Rushes for Dedication Day

An Act of Convocation of 1536 ordered that the feast of the dedication of every church should be kept everywhere on the same day, the first Sunday in October, and the churches’ own saints’ days laid aside. Brand found that the order was soon disregarded and parishes kept their own wakes again. At St Margaret’s, Westminster, however, the churchwardens paid in 1544 for rushes to strew the church against Dedication Day, which they noted was always the first Sunday of October.