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yule log

 
Dictionary: yule log   (yūl) pronunciation
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n.
A large log traditionally burned in a fireplace at Christmas.


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Food Lover's Companion: yule log
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[YOOL] see bûche-de noël

WordNet: Yule log
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Note: click on a word meaning below to see its connections and related words.

The noun has one meaning:

Meaning #1: large log traditionally burned at Christmas

Wikipedia: Yule log
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For other uses, see Yule log (disambiguation).
An illustration of people collecting a yule log from Chambers Book of Days (1832) p. 736

A Yule log is a large wooden log which is burned in the hearth as a part of traditional Yule or Christmas celebrations in several European cultures. It can be a part of the Winter Solstice festival or the Twelve Days of Christmas, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, or Twelfth Night.

The expression "Yule log" has also come to refer to log-shaped Christmas cakes, also known as "chocolate logs" or "Bûche de Noël". The Yule log is related to other Christmas and Yuletide traditions such as the Ashen faggot.[1]

Contents

Etymology

The term "Yule log" is not the only term used to refer to the custom. In the north-east of England it was commonly called a "Yule Clog",[2] and in the country's Midlands and West Country, the term "Yule Block" was also used.[2] In the county of Lincolnshire, the term "Gule Block" was found, and in Cornwall, the term "Stock of the Mock" was as well.[2] In other parts of the British Isles, different terms were used, for instance in Wales, the log was often referred to as "Y Bloccyn Gwylian", meaning "the Festival Block",[2] whilst in Scotland, "Yeel Carline" (meaning "the Christmas Old Wife") was used, and in Ireland, the term "Bloc na Nollaig", which meant "the Christmas Block", was used.[2]

In Germany, the log is referred to as Christklotz, Christbrand or Weihnachtsscheit ("Christ-log" or "Christmas-log"). Kindled on Christmas Eve, the log in German tradition functioned as a lightning charm.[citation needed]

Historical custom

Germanic pagan origins

The Yule log has frequently been associated with having its origins in the historical Germanic paganism which was practiced across northern Europe prior to Christianisation. One of the first people to do so was the British Henry Bourne, who, writing in the 1720s, described the practice occurring in the Tyne valley. Bourne theorised that the practice originated from Anglo-Saxon paganism,[2] which is a form of Germanic paganism that was practiced in England during the early mediaeval period.

Robert Chambers, in his 1832 work, Book of Days notes that "two popular observances belonging to Christmas are more especially derived from the worship of our pagan ancestors—the hanging up of the mistletoe and the burning of the Yule log." James George Frazer in his work on anthropology, The Golden Bough (p. 736) holds that "the ancient fire-festival of the winter solstice appears to survive" in the Yule log custom. Frazer records traditions from England, France, among the South Slavs, in Central Germany (Meiningen) and western Switzerland (the Bernese Jura).

However, some historians have disagreed with this claim, for instance the Swedish C.W. von Sydow attacked Frazer's theories, claiming that the Yule log had never had any religious significance, and was instead simply a festive decoration with practical uses.[2]

In the British Isles

Because there are no accounts of the custom in the British Isles prior to the 17th century, some historians and folklorists have theorised that it was not an ancient British custom but was in fact imported into Britain from continental Europe in the early modern period, possibly from Flanders in Belgium, where the tradition thrived in this period.[2]

The first mention of the Yule log in the British Isles is a written account by the clergyman Robert Herrick, from the 1620s or 1630s. Herrick called the tradition a "Christmas log" and said that it was brought into the farmhouse by a group of males, who were then rewarded with free beer from the farmer's wife. Herrick claimed that the fire used to burn the log was always started with a remnant from the log that had been burned in the previous year's festivities. He also said that the log's role was primarily one of bringing prosperity and protection from evil - by keeping the remnant of the log all the year long the protection was said to remain across the year.[2]

In traditional British rural culture, the Yule log was not only seen as a magical protective amulet, and there are many reports of rivalries occurring between members of a community as to who had the largest log.[2]

The traditions of the Yule log died out in Britain in the latter 19th and early 20th century because of, according to historian Ronald Hutton, "the reduction in farm labour and the disappearance of the old-fashioned open hearths".[2]

In English folklore, Father Christmas was often depicted carrying a Yule Log.[3]

In Italy

In Tuscany, there is a Festa del Ceppo ("festival of the log").

In Catalonia

In the most traditional of the Catalan homes, the old custom of "fer cagar el tió" is still followed for Christmas. A log is wrapped with a blanket several days in advance of Christmas and on Christmas Eve the blanket is removed

Among the Serbs

Main article: Badnjak

The badnjak is a central feature in the traditional Serbian Christmas celebration. It is the log that a family solemnly brings into the house and places on the fire in the evening of Christmas Eve. The tree used for the badnjak, preferably a young and strait oak, is ceremoniously felled in the early morning of Christmas Eve. The burning of the log is accompanied by prayers to God so that the coming year may bring much happiness, love, luck, riches, and food. It would burn on through Christmas Day, whether rekindled or kept burning from the Eve. The first person to visit the family on that day should strike the burning badnjak with a poker or a branch to make sparks fly from it, at the same time uttering a wish that the happiness, prosperity, health, and joy of the family be as abundant as the sparks. The ideal environment to fully carry out these customs is the traditional multi-generation country household. Since most Serbs today live in towns and cities, the badnjak is symbolically represented by several leaved oak twigs that can be bought at marketplaces or received in churches. The origin of the badnjak is explained by events surrounding the Nativity of Jesus Christ. Scholars, however, regard these customs as practices inherited from the old Slavic religion.

Confection

Main article: Bûche de Noël
Durian-flavoured log

Sometime in the late 18th to early 19th century, a facsimile of the Yule Log became a traditional French dessert. Usually, it is in the form of a large rectangular yellow cake spread with frosting and rolled up into a cylinder - one end is then lopped off and stood on end to indicate the rings of the "log." This "Bûche de Noël" became a traditional Christmas dessert, and has recently spread to other regions, where it is often referred to as a yule log.

See also

References

  1. ^ Ashen Faggot at Dartmoor
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Hutton, Ronald (1996). The Stations of the Sun: A History of the Ritual Year in Britain. Oxford University Press. p. 39-41. 
  3. ^ American Christmas Origins
  • Margaret Baker, Discovering Christmas Customs and Folklore (1992), pp. 16 ff.
  • Walsh, William Shepard.Curiosities of Popular Customs And of Rites, Ceremonies, Observances, and Miscellaneous Antiquities (1897), p. 1014

External links


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Copyrights:

Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
Food Lover's Companion. Food Lover's Companion. Copyright © 2001 by Barron's Educational Series, Inc. All rights reserved.  Read more
WordNet. WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.  Read more
Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Yule log".  Read more