Christmas Countdown - Day 1

Throughout Europe and into Eurasia, particularly in the Northern climates, winter has been a time of feasting and celebration, the time of yuletide. If you think about it, this actually makes good sense. By the end of November, all of the crops were in, and the deep cold of winter was setting in. Many areas had already seen their first snowfall and could expect to be snowbound until the following spring.

Even in the midwestern United States, this is the pattern - the heavy work for farmers and livestock people is in the growing and harvesting months. Winter just doesn't allow for a great deal of outdoor work for agricultural people and you sure can't plant or harvest under a couple of feet of snow!

Most historians agree that Christmas probably grew out of Yule festivities. What they don't always agree on is just where the word Yule came from and how it evolved into Christmas.

There is general agreement that Yule is derived from the Anglo-Saxon "Yula," or "Wheel of the Year" and that the Yule celebrations marked the celebration of both the shortest day of the year and the re-birth of the sun or that "Yule" was originally a Scandinavian word (in Finnish: "Joul"). Joul, they say, probably means 'feast', so "Yuletide" means the time or season of feasting. Yet another possibility is that Yule comes from hjol in Old Norse, which refers to the moment the sun begins to turn after it's low point on the shortest day of the year, typically around December 20- 21st. Since they both mean pretty much the same thing, it seems that Yule was likely the celebration of the end of the shorter and shorter days and the beginning of longer and longer days.

For those of us living in lower and warmer areas of the world, we just need to imagine how life must have been during the winter - bitter cold, short days and very little in the way of fresh food. It probably was real cause for celebration that the days were now becoming progessively longer.

Something to celebrate? You bet!