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Villages’ Wakes grew out of communities celebrating their church’s patron saint. For us that is St Peter whose feast day is the 29th of June, still used to to calculate the start of Parwich Wakes; our Wakes beginning on the nearest Saturday to the 29th of June.

The current St Peter’s Church was built in 1872/73, replacing the smaller Norman building also dedicated to St. Peter. We can see some features of the old Church today in the current building, including the tympanum over the west door, the archway of the west door, the archway between the tower and the nave and the carved faces high up in the side chapel. It is thought that the old church was built in the late eleventh or early twelfth century and would almost have certainly been dedicated to St. Peter as it is unusual for the dedication to be changed. It is possible that there was a previous Saxon church here, but the evidence is inconclusive.

The old St Peter’s in a nineteenth century water colour

So we have been celebrating as a community at the end of June for at least nine hundred years, though perhaps much longer. These celebrations from the start would have included a lot more than just a church service. Processions and theatricals would have been included, possibly by the fourteenth or fifteen century involving a play celebrating Robin Hood and Maid Marion. The prettiest or best dressed youngsters might even have be elected to be that year’s Marion and Robin, a precursor to out Carnival parade and fancy dress competition. It is likely that there were local sports, foot races and perhaps archery competitions, certainly when archery practice was compulsory from the fourteenth right up to the sixteen century. ‘Beers’ were a big part of the celebrations, where local guilds and groups brewed beer to sell during the revels. This tradition was revived not so long ago with the Oddfellows Ale, brewed by Leatherbritches. The ‘beers’ raised money either to fund candles and devotion in the church for each guild’s favourite saint or to help guild members when times were hard. (more…)

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