April Fools’ Day

Wikipedia says the origin of April Fools’ Day is not exactly known. Winick of the Library of Congress says: “Nobody knows for sure.” He adds that people have long guessed at Roman Saturnalia, Druidic rites in Britain, the medieval Feast of Fools and even the Indian festival of Holi, but that “clear references to a tradition of fooling in April don’t begin until the late Middle Ages.”

This matters for everything below. Every popular story of how the day began is either a guess, a legend or a hoax, and we label each one.

The Museum of Hoaxes, run by Alex Boese, says the earliest unambiguous reference we know is a poem by the Flemish poet Eduard de Dene of Bruges, in his handwritten Testament Rhetoricael, page 358. Its title, Refereyn vp verzendekens dach / Twelck den eersten April te zyne plach, means roughly “Refrain on fool’s errand-day, which is the first of April.” In the poem a nobleman sends his servant back and forth on absurd errands, supposedly to prepare for a wedding feast. In Belgium 1 April is still called Verzenderkensdag.

Winick also names this poem as the first certain reference. The Museum of Hoaxes adds that because de Dene assumes his readers already know the day, the custom is probably older, “But exactly how much older, we don’t know.”

In the Nun’s Priest’s Tale the fox tricks the rooster “Syn March bigan, thritty dayes and two,” which reads as 32 days after March began, that is 1 April. Winick calls it possibly “a glimpse” of the day and an early, clear reference to the date, but adds that many scholars think “bigan” is a scribal error and that the intended date was 2 May. Wikipedia explains why: the same passage puts the sun twenty degrees and one into Taurus, which fits early May and not 1 April.

The Museum of Hoaxes goes further and says the evidence suggests Chaucer had no knowledge of April Fools’ Day and probably did not set the tale on 1 April.

The French name for an April fool is poisson d’avril, “April fish.” The phrase appears in the poet Pierre Michault’s work in 1466 and in Eloy d’Amerval’s Le livre de la deablerie in 1508. Wikipedia says d’Amerval’s line is “possibly” the first reference to the celebration in France. Winick says that from the context we cannot be sure whether the author meant 1 April or fools in general.

The Museum of Hoaxes reports that etymologists believe the phrase first meant a go-between or messenger in a love affair, and that it only took on its April Fools’ meaning in the late seventeenth century. The paper fish stuck on a person’s back and the chocolate fish in French bakeries are later customs of the same name.

The most repeated explanation is that the day began when France moved the start of the year from late March to 1 January, and that people who kept the old date were mocked with false gifts and invitations. Charles Panati gives this account. It is tied to a real law: Wikipedia says King Charles IX issued the Edict of Roussillon, promulgated on 9 August 1564 and applied from 1 January 1567, and that its Article 39 made 1 January the start of the year. The year had begun on different dates in different regions, among them Christmas, 25 March, 1 March and Easter.

Winick calls Panati’s version “interesting speculation” and notes that French books printed as early as 1507 already show years starting on 1 January. The poem of 1561 is older than the edict. Wikipedia also says April Fools’ Day was established in Britain before 1 January became the start of the year there.

A second version, which Winick cites from Jack Santino, says the change came with the switch from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar, which France adopted in 1582, and that those who kept the old date were fooled. Winick treats the calendar-change story, in its various forms, as a “migratory legend” and as “metafolklore”, which is a folk story about the origin of a folk holiday. The same tale is told about other holidays in other places. He adds that this does not necessarily mean it is untrue, but that it “often means not all variants can be true simultaneously.”

Writers have compared the day to spring festivals of fooling. The Roman Hilaria was held at the March equinox and, per Wikipedia, honored a pagan goddess on 25 March, and it allowed games, masquerades and imitation of anyone. Winick notes that in Roman terms 25 March was “the eighth of the Calends of April”, which links the festival with 1 April, but says “there’s no hard evidence to connect Hilaria with April Fools’ Day, so this is just one of many guesses.” Wikipedia reports that in Punjab Holi has been associated with making fools of others, and the Library of Congress lists Holi only as a guess. In Iran, Wikipedia says dorugh-e Sizdah, the “lie of Thirteen”, is celebrated as part of Sizdah Bedar, the 13th of Farvardin, which usually falls around 1 or 2 April.

Of Sizdah Bedar, Wikipedia says there is no direct mention of such a celebration in history books before the Qajar era, and that pranks have “reportedly” been played on that day since 536 BC. We treat the 536 BC date as a report, not as a fact.

The Museum of Hoaxes cites Francis Osborne in 1659, who mentions “impertinent errands, as the Dutch youth do” on the second of April, and John Aubrey in 1686, who writes of “Fooles holy day. We observe it on ye first of April. And so it is kept in Germany everywhere.” Both treat it as a foreign custom. The Library of Congress adds Poor Robin’s Almanac of 1760, which says of the day “Nor I nor they themselves do know” why it is kept, a diary entry written in Boston in 1771 by Anna Green Winslow, and a Connecticut handbill of 1796.

Wikipedia reports that on 1 April 1698 several people were tricked into going to the Tower of London to “see the Lions washed.” An 1857 ticket for “Washing the Lions” exists for an event that never took place.

In Scotland the day is “Huntigowk Day”. A gowk is the Scots word for a cuckoo and for a fool. Wikipedia describes the custom of sending someone with a sealed message that reads “Dinna laugh, dinna smile. Hunt the gowk another mile,” and the person who reads it says they can only help if they first contact someone else, and sends the victim on with an identical message. The following day is “tailie day”, when paper tails are fixed to people’s backs, often with an unflattering message. In Ireland the equivalent is the “important letter” and the phrase “send the fool further.”

On 1 April 1957 the BBC programme Panorama broadcast a three-minute report on the spaghetti harvest in southern Switzerland. Wikipedia says cameraman Charles de Jaeger had the idea, editor Michael Peacock gave him £100, and Richard Dimbleby read the commentary. About eight million people watched. Hundreds phoned the next day to question the story or to ask how they could grow their own spaghetti trees, and the BBC told them to “place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best.” Newspapers were split over whether it was “a great joke or a terrible hoax on the public.”

The story says the day began in the time of the Emperor Constantine. Winick of the Library of Congress calls it a hoax, and it is. In 1983 Joseph Boskin, a Boston University professor, invented it when pressed by Fred Bayles, an Associated Press reporter, who asked for the origin of the day. In his telling a group of court jesters told the emperor they could run the empire better, and the amused emperor made a jester named Kugel king for a day, who then passed an edict calling for absurdity. The AP ran the story and, in Winick’s words, retracted it some days later; Wikipedia says it went out on the wire on 1 April 1983. Wikipedia says it came to light when Boskin told his own class what he had done, and a student, Bill Swersey, wrote it up in the Daily Free Press on 14 April 1983.

Wikipedia adds that Boskin was sure Bayles would realize he was joking when he gave the jester’s name as Kugel, which is a kind of Jewish noodle pudding. Bayles later joined the faculty at Boston University.

This is the story in cards 5 and 6, in its 1564 form (the Edict of Roussillon) and its 1582 form (the Gregorian calendar). The edict is real. The link to April Fools’ Day is a guess. Winick found that the poem of 1561 is older than the edict, that French books of 1507 already begin the year in January, and that Panati gives no contemporary accounts or surviving invitations for his claim. The story is told, in other forms, about other holidays as well.

See card 3. The line that seems to give 1 April may be a scribal slip for 2 May, as many scholars think, and the Museum of Hoaxes says Chaucer probably did not know the day at all. The reference is real as a line of poetry, and the claim that it names April Fools’ Day is disputed.

Wikipedia quotes the Public Advertiser of 13 April 1789, repeated by William Ralston Balch in 1895, that the day began from Noah’s “mistake” in sending the dove out of the ark too early on the first day of a month “among the Hebrews”, and that fools are sent on errands in memory of it. Wikipedia notes that no biblical scholar or historian is known to have mentioned a relationship. It also notes that the Hebrew calendar is lunisolar, so no fixed day always falls on 1 April.

Wikipedia says in its April Fools’ Day article that pranks have “reportedly” been played on dorugh-e Sizdah since 536 BC, making it “perhaps the oldest known joke day.” Its page on Sizdah Bedar says there is “no direct mention of such a celebration in history books prior to Qajar era.”

Some say the day grew from spring celebrations at the equinox. IslamQA lists this among several differing opinions on the origin and says the origin “is not known for sure.” Winick notes that the Roman Hilaria was originally probably an equinox celebration, and that there is no hard evidence to link it to April Fools’ Day.

Some Muslim articles say poisson, fish, is a distortion of passion, so that the French phrase refers to the suffering of Jesus. We found no historian who says this. The Museum of Hoaxes reports that etymologists trace poisson d’avril to an old sense of a go-between (card 4).

The story says that after failing to beat the Muslims in battle the Christians of Spain gave them liquor and tobacco, and that when the Spaniards took Granada in 1492 they celebrated it as April Fools’ Day. Wikipedia and the University of Cambridge both date the surrender of Granada to 2 January 1492, when Boabdil handed the keys to Ferdinand and Isabella. It was not 1 April.

Dunya News, a Pakistani outlet, rebuts the story in an article that it titled “Muslim myths surrounding April Fools’ Day.” It also says that Europeans did not know tobacco until after 1492, and that the Muslims of Spain were not ordered to leave until 1609. We cite it for the fact that such stories circulate, and for those two points, and no more.

From the Islamic view this is false. The Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, said: “Woe to him who tells things, speaking falsely, to make people laugh thereby. Woe to him! Woe to him!” (Abu Dawud 4990), and he said that it is not lawful for a Muslim to frighten a Muslim (Abu Dawud 5004). A lie told to make people laugh is still a lie, and a prank that frightens or deceives someone is not made lawful by being called harmless.

The harm is also recorded outside the hadith. Wikipedia says critics call April Fools’ hoaxes “creepy and manipulative” and “rude”, and it lists “confusion, misinformation, waste of resources” and legal or commercial consequences among the effects. It also lists true news that was dismissed because of the date: the warnings about the 1946 tsunami, which killed 165 people in Hawaii and Alaska; the news of the death of the singer Marvin Gaye in 1984; the news of the death of the singer Selena in 1995, when many accused the radio staff of lying. In March 2020 various organizations warned against observing the day during the pandemic, and in 2021 Thailand’s police warned that posting fake news online could mean up to five years in prison.

This is a claim about the ruling, and Islam answers it. The Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, said: “Woe to him who tells things, speaking falsely, to make people laugh thereby. Woe to him! Woe to him!” (Abu Dawud 4990). He also guaranteed a house in Paradise for a man who avoids lying “even if he were joking” (Abu Dawud 4800). The scholars we quote below say the same of April Fools’ Day by name.

The IslamQA article on April Fools’ Day says the first English mention was in “a magazine known as Dreck Magazine” on 2 April 1698, and describes an announcement in the Evening Star in March 1746 of a parade of donkeys at Islington. We could not confirm either in the sources we read. Wikipedia gives John Aubrey’s “Fooles holy day” of 1686 as the first British reference, and reports the 1 April 1698 prank as people being tricked into going to the Tower of London to “see the Lions washed.”