Website celebrating May Day festivities in Oxford
Some 16,500 attended in 2025 (more pics coming soon)
Above: Broad Street, May Morning 2025. Below: Jack-in-the-Green proceeds up the High in 2024
(Photos Tim Healey)
May morning in Oxford is famous for the thousands who gather at 6am to hear a Latin hymn sung from the top of Magdalen College tower. It is an extraordinary ceremony, but only one feature of Oxford tradition.
Maytime revels take place all over the city, and were already controversial in Britain in 1250 when the Chancellor of Oxford University forbade ‘alike in churches, all dancing in masks or with disorderly noises, and all processions of men wearing wreaths and garlands made of leaves of trees or flowers or what not.’
This website honours both the historic celebrations and the joyous spontaneity of revels today. You will find photos, videos and any amount of abstruse information about maypoles and morris and much more besides.
Up the May!
LINKS
Oxford City Council has notes on bus transport, road closures and parking. See https://www.oxford.gov.uk/info/20035/events/559/may_morning_in_oxford
Daily Information highlights concerts, gigs, and much more. See www.dailyinfo.co.uk/mayday
STOP PRESS
The May Ox and comical effigies of the Emperors’ Heads are among the displays at the Oxfordshire Museum in Woodstock, forming part of an exhibition devoted to the life and work of their creator, Michael Black. Videos and ephemera relating to his May Day celebration testify to the sculptor’s love of fun. The exhibition Michael Black: Chisel, Wood, Stone runs until 1 June 2025. (For more on the Ox, see May Day Trivia in the menu above).
This site is maintained by writer and broadcaster Tim Healey. Visit www.timhealey.co.uk
Email contact shown here:
Share this page