It’s the day where people play pranks on each other and hoaxes are being spread by every single media company in this world*, but have you ever wondered how it all started? How come that April 1st became April Fools’ Day?
Well, there are many theories on the origin of April Fools’ but the truth is that no one knows for sure how it all started and the whole April Fool’s thing is shrouded in mystery.
Let’s see the theories. (the article continues after the ad)
The most dominant one is that it began in 1582 when people went form the Julian calendar to the Gregorian (remember when we talked about The Unbelievable Story Of Why October 5th – October 14th, 1582 Did Not Exist). Because Julian calendar celebrated New Year’s on April 1st, some people forgot the change and indeed celebrated New Year’s on the wrong date so they were teased as “April fools”.
Another common myth is that that April Fools’ Day is celebrated on April 1st because it’s related to Spring’s arrival where nature “fools” us with fickle weather. Others theorize that it has something to do with the Romans’ ‘Hilaria’ festival that celebrated the end of winter and the end of the Celtic new year festival.
But all these are just myths and we will never know the true origins of April Fools’ Day. What we know for sure it that it started popularizing at the beginning of the 18th century and soon became its own lore.
* A clever “shower thought” found on Reddit reads “April Fool’s Day is the one day of the year when people critically evaluate news articles before accepting them as true”. We couldn’t agree more.
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Sources: April Fools tradition popularized | April Fools’ Day Origins