Since 1980 the town has seen the revival of the historic Rochester Jack-in-the-Green May Day dancing chimney sweeps tradition, which died out in the early 1900s. Whilst not unique to Rochester (similar sweeps gatherings were held right across southern England, notably in Bristol, Deptford, Whitstable and Hastings), the Rochester revival was directly inspired by Dickens' description of the celebration in Sketches by Boz.
The festival has since grown from a small gathering of local Morris dance sides to one of the largest in the world.
The current festival begins with the awakening of the Jack-in-the-Green ceremony, atop Blue Bell Hill at sunrise on 1 May and continues in Rochester High Street. [Wikipedia]
Until a few years ago, not all houses in Malta had numbers. Many houses only had names. (Bear with me, this will make sense soon enough). And although this has now changed and every door has been given an official number, most have retained their names too. It's a sweet tradition.
The house we will be moving into over the next few weeks has both number and name - but a name that meant nothing to us. For months, since beginning the purchasing process, we have tried to find a suitable name for it. A name that represents us and our journey. We really wanted something that linked back to Rochester, but in a subtle way. We researched Dickensian names and had a few ideas but none entirely convinced us.
Then one day, David jokingly suggested The Sweeps. Yes, I said, I love it. And so did he.
So it was named. Our house will be called The Sweeps. It will mean nothing to anyone here, people will wonder what it means, they might think Sweep is our family name, it will certainly get conversations going. But to us, it's perfect - it's us tipping our hats to Rochester and saying thank you for being such a significant part of our journey. A way to keep Rochester close even though we're thousands of miles away, living out our next chapter. To hold on to a place where it all began.
I'm so excited about this new house!
See, I told you it would make sense in the end.
[image]
The house we will be moving into over the next few weeks has both number and name - but a name that meant nothing to us. For months, since beginning the purchasing process, we have tried to find a suitable name for it. A name that represents us and our journey. We really wanted something that linked back to Rochester, but in a subtle way. We researched Dickensian names and had a few ideas but none entirely convinced us.
Then one day, David jokingly suggested The Sweeps. Yes, I said, I love it. And so did he.
So it was named. Our house will be called The Sweeps. It will mean nothing to anyone here, people will wonder what it means, they might think Sweep is our family name, it will certainly get conversations going. But to us, it's perfect - it's us tipping our hats to Rochester and saying thank you for being such a significant part of our journey. A way to keep Rochester close even though we're thousands of miles away, living out our next chapter. To hold on to a place where it all began.
I'm so excited about this new house!
See, I told you it would make sense in the end.
[image]
What a nice story and an interesting name!
ReplyDeleteI've always found house names an interesting tradition. My grandparents' house also had just a name and no number. Here in Germany, the custom is unknown.