A hen night (UK, Ireland and Australia) or bachelorette party (United States) is a party held for a woman who is about to get married. While Beth Montemurro concludes that the bachelorette party is modelled after the centuries-old stag night in the US, which is itself historically a dinner given by the bridegroom to his friends shortly before his wedding, Sheila Young argues that its British counterpart evolved from a number of earlier pre-wedding traditions for women (Ribbon Girl, Pay Off, Bosola, Taking Out, Jumping the Chanty, to name but a few) whose origins are obscure but which have been around for at least a century in factories and offices across the UK. Despite its reputation as "a sodden farewell to maiden days" or "an evening of debauchery", these events can simply be parties gi