APRIL: Burning of the Böögg

A traditional spring festival in Zürich is held every 3rd Monday of April. Sechseläuten (‘the six o’clock ringing of the bells’) goes back to the medieval times when in the summer, work must cease when the bell tolled at six o’clock.

The burning of a rag doll called bogey or Böögg in Swiss German, represented some yearly disaster such as the influenza or bad harvest. In 1892, the Trade Guilds received the responsibility of burning the Böögg, but it was no longer representing yearly disasters but the end of winter and so the rag doll evolved to look like a snowman.

The belief is that the time it takes for the explosion of the Böögg’s head (packed with explosives) is indicative of the summer: a quick explosion promises a warm and sunny summer. A drawn out burn predicts a cold and miserable summer. The quickest time on record is 5:07min in 1974 and the longest one is 57:00min set this year. Shock horror.

The festival is huge. The burning of the Böögg is preceeded by two parades. The Children’s Parade the day before and the Trade Guilds’ Parade on the day itself. This is a riot of colour and tradition –dirndls (the Heidi dress) and lederhosen mixed with uniforms and period costumes. Mounted horses, horse drawn carriages, wagons and floats. And even the odd camel this year. There are dozens of marching bands.

The construction of the Böögg pyres starts early on the day itself. This is massive undertaking. The finished pyre is 10m high requiring a crane and harnesses for the builders.

The best bit is after the Böögg and pyre has burned down leaving a 1-storey high pile of burning embers. People armed with long handled shovels brave the heat to remove the embers and put them in their portable barbecues. Out comes the cervelats, schlangen brot (bread dough coiled on a stick and looks like a snake) and even the caquelon for a cheese fondue. This is typical of a Swiss outing – practical, communal and not necessarily expensive in an already very expensive town.

Some interesting history in the Burning of the Böögg:

1921 Böögg was burned early by a student instigated by a communist

1923 Böögg didn’t burn as it rained too much

1941 no Böögg was burned as the field was used to plant corn

1942 crop rotation to potatoes

1943 wheat this time, so the burning of the Böögg was moved to the port of Enge

1944 the Böögg fell in the lake as the construction was not stable enough. People fished it out and threw its

head into the fire .

2006 abduction of the Böögg by leftist “revolutionaries” (since then spare Bööggs are kept in a nearby bank)

2007 the head of the Böögg exploded in 12:09min

2008 heavy rains soaked the Böögg that firemen had to spray the pyre with kerosene

2014 the head exploded at 7:23min but it ended up being a poor summer

2016 the head exploded at 43:34min, setting a record which held until this year

2017 the head exploded after 9:56min and it was a good summer

2020 was cancelled because of the Covid-19 pandemic, the first time in almost 100 years that it had not taken

place.

2021 with Covid-19 still raging, the Böögg was burned outside Zürich in the canton of Uri.

2023 the head exploded in 57min setting a new record. It’s a good summer so far…