Carnival customs

1. CARNIVAL CUSTOMS OF GREECE

2. The last 3 weeks in Greece
we celebrate the period of
APOKRIES, a similar
celebration to Carnival,
that is a common tradition
and fest for a lot of
European countries.
The greek word ΑΠΟΚΡΙΕΣ
(strictly) means abstaining
from meat.

3. Also, according to one version, the
greek word originated from the Latin
word "carnival" consists of the words
carne = meat and vale = salute.
The concept of this period is first
encountered in Ancient Greece, in the
processions that took place during the
Eleusinian Mysteries, which along with
ceremonies dedicated to god Dionysus
are the ancestors of contemporary
carnival.

4. • The first week of AΠΟΚΡΙΕΣ that ends on the
Sunday of the Assumption is also called
Prophethood, because they used to say that
CARNIVAL was about to begin.
• The second week is called Creatine or
Creatophagus because they eat meat and didn't
fast on either Wednesday or Friday, that they use
to do during other weeks of the year. This week is
celebrated with feasts and buckwheat without any
religious restrictions.
• The last Sunday,1st of March, people they use to
eat only dairy products preparing themselves for
the Clean Monday.

5. Carnival customs in Ancient Greece
These days it becomes the custom of fun,
entertainment and "masquerade", of disguise,
which has remained Kronia's "Lupercalia" and
"Saturnalia" and one of the earliest "Dionysian
feasts" of the Greeks, where the people were
dressed as masquerades, drinking wine and
cheerfulness reached the vertical in honor of
Dionysus

6. One of the most famous
traditional carnivals in Greece
is "Boules" in Naousa
Imathias. The custom has its
roots in antiquity and is
probably related to tribal
initiation ceremonies such as
the adult ceremony in which
the young man, dressed in
women's clothing and driven
by unmarried men of the
breed, will in turn be initiated
into her secrets, will expel
women's clothing and will be
transformed into a man.

7. Today we can observe that in its centuries-long
history custom has transformed and incorporates in
its individual elements the local tradition, myths,
legends, songs and heroic struggles of Naoussa,
located on northern Greece.

8. Thessaloniki's Soho and Lesvos’ features
“KOUDOUNATOI", an event related to the fertility of
the earth or, for many, to love. The culmination of
the events takes place three days before Clean
Monday, where participants dressed in goat
costumes and bells throughout their body rush out
and dance on the streets and squares.

9. Jamala from IOANNINA
The “Jamala", the carnival fires, will light up in
various neighborhoods of the city of Ioannina on
the night of last Sunday, before Lent Monday.

10. Jamala from IOANNINA
A 19th-century custom in Ioannina, it has been
continuously reviving from the 1980s until
today. The “Jamala" are warmed by the freezing
of the area, and when the first spark is lit ... the
motto is to start the big celebration.

11. Fights with flour and coal
The custom of "flour war" has been revived in
Galaxidi, in centre of Greece, for three centuries.
Generous quantities of flour are thrown among
the carnivalists, who, as the custom states, must
be smeared with charcoal on the face.

12. Fights with flour and coal
Of course in recent years, faces have been
literally covered by a whole host of rather
original materials, such as indigo, shoe polish
and more.

13. TONGUE TWISTER
• ΑΛΕΥΡΟΜΟΥΝΤΖΟΥΡΩΜΑΤΑ
• (Alevromoujouromata)
• Just another time
• ΑΛΕΥΡΟΜΟΥΝΤΖΟΥΡΩΜΑΤΑ
• (Alevromoujouromata)

14. Traditional wedding ceremony revival
In several places of Greece during the last
Sunday of APOKRIES people revive the customs
of a traditional wedding ceremony.

15. Traditional wedding ceremony revival
Many people dressed in folklore customs
celebrate a wedding ceremony as a tradition
They sing, they dance, they have fun for hours
and hours.

16. Clean or Ash Monday
The Clean or Ash Monday is the first day of the
LENT PERIOD, before EASTER, while people
avoid to eat meat and dairy foods.
This day, Clean Monday, people use to go to
countryside with their picnic food. After meal
they use to play another game they fly kites.

17. Clean or Ash Monday
The flying of kites and the dancing with the wind, high in the
blue sky, signify the rising, the clearing of the soul after the
Dionysian fest of Carnival.
Although the kite is starring in our own Kuluma, the popular
word for CLEAN MONDAY, we should remember that his
homeland is the Far East.

18. The history of kite has deep roots in ancient China,
going back more than 2,400 years. Originally, of course,
the material for making the kites was not the paper, but
the wood. The people of the East used kites in magical
ceremonies, religious events and rituals to exorcise evil.
They believed that the higher the kite flies, the more
lucky they will be in their life.

19. Thank you for your attention