It’s December, and all over Bideford and district, Christmas trees are now to the fore. And in the time-honoured way, ornaments and decorations will be foisted upon them. They’ll range from tiny, tinselly, dusty things to gigantic statement trees as some people try to show how Christmassy they can be. Usually, it will be the traditional Norway spruce or the Omorica spruce, although there is a growing practice to have non-drop trees instead. These trees hold their needles much longer than the traditional varieties and include the Douglas fir, Scots pine, and the Blue spruce.
It’s interesting to note though that veneration of the Christmas tree existed long before Christianity came on the scene. Just recently in Østfold, Norway and Bosulön Province in Sweden, archaeologists have discovered over 75,000 rock carvings at more than 5,000 different sites made between 1,800 and 500 B.C.E.. All of these carvings are spruce trees. The archaeologists suggest that because the trees are evergreen, the inhabitants looked on them as sacred symbols of life, survival and immortality.[i]
Research indicates that the adoption of the Christmas tree in Europe happened in about the 11th century. At this time, the vast majority of people were illiterate and so to teach the great-unwashed public the stories of the Bible, the church sanctioned ‘mystery plays.’ One of these, performed on the 24th December, was the ‘Paradise Play,’ which told the story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. The play ended with the promise of a coming saviour, Jesus Christ.
These plays were primitive to say the least. The ‘Paradise Play’ only had one prop, the ‘Paradise Tree,’ which was hung with apples. There was no available apple tree in the middle of winter so the evergreen conifer came into its own.
By the 15th century, moral standards had slipped so low that the church banned the Christmas ‘Paradise Play’ because it, and the other plays, had become an excuse for debauchery (nothing new there then!) People had become used to the tree though, and so they took it indoors. Interestingly, the Eastern Orthodox Church celebrate the feast day of Adam and Eve on 24th December, and in the home the tree was decorated with apples (to represent the original sin) and home-made wafers (to symbolise the fruit of life.)
Running parallel to this was the popular decoration of the ‘Christmas Pyramid.’ It was a sizable triangular wooden structure similar to the gable end of a house (but not as big of course!) Within the pyramid, there were shelves to hold figurines and it is likely to be the forerunner of the nativity scene. Decorated with evergreens, tinsel, various baubles, the whole edifice had at the apex, a star. By the 16th century, the paradise tree and the Christmas pyramid had blended to become the Christmas tree.
Attached to the Christmas tree are many interesting legends, one of which concerns our own local so-called saint, St Boniface (real name, Wynfrith) from Crediton. The story is that as he was travelling through the German countryside on one of his missionary tours, he came across a group of pagans who, underneath an oak tree, were on the verge of sacrificing a child to the god Thor. To prevent this happening he cut the oak tree down. As it fell, it laid waste every surrounding tree except a small fur sapling. He thought this was a miracle and so taught the pagans that the fir tree was the ‘tree of life,’ and that it’s triangular shape represented the Holy Trinity. The converted pagans subsequently dropped the oak as their sacred tree and adopted the fir tree instead.
Allegedly, the founder of Protestantism, Martin Luther, was walking through a thick German forest one Christmas eve when he became totally enthralled by the stars in the night sky glittering through the fir branches. The experience so moved him that he felled one of the smaller trees and took it home. Then, trying to recreate the shimmering stars as seen through the trees, he suspended candles from the branches (there was no Health & Safety Executive in those days!)
The Christmas tree tradition started in Germany, of that there is no dispute, but there is a difference of opinion on where the decorated tree first occurred. One account says that it was at Riga, Latvia, in 1510. Another source states that it was in the German province of Alsace in 1521. Therefore, you pay your money and you take your choice.
The next provable account comes from an unknown diarist who lived in Strasbourg in 1605. He writes that the residents of the town draped their trees with, ‘…coloured paper roses… apples, wafers, gold foil, and sweets.’
The tradition continued to thrive through the 17th century, but it was not until the 19th century that it became universally fashionable. Its popularity spread from Germany and across Europe like a disease. It finally arrived in Britain with a bang in 1841 when Queen Victoria and her German Consort, Albert erected one at Windsor Castle. They decorated it with the traditional ribbons, paper chains, fruit, fancy cakes, sweets, and (quick, fetch the fire brigade!) candles. In 1846, the Illustrated London News published a picture of the royal family standing around their tree. This one act caused the Christmas tree to cement itself in British culture.
Interestingly, the architect of the modern Christmas, Charles Dickens, originally called it ‘a new German toy,’ but he too finally fell under its spell.
So in essence, we’ve now gone full circle. Since the 1930s and the resurgence of the ‘Dickensian Christmas’ the German Christmas tree in now a part of the British Christmas tradition. It is now as traditional as; turkey (from America - until the 20th century it was customary to eat goose,) Father Christmas (St Nicholas – the Archbishop of Myra in Turkey- although this is a cover for ‘Old Nick,’ Satan the Devil,) presents (from the Roman celebration of Saturnalia,) and the Yule Log (from northern Europe, but originally from Babylonia.)
So when you go out to buy your ‘traditional’ tree just think how strange it is that pagan history is the basis for our ‘Christian’ Christmas, and that you will be celebrating a traditional ‘British’ custom that is everything but British!
Meanwhile, you can contact me on [email protected].
Until we meet again next month, happy gardening!
[i] Information courtesy of Awake! Magazine (Dec 2011.)
[1] Information courtesy of Awake! Magazine (Dec 2011.)