Source: CCTV.com

12-27-2007 09:36

England is rife with seasonal tradition at Christmas. Even today, in the age of television and the cinema there are still mummers. They are actors who perform rites, skits or old fashioned seasonal mummers plays. The actors perform on the streets, wander from door to door and sometimes appear in pubs. Sometimes they are called guisers. Sometimes they have distinctive local names, like rhymers, pace-eggers, soulers, tipteerers and even galoshins.

The Ashdown Mummers perform a traditional Sussex Mumming ritual and ancient fertility dances. The group derives its name from the forest near to their homes in the heart of Sussex.

The play is the same at every venue, a tale of good versus evil. Players include; St George, Mad Johnny Jack, a Turk, Father Christmas, dressed in green, the devil and a few other assorted characters.