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About
Stilton
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Stilton
Village Website
| About
Stilton: Stilton Cheese Rolling |
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Cheese
Rolling has become an annual event in Stilton and every May
Day hundreds of villagers and visitors make their way to the
main street to watch the teams battling for the honour of being called the 'Stilton Cheese Rolling
Champions'.
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Cheese
Rolling Evening Concert
featuring
Leon and friends
On the village Playing
Field, 5-9pm, £5 on the gate.
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August
23rd 2007: Stilton Cheese Rolling features in Robbie
Coltrane's "B-Road Britain", broadcast on ITV1
at 9pm.
From the Radio Times "Choices": "What does a
village community do to keep itself alive after an A-road has
completely bypassed it? Organise an annual cheese-rolling contest
down its high street, of course. The village of Stilton in Cambridgeshire,
where this bizarre activity takes place, is Robbie Coltrane's
first stop on the second leg of his journey peeking over the
hedgerows of Britain's B-roads to see what lurks there." |
CHEESE
ROLLING 2006 took place on
May Day Monday May 1st
This year, celebrating the history that has rolled along our
high street, the theme was
"Let's
do the Timewalk".
Stilton's position on the Great North Road made it an important
stop for the postal system. At first, riders carried letters
from stage to stage where horses could be changed and refreshments
consumed. However, just 300 years ago on Friday 12 April 1706,
the London to York coach service began. The journey took four
days, leaving the Black Swan in Holborn at 5am on Mondays,
Wednesdays and Fridays. Stamford was the half-way point.
So in 2006 we marked this anniversary with a magnificent Mail
Coach, traditional dancers, maypole dancing and mummers (who
performed "George and the Dragon" to mark the 80th
birthday of HM the Queen, and St. George's Day), and we also
featured Fred's Flying Circus (www.fredsflyingcircus.co.uk).
Download a Programme of Events and Attractions (jpg, 266kb)
2006 photographs
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CHEESE
ROLLING 2005 took place on
May Day Monday May 2nd.
The theme was "Sixty Years On", commemorating
the end of World War II.
Programme of Events
Photographs
Results
and Thanks
In
the evening, the Stilton Cheese
Rolling Music Festival was held
in the Talbot car park, featuring the acclaimed Stilton-based
band LEON,
supported by It's
the pigs and ECHO20.
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CHEESE
ROLLING 2004 took place on
May Day Bank Holiday 3rd May.
Full 'rolling
programme'
Pictures
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CHEESE
ROLLING 2003 took place on
May Day Bank Holiday 5th May.
Pictures
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How
did it start?
It would be nice to be able to say that the event is
"as old as the village" or that it's
origins have been lost in "the mists of time" but really
no one knows how far back the tradition of rolling the cheeses goes.
Midway through the Twentieth Century, when the village had turned
into rather a quiet place having been by-passed by the A1 and the
inns and businesses had seen a big drop in their trade, a landlord
of one of the pubs decided to revive an ancient tradition. Or so he
told everyone! He could be seen rolling a Stilton Cheese along the
road outside his pub. People came to stand and watch and eventually
joined in. And so the sport began - again. |
The
Rules
It was originally run on Easter Monday and there was not a lot of
uniformity to it to begin with. It seems a piece of wood in the shape
of a Stilton Cheese was produced, a starting line drawn up somewhere
between the The Stilton Cheese Inn and The
Talbot and the finish line was outside The Bell Inn. Brave teams of
Stilton men would then vie to roll the cheese to it's finish and, after the ensuing scramble, and many
tussles and spills, the team that ended up steering the cheese to
the finishing line would win! Nowadays, the starting point is always
outside The Bell Inn and The Angel and the finish is a line drawn
at the cross roads between the bottom of Fen Street and Church Street.
The contestants are teams of 4, either all men or all women and each
team member has to roll the cheese at least once during it's
flight. It's a knockout competition with quarter's, semi's and a grand final. |
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Fancy
Dress
Some of the teams wear fancy dress for which there is a good prize
and it all adds to the colourful scene. We would like to say that the sport
has become more genteel over the years but we still get the tumbles
and spills as in former days. The friendly rivalry grows during
the competition as each team passes through to the next round so
we end up with some very competitive finals!
The prizes are always the same, a Whole Stilton Cheese and beer
for the men and a Whole Stilton Cheese and wine for the ladies.
But, of course, the main prizes are to be the winners of the coveted
Bell Cup for men or the WI Cup for the ladies and to go down in
history as 'Stilton Cheese Rolling Champions'. For more information
about next years Cheese Rolling or to obtain an entry form contact
the organisers:
Stilton
Community Association
01733 241206
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