European Holiday

Traditions

Mr. Branch, 2011

Resources Listed in Notes Section

• The information in this presentation has been copied from various websites. The

websites are listed in the notes section of each slide.

France

Game: Hot Cockles• Hot Cockles was an extremely popular

game at Victorian Christmas parties. One player sits down, another player is blindfolded, kneels, and places his/her head in the sitter's lap. The kneeler places an open hand on his/her back, with palm uppermost, which other players take it in turns to strike, and the kneeler must guess who has struck the blow.

Game: Hot Cockles

• Hot Cockles was thus one of several traditional games in which someone has to guess who has hit or touched them, and it also existed as a street and playground game, no doubt played more robustly there than in the Victorian drawing-room.

Game: Hot Cockles

• Certainly, in mixed company, it allowed some mild flirtation. The game can claim some considerable antiquity, being referred to by name as early as 1549 and 1590, and an illustration from a 14th-century manuscript, printed by Strutt, appears to take the game back even further in time.

Game: Hot Cockles

Games: Three Kings Cake

• French families also bake a Three Kings Cake with a bean hidden in it on the Twelfth Day. The lucky person to find the bean in their slice is crowned the King or Queen, for the day. Children look for the Kings and offer them the gifts of hay for the camels. Last night of the holiday was celebrated as the Feast of Fools and only after that the Lord of Misrule could give up his crown. There are family gatherings during the holiday season.

Three Kings Cake

French Traditions

• French children put their shoes in front of the fireplace, in the hopes that Père Noël (aka Papa Noël) will fill them with gifts. Candy, fruit, nuts, and small toys will also be hung on the tree overnight. In some regions there's also Père Fouettard who gives out spankings to bad children (sort of the equivalent of Santa Claus giving coal to the naughty).

Père Noël and Père Fouettard

Père Noël and Père Fouettard

French Traditions

• In 1962, a law was passed decreeing that all letters written to Santa would responded to with a postcard. When a class writes a letter, each student gets a response.

French Traditions

Le Réveillon• Although fewer and fewer French attend la Messe de

Minuit on Christmas Eve, it is still an important part of Christmas for many families. It is followed by a huge feast, called le Réveillon (from the verb réveiller, to wake up or to revive). Le Réveillon is a symbolic awakening to the meaning of Christ's birth and is the culinary high point of the season, which may be enjoyed at home or in a restaurant or café that is open all night. Each region in France has its own traditional Christmas menu, with dishes like goose, chicken, capon, turkey stuffed with chestnuts, oysters, and boudin blanc (similar to white pudding).

French Traditions

• The Great Supper is a typical Provençal Christmas feast. On the 24th of December, before midnight mass, this meal is served on three white tablecloths of decreasing size, with three candleholders and three saucers of Sainte-Barbe's sprouted wheat.

Sainte-Barbe's Sprouted Wheat

Saint Barbara's Wheat

• In Provence, the Christmas season (called Calendale) begins on 4 December, Saint Barbara's Day, with a fertility tradition that dates back to Greek and Roman antiquity. You start by choosing three pretty saucers or small plates. After covering the bottom of each one with damp cotton, you have to scatter Saint Barbara's wheat, or else some lentils. With daily waterings, they should germinate before Christmas Eve; a good germination indicates a good harvest the following year. If you over water them, they will rot, which symbolizes a poor harvest.

Saint Barbara's Wheat

• This sprouted wheat is decorated with ribbons tied around the shoots, and the saucers are put on the table during the Great Supper. Afterwards, the ribbons are removed and the saucers are placed in the crèche, to represent fields. You continue watering them until the final day of Calendale, 2 February, when traditionally the sprouts are transplanted into the fields to ensure fertility.

Saint Barbara's Wheat• By selling little packets of Saint Barbara's

wheat, the Blé de l'Espérance ("wheat of hope") association combines this nice tradition with the purchase of materials for hospitalized children.

• Proverb: Well-germinated Saint Barbara's wheat is symbol of prosperity for the next year.

French Traditions

• The seven "meatless" dishes vary, but can include fish, snails, cold cuts, omelettes, savory pies, salads, pâté, and rolls, and there can also be seven different wines. And then come the 13 desserts.

French Traditions• The desserts are mainly regional products: fresh fruit

(oranges, pears, melon), dried fruit (dates, figs), nuts (walnuts, hazelnuts, almonds), quince paste, nougat (white or black), wrapped candies, and olive oil bread, but don't forget about the Yule log. Each of the numbers means something:– 3 represents the Holy Trinity – 7 is for Mary's pains – 13 stands for Jesus Christ and the twelve apostles, but you can

also consider the desserts as representations of the four mendicant orders, the poor, the rich, and good and evil.

Gibassier

Gibassier

• Pompe à l'huile, literally "oil pump," is one of Provence's traditional Christmas desserts. This round cake, which can also be called "Christmas pump," "Arles's focaccia," or "gibassier,"* features a typical Provençal ingredient not often found in dessert: olive oil.

Yule Log

Yule Log

Yule Log• Nowadays, when people talk about Yule logs, we tend to

think of a log-shaped cake served for dessert. But did you know that this cake symbolizes a real log?

• The true Yule log is a big piece of wood, traditionally from a fruit tree like an olive or cherry tree. In Provence, it's at the heart of another tradition: lou cacho-fiò, "set on fire" in Provençal. On Christmas Eve, right before the Great Supper, the oldest and youngest member of the family go and get a big log and carry it around the table three times. They bless it by sprinkling it three times with fortified wine, and then put it in the fireplace and set it on fire. Then everyone goes to the table for the Great Supper.

Yule Log• Traditions vary - some sources say that the log has to burn for

at least three days, others that it's supposed to continue until New Year's Day, or even until Epiphany. According to the site Le Beausset en Provence, you put the fire out at midnight, and then relight the log each evening, which would certainly help it to last for a week or more.

• Afterwards, the ashes are collected for various uses: mixing with natural remedies, sprinkling under furniture to protect the house from fire, and spreading in the fields.

• In South France, people burn yule logs continuously from Christmas Eve to New Year's Day and once a part of this log was used to make the wedge for the plough as good luck omen and plenty of harvest in the coming year.

French Menu

• The main Christmas feast is quite grand and is known as 'Le Reveillon', served as a very late supper held after midnight mass on Christmas Eve. Different regions have different traditional menus. Goose is served as the main course in Alsace while turkey with chestnuts is served in Burgundy. Parisians love oysters and pat de foie gras. Other dishes that can be included are poultry, ham, salads, cakes, fruits and wine.

French Christmas Decorations

The sapin de Noël (Christmas tree) is the main decoration in homes, streets, shops, offices, and factories. The sapin de Noël appeared in Alsace in the 14th century, decorated with apples, paper flowers, and ribbons, and was introduced in France in 1837.

French Christmas Decorations

Another important aspect of French Christmas celebrations is the crèche filled with santons, which is displayed in churches and many homes. Living crèches in the form of plays and puppet shows based on the Nativity are commonly performed to teach the important ideas of Christianity and the Christmas celebration.

French Christmas Decorations

Mistletoe is hung above the door during the Christmas season to bring good fortune throughout the year.

After Réveillon, it's customary to leave a candle burning in case the Virgin Mary passes by.

French Carols

O Holy NightCantique de Noël or Minuit, Chrétiens ("Midnight, Christians")

• This carol has been heralded as among the most beautiful of all Christmas carols, with excellent lyrics and a superb melody.

The author of the lyrics was Placide Cappeau (1808-1877), a resident of Roquemaure, located a few miles north of the historic city of Avignon. He was a commissionaire of wines, and an occasional writer of poetry. It is said that Cappeau was about to embark upon a business trip to Paris when the local parish priest asked Cappeau to write a Christmas poem. On December 3, 1847, about halfway to Paris, Cappeau received the inspiration for the poem, "Minuit, Chrétiens."

According to William Studwell, when Cappeau arrived in Paris, he took the poem to the composer Adolphe Adam (1803-1856), an acquaintance of M. and Madam Laurey who were friends of Cappeau. Adam was at the peak of his career, having written his masterpiece, Giselle, only a few years before, in 1841. He was also the composer of over 80 stage works. Adam wrote the tune in a few days, and the song received its premier at the midnight mass on Christmas Eve 1847 in Roquemaure.

The Christmas Truce

• http://www.christmastruce.co.uk/index.html

Songs Of The Christmas TruceClick on the link below for some of the songs and carols sung by troops taking part in the Christmas Truce of 1914, either prior to the actual truce itself or during the event. • http://www.christmastruce.co.uk/songs.html

Alfred Anderson, 109, Last Man From “Christmas Truce” of 1914, DiesBy THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

November 22, 2005LONDON, Nov. 21 (AP) - Alfred Anderson, the last surviving soldier to have been present when the guns fell silent along the Western Front in the spontaneous "Christmas Truce" of World War I, died Monday in Newtyle, Scotland. He was 109.

He died in his sleep at his nursing home, said his parish priest, the Rev. Neil Gardner.

More than 80 years after the war, Mr. Anderson recalled the "eerie sound of silence" as shooting stopped and soldiers clambered from trenches to greet one another Dec. 25, 1914.

Born June 25, 1896, he was an 18-year-old soldier in the Black Watch regiment when British and German troops cautiously emerged from the trenches that Christmas Day in 1914. The enemies swapped cigarettes and tunic buttons, sang carols and even played soccer amid the mud, barbed wire and shell holes of no man's land.

The informal truce spread along much of the 500-mile Western Front, in some cases lasting for days - alarming army commanders who feared fraternization would sap the troops' will to fight. The next year vast battles of attrition began, which claimed 10 million lives, and the Christmas truce was never repeated.

"I remember the silence, the eerie sound of silence," Mr. Anderson told The Observer last year.

"All I'd heard for two months in the trenches was the

hissing, cracking and whining of bullets in flight, machine-gun fire and distant German voices," said Mr. Anderson, who was billeted in a French farmhouse behind the front lines.

"But there was a dead silence that morning, right across the land as far as you could see," he said. "We shouted 'Merry Christmas,' even though nobody felt merry. The silence ended early in the afternoon and the killing started again. It was a short peace in a terrible war."

During the war, Mr. Anderson served briefly as a batman - or valet - to Capt. Fergus Bowes-Lyon, brother of Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother. Captain Bowes-Lyon was killed at the Battle of Loos in 1915.Mr. Anderson fought in France until 1916, when he was wounded by shrapnel from a shell. In 1998, he was awarded France's Legion of Honor for his war service.He is survived by 4 children, 10 grandchildren, 18great-grandchildren and 2 great-great-grandchildren.

Christmas Truce Letters

The following link includes letters from soldiers throughout the United Kingdom:

• http://www.christmastruce.co.uk/letters.html

Poland

Christmas Preparations

• The preparations for Christmas begin many days before the actual celebration. Nearly everywhere women are cleaning windows in apartments and houses just before Christmas. The insides of the houses are also cleaned thoroughly. It is believed that if a house is dirty on Christmas Eve, it will remain dirty all next year.

Weather

• Weather-forecasting is quite popular during Christmas. Everything that happens on Christmas, including the weather, has an impact on the following year. The weather on Easter and throughout the next year supposedly depends upon the weather on Christmas (snow, rain etc). Only a white Christmas is considered a real Christmas; therefore, everybody is happy when there is fresh snow outside.

Rituals

• Some ceremonies take place before the Christmas Eve supper. Among farmers, a popular ritual is the blessing of the fields with holy water and the placing of crosses made from straw into the four corners. It is also believed that animals can speak with a human voice.

Rituals

• Straw is put under white tablecloth. Some maidens predict their future from the straw. After supper, they pull out blades of straw from beneath the tablecloth. A green one foretells marriage; a withered one signifies waiting; a yellow one predicts spinsterhood; and a very short one foreshadows an early grave.

Poles are famous for their hospitality, especially during Christmas. In Poland, an additional seat is kept for somebody unknown at the supper table. No one should be left alone at Christmas, so strangers are welcomed to the Christmas supper.

Hospitality

This is to remind us that Mary and Joseph were also looking for shelter. In Poland, several homeless people were interviewed after Christmas. Some of them were invited To strangers' houses for Christmas; others that were not asked inside the homes but were given lots of food.

Hospitality

Christmas & New Year’s It is still strongly believed that whatever occurs On Wigilia (Christmas Eve) has an impact on the coming year. So, if an argument should arise, a quarrelsome and troublesome year will follow. In the morning, if the first visiting person is a man, it means good luck; if the visitor is a woman, one might expect misfortune. Everyone, however, is glad when a mailman comes by, for this signifies money and success in the future.

Christmas & New Year’s

To assure good luck and to keep evil outside, a branch of mistletoe is hung above the front door. Finally, old grudges should end. If, for some reason, you do not speak with your neighbor, now is the time to forget old ill feelings and to exchange good wishes.

Decorations Traditionally, the Christmas tree is decorated on the Wigilia day - quite an event for children. The custom of having a Christmas tree was first introduced in Alsace (today a region of eastern France) at the end of the 15th century. Three centuries later, it was common around the world. Early on, the tree was decorated with apples to commemorate the forbidden fruit – the apple of paradise (the garden of Eden).

Decorations

Today, the Christmas tree is adorned with apples, oranges, candies and small chocolates wrapped in colorful paper, nuts wrapped in aluminum foil, hand-blown glass ornaments, candles or lights, thin strips of clear paper (angel's hair), and home-made paper chains. The latter, however, has become rarer because commercially produced aluminum foil chains are being sold.

St. Nicholas

Christmas and Santa Claus Day are not celebrated at the same time in Poland, but rather three weeks apart. Santa Claus (called Mikolaj) Day is celebrated on December 6th, the name day of St. Nicholas. This is when St. Nicholas visits some children in person or secretly during the night.

Weather Predictions

Christmas Day, called the first holiday by the Poles, is spent with the family at home. No visiting, cleaning, nor cooking are allowed on that day; only previously cooked food is heated. This is a day of enjoyment, for Jesus was born. On Christmas Day, people start to observe the weather very closely. It is believed that each day foretells the weather for a certain month of the following year. Christmas Day predicts January's weather, St. Stephen's Day impacts February's, etc.

St. Stephen’s Day

St. Stephen's Day is known as the second holiday. This is a day for visiting and exchanging Christmas greetings. When night begins to fall, you can hear stamping and jingling, followed by Christmas carol singing outside. Carolers begin their wandering from home to home.

Herody

HerodyHerody, a popular form of caroling, is a live performance usually played by twelve young boys. Dressed in special costumes, they include King Herod, a field marshal, a knight, a soldier, an angel, a devil, death, a Jew, Mary, shepherds, and sometimes the Three Kings and an accordionist.

Herody

They sing pastoral songs and carols, and when let into a house, perform scenes from King Herod's life. Oration and songs vary and depend upon to whom they are being addressed: the owner of the house, a young woman about to be married, a widow, etc. At the conclusion, the performers are offered refreshments and some money. Also popular is caroling with a crib (szopka) and with a star. Usually, those are items are carried by three caroling teenagers. They, too, are given some money.

The Breaking of the Oplatek

The Breaking of the Oplatek

One of the most beautiful and most revered Polish customs is the breaking of the oplatek. The use of the Christmas wafer (oplatek) is not only by native Poles in Poland but also by people of Polish ancestry all over the world.

The Breaking of the OplatekThe oplatek is a thin wafer made of flour and water. For table use, it is white. In Poland, colored wafers are used to make Christmas tree decorations. In the past, the wafers were baked by organists or by religious and were distributed from house to house in the parish during Advent. Today, they are

produced commercially and are sold in religious stores and houses. Sometimes an oplatek is sent in a greeting card to loved ones away from home.

Christmas Eve Traditions

On Christmas Eve, the whole family gathers and waits impatiently for the appearance of the first star. With its first gleam, they all approach a table covered with hay and a snow-white tablecloth. A vacant chair and a place setting are reserved for an unexpected guest, always provided for in hospitable Polish homes.

Wafer

The father or eldest member of the family reaches for the wafer, breaks it in half and gives one half to the mother. Then, each of them breaks a small part from each other's piece. They wish one another a long life, good health, joy and happiness, not only for the holiday season, but also for the new year and for many years to come.

Wafer

This ceremony is repeated between the parents and their children as well as among the children; then, the wafer and good wishes are exchanged with all those present, including relatives and even strangers. When this activity is over, they all sit down and enjoy a tasty though meatless supper, after which they sing koledy (Christmas carols and pastorals) until time for midnight Mass, also know asPasterka ("the Mass of the Shepherds").

The Epiphany or Feast of the Three Kings

On Twelfth Night, Jan. 6, Poles take small boxes containing chalk, a gold ring, incense and a piece of amber, in memory of the gifts of the Magi, to church to be blessed. Once at home, they inscribe the date and "K+M+B" with the blessed chalk above every door in the house to provide protection against illness and misfortune for those within.

The Epiphany or Feast of the Three Kings

For 2011, it would look like "20 K+M+B 11." The letters, with a cross after each one, stand for names of the Three Kings -- Kaspar, Melchior and Balthasar. They remain above the doors all year until they are inadvertently dusted off or replaced by new markings the next year.

The Epiphany or Feast of the Three Kings

A King Cake with a lucky coin or almond is baked on this day. The one to receive the piece with a coin or almond must host the next party. The Feast of the Three Kings ends the swiete wieczory -- the twelve holy nights that began on Christmas Day -- and signals the beginning of zapusty or carnival time.

Polish Three Kings Cake

Czech Republic

Good King WenceslasOne of the best loved Christmas Carols is the 129-year-old carol: Good King Wenceslas. In 1853, John Mason Neale, and English clergyman, chose Wenceslas as the subject for a children’s song to exemplify generosity.

Good King WenceslasSome refer to Good King Wenceslas as a carol for the Feast of St. Stephen or Boxing Day since there is no mention of the Nativity. It quickly became a Christmas favorite, even though its words clearly indicate that Wenceslas ‘looked out’ on St. Stephen’s Day, the day after Christmas.

Good King WenceslasSo Good King Wenceslas is actually a Boxing Day carol! For a tune, Neale picked up a spring

carol, originally sung with the Latin text ‘Tempus adest floridum’ or ‘Spring has unwrapped her flowers’. This original spring tune was first published in 1582 in a collection of Swedish church and school songs.

Good King Wenceslas

Who was King Wenceslas anyway? Wenceslas was the Duke of Bohemia who was murdered in 929 AD by his wicked younger brother, Boleslav. As the song indicates, he was a good, honest, and strongly principled man. The song expresses his high moral character in describing King Wenceslas braving a fierce storm in order to help feed a poor neighbor. Wenceslas believed that his Christian faith needed to be put into action in practical ways.

Good King WenceslasWenceslas was brought up with a strong Christian faith by his grandmother St. Ludmila. Wenceslas’ own mother Drahomira, however, joined forces with an anti-Christian group that murdered Wenceslas’ grandmother, and seized power in Bohemia.

Good King Wenceslas

Two years later in 922 AD, the evil Drahomira was deposed, and Good King Wenceslas became the ruler. He became Bohemia’s most famous martyr and patron saint. His picture appeared on Bohemian coins, and the Crown of

Wenceslas became the symbol of Czech independence.

Good King Wenceslas

• Click below for the lyrics to Good King Wenceslas:

• http://www.carols.org.uk/good_king_wenceslas.htm

• http://www.hymnsandcarolsofchristmas.com/Hymns_and_Carols/good_king_wenceslas.htm

England and Ireland

Boxing Day and St. Stephen’s Day

• Click below for the articles regarding England’s Boxing Day and Ireland’s St. Stephen’s Day:

• http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1868711,00.html

• http://britishfood.about.com/od/christmas/p/boxingday.htm

Scotland

Scotland

• Click below for Robert Louis Stevenson’s Christmas at Sea:

• http://classiclit.about.com/library/bl-etexts/rlstevenson/bl-rlstevenson-chratsea.htm

• http://allpoetry.com/poem/8450533-Christmas_At_Sea-by-Robert_Louis_Stevenson