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For other uses, see Cockayne (disambiguation).
Pieter Bruegel the Elder's „Luilekkerland“ ("The Land of Cockaigne"), painted in 1567. Oil on panel. Currently in the collection of the Alte Pinakothek, Munich, Germany.
Pieter Bruegel the Elder's „Luilekkerland“ ("The Land of Cockaigne"), painted in 1567. Pieter Bruegel the Elder (c 1525 &ndash September 9, 1569) was a Netherlandish Renaissance Oil on panel. Currently in the collection of the Alte Pinakothek, Munich, Germany. The Alte Pinakothek (Old Pinakothek is an Art museum situated in the Kunstareal in Munich, Germany. Munich (München; Minga is the capital city of Bavaria, Germany.

Cockaigne or Cockayne (pronounced /kɒˈkeɪn/) is a mythical medieval land of plenty, where all the harshness of medieval peasant life does not exist. A mythological place (also called "mythical place" is a place that a particular culture describes in their Mythology and Folklore as existent A peasant is an agricultural worker who subsists by working a small plot of ground Specifically, in poems like The Land of Cockaigne, Cockaigne is a land of contraries, where all the restrictions of society are defied (abbots beaten by their monks), sexual liberty is open (nuns flipped over to show their bottoms), and food is plentiful (skies that rain cheeses). Writing about Cockaigne was a commonplace of Goliard verse. The Goliards were a group of Clergy who wrote bibulous satirical Latin Poetry in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. It represented both wish fulfillment and resentment at the strictures of asceticism and dearth.

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Etymology of Cockaigne

The word Cockaigne derives from Middle English cokaygne, traced to Middle French (pays de) cocaigne[1] "(land of) plenty," ultimately adapted or derived from a word for a small sweet cake sold to children at a fair (OED). Middle English is the name given by Historical linguistics to the diverse forms of the English language spoken between the Norman invasion of Middle French (le moyen français is a historical division of the French language which covers the period from (roughly 1340 to 1611. The Oxford English Dictionary ( OED) published by the Oxford University Press (OUP is a comprehensive Dictionary of the English The Dutch equivalent is Luilekkerland ("lazy luscious land"), and the German equivalent is Schlaraffenland (also known as "land of milk and honey"). In Spain an equivalent place of Cockaigne is named Jauja, after a rich mining region of the Andes, and the word "cucaña" may also mean such place. Jauja is a town of 25000 people in central Peru, capital of a province with a population of 105000

In the 1820s, the name Cockaigne came to be applied jocularly to London[2], as the land of Cockneys[3], and thus "Cockaigne", though the two aren't linguistically connected otherwise. London ( ˈlʌndən is the capital and largest urban area in the United Kingdom. The term Cockney has both geographical and linguistic associations The composer Elgar used the title "Cockaigne" for his overture (1901) and suite evoking the people of London.

The Dutch villages of Kockengen and Koekange were named after Cockaigne. Kockengen ( is a village in the Dutch province of Utrecht (province.

Descriptions

Like Atlantis and El Dorado, the land of Cockaigne was a fictional utopia, a place where, in a parody of paradise, idleness and gluttony were the principal occupations. Atlantis (in Greek,, "island of Atlas " is the name of a Legendary Island, first mentioned in Plato 's dialogues El Dorado ( Spanish for "the golden one") is a Legend that began with the story of a South American tribal chief who covered himself In Specimens of Early English Poets (1790), George Ellis printed a 13th century French poem called "The Land of Cockaigne" where

the houses were made of barley sugar and cakes, the streets were paved with pastry, and the shops supplied goods for nothing. Year 1790 ( MDCCXC) was a Common year starting on Friday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Common year

According to Columbia University Press' reference to Herman Pleij's Dreaming of Cockaigne (2001) [3],

roasted pigs wander about with knives in their backs to make carving easy, where grilled geese fly directly into one's mouth, where cooked fish jump out of the water and land at one's feet. Columbia University Press is a University press based in New York City, and affiliated with Columbia University. The weather is always mild, the wine flows freely, sex is readily available, and all people enjoy eternal youth.

According to the New York Public Library (ref. The New York Public Library ( NYPL) is one of the leading public libraries of the world and is one of America's most significant Research libraries. ), Cockaigne was a

medieval peasant’s dream, offering relief from backbreaking labor and the daily struggle for meager food.

The Brothers Grimm collected and retold the fairy tale in The Tale About the Land of Cockaigne (Das Märchen vom Schlaraffenland). The Brothers Grimm ( German: Die Gebrüder Grimm) Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, A fairy tale or fairy story is a fictional Story that may feature folkloric characters (such as fairies, enchantments]] often involving

Traditions

Greasing the pole during the Tomatina festival of Buñol, Spain.
Greasing the pole during the Tomatina festival of Buñol, Spain. La Tomatina is a Food fight Festival held on the last Wednesday of August each year in the town of Buñol in the Valencia region of Spain Buñol (Catalan/ Valencian: Bunyol) is a town and Municipality in the Province of Valencia, Spain.

A Neapolitan tradition, extended to other Latin-culture countries, is the Cockaigne pole, a horizontal or vertical pole with a prize (like a ham) at one end. Naples ( Napoli, Neapolitan: Nàpule) is a historic City in southern Italy, the Capital of the Greasy pole or Grease pole refers to a pole that has been made slippery and thus difficult to grip Ham is the Thigh and Rump of Pork, cut from the Haunch of a Pig or Boar. The pole is covered with grease or soap and planted during a festival. Then, daring people try to climb the slippery pole to get the prize. The crowd laughs at the often failed attempts to hold to the pole.

Cockaigne in the arts

See also

Notes

  1. ^ The modern French is cocagne, a dolt. Vincent Desiderio (born 1955 is an American Realist painter. He is currently the senior critic at the New York Academy of Art and lives and works in New This page is about the proverbial land of Arcadia for the province in modern Greece see Arcadia; for other uses see Arcadia (disambiguation " Big Rock Candy Mountain " is a Song about a Hobo 's idea of Paradise - a modern version of the Medieval concept of Cockaigne Fiddler's Green is the Afterlife imagined by Sailors and later adopted by U Not to be confused with Eden Gardens.The Garden of Eden ( Hebrew "pleasure" גַּן עֵדֶן Arabic: جنات عدن, The term Golden age is best known from Greek mythology and legend but can also be found in other ancient cultures (see below Utopia is a name for an ideal community taken from the title of a book written in 1516 by Sir Thomas More describing a fictional Island in the
  2. ^ OED notes a first usage in 1824.
  3. ^ "Cockney" from a "cock's egg", an implausible creature (see also basilisk). In European bestiaries and Legends a basilisk ('bæzɪlɪsk from the Greek βασιλίσκος basilískos, "little king"
  4. ^ See articles in Cincinnati Enquirer, October 25, 2006,[1] and on CBS News website, November 1, 2006. [2]

External links and references

Dictionary

Cockaigne

-proper noun

  1. A land in medieval myth, a land of plenty, a land of luxury and idleness.
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