Christmas in America is celebrated in as many different ways as there are people who live here! Each having their own traditions that have been passed down from one generation to the next.
This page not only contains some of the traditions my family and my
husband’s family have passed down over the years, but many of my friend’s and e-pals traditions. There will also be some traditions that most of you will have heard about, but didn’t know of its origin.
Who knows, maybe you will find a new tradition to start in your family!?
INDEX
[ PLANTS: ]
[ POINSETTIA ] [ ROSEMARY ] [ IVY ] [ HOLLY ] [ MISTLETOE ]
[ OAK ] [ NORWAY SPRUCE ] [ GLASTONBURY THORN ]
[ FAMILY TRADITIONS: ]
Two of the first gifts to the Christ child were made from plants. F rankincense and myrrh are precious fragrant resins from Asiatic trees.
The POINSETTIA is one of the very few strictly American
plants that have become a traditional Christmas plant because of their
bright color.
There is a Mexican legend about a poor peasant girl who was on her way
to church on Christmas Eve. She was so sad at having no gift to place
on the altar for the Christ Child that she wept. An angel heard her
and instructed her to gather up an armload of twigs from the roadside.
When she gathered the twigs together they began to bloom into an
armload of poinsettias.
This legend, of course, is clearly taken from the
legend of the Christmas Rose.
ROSEMARY:
The legends say that, on the flight into Egypt, Mary was sheltered by
a rosemary bush, and hence rosemary blooms on the day of Christ’s
Passion. So it was long used to decorate homes and churches at
Christmas.
Throughout Europe, IVY was used as decoration for churches and homes at Christmas, but only for outer passages and on doorways because of its pagan associations. It was put up on Christmas Eve and taken down on the second day of February, Candlemas Eve.
HOLLY was known and revered by early British druids and Roman pagans. The druids thought it was a special favorite of the sun because it was evergreen. The Romans used it as a charm to ward off lightning and evil spells and believed its blossoms could repel poison. They sent sprigs of holly to their friends during Saturnalia, the winter festival of the god Saturn. The early Christian Church forbade the use of holly, particularly during Saturnalia, but the Romans largely ignored the ban. So did the British, among whom arose the custom of hanging sprigs of holly about the house as hiding places for Christmas elves and fairies. In Germany a soberer legend evolved about the holly, which was called christdorn, or Christ’s crown of thorns. The berries were believed to have been white until they were stained by Christ’s blood.
MISTLETOE legends reach back to Norse mythology. The duids would cut it with a golden sickle and catch it in a white cloth before it touched the ground. It symbolized purity and strength, and was hung in houses to bring happiness, promote romance, and enforce peace. If enemies met beneath the mistletoe they disarmed and kept a truce that day. Because of the plant’s pagan associations, the Church banned it from Christmas ceremonies.
European mistletoe grows on oaks. American mistletoe, of the same
family but a different species, grows on maples, black gum and (here
in Texas ... ) mesquite trees.
The OAK is perhaps the most widely respected of all
trees. Jews, Greeks, and Romans considered it sacred, and the Celts
dedicated it to their gods of thunder and fire. Oaks were symbols of
strength and immortality - so holy that they even imparted special
value to plants that grew on them, such as mistletoe. Yule logs kindled
on Christmas Eve were always oak.
The oak is an extremely valuable tree because its hard, tough wood is
almost indestructible. It was used to build ships, houses and cathedrals.
Its bark was used to tan leather, and the acorns were food for both
animals and people.
The evergreen tree usually is called a fir in the legends because “fir”
is the layman’s term for all evergreens and because few of those who
translated the legends knew botany. In most cases the tree problably
was the NORWAY SPRUCE, which was king of the conifer
forests.
In England it was symbolic of life enduring. In Germany it was decorated
with lights, flowers, and colored eggs. Harz Mountain girls danced around
the decorated tree and held an imp captive there until he provided gifts
for them. One legend says the “fir” was the original Tree of Life in
Eden and had big leaves and blossoms until Eve ate of its fruit. In
punishment, its leaves were shrunken to needles, its fruit to cones. Another legend says it bloomed again the night of the Nativity and thus became the first Christmas tree.
The GLASTONBURY THORN is a common Engish hawthorn, but legend says this particular tree at Glastonbury Abbey grew from a staff Joseph of Arimathea thrust into the soil when he arrived to Christianize England. It thrived and came to bloom on Christmas, and trees grown from its cuttings were belived to heal all who touched them on Christmas day. In Elizabethan times a Puritan who tried to destroy the parent tree cut one of its twin trunks but was blinded by its thorns as it fell. Glastonbury thorns continued to bloom at Christmas until 1752, when England adopted the Gregorian calendar. The change shifted the date of Christmas by eleven days, and when the famous thorn failed to bloom on the new Christmas there was brief rebellion against the new calendar.
Oops!! Sorry .... I’ve run out of time this week!! I will try to have them on here by next week. Thankyou for your patience.
Please visit some of my other favorite Christmas sites!
Christmas ‘round the World Wide Web
Coming November 22 .... Clause.com
Time to decorate the tree!
Lots of Links to other Christmas pages
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