Every year, on the first Saturday of the month of December, the streets of Geneva's
old town swarm with a colourful crowd celebrating one of the oldest and most popular
events of the city's life:
la Fête de l'Escalade.
L'Escalade is a patriotic celebration of the city's fervent spirit
of independence, the Genevan equivalent of Guy Fawkes Day. Literally meaning
"scaling", to refer to the invaders' use of ladders to storm the walls
surrounding the old town, it commemorates the Duke Charles-Emmanuel of Savoy's
final and failed attempt to invade Geneva.
On the night of December 11th, 1602 the Duke of Savoy's soldiers attacked the
town by surprise. All the locals hastened to arm themselves to defend their city
and the entire population fought alongside the town guards. After a fierce battle
the invaders retreated at five o'clock in the morning. Geneva had bravely managed
to keep its independence.
One of the most remembered participants in the battle is undoubtedly Catherine
Cheynel, wife of Pierre Royaume and affectionately known in Geneva as la
Mère Royaume. According to the legend, this formidable housewife
dispatched a Savoyard soldier, who was pushing his way up the street beneath
her window, by tipping her marmite (cauldron) of hot vegetable soup over
his head.
In honour of this expression of the people's solidarity, the Genevan world-famous
confiseurs (confectioners) have made, every year since the middle of
the 19th century, the Marmite de l'Escalade, a small pot made of chocolate
and filled with marzipan vegetables. And although nowadays tossing a soup cauldron
from one's window is not exactly encouraged by the local authorities, the Genevans
celebrate the event by happily smashing their own chocolate cauldrons and feasting
on the resulting pieces.
Many locals also celebrate the night by dressing up in fancy costumes and parading
by torchlight around the streets to the music of drums and fifes, while groups
of kids sing in the city-centre cafés. A highlight of the festivities is
the costumed re-enactment of the battle, with period spears and weapons, performed
by the 700 members of the "Compagnie de 1602" in Geneva's old town.
A warm and truly friendly celebration in the middle of the cold Swiss winter,
L'Escalade also offers one of the many paradoxes of the modern world:
a carnival-like celebration in one of the oldest protestant cities of Europe.
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