May Morning
May Morning is Oxford's dawn celebration on 1 May, when the choir of Magdalen College sings from the top of Magdalen Tower at 6am to crowds gathered below on the High Street and Magdalen Bridge. Magdalen is pronounced "MAUD-lin", and getting it right is the first test every newcomer faces.
In practice
At six o'clock the choir sings the Hymnus Eucharisticus, a seventeenth-century Latin hymn, followed by a madrigal; then the bells ring and the city carries on celebrating. Morris dancers perform in the streets, pubs and cafés open unusually early, and many students arrive after staying up all night. For years some revellers jumped from Magdalen Bridge into the Cherwell; after serious injuries in shallow water the authorities discourage it, and the bridge has been closed or controlled in some years.
Why it matters to newcomers
Come early if you want to hear the singing: the crowd on the bridge and the High Street is dense well before six, and the streets around it are closed to traffic. Bring something warm. It is one of the few city-wide celebrations shared by town and University alike.
Related
- The High - the street the crowd fills
- The Isis - Oxford's other river; Magdalen Bridge crosses the Cherwell
- Summer Eights - the next big crowd of the year
Source: Magdalen College, Oxford.