The community of Aldermaston has put on a Nativity Play in St Mary the Virgin Parish Church every year since 1957. The play is taken from the 400 year old York Mystery Cycle and is an adaptation of 9 plays that tell the story of the first Christmas .The play is performed in medieval costume with an acapella choir singing carols and songs from the medieval period.

The Plays Origins

In 1957, the Aldermaston York Nativity Play was the brainchild of Revd Canon Stanley Young, the vicar of Aldermaston, and Pat Eastop, a local mother and art teacher who had studied Medieval Art. Pat went on to direct the play for 57 consecutive years before her death in 2014. She was awarded an M.B.E.

This version of The York Nativity Play Cycle script was made in 1930 by E. Martin Browne. The text was revised in 1952, after E. Martin Brown’s experience in producing the York Mystery Cycle Plays. It is this 1952 edition that we perform at Aldermaston. E. Martin Browne had a long career in religious drama producing the revival of the Mystery Cycle in York in 1951, 1954 & 1957. It is likely that E Martin Browne based his text on the Mystery Cylce manuscripts published in 1885 by Lucy Tomlin Smith.

The adaptation of text from nine of the Mystery Cycle plays forms The York Nativity Play. It was designed for performance in a church with multiple staged areas. The nine plays are:

• The Spicers
• The Pewters and Founders
• The Tille Thekers
• The Chaundlers
• The Masons
• The Goldsmiths
• The Marshals
• Hatmakers, Masons and Laborers
• Girdlers and Nailers

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