Illuminated procession

An illuminated procession is a procession held after dark so that lights carried by the participants form a spectacle. The lights will commonly be of the same type, so making a candlelight procession, lantern parade or torchlight march.[1]

La Fête dé Noué in Jersey.

Examples include the Christmas festival of Ndocciata in Italy; the Chinese Lantern Festival to celebrate the first full moon; and the daily procession of pilgrims to the grotto of Lourdes.

What is believed to be the largest and the best illuminated procession in the world is the Bridgwater Guy Fawkes Carnival held on the first Saturday of November in the town of Bridgwater, Somerset, in the UK. It is followed by a fireworks display that is unique to the town, known as squibbing.[2] The carnival parades also take place in a variety of Somerset towns throughout November.

History

Torchlight processions were known already in Ancient Greece where it was connected with Ancient Greek religion. Until today they are part modern adaptations of Dionysia festival in Greece and elsewhere.[3]

Torchlight marches in politics

Before the American Civil War in the U.S. illuminated processions were held as a way of promotion of political parties. That includes mass torch light processions in 1858 at Hartford Connecticut, the Republican Party in New York City in 1860[4] and in Galesburg, Illinois in 1884.[5]

Ski parade

Processions of skiers holding torches or flares while skiing down a slope at night has been a scheduled event of winter festivals since at least 1903.[6]

Marches by Far-right

The Far-right and Nationalist groups have had a long history of torchlight marches.[7]

During the 1930s Nazi Germany in some of its Nuremberg rallies used torchlight marches.

On 1 January 2014, Stepan Bandera's 105th birthday was celebrated by a torchlight procession of 15,000 people in the centre of Kyiv and thousands more rallied near his statue in Lviv.[8][9][10] The march was supported by the far-right Svoboda party and some members of the center-right Batkivshchyna.[11]

In 2017, During the Unite the Right rally that took place in Charlottesville, Virginia. a group of white nationalists – variously numbered from "dozens"[12] to "about 250"[13] – gathered for an unannounced (and unsanctioned by the city) march through the University of Virginia's campus. They marched towards the university's Lawn chanting Nazi and white supremacist slogans, including "White lives matter"; "You will not replace us"; and "Jews will not replace us".[14][15] (The phrase "You will not replace us" has been reported by the Anti-Defamation League to "reflect the white supremacist world view that ... the white race is doomed to extinction by an alleged 'rising tide of color' purportedly controlled and manipulated by Jews".[16]) The Nazi slogan "Blood and Soil" was also used.[17][15][12][18] The group was primarily composed of white men,[18] many of them wielding tiki torches.[15][18][19]

In Estonia Conservative People's Party of Estonia The party's affiliated nationalist youth movement Blue Awakening is the main organizer of the annual torchlight march through Tallinn on 24 February, Independence Day of Estonia. The first Independence Day torchlight march was held in 2014. According to Blue Awakening, the torchlight march is meant to honor those who have fallen for the nation of Estonia and to signify that Estonian youth have not abandoned the nationalist principles.[20][21][22][23][24] The event has been harshly criticized by the Simon Wiesenthal Center that described it as "Nuremberg-esque" and likened the ideology of the participants to that of the Estonian nazi collaborators.[25][26]

  • Torchlight marches by the Far Right
  • 2014
    2014
  • 2018
    2018

See also

References
  1. Beverly N. White. "Torch Light". Amazon. Retrieved 7 June 2013.
  2. "Home". bridgwatercarnival.org.uk.
  3. "The Ancient Festivals Of Dionysus In Athens: 'Euhoi Bacchoi'". TheCollector. 25 February 2021.
  4. The Torchlight Parade Smithsonian Institution
  5. "Poet Carl Sandburg interview (1956)". artvilla.com.
  6. End of Sports N.D. Pioneer Express, 1903-03-13
  7. "Why They Parade by Torchlight". The Atlantic. 21 August 2017.
  8. "15,000 nationalists march in Kiev". Archived from the original on 2 January 2014. Retrieved 2 January 2014.
  9. Torchlight procession to honor Bandera taking place in Kyiv, Interfax-Ukraine (1 January 2014)
  10. Lviv hosts rally to mark 105th anniversary of Ukrainian nationalist leader Bandera, Interfax-Ukraine (1 January 2014)
  11. "MP: Euromaidan exposed to neo-Nazi trends". Kyiv Post. 3 January 2014.
  12. Chia, Jessica (August 12, 2017). "White nationalists march through UVA with torches". Daily News. New York. Archived from the original on August 12, 2017. Retrieved August 14, 2017.
  13. Heim, Joe (August 14, 2017). "Recounting a Day of Rage, Hate, Violence and Death". The Washington Post.
  14. Stolberg, Sheryl Gay; Rosenthal, Brian M. (August 12, 2017). "Man Charged After White Nationalist Rally in Charlottesville Ends in Deadly Violence". The New York Times. Archived from the original on August 12, 2017. Retrieved August 13, 2017.
  15. Pearce, Matt (August 11, 2017). "Chanting 'blood and soil!' white nationalists with torches march on University of Virginia". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on August 12, 2017.
  16. "White Supremacists Adopt New Slogan: "You Will Not Replace Us"". Anti-Defamation League. June 9, 2017. Archived from the original on August 14, 2017. Retrieved August 14, 2017.
  17. Heim, Joe; Silverman, Ellie; Shapiro, T. Rees; Brown, Emma (August 13, 2017). "One dead as car strikes crowds amid protests of white nationalist gathering in Charlottesville; two police die in helicopter crash". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on August 13, 2017.
  18. Lopez, German (August 12, 2017). "The most striking photos from the white supremacist Charlottesville protests". Vox. Archived from the original on August 13, 2017. Retrieved August 12, 2017.
  19. Gravely, Alexis; Hoerauf, Daniel; Dodson, Tim (August 12, 2017). "Torch-wielding white nationalists march at U.Va.: Protest comes to an end after fights, pepper-spray". Cavalier Daily. Archived from the original on August 13, 2017.
  20. EKRE: Muljeid tõrvikurongkäigust (in Estonian)
  21. "FOTOD! Vabariigi aastapäeva tähistati vaatemängulise". www.pealinn.ee. 24 February 2016. Retrieved 30 November 2017.
  22. "Eesti Vabariigi aastapäeva tähistamine Tallinnas". Estonian World Review. Retrieved 30 November 2017.
  23. "Vabariigi aastapäeval toimub Tallinnas järjekordne tõrvikurongkäik (Objektiiv.ee (SAPTK))". 23 February 2016. Retrieved 30 November 2017.
  24. "TV3 VIDEO: Mida arvavad tõrvikurongkäigust sellel osalenud inimesed?". Archived from the original on 2 October 2016. Retrieved 1 October 2016.
  25. "Wiesenthal Center Criticizes Extreme Right March to Mark Estonian Independence Day". Simon Wiesenthal Center. 5 October 2020.
  26. "Nazi Hunter: Nuremberg-esque march no way to celebrate Estonian independence". International Business Times. 5 October 2020.
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