This illustrated reference work covers a wide range of festivals that have sacred origins and are, or have been, part of a folk tradition, a world religion, or a major civilization.

Traditional Festivals: A Multicultural Encyclopedia travels around the world and across the centuries to uncover an often unexpected richness of meaning in some of the major sacred festivals of the world's religions, the hallowed calendars of ancient civilizations, and the seasonal celebrations of tribal cultures.

From Akitu to Yom Kippur, its 150+ entries look at the content and context of these festivals from a number of perspectives (including those relating to theology, anthropology, folklore, and social theory), tracing their historical development and variations across cultures. Readers will get a vivid sense of what each festival means to the people celebrating it; how each captures its culture's beliefs, hopes and fears, founding myths, and redemptive visions; and how each expresses the universal need of humans to connect their lives to a timeless spiritual dimension.

• More than 150 A-Z entries on the content and context of each festival, tracing its historical development and geographic variations, from Ashura (Islam) to Whitsuntide (Christianity)
• 70 illustrations of festive rituals including photos of Belgium's Binche Carnival, Japan's Cherry Blossom Festival, and the Zulu Reed Dance
• Tables of dates for the major feasts in Hinduism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, as well as for the Chinese New Year
• Calendar graph showing at a glance the relative places of all the festivals discussed in the seasonal cycle of a single year