Foundation festival
A foundation festival is a term that is widespread, especially among academics' associations, for a celebration on the occasion of the anniversary of the founding of an institution, association, association or association .
Student associations
The foundation festival is the most important festival of the year for student associations . Originally introduced to celebrate the founding anniversary, the festival is now celebrated by some connections regardless of the Foundation Day in the second half of the summer semester (mainly in June) - when nice weather is expected but the holidays have not yet started. As a rule, of all the festivities of a connection, the foundation festival has the highest participation from the old gentlemen , who often travel with their families.
Typical events within the framework of a foundation festival are the foundation festival ball and the foundation festival commers . More informal forms of events are the welcome evening and the end, which are sometimes also held outdoors. With some connections, e.g. B. the Wingolfsbund , it is common to undertake a joint excursion to foundation festivals , this is called an exbummel . For anniversaries, the year of which is divisible by 5 (final digit “0” or “5”), so-called “large foundation festivals” are often held, the design of which is more costly and for which even more guests can be expected.
The corporation house of the connection plays an important role at foundation festivals, taking on a central function as a meeting point and event location, even if - especially at "large foundation festivals" - not all official events take place there.
In many connections it has become common practice to publish commemorative publications on particularly important anniversaries (e.g. 100th foundation festival). In addition to texts on the history of the connection, these often also contain the ceremonial speeches and drums (studspr .: speeches of the charged ).
Foundation celebrations of student associations - even if they take place with a participation of several hundred people - are usually not public events, since - similar to a family celebration - only members of the respective association and in rare cases a few other people close to the association who are all personally connected to each other.
Masonic foundation festivals
The United Grand Lodge of England was founded in London on June 24, 1717 as the first grand lodge in the world .
Some of the local Masonic lodges , which are spread around the world, look back on more than 200 years of history. On the anniversary of their establishment, the corresponding lodges celebrate a foundation festival.
The internal part of the foundation festival is held among the Freemason brothers, on this occasion a festive temple work is held and a seeker may be admitted to the union of Freemasons . Most of the time, the foundation festivals are celebrated in the local lodge house or in a place that has great historical significance for the lodge. For example at the Völkerschlachtdenkmal in Leipzig , which was built by Clemens Thieme . The Leipzig master of the Masonic Lodge Apollo had the crypt built there.
After the temple work, a table is held with all members of the lodge and the visiting brothers from other lodges. Lodges, which are historically closely linked to one another, present gifts to each other on this occasion. These presents are often dedicated or have historical significance for the celebrating lodge. Such as utensils or documents that belonged to the lodge and were requisitioned during the Nazi era . Often these items were bought back later.
It is a tradition of the lodges to publish a commemorative publication at round foundation festivals in which the history of the lodge is written down. Copies of the Festschrift are given to the city archives and the visiting brothers. In some boxes it is customary to hold a dance ball for the families on the following weekend and to collect money for charity.
literature
- Eugen Lennhoff, Oskar Posner, Dieter A. Binder : International Freemasons Lexicon. 5th edition. Herbig, Munich 2006, ISBN 978-3-7766-2478-6 .
