Nickanan Night on Collop Monday

A Bacon Butty this morning.

It is pancake day tomorrow...
Once we have eaten our pancakes and got rid of our delicious treats we can prepare for the fast.
So today on Collop Monday or Shrove Monday or Peasen Monday we finish our meats.
We stuff our faces with our last steak or a bacon butty followed by pea soup ready for our veg only diet.
That all sounds wonderful but... beware of the vandals loose on Nickanan Night tonight...

Children playing Nick Nack on Collop Monday

In some villages naughty children play "Nick Nack" ... knocking on doors and running away. This is terrifying for anyone who owns a door and children should be warned against such shenanigans - as, not only does it frighten poor souls, it may result in the bairns who are caught getting no pancakes tomorrow or something even worse.

Nickanan the Demon - (Taken from the children's book "Nickanan and the Eggs" by Bernadette Teldwater)

It is well known that three knocks on three doors in succession are likely to raise the demon Nickanan who forces communities to abandon Lent in favour of forty days of a strict egg based diet. One village who suffered his visitation saved hundreds of pounds on toilet paper that year but were incredibly foul tempered throughout the feast of Lent.

Nickanan nights tend to be celebrated in Cornwall - if you have an experience of this tonight please do tell us here...