The Winter Solstice

Today I am going to be talking about the winter solstice.

The pagans are the people who celebrated yule. The pagans arrived in Britain around 500 BCE and changed to Christianity around 500 CE. The pagans had lots of different gods all of which  possessed a different power. They would worship their gods in wooden temples or sacred clearings in the woods. They would wear amulets with animal bones or teeth which they believed would give them the power of the animal.  

The winter solstice is the shortest day of the year and the longest night of the year. It is a time celebrate the sun because without the sun there would be no plants and without plants there would be food, oxygen or life. The winter solstice is on the first day of winter (21st December.) The historical tradition started with the fear that fading sun would never come back unless people kept a eye on it and had a big celebration.

The Norsemen saw the sun as a big sacred wheel that changed the seasons. The word for the wheel was ‘houl' and it is thought that is where the word yule came from. On the winter solstice Norsemen would light big bonfires, tell old stories and drink sweet ale. It is known that yule was celebrated long before Christmas. Druids (Celtic priests) would cut the beautiful mistletoe that grew on the oak trees and give it as a blessing (the oaks where considered sacred.) The winter fruits of the lovely mistletoe was a symbol of life in the cold and dark winter months. 

It is believed that the druids started the tradition of the Yule log. They thought that the sun stood still for twelve days and it was thought that the log when lit would conquer the darkness, banish evil spirits, celebrate the return of the sun and bring luck for the next year to come. But the log could also bring bad luck for example if the fire went out before the end of the night disaster would strike the house and if the fire showed someones shadow without its head that person would die within the coming year. 

Even though it was always thought that Stonehenge was made for the summer solstice historians have recently found out it was made for both solstices for more information about Stonehenge look at my post: Day at Stonehenge (probably in older posts.)