1 April, Hunt-the-Gowk

Scottish Pranks
April Fooling was probably introduced by France into Scotland, where it is known as 'hunting the Gowk,' and children shout 'Gowk, gowk!' at their victims. April Fool's Day is there called Gowkin' Day.

" 'What compound interest is to simple addition,' writes Chambers in his Book of Days, `so is Scottish to English fooling' (McNeill, 53, quoting from Robert Chambers' Book of Days)." Not being content to make someone believe a single piece of absurdity, some poor fool is sent out on a Gowk's errand. The victim is sent away with a note supposedly asking for some item, but in reality containing only the words,

`Never laugh, never smile,
Hund the gowk another mile.'

The recipient of this note, with a grave face, tells the victim that he doesn't have such an article, but if the victim will go to so-and-so's with the note, only another mile away, surely he will find it. Off he goes, only to be told the same thing by the next person. He goes on, hunting the gowk another mile, then another; till finally he realizes what is happening, or some tender- hearted person tells him. ``A successful affair of this kind will keep rustic society in merriment for a week, during which honest Andrew Wilson hardly can show his face" (McNeill, 53, quoting from Robert Chambers' Book of Days).

In Scotland, the word `Gowk' means both fool and cuckoo. April 1, Old Style, fell on what is now April 13, and it is usually in the second week of April that the cuckoo utters its first note. People associated the cuckoo with folly a trait probably transferred from the cuckoo's victim, as in the word `cuckold,' and it may be this way that the term gowk became associated with the victim of April fooling.

At Mere, in the south-west corner of Wiltshire, England, there used to be a `Cuckowe King,' apparently elected annually to preside at a `Church Ale' at this season. And in Somerset, the folklore is full of references to `cuckoo pennings' with vague meanings.

"One theory advanced is that the 'cuckoo' in many of the old traditions is not the bird but the Britons of the Dark Ages. These Celts were derisively termed 'cuckoos,' meaning nincompoops, by the advancing Saxons, largely because they were too stupid to understand the Saxon language, as any normally bright person would do with ease! The 'cuckoo pen' legends usually refer to places of ancient origin with at least the traces of a fortified earthwork, so it can be assumed that this was where the invaders managed to get those British cuckoos penned."

Web Source - http://www.auburn.edu/~kerrlin/AprilFool.html