Love it or hate it, Stratford's Mop Fair is here to stay

SOME love it, others don't, but the Mop Fair is very much here to stay.

The fair rolled into Stratford-upon-Avon on Tuesday for its annual visit.

And while it caused the usual tailbacks on Stratford's roads, with much of the centre of town closed from midnight on Monday, the fair is cemented in the town's future, as it is its past.

The past

The history of Mop Fairs is this: Farm workers, labourers, servants and some craftsmen would work for their employer from October to October.

At the end of the employment they would attend the Mop Fair dressed in their Sunday best clothes and carrying an item signifying their trade. A servant with no particular skills would carry a mop head – hence the phrase Mop Fair.

Employers would move amongst them discussing experience and terms, once agreement was reached the employer would give the employee a small token of money and the employee would remove the item signifying their trade and wear bright ribbons to indicate they had been hired.

They would then spend the token amongst the stalls set-up at the fair which would be selling food and drink and offering games to play.

Michaelmas Day is celebrated on the 29th September but Mop Fairs were tied to the seasons and the harvest, not the calendar. When the Gregorian calendar was adopted in 1752 and 11 days dropped from that year, events associated with the end of the harvest moved 11 days later to the 10th October.

This date is known as Old Michaelmas Day and since 1752 has been the date Mop Fairs take place.

Mops are still held in some English towns, though many have died out. To confuse matters some fairs have adopted the term Mop even though they are not held on or near to Michaelmas Day or they are a recent creation.

Mops usually last for two days and take over the centre of the town, and in recent times the Mops have become little more than a funfair.

Stratford-on-Avon Mop Fair has its origins set out some time during the reign of Edward III and provision of the statutes of labourers.

The date is set for 12th October - or is moved if the 12th October falls on a Sunday - and as a pleasure fair it remains a key date in the Warwickshire calendar.

In the 1950s, during the prominence of railway travel, a plethora of special trains were laid on to ferry the local population to and from the fair.

Stratford Mop has an associated 'runaway mop' one week later. The tradition of this is from the need for employers to reconsider and re-hire any staff before committing to a full years work.

This street fair has a tradition of exciting and up-to-date riding machines, as well as maintaining loyal old-fashioned rides.

The fair is also renowned for the open roasting of pigs and oxen, and the atmosphere remains at a premium right up until its midnight closure.

The future

In 2003 Stratford-on-Avon District Council obtained legal advice on the Mop Fair.

The issues covered included both the rights to hold these fairs, the locations where there they are held, and how the council can arrange for them to be moved to other locations such as recreation grounds.

A lawyer reviewed all relevant material including the original Charter granted by Edward VI on 28th June, 1553, the Charter granted by James I on 23rd July, 1611, and the Charter from Charles II dated 31st August, 1676.

The latter provides that Mops or fairs should be held “...within and through all places Streets Lanes Alleys and Fields in the said Borough (Stratford-upon-Avon)"

He also identified that if the district council wished to move the Mop from the current historical location, it could only do so with the approval of the public.

In December 2004 the council consulted the public, with 813 local residents responding to a postal survey.

Two-thirds of those who responded (68 per cent) felt it should remain at its current location. Exactly one in five said it should be moved to the edge of the town, notably to the Recreation Ground.

Some 81 per cent of respondents agreed that the Mop Fair was part of the heritage of Stratford, but conversely 28 per cent expressed the opinion that it has no place on the streets of Stratford.

Although 56 per cent of respondents said traffic congestion caused them to alter their plans when visiting Stratford at the time of the Mop, 66 per cent did not mind being diverted on to an alternative route.

The council concluded that the Mop would need to continue to be operated in the town centre.

There is currently a legal agreement in place for the practical management and operation of Mop Fairs. The consultation will be repeated at some point in the future to see if there is any difference in public opinion before any future agreement is considered by the district council.

Don't miss the Runaway Mop which is in town next Thursday and Friday!

See this week's Stratford-upon-Avon Herald for more pictures from this year's Mop - out on Thursday, 13th October - just 70p!

*This article uses information sourced from the official website of Stratford District Council.