Ertach Kernow - Cornish Christmas’ past traditions and for today
Cornish Christmas: Yule is the name now given to the time we celebrate the winter solstice as part of our Cornish Celtic traditions. Not necessarily Celtic or Cornish Yule was a time of the year that ancient peoples throughout the northern hemisphere observed as the hours of daylight began to lengthen following the solstice on or about the 21st December. The word Yule comes from the Germanic or Norse languages and there are differences of opinions by linguists as to the exact origins of the name. In time of course as Christianity spread it was often the best way of converting people to use their existing feast days and Christmas became linked to Yule. Many of the ancient traditions relating to singing, dancing, and feasting and association with evergreen plants like holly, mistletoe, and trees became a part of later Christian Christmases’. These ancient traditions are still with us along with the later arrival of the now traditional fir, spruce, and pine Christmas trees.
During the Roman occupation of Britain the area that included Cornwall was known as Dumnonia and this stretched through Devon into Somerset and Dorset. There was little in the way of identification of the area that we now know as Cornwall until around the 9th century. Many of older Celtic the traditions would have been carried out throughout virtually the whole of Britain. Gradually Christianity spread throughout the land with some occasional backtracking to pagan beliefs, rites and rituals. The coming of the Saxons changed many traditions as they and later the Danish Viking invaders brought their own traditions which added to and merged with existing Celtic customs. Early Cornish history and culture would have been part of the wider Celtic area.
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One of the earliest Christmas and New Year traditions is that of the wassail. Although it is not a custom of Cornish origin wassailing has certainly stood the test of time here in Cornwall. Although it saw a decline it is one of those customs that is now seeing an increasing revival. That it was a part of Cornish tradition back to at least the 14th century can be established through its appearance in the second play of the Cornish Ordinalia. The origins of the term are from the Old Norse term for ‘Good Health’ which was ‘Ves Heill’ as we in Cornish would say ‘Yeghes Da’. Whether it came to Cornwall through the 9th century alliance with the Vikings or travelled down through Britain as the Saxons began encroaching on Cornish territory is unknown. The famous poem Beowulf mentions wassail, this being written between the eighth and tenth centuries depending on which academic scholar one trusts. J R R Tolkien who was Merton Professor of English Language and Literature at Oxford carried out a translation in 1926. He gave an acclaimed lecture on the work, ‘Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics’ and dated it to the 8th century.
The wassail name tradition has also been linked to Vortigern, the king who allegedly allowed the Saxons free entry to Britain as mercenaries to fight the Picts. The Welsh monk Gildas a near contemporary of Vortigern writer of ‘On the Ruin and Conquest of Britain,’ during the 6th century alludes to Vortigern although not actually using his name. The Venerable Bede writing in the 8th century actually used the name of Vortigern but doesn’t mention any wife. However later stories tell of on the marriage of Vortigern to his second wife the daughter of Saxon warlord Hengest, that Rowena raised her cup and proclaimed, "Louerd King, waes hael," Lord King, be hale. Vortigern of course has become a part of the wider Arthurian legend which itself is linked to Cornwall.
Links to these on the Cornish National Music Archive can be found below:
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- https://cornishnationalmusicarchive.co.uk/content/wassel-kernow-a-cornish-wassail/
- https://cornishnationalmusicarchive.co.uk/content/wassel-resrudh-redruth-wassail/
- https://cornishnationalmusicarchive.co.uk/content/bodmin-wassailers/
- https://cornishnationalmusicarchive.co.uk/content/cornish-wassails/
Following a reference in the Ordinalia mention was made in 1624 when former mayor of Bodmin Nicholas Sprey bequeathed 13s 4d to create an annual wassail cup. This amount of two-thirds of a pound was known as a mark and a well-known accounting sum in medieval times. This cup was to be taken to the mayors house each year on the twelfth day of Christmas passing through the town collecting funds and was to encourage neighbourliness. This tradition continues and has now reached its 400th anniversary with monies collected donated to charities. The Redruth Wassail died out I the early 1900’s but was revived in 2015 the music played to Redruth’s own historic tune. These wassail events are examples of visit wassails but perhaps today in Cornwall wassailing is best related to ceremonies relating to orchards where the trees are blessed. This is to wake the trees and encourage them to provide a bounteous harvest and involves a ceremony with a form of words, partially said in Kernewek and singing. A K Hamilton Jenkin recorded in the 1930’s that at some of these events a gun was fired to scare away malignant spirits, these days this is given a miss and there’s lots of banging on drums, saucepans and the like to make a loud noise instead. There are traditional wassail songs sung and also some new ones have been written.
For those interested in the wassail story in Cornwall, the ceremony, music and dance all this can be found in the recently published ‘Wassel Kernow – Ceremonies of the Cornish Wassail’. Published by the Federation of Old Cornwall Societies this can be obtained from their website shop at www.kernowgoth.org for just £2.00 plus postage. This gives more much more information about the history and other types of wassail that occurred in the past. Perhaps this booklet will encourage interest in holding new wassail events throughout Cornwall. A link to purchase this booklet can be found below.
Today television and digital games have often taken over from old time amusements on Christmas Day. During the Victorian age records tell of the many games which were played by both children and adults at Christmas. Older folk may remember many of these party games from their own childhood, not necessarily played just at Christmas. Without going into the complexity of each game these included Shadow-Buff, Copenhagen, The Cat and the Mouse, Buff with the Wand, Magic Music, Do as I Do and many more. One I remember being played at a Cornish rugby club a few years ago was ‘Thus said the Grand Mufti.’ Needless to say this was a drinking game, highly entertaining for those participating and watching, also profitable for the bar.
Many customs were recorded by Miss M A Courtney in 1890 in her ‘Cornish feasts and folk-lore’. A nice custom in Falmouth was for shops, from where poorer people bought their Christmas groceries, to provide a slice of cake and a small glass of gin. Today there would have been a huge selection of Cornish produced gin to choose from, but alas a custom that has passed its time. For those with open fires it was a tradition to have saved a piece of log, known in Cornwall as a block, from the previous year to start the Christmas fire.
Let’s be frank there are some old customs especially with food which should be remembered but perhaps not cooked, as shared by Miss Courtney. ‘Egg-hot, or eggy-hot, was the principal drink. It was made with eggs, hot beer, sugar, and rum, and was poured from one jug into another until it became quite white and covered with froth. A sweet giblet pie was one of the standing dishes at a Christmas dinner, a kind of mincepie, into which the giblets of a goose, boiled and finely chopped, were put instead of beef. Cornwall is noted for its pies, that are eaten on all occasions; some of them are curious mixtures, such as squab-pie, which is made with layers of well-seasoned fat mutton and apples, with onions and raisins. Mackerel pie: the ingredients of this are mackerel and parsley stewed in milk, then covered with a paste and baked, then brought to table a hole is cut in the paste, and a basin of clotted cream thrown in it. Muggetty pie, made from sheep's entrails, parsley, and cream.’ It was said ‘The devil is afraid to come into Cornwall for fear of being baked in a pie.’
A mid-winter custom which is seeing a good revival is that of mummers and guise dancers, especially in and around Penzance and St Ives. This was carried out far more at Christmas during the 19th century, todays Montol Festival carried out on 21st December is far less intimidating. The riotous nature of ‘goose-dancers’ became such a terror to the respectable inhabitants of Penzance the Corporation stopped them around 1880 and every Christmas eve a notice was posted in conspicuous places forbidding their appearance in the streets. Apparently it continued in the streets of St Ives.
Christmas lights are a big thing now and those at Mousehole especially well-known. Church towers, too, were sometimes illuminated, this of course could only then be done in very calm weather. The tower of Zennor church was reported to have been lit up in 1883, for the first time since 1866. Today a number of churches illuminate their towers although sadly this is lessening due to budget restraints. Cost and carbon emission reasons were highlighted when Truro Cathedral stopped lighting up and switched off its floodlights in 2022. However, Truro makes up for it with its Christmas street decorations when thousands of people flock to the city.
It's lovely that so many Cornish historic traditions and customs are once again taking place and involving people from across all communities. Whatever peoples religious beliefs let’s take these customs and enjoy participating in them as part of our Cornish cultural heritage.
Heritage Column
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