Bright boys and maids
Hellige Knäächte un Mägde (High German: "Holy Knechte und Mägde") are the oldest traditional dance group of the Cologne Carnival , whose founding can be traced back to the 13th and 14th centuries.
history
In medieval Cologne , Cologne “Kappesboore” (“Kappes” is Kölsch for “cabbage”) founded so-called five “ farmers' benches ” within the city walls. Their sons and daughters wore figures of saints in the parish processions of the medieval city, danced for amusement at the fair and cultivated the Cologne customs. In addition to Bauernschütz and Fähnrich, the group is led by the "Jeckenbääntchen" (borrowed from the first name Bernd). This old Cologne figure, mostly described as the court jester of the free imperial city of Cologne, was mainly encountered from the 16th to the 18th century at city festivities. In March 1811 the dance group is occupied in the procession of homage to the birth of Napoleon II . On February 10, 1823, she was appointed to the first Cologne Rose Monday procession together with today's “ Kölsche Funke rut-wieß vun 1823 eV ” , in which they have been taking part ever since. Without a “carnivalist attitude” they appeared - clearly outside the carnival session - on August 14, 1842, officially in front of King Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia on the Neumarkt in Cologne, who celebrated the laying of the foundation stone for the completion of Cologne Cathedral .
Demerger / trademark protection
From 1997 the community with the "Lyskircher Junge" was ended, they then appeared as an independent group. Since 1998 the “Hellige Knäächte un Mägde” have been entitled to use this name for the dance group through a protected trademark right, to use the costumes in the traditional costume colors red, white and black and to be “Cologne's oldest traditional dance group in the Cologne Carnival since 1823 " to call.
