Christmas in your story is a great way of marking time, bringing people together, and giving readers something to enjoy.
But although Christmas seems unchanging, beware of assuming your characters will do the same as we do now. Christmas is a rich confection, added to generation by generation. Each era contributes its own tradition to a continuity of festivities stretching back further than we can trace.
Here is a quick romp through Christmases past.
Return of the light
Christmas marks the Winter Solstice, when days in the northern hemisphere cease waning, and begin to lengthen. Hence, it is the coming of the light. European settlers exported the festival across the world.
Neolithic gatherings
Stonehenge frames sunset on the shortest day, and people travelled from all over the country for the party – possibly the biggest Christmas parties ever seen. Families could reunite with those who had moved away, perhaps to marry into another tribe. Some historians suggest trading too: the first Christmas shopping.
Roman silly season
Pre-Christian Romans celebrated Saturnalia, a feast to the God of agriculture and time. Celebrations included evergreen garlands, gift giving, a week off work, and a ‘mock king’ who entertained by turning everything upside down. There was cross-dressing: masters as slaves, men as women, a tradition that lives on in pantomime.
Christ’s Mass
Christianity named Christmas. Happily, the birth of the Son of God coincided with the returning sun. The nativity scene, with Mary, Joseph, the babe in the manger, animals in the stable, angels, shepherds and gift-giving wise men gave new symbols to add to wreaths, candles and cross-dressing.
Teutonic twelve days
Outside the Roman Empire, northern Europeans kept their own customs. Deep in their forests, they hung sacrifices in trees, and at midwinter, they feasted and drank. Gathered around a Yule log that burned for twelve days, they heard the storms and imagined Woden leading the wild hunt. Woden, or Odin to the Scandinavians, rode a flying sleigh, and left gifts for the needy.
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Medieval merriment
In medieval England, mass gatherings in the lord’s hall celebrated Christ’s Mass by feasting around the Yule log. Twelve days of festivities were orchestrated by a ‘Lord of Misrule’, who organised feasting, music, games, and mummers’ plays. While acting stories of death and rebirth, mummers disguised themselves to avoid repercussions should their horseplay become too outrageous.
Misrule was fuelled by drink from the wassail bowl, shared around to the toast ‘Wass-hale’, a wish similar to today’s ‘good health’. Wassailers, like mummers, travelled from steading to steading, and expected to be rewarded. The tradition lives on in today’s carol singers.
You can’t ban Christmas!
Christmas has survived since ancient times – but in the 17th century, Puritans tried to ban it. From the 1620s in America, and the 1640s in England, earnest preachers, noting that Christmas is not mentioned in the Bible, urged people to abandon ‘sins of carnal and sensual delights.’
However, too many people continued enjoying the delights of Christmas, so in 1657, the English Parliament banned it.
The public did not easily abandon their festivities, and there were riots as soldiers broke up parties.
Scottish Presbyterians suppressed Christmas too. But the canny Scots simply moved the party to secular New Year, Hogmanay. The first visitor of the year, the ‘first footer’, brought gifts symbolising good luck for the following year.
But the longest ban on Christmas was probably in Massachusetts, USA. Here, in 1621, possibly in a reaction against too much ‘misrule’, the governor declared 25th December a work day. In 1659, the Massachusetts Bay Colony followed up with a law penalising any Christmas festivities.
In England, Christmas was restored after only three years. But in Massachusetts, it was banned for sixty years. By the time the ban was lifted in 1681, two generations had become accustomed to it, and Christmas struggled to regain its sparkle.
Restoration and Industrial Revolution
Although Christmas in England returned in 1660, somehow, its allure was diminished. Life had changed, the great gatherings in the feudal hall were no more. Families were broken up as people migrated to cities. Images of ‘Old Father Christmas’, the personification of the season, depicted an old man, wearing a garland of evergreens, carrying a wassail bowl, and riding a Yule goat – the animal that drew Thor’s flying sleigh.
But, despite his age, Old Father Christmas still had a mischievous twinkle.
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Charles Dickens, Queen Victoria, and the family Christmas
Charles Dickens’ Scrooge struck a chord. His story gathered elements of Christmases old and new, and re-invented it. In place of ancient communal feasts, he spread the message of smaller, family Christmases, with turkey rather than a roasted boar or ox. The new consumer economy brought cards, sweets and toyshops, while the Christmas tree emerged from its ancient forest roots, made fashionable by the Royal Family.
In America too, Christmas was remade by authors entranced by ‘The German Christmas Tree’, who spread the custom through stories of children glowing with the joy of the tree.
Santa
No Christmas is complete without the gift-bringer, and in 19th-century America, new European immigrants brought their traditions with them. Here, Old Father Christmas, Woden, Kris Kringle and Saint Nicholas met, mingled, and were reborn as Santa Claus.
Santa rides Woden’s flying sleigh, he’s jolly like Old Father Christmas, he leaves secret gifts like St Nicholas. Celebrated in American literature, he rapidly became beloved around the world.
In Australia, he has a bit of fun by arriving on a surfboard. Across the world, his elfish assistants inhabit department store grottos, and on Christmas Eve, his momentous journey is tracked by NASA.
The twentieth century
Twentieth-century Christmases were overshadowed by the grief of war. But remembering those gone has always been part of Christmas – Stonehenge was also a cemetery, a place to remember the ancestors.
The twentieth century also brought new technologies to the party. Electric fairy lights illuminated the winter dark, while the Queen on TV restored a shared national experience probably not seen since Stonehenge.
The twenty-first century
Who knows what new customs will mark the 21st century? But we can be sure that whatever comes, the ancient elements of Christmas will continue: we will gather together, eat, drink, and celebrate the hope of better things to come.
Helen Johnson is a guest contributor to The History Quill. She has spent a quarter of a century writing about Yorkshire’s people, places, culture and heritage. What she learned inspired her to bring Yorkshire’s past to life through historical fiction. She is currently working on a novel set during William the Conqueror’s genocide. Helen also publishes articles, reviews and short stories. She is a beta reader for The History Quill, a reviewer for the Historical Novel Society, and leads workshops for Promoting Yorkshire Authors. Visit Helen’s website for more information.
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