Talk:Sechseläuten

Well, 2016 isn’t the longest time anymore, as today, it took 57 minute. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.55.241.185 (talk) 19:08, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

Talk page before sectioning began

The members of the guilds of Zurich parade through the streets once a year on the third Monday in April (unless postponed by Easter). They wear the traditional costumes and carry traditional equipment related to their trades.

The day is a half day holiday for the city and some of the canton.

The parade culminates on Bellevue Square where at 6pm sharp a fire is lit under a styrofoam statue of a snowman, called the Böög, which symbolizes winter.

While the fire burns the horsemen of the guilds ride around the fire. The head is charged with a strong explosive and throughout the body lesser explosives make e.g. the arms blow off with a bang.

When the head explodes the time is logged and if it burned for a short time, winter will be over shortly and warm weather should ensue. If it takes a long time, cold weather will continue for quite some time. It is quite uncanny how in many years this prediction has been quite precise.

Having lived in and around Zurich for decades, I am able to verify these facts based on being personally familiar with the details of this event due to its annual recurrence. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Scottyphus (talk • contribs)

all true, except for the "uncanny precision". people have actually gone to the trouble of demonstrating that the Böög's "prediction" is, in fact, uncorrelated to the weather that ensues. The age of this "tradition" would actually be interesting. The oldest recorded times on de-wiki date to 1974, I don't know if the time was logged before that. dab (ᛏ) 21:10, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

Böögg as Carnival figure?

Is the böögg really deriving from a carnival figure? carnival was banned from zurich during reformation (only the "immigrants" from catholic parts of switzerland do celebrate it(in very small numbers)) so this connection is no longer visible.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.162.144.131 (talk • contribs)

Your point about carnival being banned in Zürich during the Reformation and the connection with the Böögg seems valid. Even today, there doesn't seem to be much attention given to the carnival season in Zürich as there are is in other Swiss-German areas, especially Roman Catholic ones.--TGC55 (talk) 19:56, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Böögg head security?

I'm curious about the following: "Since then, several Bööggs are held in reserve with the main one stored at a bank nearby the Sechseläutenplatz (the open area in front of the Operahaus near Bellevue where most Zürich open air activities take place)." I'm wondering if the author of this is either mistaken or has a very different definition of "nearby." Out of curiosity, I searched google maps and the nearest bank to the Sechseläutenplatz seems to be 24 km away. That isn't very close in my book. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.163.109.69 (talk)

I live in Zurich, and there are, in fact, several banks in the near vicinity of the Sechseläutenwiese. According to this NZZ article, the main Bögg was stored in the Zürcher Kantonalbank in 2007, though it didn't specify which branch office. The closest one is only 200 m away, at Stadelhoferstr. 8, the next two ZKB buildings (Bahnhofstrasse 9 and Limmat-Quai 112) aren't much more than 1km away, well within walking distance. The substitute Böögg is usually stored at a secret place, as explained here. ---Sluzzelin talk 12:17, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

I lived in Zürich for 10 years and now live about 15 km from Sechseläutenplatz/Bellvue/Opera House and there are numerious banks within easy walking distance of the burn site. What user 24.163.109.69 proves without knowing is that Google maps are very subject to error.--TGC55 (talk) 19:56, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Cleanup

I have tagged this article for wikification and cleanup. It needs sections and that list at the end should either be made a paragraph proper or formatted correctly. Alekjds ^talk 02:20, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Done. — Graf Bobby 05:49, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Shouldn't there be someting about the "Zeuft" too?

After all, in my humble opinion, the march of the guilds ("zeuft") to the fire is almost as an important part of Sechseläuten (and much more colorful) than the Böög itself.

Could we at least put a table with the names of the guilds here? Halbwolf (talk) 21:39, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Upper Class vs. Working Class, etc.

"Additionally, because of its present date, the holiday is often within a week of 1 May, leading to a stark contrast between the upper class dominated Sechseläuten and the working class holiday of May Day." In Zurich, Sechseläuten is a much more formal "holiday" (work and shops closed, schools close at noon), whereas May Day is much more of a political day. I don't think this is necessarily class-ist, as Sechseläuten traditionally marks the end of the working day for working men (and women) at 6 pm. Also, the guilds (your builders, your bakers, your candlestick makers) are represented. I would almost say that the two holidays are wholly unrelated (except that they're both working men's holidays), with the exception of the stealing of the Böögg in 2006.

There are several traditions not mentioned in the article: the giving of flowers, the fact that there's an entire weekend's worth of festivities (99% of which no one goes to except the guilds), etc. Should these be added? 84.74.130.176 (talk) 11:20, 19 April 2010 (UTC)sasouthcott

Compare to the German version

The German version of this article is very good and has lots of references. Maybe somebody compares the two versions and translates the relevant parts. Details: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sechsel%C3%A4uten Zugerbueb (talk) 08:26, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Python algorithm

This python algorithm must be useful info for about 0.001 percent of the readers and very likely totally confusing for all the rest.--K0zka (talk) 13:58, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

• Also not sure how useful it is, always returns the same date for me (tested 1650 to 2250). bug in my test script, disregard this DerCed (talk) 12:52, 11 April 2016 (UTC)
• Not even developers are interested in this, seriously, please remove it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.75.162.46 (talk) 16:05, 18 April 2016 (UTC)
• Agreed: removed — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A00:A680:2020:E9:87:7DDB:ECA2:CC7F (talk) 09:52, 24 April 2017 (UTC)