Masks, straw hats, music and and story telling are all part of Wren Day tradition in south Dublin.
Bob Ryan has been burning cork to blacken his moustache on Wren Day for the last fourteen years. For Bob and hundreds of others around the country, keeping Wren Day alive is important and great fun.
The day of the wren is a day for dressing up and hunting for the wren.
Bob describes Wren Day as an inverted day when men became women and women became men, the king became the pauper and the pauper became the king.
In the Dublin suburb of Sandymount it is a day to collect money for charity as the Wren Boys go door to door before enjoying the carnival atmosphere of song and dance.
Many see it as a combination of pagan and Christian rituals.
Over three hundred people including the Lord Mayor of Dublin came out to enjoy this celebration of song, dance, and storytelling.
An RTÉ News report broadcast on 26 December 1998. The reporter is Damien Tiernan.
