Hoodening in popular culture

We never imagined, when we resumed hoodening some 50+ years ago, that hooden horses might become a 'meme' — indeed, the concept didn't even exist. And much of what is called 'hooden' in popular culture has very little to do with our tradition. Nevertheless, some of it is quite creative, or at least it's thought-provoking to see what 'creatives' do with it.

Games

Hoodening has appeared in both video games and role-playing games (RPG).

• Dungeons & Dragons, in the "5e SRD" (Systems Reference Document), contains a description of a "medium undead, lawful evil" creature called Hooden Horse. It's allegedly "topped by a horse’s skull" so there's a bit of confusion with Mari Lwyd, perhaps, although "a drunken procession staggers toward the tavern" is on the mark!
• A Swedish heavy-metal tabletop RPG called Mörk Borg includes a "weaponised fölk custom called (and inspired by) hoodening. The hunching and jockey are authentic, but the skull is again more Mari (let alone the "lance of the Mari Lwyd").
• At the opposite extreme, an online "Easter Egg Hunt" played inside Facebook called Hatchlings includes a "North Pole" series called Hoodening, with numerous cute eggs such as a mollie, a jockey and a violin player.

The similar tradition of the Mari Lwyd has also appeared, in more mainstream games:

• Assassin's Creed: Valhalla. The Welsh historian/archaeologist Dave Howell plays/discusses it in this "Mari Lwyd expert" video.
  

  It's amusing to see that in Valhalla, they even conflate our two customs, with lines like "you invited me to a hoodening" then "you are the very spirit of the Mari Lwyd: now, let's hooden!"
  

• Cthulhu Saves Christmas. Again, Dave Howell has a gameplay video. Here apparently the Mari Lwyd and Krampus are evil forces pitted against Santa.
• Vampire Survivors (under the name Maronna; there's also a Maronna Meea which looks similar)
• Mari Lwyd also appears in D&D, as a "skeletal mare speaking in constant rhyme", which seems much milder than the hooden horse character above.

DIY Models

James Frost runs occasional "build your own hooden horse" workshops, suitable for children too. Beth Hopkins, Stephen Rowley and others have done adult workshops elsewhere — although as you'll see from our definition of Hoodening we're reluctant to apply that word to anything outside East Kent, so these are generally what we'd call morris beasts (Rowley refers to "a real hobby horse for morris/mummers based on the Kentish Hooden Horse"). Many years ago Ron Shuttleworth, former "Keeper of Beasts to the Illustrious Order of United Fools", produced a thorough guide to constructing hobby animals, where he made clear this was mainly aimed at morris dancers; nevertheless, it is useful for anyone thinking of making a beast of any type. One issue highlighted in this making a Mari Lwyd walkthrough is that with all skulls, one has to work out a mechanism to attach (and hinge) the jaw.

All hooden horses are unique, but amongst the various traditions similar to Hoodening, some have created mass-produced (occasionally downloadable) templates to make your own beast. On Alamy there are images of various polygonal or 'origami' horse & unicorn heads that could perhaps be adapted; searching for papercraft reveals some template models. The closest we've got to that is a PDF containing a 3D scan of Coomber's hooden horse, which is probably not high enough quality for 3D printing. If you're looking to make a souling horse or Mari Lwyd, there are numerous technical/legal difficulties with obtaining actual skulls, so it's simpler nowadays to buy a polyurethane model or 3D-print your own.

Mari Lwyd

The Trac and Twinkl versions below come in both languages.

• Trac Cymru has a "fflat-pac" waterproof Mari Lwyd kit, with a video how-to guide and an optional book.
• The version from Wintercroft looks more polygonal.
• There are also several simple designs for children from Twinkl, largely with printed (rather than carved) designs.

The Newfoundland Jannie (mummering horse)

• The Mummers Festival have been running what they style as "Hobby Horse" workshops since 2009, including a virtual one during the coronavirus pandemic. There is a how-to video (and an older documentary-style video), but the link to download the template is no longer valid: use this archive copy instead.

Art (paintings, sculptures, film, etc.)

Many artists have been inspired to depict hoodening or the hooden horse — as shown throughout our website. A few more examples are shown below to demonstrate the range of media; we've omitted most live dramatic performances as it's hard to draw a line between these and hoodening variants or similar traditions, and for music, see the page on hoodening songs.

• Animation: Quarantine includes a quasi-hooden horse clearly based on Barnett Field's East Kent Morris beast.
• Film: as part of the 2023 exhibition, Sonia Overall created a 12-minute film "Poor Old Horse":
  
• Film: as a prelude to the 2023 exhibition, Ben Edge (see also below) created a 16-minute film "Hooden Horse":
  
• Immersive experience: whether this really counts as 'art' is debatable, but Scare Kingdom (north of Manchester) used to have a section called 'The Hoodening', described as "the mysterious hoodeners and the Mollie Queen invite you into their pre-Christian ancient folk ritual" (basically, actors tell you to wear a hood — sensory deprivation — then follow a rope through a dark maze towards your 'sacrifice').
• Woodwork: a collecting box made for the East Kent morris side.
  
• Woodwork: mini-horses can sometimes be found at Broadstairs Folk Week, Strange Cargo and elsewhere.
  
• Woodwork: on a larger scale, we see a chainsaw sculpture of a mummering horse in Newfoundland.
  
• Collage/Craft: on a much smaller scale, the mudlarkers "Kit & Caboodlers" created a metal Mudmas 'hoodening horse' from something found in the mud: see their full 10-minute video.
  
• Clay: a model by Jen Armstrong of Wren Folk Ceramics.
  
• Mineral sculpture: Green Man Gatekeeper sell a figurine made of unknown 'natural minerals', while Jo Woollen Weirds uses felt and other fibres.
  
• Plastic sculpture: young Mikkel Arildskov from Denmark was - amazingly - the first to think of making a horse prototype out of Lego, including flashing eyes.
  
  He then followed it up with a gobbling horse, clearly with a huge appetite thanks to the bin mouth!
  
• Linocut: Cath Deeson, Hattie Hyder and others can be found on Instagram.
  
• Hand painted: Ben Edge (see also above) created a great painting of "Satan":
  
• Hand painted: Kelda Sproston a.k.a. Skulls & Sheets is devoted to creating Mari Lwyd images, in an incredible variety of styles; twice she has included hooden horses.
  
• Tattoo: louchadora and others have inked in some horses
  
• Stage: not specifically designated 'hooden', but some wonderful beasts appeared at English National Opera
  

Etsy has dozens of Mari Lwyd Christmas Tree ornaments, badges, stickers, T-shirts, cards, 3D-printed statuettes, keyrings, and the like.