A maypole is work, argument, hospitality and pride, gathered into one piece of wood. To understand why whole neighbourhoods spend their April nights on camping chairs, you have to go back a few centuries.
Where the maypole comes from
Where the custom began is not known. It is often traced back to pre-Christian spring rites, but no unbroken line from those to today's maypole can be shown. The tree only becomes tangible in the records: it is attested from the 13th century, and there is evidence for Bavaria from the 16th century. In the 17th century setting up maypoles was banned in Bavaria, and in 1827 King Ludwig I allowed it again. The maypole as the emblem of a whole village or town, as it is known today, took shape mainly in the 19th century. What has changed since are the trades on the plaques.
What the maypole means
The meaning lies less in the tree than in the people who raise it. Zunftzeichen, the emblems of the guilds, together with figures and plaques, show the trades and clubs of a place, and to read them is to read the community. On top of that comes a quiet contest: who has the taller tree, who the finer one, who the one people are still talking about in autumn. More on the page about the meaning of the maypole.
What a maypole looks like
Usually a tall spruce or fir, stripped of branches and peeled, the trunk often wound in a white and blue spiral, the colours of Bavaria. At the top a green crown is left standing, or a wreath sits there instead. Heights of around thirty metres are typical, and a few record trees pass fifty. Everything else is made by hand over weeks, and no two trees are alike. How one is decorated is an art in itself.
A maypole is not a monument you set up once and then forget. It is felled, decorated, guarded, stolen, ransomed and eventually replaced. The custom lives in those acts, not in the wood.
How long a maypole stands
Places handle that differently. Some trees disappear at the end of May, many stay for a year or longer until a new one takes over. Elsewhere it happens only every few years. The tree at the Viktualienmarkt is renewed at intervals of several years.
The maypole in Munich
At the Viktualienmarkt it has long been a landmark, and in the districts that have one it belongs to spring as firmly as the first radler, beer cut with lemonade, in the sun. The society Chinesischer Turm e.V. keeps that tradition visible under the name Maibaum München. More background on the custom comes from our sister project (in German), Brauchtum München.
Sources
- Wikipedia: Maibaum.
- München Wiki: Maibaum (muenchenwiki.de).
- MeinBezirk Salzburg, 29.04.2026, Gespräch mit Michael Greger, Salzburger Landesinstitut für Volkskunde: Der Maibaum-Irrtum: Kein Fruchtbarkeitssymbol, sondern Verbotsschild.
Retrieved on 8 October 2026. The sources are in German. They document the facts given on this page; the bodies named remain the authority.