Celebrates of Wallonia

The Fête of Wallonia is célêbrée third Sunday of September. It commemorates the participation of the Walloons in the Belgian Révolution of 1830.

The Law

Extract of the decree (appeared the August 8th 1998 in the Belgian Monitor) determining the feastday and the emblêmes suitable for the Walloon region:

“The Walloon District council adopted and Us, Gouvernement, let us sanction what follows:
Article 1st. The festival of the Walloon region is celebrated each year third Sunday of the month of septembre.
(…)
Namur, the July 23rd 1998. ”

The direction of this festival

The importance of this festival imposes the respect of its date as well as its denomination. It is thus erroneous of speaking about " Festivals of Wallonie" , unhappy expression which “dissects” the Walloon unit in as much of “ducasses” unsuitable celebrating with dignity the expression of the unit of a whole people.

It is about a date which has as a function essential to commemorate the foundation of the Wallonia, the memory of all the combat, large or small, which led million people to voluntarily living under the current aegis of a Walloon Parliament and a Walloon Gouvernement for their larger good and according to their democratic will.

Eminently political, this festival renews each year the foundation of a Walloon history through the systematization of a Walloon space time: the festival everywhere the same day to remember and project themselves in the future, to hear the speech of the Minister-President of the Walloon region. The role of the festival is to cause the clear conscience of this framework first without which the texts nor the words would not have a direction. Accordingly, to respect the festival of Wallonia according to the stated legislative terms higher marks the adhesion of all with the Walloon unit and the celebration of its material and immaterial inheritance, in a word the land respect of the Walloon identity.

In Namur

Thus with Namur, Walloon capital, one assists the weekend of third Sunday of September with " festivals of wallonie" folk. They begin Thursday to finish Monday evening. These festivals drain, in addition to the local population, several tens of thousands of visitors coming from the 4 corners from Wallonia.

Several animations are organized during these five days of fête.

Enter other:

a mass called in Walloon Namurian (Monday, in the middle of the city, in the Midsummer's Day Church);
some open attractions;
traditional combat of stilts
the tasting of Walloon gastronomical products like the avisance (fresh sausage of pig and butchery, wrapped slightly laminated or broken paste, the whole cooked with the furnace);
the tasting (considered to be abusive) of the Peket by all the participants.

Until the end of the Sixties, it was served only two kinds of this grain alcohol, the peket pure alcohol of approximately 20° and the pecq, lengthened mint. Thereafter of many varieties appeared. Let us make confidence with the students (very many in Namur) to allot a name to them!

various commemorations: Pilgrimage with the cemetery of Namur with a homage to the combatants of the two world wars, the " Road of the plaques" (homage to Namurian famous of which Nicolas Bosret, Félicien Rops, François Bovesse…)
the road of the peket: stroll in boat between the three locks girdling Namur and in the streets of the " Namur" old man; , accompanied by a brass band and sprinkled peket.
of the official discourses given by the local authorities and regional;
the Namurian anthem Li Bia Bouquet interpreted by the Royal Company Moncrabeau.
Combat traditonnels on stilts with arches by the group of Echasseurs.

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