The Holy Fool (UPDATED)

The jingling of bells during the dance is meant to frighten evil spirits and the clashing of sticks represent the fight between good and evil. The dancer who weaves in and out of the team of dancers is known as the Fool and whilst his dance seems to be that of a random nature, in fact his is a very intricate dance and represents the naivety of man. A dancer who is dressed as an animal character shows mans reliance on nature. Handkerchiefs emphasise the hand movements during the dance.- Crop Fertility Rituals

The Kalends of April are sacred to Venus, as is the entire month, and this day has been called the Veneralia. Public games, ludi, would be held in honor of the deity. This day was also known as All Fools Day to the Romans, and they would spend the entire day celebrating with comic hilarity, doing things backwards, wearing women's clothes, dancing in the streets, and generally carrying on in the most in the most foolish and congenial manner. This is one of the few Roman holidays that has preserved some of its original character, under the modern name April Fools Day. In Egypt, this day was celebrated as the Birthday of the god Hathor.- (link)

The Anglo-Saxons called April Oster-monath or Eostur-monath, the period sacred to Eostre or Ostara, the pagan Saxon goddess of spring, from whose name is derived the modern Easter.- Wikipedia

It's probably no coincidence that April Fools' Day is celebrated at the same time that two other similar holidays are celebrated. In ancient Rome, the festival of Hilaria was thrown to celebrate the resurrection of the god Attis. Hilaria is probably the base word for hilarity and hilarious, which mean great merriment. Today, Hilaria is also known as Roman Laughing Day. -How Stuff Works

In tribute to Attis, the priests of Cybele - known as Galli or Galloi - would castrate themselves and dress as women. They’d then travel the countryside, and perform wild musical rituals to the Great Mother just as Attis did...

Ancient historians held a variety of opinions on the Galloi, from admiration to bemusement to ridicule to hostility. But everyone seemed to agree that the Galloi loved to kick up a racket. Their rituals and festivals made Woodstock look like a ladies’ club luncheon.

The public performances of the Galloi were so intense that crowds would be driven into a religious frenzy... The Galloi even made an appearance in Apuleius’ Metamorphoses, the classic Roman comic novel. The story concerns an amateur sorcerer named Lucius, who mucks up a spell and turns himself into a donkey. Lucius is then sold to a wandering band of Galloi and dragged around while the priests travel the countryside, often performing their act door-to-door.

Obviously not a fan, Lucius describes the Galloi's rites, which include an eerily-exact precursor of heavy metal headbanging: “They arrived at a rich man's villa and screeching their tuneless threnes from the moment they saw the gates, they rushed frantically inside. Bending their heads, they twisted, writhed and rolled their necks to and fro while their long hair swung round in circles.”

The Secret History of Rock 'n' Roll

Perhaps the biggest change came from the initiated version of the Tarot that the original Golden Dawn (and its later offshoots) used. In that deck, the Fool is represented as a naked child of indeterminate sex, who is accompanied by a wolf on a leash, who is reaching up for a rose. In Golden Dawn, the Fool represents the god Harpocrates, the Egyptian god Horus as a young child. - Associated Content

"The four magic symbols, the sceptre, the cup, the sword and the pentacle. The fool always carries them, although he has long since forgotten what they mean. Nevertheless they belong to him, even though he does not know their use. The symbols have not lost their power, they retain it in themselves. - P D. Ouspensky