Hello again. Today’s Christmas tradition owes its origin primarily to the Celts and Druids, although a number of other cultures had a hand in it, too.
Mistletoe was an important part of several pagan cultures. To some, the white berries symbolized male fertility because they thought the seeds resembled male ejaculate–gross right? The Ancient Greeks referred to mistletoe as “oak sperm” since oak trees, also sacred to Celts and Druids, were often home to the parasitic, poisonous plants.
According to Pliny, a Roman author, mistletoe played a significant role in Druidic beliefs, specifically as a key component in a ritual known as oak and mistletoe. The Druid priest climbed an oak tree and removed the sacred mistletoe growing there. Afterwards they used the mistletoe to create a drug whose purpose was two-fold. First, it cured infertility and then mitigateed the effects of its poison. According to evidence recovered from bodies found in bogs, the Celts did ingest mistletoe, possibly as some sort of medicine or as part of a ritualistic human sacrifice, surprisingly a practice banned by the Romans and replaced with the sacrificing of white bulls– good for people, not so good for the cattle. Acvording to the Aeneid, Aeneas consumed mistletoe berries to get to the underworld so that he could visit his father’s ghost and see the future.
Stepping across the North Sea, Norse Mythology also laid claim to mistletoe, pointing out that Loki, the trickster got the blind god Hodur to murder his own twin Balderby shooting him with an arrow made from mistle toe wood, the only wood that could kill him. In some versions of the story, mistletoe became a symbol of peace and friendship to atone with its part in the murder.
That aspect must’ve been what the Romans gleaned from their pagan neighbors because to them, mistletoe became a symbol of peace, love, and understanding. They hung it over their doorways as a way to protect the household.
So how does any of this make it part of our Christmas traditions? During the Middle Ages, long after Chritianity had taken root in Europe, mistletoe continued to be associated with fertility and vitality, as well as a means of protecting themselves from witches and demons. The easiest way to get this protection was to kiss under it. By the 18th century, kissing under the mistletoe was popular among the servants in England, possibly because they though themselves more vulnerable to demons.
The servants in Victorian England are credited with continuing the tradition of kissing under the mitletoe, even adding to it, claiming people were expected to kiss under it and find true love.The rule didctated that any man could kiss any woman standing underneath mistletoe, and if that woman refused the kiss, she would be earn herself some bad luck. One variation of the tradition stated that each time someone kissed, they had to remove one of the white berries from the sprig of mistletoe. Once all the berries were gone, so was the mistletoe’s magic.
Did you know that mistletoe is the floral emblem of Oklahoma? Every year, in Tenbury Wells, a town in Herefordshire, holds an annual mistletoe festival and chooses a Mistletoe Queen. Today, kissing under the mistletoe is ingrained in our Christmas tradtions and found in many of our Christmas songs. Enjoy a different take on one of those songs. Come back tomorrow to learn about another of our Christmas traditions.
Living the Dream 