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The ancient sport of beer barrels and a hare pie

Isaac Ashe,Leicesterand
Ben Jackson,BBC Radio Leicester
PA Media A scrum of people wrestling over a barrel in a field - although the barrel is deep inside the melee and cannot be seenPA Media
The Hallaton Bottle Kicking event sees two villages lock horns every Easter

Easter might mean hot cross buns, roast lamb or chocolate eggs to most of us, but in one corner of rural Leicestershire, it can only mean one thing - hare pie.

That, and a day's brutal competition between rivals trying to wrestle barrels over a mile-long stretch of countryside.

Hallaton Bottle Kicking is an ancient tradition, held each Easter Monday, in the village of Hallaton and neighbouring Medbourne.

A pipe band-led parade is held and hare pie is given out before sleeves are rolled up and the two communities lock horns to bring honour to their village.

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Records of bottle kicking date back to the late 18th Century, but the custom is thought to originate much earlier.

Blue badge tour guide James Carpenter said: "We don't know exactly when it started but it has been going since medieval times."

It is a day which follows "centuries old customs and practices" and sees money raised for local charities.

PA Media A street filled with people led by a man and a woman in medieval looking attirePA Media
Easter Monday begins with a parade in Medbourne and Hallaton

This year the Nene Valley Pipe Band is due to perform in Medbourne at 09:30 BST on Easter Monday.

From 10:30, a children's parade will be led by the band through Hallaton to the parish church for a service at 11:00.

At 13:00, the band will play at the Butter Cross in Hallaton - an important focal point in the tradition - before the Hare Pie Parade starts from 13:45 to the village church gates.

Here at 14:00 the scramble, where the pie is blessed by the local vicar, cut up and handed out, takes place.

Carpenter said: "Apparently one year, back in Victorian times, because of all the boisterousness that took place, one of the parsons refused to do it.

"There was a huge demonstration, they went on to his lawn shouting things like 'no pie, no parson!'.

"He got so worried he was going to be killed that he got his cook to quickly make the hare pie and he distributed it."

PA Media A man pouring a jug of bitter into a small barrel on a barPA Media
Two of the bottles - each a small barrel - are filled with beer while a third is a dummy

One "bottle", which is a wooden cask much better suited to the rigours of the scrum than any glass item would be, is then decorated in red and white then paraded to the top of the village where the contest between Hallaton and Medbourne begins.

The game is a best of three, with two "bottles" containing beer and the third completely wooden decorated bottle - which is referred to as the dummy.

The outdoor sport is played across about a mile of open land and the two teams attempt to move the bottles over to the opposing team's parish at each end of the area.

PA Media A man holding a barrel aloft by a stream, with the other side of the bank filled with people congratulating each otherPA Media
The game is a best of three, with each village pushing to get the bottles past their parish boundary

The winning team celebrates by being lifted on to Hallaton's Butter Cross, and the opened bottle is passed up for players to drink from before being handed around the crowd.

Carpenter said: "The Hallaton parish boundary is just down the field to the river, poor old Medbourne have to go over a couple of hedges to get to theirs.

"It's good fun. I would imagine there's quite a few traditions in other villages that have waned and waxed and then passed on, so it's wonderful that these sort of traditions really do carry on."

Correction 4 April 2026: This story has been updated to make it clear the children's parade will be taking place in Hallaton, not Medbourne.

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