Europe is home to an array of colorful, vibrant, and noisy festivals, where people come together to eat, drink, dance, and have fun. Tourists flock from across Europe and the world to take part. The majority of these folk festivals have their roots in the Christian calendar, which is surprising given that today they are usually more about parties than piety.

Whether it’s a saint’s day, the middle of summer, a crazy horse race, or just to enjoy a beer and good company, here we visit eight of the continent’s oldest – and strangest – folk festivals...

Legend has it that it began when people gathered in San Marco Square in 1162 to celebrate victory in battle. Today, it is known for its ornate masks which were first worn in the 13th century, perhaps to protect the identity of the revellers as normally strict codes of conduct were relaxed. This 1756 painting by Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo shows the relaxed and decadent Carnival atmosphere that made it a top tourist destination even then.

A very different type of mask is worn for Carnival celebrations in the Lötschental villages in Switzerland, where men roam the streets ringing bells and wearing furs and monstrous masks like the one here from 1925. The mask wearers are called Tschäggättä, or witches, and their job is to go about scaring people.

In Granada, Spain, this festival takes mask wearing in an altogether bigger direction during La Tarasca, which celebrates the mythical defeat of a dragon by St Martha. The parade, which has taken place since at least the early 19th century, is led by La Tarasca, a woman wearing a specially commissioned dress. She is followed by ‘giants’ with huge papier-mache heads, like this one inspired by Cervantes' Don Quixote from 2005.

Another saint’s day – better known as St Patrick’s day – is unusual because it has broken free of its original location in Ireland and is now celebrated by people all over the world thanks to the Irish diaspora, with some of the biggest celebrations taking place in the United States.

This is actually two festivals, held on 2 July and 16 August every year in Siena, Italy with two fiercely competitive sets of horse races, between riders representing their contrades or city wards. This picture shows how the riders compete bareback in brightly colored uniforms. It’s not uncommon for most of the horses to finish riderless at the end of three chaotic laps of the piazza.

In Catalonia, castells require a completely different kind of bravery. Castells are human towers built all across the region on festival days. The earliest known was made in Valls, Spain, in 1712, but the phenomenon quickly spread. It became hugely popular from the 1970s onwards.

Munich is home to a gathering of one of the largest folk festivals in the world. In a typical year at the Oktoberfest, nearly eight million litres of beer will be drunk. Strangely, the Oktoberfest also began as a horse racing event, but over the years has morphed into a 16-18 day beer festival, without a horse in sight.

We know very little about Stonehenge in England, beyond the fact that it was created 5,500 years ago to serve as a calendar, with the avenue through the stones aligning perfectly with the rising sun, once a year, at the summer solstice. The Bronze Age rituals that were carried out there are lost forever, but every year people gather there to celebrate the solstice with their own pagan rituals.

Throughout history, humans have sought to honor and speak to the dead. Many cultures, past and present, hold festivals to venerate their family and friends who have passed on.  

Such traditions date all the way back to the ancient Egyptians, who celebrated the Wag festival. Dedicated to Osiris, the god of the dead, afterlife, and resurrection, the festival honored those who passed on.

During the festival, people would construct papyrus boats and put them on the graves of loved ones facing West, or float papyrus shrines down the Nile River, symbolizing their journey to the afterlife.  

Paper offerings are also an important part of Ghost Festival in East Asia, also known as the Zhongyuan Festival in Taoism and Yulanpen Festival in Buddhism. This is a full month when the souls of the dead are free to roam the Earth.

People make offerings, including burning paper money and food, to appease and show respect to the dead. At the end of the festival, boats or lanterns are set afloat in the water to guide spirits back as the doors of hell close behind them.

During this festival, there are important rules to remember to keep yourself safe from menacing ghosts including: don’t take pictures at night, don’t touch another person’s shoulder, and don’t wear red or black. 

People also avoid making big life changes during this month, so avoid getting married, buying new cars, or moving houses. 

Also known as the Bon festival, this Japanese Buddhist celebration commemorates dead ancestors. Families gather together and hang lanterns to guide the spirits home to visit their families.

As part of the traditions, people place food offerings on graves or family altars. The celebrations also include special dances, known as Bon Odori, which are specific to each region. 

You may be familiar with one of the most famous festivals of the dead, Día de Muertos, which originated in Mexico. Like the Obon Festival, it is a time for family and friends to honor the dead.

Some traditions focus on not just the soul of the deceased, but also their physical bodies. The Torajan culture of Indonesia views death as a gradual process of transition into the afterlife. The deceased body is kept in the house, sometimes for years, until the funeral.

Every year, or few years, the bodies are exhumed to be cleaned and redressed before returning them to their burial place. 

Madagascar has a similar tradition, known as the turning of the bones. During this celebration, families reunite with their deceased loved ones. People remove the dead from their crypts, rewrap them in fresh cloth, and write their names on the outside of the cloth to ensure their memory lives on.