Pagan Christmas (17 page)

Father Christmas and the holly. (Motif circa 1900)

Unlike other evergreen plants that grow in Central Europe, the holly is only partly frost tolerant. It grows primarily in moderate climate zones, especially in England, which is blessed with the influence of the Gulf Stream. There, the Celtic druids once worshipped the holly tree. They cut the spiky branches as rods of life. The red berries embodied female energy, just as white mistletoe berries symbolized male semen. United in the ritual performed for the summer solstice, these two plants became “mythical parents” and played the vital role of guaranteeing renewed life in springtime.

In the Roman Bacchus cult, holly was the female counterpart to the male ivy, and this is why doors of houses were decorated with wreaths from both plants during Saturnalia. The doctor of the church, Quintus Tertullian, forbade this practice as a heathen custom in the second century CE. Church authorities were helpless in the face of the ongoing popularity of the holly rituals, however, and eventually reinterpreted the practice in Christian terms: “In the legend, every palm that greeted the Savior Jesus during his entry into Jerusalem received thorns as a reminder of the ordeal that Christ was put through” (Schöpf 1986, 146). Thus the spiky leaves of the holly became a Christian symbol of the thorny crown and its red berries became the blood of Christ.

Today, Ilex is a protected plant in Germany. The extensive use of holly branches for Advent and Palm Sunday endangered natural tree populations in many parts of the country. In the German Teutoburger Forest, for example, the extinction of Ilex trees around the sacred Extern Stones11 was prevented by a nature-conservation treaty at the beginning of the twentieth century. In the British Isles, the holly forests that remain (“The Hollies”) are considered a botanical treasure by plant-lovers.

Nomen est Omen—TRACING THE PLANT NAME

The meaning of holly as a symbol of eternal life and wise foresight is mirrored in its English name, holly, which is related to the word holy. In the Celtic holly day ritual performed the night before the winter solstice, holly branches were collected and put up in the house as a protection against sorcery, lightning, and death. From this comes the term “holy day,” later demoted profanely to “holiday”! The Celts collected branches with red berries in solitude in the dark of the midnight hour, deep in the middle of the woods. To properly cut them from the trees, a drop of blood was considered essential, but red wine was supposed to do the job as well. The red drops stood for the “oldest and most powerful god of the land [England]” (Hyslop and Ratcliffe 1989, 17).

The holly fairy, a form of Frau Holle. (Postcard: The Holly Fairy, Flower Fairies™, © The Estate of Cicely Mary Barker, 2000)

Germanic tribes worshipped the spiky evergreen tree as an embodiment of the love goddess, Freia, the Great Mother (Ströter-Bender, 1994). Her holy day was Friday (free day). The German name Hülse, which comes from the Old High German huls or hulis, is related etymologically to the English plant name holly and mythologically to Frau Holle (also Holde, Holda), who belonged to the flock of spirits in the wild army and is the mother of Thor (Donar). She is the heir, in folklore, of the Germanic love goddess Freia, and thus the circle back to Freia is completed. (For more on Frau Holle, see “The Old Ones of the Woods.”)

The legendary Christmas plant is also called “hollywood star” and “star of the holy wood,” names that found new meaning in the New World. Supporters of English Christmas customs brought holly and its symbolism to North America and a new Hollywood: the heart of the American film industry. “British Immigrants to the U.S. established holly plantations so they would not have to live without the Christmas spirit” (Storl 2000b, 294). The fact that the legendary American Hollywood inherited this ancient name is not mere coincidence.

MAGICAL AND FOLK USE

Like other evergreen plants, the jagged, thorny leaves of the Ilex were believed to both protect against and attract dangerous powers: “It was the belief of the people that there were signs that the witches needed the red berries of the holly to brew thunderstorms. The berries were an important ingredient of witches’ ointment and incense” (Weustenfeld 1996, 111).

They were used in magic as protection from nightmares, incubi and other demons, and lightning.

Planted near a house, holly keeps away evil magic. Pythagoras writes that the power of their blossoms changes water into ice. He also says that when a holly branch stick is flung at an animal without enough force to reach it and is about to land a little short of the animal, the stick will make itself come nearer by a cubit through its own magic, such a great power is in this tree (Pliny the Elder XXIV, 116).

Folk sources also discuss the symbolic erotic and fertility power of this evergreen rod of life. An old Latin document states “that the dresses of women were lifted, and they were beaten on their naked behinds with it. A remnant of an age-old ritual that involved beating women on their genitals with the life rod” (Aigremont 1987 I, 51).

As with other plants important in the ethnobotany of Christmas, folk customs connected with the Ilex point to the chimney as the entry portal for spirits and other legendary beings, such as St. Nicholas.

The chimney was considered the entry and exit for ghosts or spirits and ancestors. In order to keep this door clean, and to drive out the bad spirits that were kept in the soot in the dark, a magic broom was needed. Up to the present time, the chimney is decorated with boughs of holly so that the Christmas Spirit or Old St. Nick can come in at the midnight hour and bless the inhabitants. It is considered bad luck to bring holly into the house before Christmas Eve (Storl 2000b, 294).

With this multilayered background of symbolism, the popular holly tree truly deserves its reputation as the crown jewel of evergreen life. This is why the Green Man wears a crown of holly leaves. He is descended from the pagan vegetation gods with anthropomorphic bodies and masks made of leaves that appear on Roman doorways. The tradition continues today with the holly wreaths that we hang on doors, mantles, and walls at Christmastime.

Laurel: The Sun God’s Plant

… nothing burns in the world with such a horrendous crackle as the flames of the tree that is dedicated to the Delphic Phoebus.

LUKREZ, VON DER NATUR VI, 154F.

Laurus nobilis L., Lauraceae (bay laurel)

OTHER NAMES

True laurel, sweet bay

We know the bay laurel as a spice for hearty winter potlucks and as a crown for glorious heroes, for whom the evergreen leaves of this aromatic plant symbolized perpetual commemoration, even beyond death. The evergreen leaves of the bay laurel evoke the yearly, springtime return of green after the dark and frosty winter days.

The laurel’s long history as a symbol of perpetual life in Mediterranean culture secured it a major role in the European ethnobotany of Christmas. As far north as Scandinavia, where the sunbeams do not even reach the horizon in winter, homes were decorated with laurel branches for the Jul feast. As a holy plant of the Greek sun gods Helios, Apollo, and Phoebus, the evergreen branches of the laurel brought the sun into wintry, dark houses.

Daphne is transformed into a laurel bush right before Apollo’s eyes. (Illustration from Cod. Guelf. 277.4 extrav. Fifteenth century. Herzog-August-Library, Wolfenbüttel)

The evergreen laurel was holy to the ancient Greeks and Romans. The aromatic tree was dedicated to Apollo, the god of spiritual ecstasy. According to myth, a beautiful woman or nymph hid behind it:

Daphne … was the name of the nymph that Apollo loved. She was a beautiful, wild virgin, and when Apollo lusted after her, she fled to her mother Gaia, who changed her into a laurel tree. Since then, the laurel is dedicated to Apollo, and inspires him with its hearty, aromatic scent, which is also used as a medium for purification. So the legend says that Apollo washed himself, after killing the dragon Python in the valley of the temples in Delphi, which is still overgrown with laurel. And then he entered Delphi, crowned with laurel, as a purified victor. This is why the laurel is a sign of victory, glory, and honor. The oldest sanctuary of Apollo was supposed to be built out of laurel branches (Pausanias 10.5.9).

The first temple in the ancient, legendary town of Delphi was built out of laurel wood. The oracle of this temple, which was dedicated to Apollo, was announced with “the rustling of the laurel.” The prophetic priestesses of the temple, called Pythia, slept on laurel, inhaled laurel, and chewed laurel before they fell into trance. On the altar of Apollo, laurel wood was burned. Only laurel brooms could be used to sweep the court of the sanctuary.

Smudge Recipes

Apollo Smudge

Ingredients

4 parts frankincense (olibanum, Boswellia sacra)

2 parts myrrh (Commiphora molmol, C. myrrha)

2 parts cinnamon (Cinnamomum verum) or cassia (C. aromaticum)

1 part laurel leaves (Laurus nobilis)

Grind and mix all ingredients. Place by spoonfuls on the smudging coals.

Protection Smudge

Ingredients

1 part thyme (Thymus vulgaris)

3 parts frankincense (olibanum, Boswellia sacra)

Grind all ingredients into coarse pieces and mix. Place by spoonfuls on the smudging coals.

Laurel and other aromatic plants were important ingredients in protection smudges. “A fast and deep purification from negative influences is induced with a smudging smoke mixed of thyme and frankincense burned together” (Belledame 1990, 89).

In the same way that Apollo and Dionysus were associated with one another, their botanical attributes were tied together as winter greens: Laurel was dedicated to Apollo and ivy to Dionysus.

Ivy: Tendrils of the Maenads

The snakes that the Maenads had cast upon the tree stumps coiled around it and transformed themselves into ivy tendrils.

NONNOS, DIONYSIACA

Hedera helix L., Araliaceae (ivy)

OTHER NAMES

Abheukraut, English ivy, eppic, ifenkraut, waldeppich, wintergrün (“winter green”), winterpflanze (“winter plant”)

Like other evergreen plants, ivy was important at Christmastime, especially as a symbol of everlasting life. Shiny, dark-green ivy leaves appear on all sorts of holiday cards, reminding us that the dormant vegetative forces of nature will be revived with the arrival of springtime. In Christian symbolism, ivy represents eternal life and the resurrection of the son of God.

The long-haired, ivy-crowned wild man, dressed in winter greens, is a folkloric reminder of the pagan gods Wotan, Dionysus, and the Green Man and a relative or ancestor of Father Christmas. In this picture, he carries a club over his shoulder instead of a rod or staff. In other pictures, he carries a fir tree. (Carnival Games. Woodcut by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, sixteenth century)

The evergreen ivy is neither an herb nor a tree, but a vine or liana. It grows at first on the earth, but then crawls in a spiral up the nearest tree; this is the origin of the species name helix (meaning “spiral”) in Greek. The ivy vine is a snake spirit that brings about a connection with Mother Earth; it is a shamanic “ladder to heaven” (Storl 2000b, 327). Ivy winding around a tree trunk can overwhelm and kill the tree, burying it under ivy leaves.

Ivy was dedicated to the Egyptian vegetation god, Osiris. In many cultures, the plant served as a symbol of immortality:

The belief in immortality adheres to the evergreen, her eternal leaves and her winter green. It is the wood mother (Silva Mater) who lovingly embraces the trees. In folklore, her leaves and her wood had the power to prolong life and give the weak a renewed life force (Höfler 1990, 55).

Ivy was one of the favorite plants of the Greek god of ecstatic intoxication, Dionysus (who also was called Kisso, or “ivy god”) because it had such chthonic,12 earthy qualities and brought to mind the cult of snake worship. Ivy was considered a sure sign of the presence of Dionysus. From Europe throughout the region conquered by Alexander the Great, it was believed that ivy tendrils sprang up wherever the god had fertilized the ground with his feet.

The Maenads (“the fury” or “the raging”) were women dedicated to Dionysus who ritually underwent a state of temporary insanity (mania). They screamed wildly and ran through the forest naked or dressed only in ivy tendrils; they killed and ate animals and ate the flesh of human beings. However, in this state, they had the gift of transcendence and prophecy: “The Maenads were returning to the original state of creative chaos, in the middle of which all order disappears, so everything can start anew” (Bosse 1990, 110). The Maenads clearly had a potion that put them into a state of Dionysian frenzy or ecstasy. The potion was a kind of pine beer or mead with ivy leaves mixed into it.

Folk belief held that ivy could make people impotent and bring on a kind of madness. Plutarch said that ivy contained a brutal spirit that could produce mad outbursts and cramps. Ivy could bring on intoxication even without drinking wine and bring out madness in those who had a natural propensity for ecstasy. When mixed with wine, ivy caused delirium and a madness of the sort normally seen only with henbane (Plutarch, “The Roman Questions,” 112). But at the same time, ivy wreaths were believed to prevent drunkenness!

THE AROMAS OF CHRISTMAS: A SHOWER OF PHEROMONES

In the aroma of the plant, the universe, the world soul, communicates with us and other creatures … scents are always the expression of the soul beings.

STORL 1996A, 99

The sense of smell is closely connected with emotion and memory. Smell has a potent ability to evoke vivid memories and sensations, a phenomenon that is difficult to explain but is now known to have a basis in scientific fact. A smell “awakens feelings, kindles emotions, directs thoughts and wishes, spirit, and matter on a surreal level” (Rovesti 1995, 45). Nearly everyone is familiar with the power of smell to bring long-lost memories back into consciousness. In this sense, it is not at all far-fetched to claim that smells can generate psychoactive reactions!

In all cultures, throughout history, special scents have been associated with important rituals. These aromas are intended to awaken past memories of the rituals and signal the olfactory nerves in the brain that the holy time has come again. Thus the smells that we associate with Christmas from our childhoods remind us of the holy feast as long as we live.