Information on Being Given the Key to the City
Are you interested to know more about why keys to the city are given to certain persons? Well if you want to know more about you can read on further because this article is about that.
First let us discuss more about the history of such tradition of giving keys to the cities. You see in olden days cities are protected by walls. It is believed that these walls help to make the citizens of such cities safe and well secured. These protected them from barbarians and people who have contagious diseases. During these times there are certain people who received keys to the cities. In this olden times when you have a key to the city you are given the power to enter and leave the city as you see fit. Those who have been given this privilege include the visiting officials, free men and the military. Free men are those who are not slaves and are free. The slaves who are not free do not have such keys because they are yoked to their masters.
In today’s modern world, such kind of walls are not valuable anymore and do not serve as typical protection to those who are living there. But the tradition of given a key to someone still continues on. Does the key to the city give have any value now when all people now can come and go as they please in any place? Well today if one is given key to the city that means that person is being honored for something the person has done or the fame that person has achieved. That is why if you research more about those persons who are given keys to the cities you will find that many of them are celebrities. Many of them have been given keys from the towns where they grew up as a way of honoring them as citizens from that town.
Aside from celebrities there are also other people who receive such honor from a town and they are special dignitaries or people who have accomplished something great. There is actually a pilot who was given keys to a city because he was able to land his plane safely on the ground even if he ran into a large number of birds. He was able to save a lot of people’s lives because of this. Not only did he receive the keys to the cities but the flight attendants as well.
However if you learn more about it giving the key to the city now is more of a PR stint. The local mayor would like to give attention to the fact that famous people like the celebrities are born in their city.