APRIL FOOL. The tradition of April Fool’s Day jokes has several origins: if the most remembered dates back to the time of King Charles IX, for others, the ban on fishing has something to do with it…
[Updated March 31, 2023 at 3:02 p.m.] April 1st sees the birth of jokes, each funnier than the next. But where does the April Fool’s Day tradition come from? The tradition of this day of pranks, jokes and pranks is not recent: it dates back to the 16th century, but its origins are controversial. The legend shared by most historians says that in 1564, King Charles IX decided that the year would no longer begin on April 1st but on January 1st. This change would have delayed the exchange of gifts and New Year’s Eve which marked the transition to the new year. To sow doubt about the actual date of the new year, some would have persisted in giving gifts in April, and over time, these small April gifts would have turned into gifts for laughs, jokes, then tricks to trap others!
But this origin is far from being definitive and there would not be a single explanation at the origin of this festival. Whether religious, or simply related to fishing! In this file, we tell you everything about the origin of this party, we give you ideas for jokes and we explain to you how to make an April Fool’s Day out of paper, by sms or fake email. Finally for children, find 10 models of April Fools to print, cut out and color!
As seen above, the calendar change operated under Charles IX, which starts the first day of the year in January and no longer in March from 1564, would be the most widespread origin of April 1 as a day of jokes . In France, the New Year until the 16th century was not celebrated on January 1, but for a whole week, until April 1, to celebrate spring. People had got into the habit of giving each other gifts. It was King Charles IX who put an end to it by fixing January 1st. At the time, April 1 also corresponded to the end of the Lenten period, when a lot of fish was eaten. When the king changed the date, not everyone got used to it and some continued to exchange gifts in April. According to legend, they were then laughed at by others and the April Fool’s Day jokes were born just like that!
But the origin of the fish associated with April 1 is disputed and several versions exist. France’s early April fishing ban may be behind the infamous “fish hooked in the back”. Indeed, during the period of fish reproduction, fishermen were “offered” a dead herring hanging from the back, which was later replaced by a paper fish. Most believers see in April Fool’s Day a symbol of Lent, a Christian period when it is only allowed to eat fish, while others assure that the fish would come from the zodiac sign of the fish, the last of the winter, used as an illustration in cards sent on April 1 to symbolize the holiday in the early 20th century…
What about other countries? The tradition of the April 1st joke, originally Western, has gradually spread. It is expressed in different ways depending on the country. In English, April Fool’s Day is “April’s Fool’s Day”. Pranks only happen in the morning in England and if you get tricked you are “a noodle”. In Scotland, be twice as vigilant as in France because pranksters can also strike on April 2. In Mexico, the only trick is to steal a friend’s property. In exchange, the victim will have sweets and a note telling him that he was tricked. There is even an Indian version of April Fool’s Day: it takes place on March 31 and is called the “Huli” holiday.
Difficult to make an anthology of the best jokes of April 1st without a little self-promotion. Every year since its creation, Linternaute.com has participated in the tradition of April 1st with a home page completely filled with April Fools. Don’t worry: it will be easy to understand the joke in this totally offbeat fake news in a second. And difficult to go very far in the deception: no article behind these titles in the second, even in the third degree. As soon as you click on a topic, April Fool’s Day will be revealed. See you on our homepage on April 1!
Posted the day before April 1 of last year, a publication on the Facebook page of the Gendarmerie des Alpes-de-Haute-Provence caused more than one Internet user to react. The gendarmerie of Digne-les-Bains assured to launch a “feline brigade”, photo in support of a gendarme accompanied by a cat during a speed control on a road in the department:
“If the success in terms of the fight against road insecurity is uncertain, it should be there to soften motorists” wrote the gendarmes by sharing this post on Facebook. “We had this little idea for April 1. The idea is above all to raise awareness among the general public to limit road crime. Anyway, with or without a cat, take it easy,” explained Commander Paul Boulvrais, boss of the Digne-les-Bains company, to BFM.
Another joke spotted on the web on April 1, 2022, the mobile driving assistance application Waze had launched an assault on Tinder and dating sites by offering to chat with comrades in misfortune in traffic jams :
The local news site Actu Toulouse had published surprising news: the creation of an urban ventriglisse station with XXL slides on the hill of Pech David in Toulouse:
Among the companies that played the game in 2022 was also Burger King with a new flexiburger burger for “vegetarians not vegetarians” which offered a beef steak coupled with a vegetable steak. The art of not choosing…
Are your toddlers looking for April Fools to draw or color? Have you remained a big child fan of fish to hang behind the backs of colleagues? Hugo L’Escargot offers you a selection of original fish to print, cut out, color in to celebrate this day of stuffing that remains on April 1st.
A few years ago, we collected testimonials from our readers on April 1st. Whether they found themselves in the role of trappers or trapped, they told us about their funny experiences that day. Like Jancap, who imagined the concept of the “fishy” collective photocopier: “Draw a pretty fish on an A4 sheet with a thick marker, right in the center, 4 to 5 cm from the edges. Take a ream of white paper and put it in the tank of the photocopier. Photocopy the fish drawn on a minimum of fifty pages. Remove the ream of blank paper and insert in about fifteen places of it a few sheets of the photocopied fish. Be careful, put the fish in the correct direction so that it comes out of the photocopied side. Insert it into the paper reservoir…”
If you opt for a text message instead (read: how to send an anonymous text message), try to come up with an idea that is funny but not too spammy. Your interlocutor should not be unduly worried. Why not send him a text like: “You have been selected to participate in Koh Lanta with your friend Michel”. If you are the Michel in question, no doubt your friend will contact you in the minute to find out why you signed him up for this reality TV game! It’s up to you to continue to lead him on or not…
