Everybody loves St. Patrick’s Day. I imply, how are you going to not love a enjoyable pageant about ingesting beer, carrying inexperienced, and getting along with household and mates? It is the final word celebration of Irish tradition. And with tens of millions of individuals world wide sharing Irish roots, it actually has turn into a worldwide celebration.
Fun Facts about St. Patrick’s Day
After visiting Ireland a number of instances we’ve got been fortunate sufficient to be a part of our share of Irish celebrations. There is a cause that St Patrick’s day is among the most enjoyable celebrations world wide. So, head out to the Beer Store (all you Canadians) and seize your cans of Guinness, put in your inexperienced shirt, and let’s get celebrating!
1. Saint Patrick was Not Irish
Saint Patrick, a patron Saint of Ireland was truly English. More precisely, he’s believed to have been from Wales or Scotland. He was dropped at Ireland as a slave round 432 AD. however escaped and after hanging out in Ireland working as a shepherd for a couple of years, he returned to England to turn into a priest. He then later returned to Ireland as a Christian missionary.
2. The Feast of St. Patrick
After St. Patrick’s demise, Ireland devoted a day to him referred to as the Feast of St. Patrick. The date of March 17 was chosen as a result of that was his demise day. St. Patrick died on March 17, in Downpatrick Ireland. Back then, demise days have been extra necessary than birthdays. Nobody actually knew what day they have been born, but when they turned anyone, everybody knew their date of demise.
Thus the Feast of St. Patrick was celebrated yearly on the demise day of the patron saint. It was a day of feasts and spiritual ceremonies. So, when St. Patrick’s Day rolls round this yr, let’s make it a feast day too!
3. No Beer!
Since it was referred to as the Feast of St. Patrick, St. Patrick’s day was initially a dry vacation. No beer was to be discovered. Instead, St. Patrick’s Day was a day of non secular ceremonies and feasts. In truth, it wasn’t till lately that Ireland began celebrating St. Patrick’s day with the identical alcoholic vigor because the United States.
It has solely been extra lately that beer and hearty celebrations have turn into extra fashionable in Ireland. Some have stated that it was in 2016 when celebrating 100 years of Irish independence that St. Patrick’s Day actually began to take off in Ireland. But from what I can inform, it’s been going sturdy in Dublin for many years.
4. Four Leaf Clover
Contrary to fashionable perception, the four-leaf clover will not be related to St. Patrick’s Day. While the four-leaf clover is taken into account fortunate and is linked with luck in each Irish tradition and world wide, it’s truly the three-leaf Shamrock that’s linked to Saint Patrick.
5. The Shamrock
Recently we had a zoom assembly with some distinguished St. Patrick’s specialists the place we realized a bit in regards to the traditions of St. Patrick’s Day in Ireland. They instructed us that it was necessary to put on a Shamrock and a badge for the St. Patrick’s Day festivities. The greater the higher. This custom has been going down in Ireland for the reason that seventeenth century!
The Shamrock has all the time been thought-about a sacred plant to the Celts and Irish. The solely cause they may provide you with it being related to St. Patrick’s day is that it’s believed that St. Patrick used it for example when explaining the Holy Trinity whereas bringing Christianity to Ireland. The three leaves are used to signify, the Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost.
6. Green Was Not the Colour of Choice
Here is a truth I didn’t know, the National shade of Ireland was blue! Blue was all the time related to Ireland and St. Patrick’s Day till the nineteenth century when Ireland turned extra intertwined with the colour inexperienced. The Emerald Isle embraced the inexperienced altering their flag to the colours of Green White and Orange.
It wasn’t till Irish Independence that the colour inexperienced turned the image of Ireland. But inexperienced has all the time performed a robust position in Irish tradition with the Shamrock and the inexperienced harp flag utilized by the Irish Catholic confederation within the 1600s.
7. First St. Patrick’s Day Parade
After doing a little analysis, I discovered that America first celebrated St. Patrick’s day in 1601, in St. Augustine, Florida. It was organized by the Irish vicar of the Spanish colony. (this may occasionally or might not be true, as a result of in keeping with Ireland tourism, it was certainly first celebrated in 1737 in Boston)
Regardless, the St. Patrick’s Day parade actually took maintain when it was held in Boston and New York City in 1737. It was the Irish members of the British Battalion who got here house feeling homesick and nostalgic. They got here collectively for the primary St. Patrick’s Day Parade to have a good time their Irish tradition.
And, now, as they are saying, the remainder is historical past. America celebrates St. Patrick’s day with extra vigor than Ireland! But Ireland has been gaining velocity prior to now few many years and St. Patrick’s Day shall be without end linked with Irish tradition world wide.
8. Downpatrick, Ireland
If you make a pilgrimage to Ireland within the close to future (which we extremely suggest, it’s our favorite nation to go to!) you’ll be able to see the grave of St. Patrick within the city of Downpatrick. Located in County Down in Northern Ireland, Down Cathedral dates again to 1183 and homes the stays of St. Patrick. In Downpatrick, they have a good time the life and legend of St. Patrick all yr lengthy.
9. St. Patrick’s Centre in Northern Ireland
The St. Patrick’s Centre in Downpatrick is the one middle on this planet devoted solely to St. Patrick. There’s an Imax expertise telling And they even have their very own Camino on St. Patrick’s Way. I’m completely doing this once we return to Ireland.
10. The Rock of Cashel – Aka St. Patrick’s Rock
Not solely is it a lovely place to go to in Ireland, The Rock of Cashel in Tipperary, is related to St. Patrick. It was right here that he baptized King Aengus, Ireland’s first Christian chief. But I like this legend a lot better: It is alleged that St. Patrick banished Satan from a mountain cave. In a fury Satan took a chunk from the mountain and spat it out, thus creating the Rock of Cashel. With 1000 years of historical past, it is among the coolest locations in Ireland that we visited.
11. The Myth of the Snakes
I by no means actually knew this earlier than, however legend has it that St. Patrick drew all of the snakes out of Ireland. Well, apparently, snakes by no means lived in Ireland.
12. Leprechauns and St. Patrick’s Day
Many related St. Patrick’s Day with Leprechauns proper? Well, they don’t have anything to do with St. Patrick. Leprechauns are part of the Irish tradition in Irish folklore. They have been little individuals who appreciated to play sensible jokes on others. During my analysis, I learn that Walt Disney sparked the connection in his film, Darby O’Gill & the Little People starring Sean Connery. (I’m completely going to hire this film on St. Paddy’s Day)
13. Celebrating Irish Culture – St. Patrick’s Day Traditions
- People began dying their beer inexperienced within the early 1900s.
- The river runs by means of Chicago within the US. (The Chicago River, is dyed inexperienced annually!)
- People world wide with Irish Ancestry collect for this historical Irish Feast Day.
- Some 70 million folks world wide have Irish Ancestry. Dave and I included! Dave truly has actually deep Irish blood. Check out Dave discovering his Irish Roots right here.
- Irish Americans eat corned beef and cabbage on St. Patrick’s Day. This will not be an Irish custom. In Ireland, they ate ham.
- Buildings all around the world gentle up in Green on St. Patrick’s Day. I’m going to maintain an eye fixed out for the CN Tower this yr!
In conclusion
So now that a bit extra about St. Patrick’s Day if you cheer your pint of Guinness and put on your inexperienced, give a nod to the Patron Saint of Ireland who began all of it. Or maybe, we should always pay tribute extra to the homesick Irish immigrants in America who got here to have a good time their homeland.
Whatever the rationale, St. Patrick’s day is well known world wide by means of gatherings of inexperienced and Guinness. We’ve traveled the world, and I can say that there’s an Irish pub in practically each metropolis on this planet. The Irish are positively doing one thing proper celebrating life with a sure Joie de Vivre.
Happy St. Patricks Day everybody. Or as they are saying in Ireland, “Lá Fhéile Pádraig Sona Dhuit. (Law Fey-la Paw-rick Sun-a-dit)