When: February 13
Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday) is the day before Ash Wednesday and the culmination of the Carnival season — traditionally the last day to eat rich, indulgent food before the 40-day Lenten fast. The New Orleans celebration is the most famous in the United States, but Mobile, Alabama, claims an older American Mardi Gras. The global Carnival traditions in Venice, Rio de Janeiro, and Trinidad have their own centuries of history.
Mardi Gras is a Catholic fasting tradition that became the world's most famous party — and New Orleans didn't invent it.
Mardi Gras — French for "Fat Tuesday" — is the day before Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent. The name reflects its purpose: the last opportunity to consume meat, fat, eggs, and dairy before the fasting season. The word "carnival" (from the Latin carne vale — "farewell to meat") describes the broader season of celebration that builds to this climax. The European Carnival tradition predates Christianity — Roman Saturnalia and the Greek Anthesteria are among the suggested precursors. The medieval Catholic Church channeled these traditions into the pre-Lenten period, creating the Carnival season as a licensed period of excess before the discipline of Lent. Mobile, Alabama, celebrates its Mardi Gras with a claim older than New Orleans: French explorers founded a settlement near Mobile Bay in 1702, and the first American Mardi Gras celebration is documented there in 1703 — six years before New Orleans was founded. The rivalry between Mobile and New Orleans over the "original" American...