Each May in Gloucestershire, contestants embark on an ankle-shattering pursuit of an enormous wheel of cheese down a 26-degree hill. In August, a man utterly covered in burdock seeds and burrs ambles 9 miles through Queensferry, getting progressively drunker on whisky offered by locals. On Bonfire Night, foolhardy residents of Ottery St Mary process through the streets with flaming tar barrels on their backs. These are just a few of Britain’s folk customs, many of them centuries old. From the profound to the baffling, this handbook brings together over 100 rituals and traditions that mark changing seasons, unite communities and offer insight into Britain’s wonderfully weird cultural identity.
