Oak Apple Day

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Oak Apple Day
An oak apple in Worcestershire, England
Also called	Shick-Shack Day Arbour Day
Type	Historical
Date	29 May
Observances	Wearing of sprigs of oak leaves.

Oak Apple Day was a holiday celebrated in England on 29 May to commemorate the restoration of the monarchy in Great Britain and Ireland, in May 1660. In some parts of the country, the day was also known as Shick-Shack Day or Arbour Day.

In 1660, Parliament declared 29th May a public holiday:

"Parliament had ordered the 29 of May, the King's birthday, to be for ever kept as a day of thanksgiving for our redemption from tyranny and the King's return to his Government, he entering London that day." ^[1]

Though the holiday, Oak Apple Day, was formally abolished in 1859, a 1915 film clip of Colonel Lyttleton inspecting the Chelsea pensioners on Oak Apple Day is preserved at the British Film Institute.^[2]

Traditional celebrations to commemorate the event often entailed the wearing of oak apples (a type of plant gall, possibly known in some parts of the country as a shick-shack, but see the article on its etymology in the external links) or sprigs of oak leaves, in reference to the occasion after the Battle of Worcester in September 1651, when the future Charles II of England escaped the Roundhead army by hiding in an oak tree near Boscobel House.

These ceremonies, which have now largely died out, are perhaps continuations of pre-Christian nature worship. The Garland King who rides through the streets of Castleton, Derbyshire, at the head of a procession, completely disguised in greenery, which is affixed to a pinnacle on the parish church tower, can have little connection with the Restoration. Events still take place at Upton-upon-Severn, Northampton, Aston on Clun in Shropshire, Marsh Gibbon in Buckinghamshire, Great Wishford in Wiltshire, and Membury in Devon.