapestry master and businessman named Jean Self. He is a local athlete in Romeng. He is famous for his accurate marksmanship and superb tennis skills, and is nicknamed the "King of Balls" for this reason. His image comes from a full year before the Bloody Carnival, the last carnival he participated in on February 3, 1579. This day was the local "St. Blaise's Day". St. Blaise was the ancestor of the tapestry industry. , and Romand is a wool textile center in the foothills of the Alps, so you can imagine Self's influence in the local area. On the opening day of the carnival each year, Self, who was elected captain of the vigilante group, would wear a bearskin and walk at the front of the procession, as in folklore, because in the myth "Saint Blaise is a bear-like man... ...The bear comes out of its hibernation cave every February (February 2)...signifying that the harsh winter is over and all things are about to revive." And Self as St. Blaise - (symbolizing power and uncontrollable). The actor who plays the bear possesses the magic power of a demigod during folk festivals. Under his call, the people who have entered the carnival atmosphere of "crime, food and obscene language, gluttony..." are attracted by The old and new aristocrats were completely caught off guard. Because his opponents from the aristocracy have already experienced his power. He once "broke into the Romans City Council Hall, convened a city council, and drove away all the upper-class people who were originally city councilors and replaced them with the dirty people who followed him." People, put these guys on the city council.” With these "misdeeds" and the intensifying conflicts between the third estate and the nobles over taxation in the past year, Self's power has been indirectly enhanced. When the carnival will be held again in a year's time, The nobles were prepared to strike first. The struggle between aristocrats and peasants continues. Although the framework connection between folk symbolism and people's specific behaviors is a bit far-fetched, Leroy Ladurie's dramatic attempt to combine ritual descriptions with historical narratives is quite effective. Reflecting the marriage of microhistory and ethnography. In the carnival parade ceremony, the three kingdoms of the aristocracy, symbolized by the eagle, and the poor, symbolized by the capon, sheep, and hare, competed for glory under the leadership of Selfo, the bear actor, and secretly competed for supremacy. Bypassing these costumed dance troupes, there was no booze, good food and orgies in the crowds that symbolized the reconciliation between the poor and the rich. "They (the armed aristocrats) came to the main gate of Self's regiment. The football king Self didn't know what was going on outside. He heard someone knocking on the door and went downstairs to open the door. Unexpectedly, he was shot to death." The diary of a neutral observer reads: However, the testimony of the nobles emphasized that it was the football king's men who prepared to launch the attack in advance. However, when these poor people saw the beautiful women of the nobles in the carnival parade, they could not restrain their lust and took the lead in the attack. However, these self-explanatory words forget the egalitarian tradition of blissful indulgence advocated by the Carnival itself. At the end of this carnival, which was described as a bloody killing, the nobles defeated the militia members who tried to rescue them from outside the city, but only a handful of militia leaders were eventually hanged. Conflicts between the tax-paying third estate and the non-tax-paying nobles continued for the next two hundred years, until the French Revolution. After that, the aristocracy and the nobility's tax-free privileges were destroyed by the revolution, and the people began to live in France in the 18th century with the unique and unique identity of "French citizens", and paying the same taxes was the real identity of this identity. certificate. Equality aroused a sense of honor among the common people and the French nation, "because participation in the war was not the exclusive right of the nobility," Leroy Ladurie enlighteningly observed, "... tens of thousands of French peasant soldiers Inspired by this spirit, advance eastward and follow the emperor to Moscow..." And this centuries-long pursuit of egalitarianism can indeed be traced back to the "Plenty Tuesday" that ended abruptly on February 16, 1580. , in that interrupted carnival, the attempts of the third-class carpet weavers and butchers to release their claims of equality through ritual symbols were rudely interrupted by the town aristocrats for the same reason: the Alps and the Pyrenees. In the mountains, there is a carnival tradition involving performers who symbolically kill a bear. In this "social drama", both parties in the performance presented the symbolic theme of the ceremony with so much tension that it was difficult to tell whether it was true or false. Fortunately, the real political-economic factors hidden behind it like an echo in a hollow valley finally emerged. With the help of Leroy Ladurie, we can be given a subtle enlightenment about egalitarianism.

Date: [December 22, 2013] Edition: [GB18] Page name: [Recommended by Nandu] Source: [Southern Metropolis Daily] /C/html/2013-12/22/content_1995833.htm