What Christmas memory comes back to you at the beginning of December?

Cold weather, crispy grass under our feet, icy puddles, our breaths leaving vapour trails, dark outlines of bare trees, variegated holly with masses of berries ... inside warming fires, toasting marshmallows, crumpets by that fire, spicy delights coming from the kitchen – has your Christmas pudding and cake already been made – ready for that last minute decoration?

Are the children or (perhaps and/or!) grandchildren under your feet getting in your way, or asking to help .. their little fingers into every pie going, greedily tasting all edible goodies available? Looking under every bed, in every cupboard, every nook and cranny to see if their wish has come true?

Christmas market in Jena, Germany

Those were the days the excitement of the weeks before – Carol Services to sing in and go to, Nativity plays to watch applauding our nearest and dearest become little angels for a few dear minutes!! The gathering of the Christmas tree, the decorating the house with holly, mistletoe and decorations .. so much to happen in the four weeks of December starting tomorrow.

Where did it all start? and now .. what do we experience ...? The Roman festival of Saturn was held in December when the temples were decorated with the fir, the pine and the slow growing evergreen box (boxwood in the States); the Druids are associated with mistletoe, while the Saxons used holly and ivy. These customs have been transferred to the Christian festival. The holly or holy-tree is called Christ’s thorn in Germany and Scandinavia from its use in church decorations and its putting forth its berries about Christmas time.

The ancient Roman Saturnalia festival was celebrated on 19 December, eventually being prolonged for seven days, and was a time of freedom from restraint and merrymaking, and often riot and debauchery. During its continuance public business was suspended, the law courts and schools were closed and no criminals were punished .. lucky them – especially in those days of ‘being thrown to the lions’!

Mistletoe in a Silver Birch tree

The Romans also decorated a Christmas tree, though the Christmas tree as we know it today, was introduced by Prince Albert to Queen Victoria, influencing the way Victorian households provided a focal point for decorations, present gathering and general festivities around the fire hearth and the tree.

Christmas as a season, we in the western world have become accustomed to, began in the days of heathen peoples ... when the winter solstice was a time of festival; the Church fixed this day in AD 440 as what to the Anglo Saxons would have been known as the beginning of the year .. when the circle of life, according to the sun and moon, started again as the daylight hours increased.

So for the Anglo Saxons the 25th December was the start of the year, but from the 12th century until the adoption of the Gregorian calendar by the British and the Protestant world in 1752, the year began on Lady Day, 25th March. Did you know we “lost” ten days doing this?

Detail of the tomb of Pope Gregory XIII celebrating the introduction of the Gregorian calendar

The druids, a priestly and learned class active in Gaul (France and Belgium) and Celtic Britain during the final centuries BC, were suppressed by the Romans and had all but disappeared from the written record by the 2nd century, although outlying nomadic groups may have survived, particularly in Britain and Ireland as they feature prominently here in mythology. In the 18th and 19th centuries there was a revival of interest in Druidism, and a new romantic and unhistorical cult grew up, which has become known as Neo-Druidism.

Woodcut published in The Legendary Lore of the Holy Wells Of England, including Rivers, Lakes, Fountains and Springs (Carrawbrough: Covertina's Well)

Society was settling down and developing during the next 1300 years before countries, or provinces came to be more established, populated with settlements, and brought with them their traditions and cultures they had been absorbing over the centuries. Today regional aspects of Christmas are still, and no doubt will continue to change over the future years to come.

The Christmas tree is an established part of our English Christmas time, while other traditions are entrenched in different countries – Mexico brought us the poinsettias, possibly because the Mexican Franciscan monks included the flower in their Christmas celebration in the 1600s and they thus became popular, and were brought back to Europe by the Spanish – remember then we were going through three Little Ice Ages (1650, 1770 and 1850) , when it was definitely colder than it has been during my lifetime. In the 1950s and 1960s it was also colder than it is today.

Pointsettia tree (with star on top) in San Diego

So many cultures and traditions have grown up in different countries of the world that I am sure most of us have not got a clue about .. when we start Christmas .. St Nicholas Day, or Christmas Eve .. or ... what we eat, what we do, and what little quirks we have each developed within our own families and that have been passed down through the generations. Is it Father Christmas, or Santa Claus, or Noel ... or, or, or ...

So much to find out in the month ahead – what we all do, what foods we eat, what are our expectations.... I have just been in Manchester about 250 miles (400 km) north from here where the population of the environs is approximately 2.5 million – so a city worth a street market for the month before Christmas.

There were stalls from Italy – with salami (including hazelnut ... see my last post), nougat from France, delicious Dutch ‘cookies’, carved wooden toys and small items from Nuremberg, Germany – famous too for spicy gingerbread - and I am sure many more .. I had a lovely time in the few breaks we had wandering through the Christmassy stalls savouring the days to come and remembering the days gone by of our childhood Christmas times.

So much to tell you and so much to find out from you, dear Readers, about your traditional and cultural celebrations – I remember my times in South Africa .. and it is seriously difficult to become enamoured about plum pudding when the sun is beating down – but we did and had the works .. though the Christmas tree was an aloe branch, painted silver, and decorated with Christmas baubles .. my best Christmas tree so far!

Dear Mr Postman – haven’t we had such terrible weather – floods in the north, floods in the south – we have floods here .. my brother’s village has been flooded – they are alright they’re high on the hill above .. but the last time it happened this badly nine years ago – a car was floating in the street – now that is a site to behold. They had 65mm of rain in the last 24 hours, while the monthly average is 80 mm. We count our blessings we do not have to deal with that aftermath. My mother is very sleepy .. so my visits are short ..

Hilary Melton-Butcher
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