ASINI, FESTA degli. — Medieval, paraliturgical religious observance intended to recall the role played by the donkey in various episodes of Sacred Scripture (the donkey of the flight into Egypt, of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, Balaam’s donkey, and above all the donkey of the Bethlehem Nativity, known only from the apocryphal Gospels). It flourished especially in France in the 12th–15th centuries, and the dramatic action assumed different forms according to the places and events commemorated.
Thus, at Rouen, the feast of the donkeys was celebrated at Christmas, after the singing of Terce. A procession made up of prophets and other figures from the Old Testament, led by two clerical singers, set out from the Cathedral cloister. Upon entering the church, they halted halfway down the nave, where a kind of furnace (linteo et stuppis constituta) had been lit, flanked on one side by six Jews and on the other by six Gentiles. The two clerics then summoned the various figures one by one, and each, advancing, recited his prophecy. When Balaam’s turn came, he approached seated on a donkey, which stopped stubbornly; the prophet beat and spurred it in vain, and it groaned and spoke to him: « Why are you beating me? » The one who actually spoke was someone hidden beneath the animal’s vestments (quidam sub asina dica). Once the summons had been completed, the figures and ministers sang a kind of hymn from the pulpit, after which the Christmas Mass was intoned.
At Beauvais, by contrast, the feast was celebrated on 14 January (it was intended to commemorate Mary’s flight into Egypt), but it had a more light-hearted character. The prettiest young woman was chosen; seated on a richly harnessed donkey and carrying a child in her arms, she made a grand procession from the Cathedral to the parish church of St Stephen and attended the entire solemn Mass, remaining at the right side of the altar. When the Mass was over, instead of singing the Ite, missa est, the priest imitated the donkey’s braying three times (ter hinhanabit), and the people, instead of Deo gratias, replied hin-han! hin-han! hin-han! Indeed, during the Mass itself, after the epistle, they sang the so-called donkey’s sequence, composed in leonine verse, in which each stanza setting forth the qualities and services rendered by the animal was followed by a refrain in the vernacular: « Hez, sir asne, hez - belle bouche rechignez - on aura du foin assez - et de l'avoine a planté ».
The performance, initially kept within reasonable limits, soon evolved toward an increasingly buffoonish tone. Thus at Sens, in 1247, the clerics took part in the feast adorned with flowers and even in disguise. In the 14th century, probably through contamination with « the Feast of Fools », after the donkey had entered the church in triumph, it was welcomed by the canons carrying bottles and glasses in their hands, and they pretended to cense it with puddings and sausages (« hoc die incensabitur cum budino et saucita »).
As the excesses increased over the years, the feast of the donkeys could no longer be either admitted or tolerated; and the 15th century marked its definitive cessation almost everywhere.