Odin and the winter festival of Yule as the origins of Christmas festivities

Yule (also Yul or Jól) was a prominent winter festival that was celebrated by the Norse and Germanic peoples from very ancient times as far as even the best part of the Early Middle Ages before incorporated by the Christians to shape the backbone of the festivities of Christmas, eventually ending up as very much a synonym.

Etymology

The spelling ‘Yule’ actually renders the modern English form which derives on the so-called Old English⁽¹⁾ ‘ġeōl’ (likely pronounced as ‘/jo:l/ or /ju:l/) and that in turn ultimately on Old Norse ‘Jól’ apparently meaning ‘feast’ or ‘joy,’ associated with supreme god Odin as ‘Jólnir’⁽²⁾ (apparently meaning ‘feast/joy bearer’) or ‘Jólfaðr’ (father of the feast/joy).

According to Agrip, a history of the kings of Norway (12th century), the festival’s name descended from the above former mentioned epithet of Odin’s while other gods were also tied to the festivities identified with the plural appellation of Jólnar, spelling ‘Yule-beings.’

Yule, Midwinter and Winter Solstice

The affair lasted a good twelve days that commenced on Midwinter Night which many scholars interpret as the Winter Solstice (December 21 or 22 nowadays but December 25⁽³⁾ on the Julian Calendar in effect back then) yet some opt for the start of the middle phase of winter, albeit the two standpoints could eventually meet.

For that matter, the Norse actually acknowledged only two seasons round the year, unlike the rest of Europeans, where Vetr or Vintr (winter⁽⁴⁾) stretched from mid October through to mid April so much so that the winter solstice would most likely fall at or around the beginning of mid winter at the end of the day.

The Anglo-Saxon Ġēola

Bede or Beda (quite likely also Bedda, a name either Frisian or Danish⁽⁵⁾ in origin), a monk and author that roughly lived between 672/3 and 735 AD in the so-called Anglo-Saxon Britain, mentions that ‘Ġēola’ (‘time of ġeōl,’ nowadays Yule) covered the entire winter solstice spell in his treatise titled ‘De temporum ratione’ (The Reckoning of Time, c. 725 AD).

Moreover, he interestingly calls ‘Ǣrra (preceding) Geōla’ the part of December up to and ‘Æftera (after, following) Geōla’ the part of January following Ġēol (Yule). With the shades of the so-called Anglo-Saxon invasion still fresh in his time, this reckoning and practice was most likely carried over and reflected that held in the lands whence the Saxons, Angles, Frisians and Jutes came from.

Ýlir, the month of Yule

The second month on the Norse calendar was that of Ýlir, a cognate of Jól, Jul (also attested in the Old Germanic calendar) and ultimately Yule that consequently spells a connection to Odin, which extended roughly from mid or late November to mid or late December with the winter solstice usually at its end.

Seeing it was a lunar calendar, namely revolving around the cycles and phases of the moon, Ýlir shifted as regards dates from year to year and thereby so could likely the festival of Yule towards its end – unless the Norse directly associated it with the winter solstice and could locate that within the month regardless of the moon.

After all, midwinter may have not necessarily carried the meaning of the centre of the winter for the Norse and the Germanic peoples but rather either the two middle months therein or even more so a spell over the darkest days of the year, as was the case in many regions Europewise, marking the transition of days from drawing in into drawing out and by extension the death and rebirth of the sun.

Gormánuður, the month preceding Ýlir (Norse calendar)

Now, the previous month to Ýlir was that of Gormánuður (meaning ‘slaughter’) when the Norse would go on to slaughter most of their domestic animals since they couldn’t feed them during the harsh phases of the winter. That would yield an abundance of meat that had to be consumed within the next few weeks since they could hardly preserve it so deep into the winter.

Which, in turn, provided them with an excellent opportunity to hold generous feasts and socialize between them at large with meat and drink aplenty at the same time that the most significant event of the winter solstice lay at hand. By implication, that shapes a sound ground to virtually rule out any suggestion by some historians that Yule may have been held in January instead.

Christmas traditions drawing on Yule

Many of the traditions and conceptions of Christmas nowadays draw heavily on Yule starting off with the Twelve Days of Christmas, getting underway on Christmas Day (doubling as the old winter solstice on the Julian Calendar), that originate from nothing else but the twelve days that the festivities of Yule lasted commencing at Midwinter, which apparently doubled as the winter solstice.

The Yule log or clog (also known as Christmas block) comes a long way from the traditional burning of large logs, usually an oak or ash tree trunk carved with runes, in the main hearth (fire place) of Norse longhouses for several days during Yule so that symbolically some light would remain in the darkest spell of the year awaiting the return of the sun as well as providing warmth.

Moving on, the singing of carols door-to-door is yet another Christmas practice that has its origins in Yule and more precisely in the Wassailing⁽⁶⁾, meaning ‘Wishing good health/fortune,’ where people would be singing and offering drink from a wassail bowl door-to-door in exchange for gifts.

Wassail was actually a hot beverage that in the early days was warmed mead with roasted crab apples that with time developed into a mulled punch of cinnamon, sugar, ginger and nutmeg interspersed with sops of toast. ‘Smoking Bishop,’ mentioned by Ebenezer Scrooge in Charles Dickens’s novel ‘A Christmas Carol’ (1843), was a popular type of wassail, punch or mulled wine at Christmas in Victorian England.

Furthermore, the Yule boar or Sonargöltr, Old Norse apparently meaning ‘sacrifice boar,’ was a boar sacrificed as part of the festivities of Yule where solemn vows would be taken over its bristles as regarded future actions in a tradition called Heitstrenging which is still reflected nowadays in the pig-shaped cakes in Sweden or the Christmas ham in northern Europe and Britain at Christmas.

This tradition was apparently linked to the golden-bristled boar called Gullinbursti, made out of pure gold by the dwarves Eitri and Brokkr, that Freyr (meaning ‘Lord’) of the Vanir (gods) would ride, potentially on Midwinter Night among other occasions, or had his chariot pulled by.

The Christmas tree and decorations as well as the Yule goat and the mistletoe are further customs that come all the way from the pagan Yule as the Norse would take in evergreen trees, likely representing Yggdrasil (the Tree of Life), and adorn them with small carvings of gods, food and clothes while also affording warmth to the vættir, spirits they believed that lived in them.

The Wild Hunt and Odin as gift-bringer

Coming to a close, Yule was also associated with the Wild Hunt, also known as Oskoreia (apparently meaning ‘Asgard’s Ride’ or ‘Odin’s Army/Hunters’) among the Norse, that was led by mighty Odin himself (also known as Woden in parts of northern or western Europe) accompanied by other fearsome ghostly riders such as Gudrun, other Æsir (gods of Asgard), Valkyries and even slain warriors from Valhalla on a relentless chase sweeping the skies over Midwinter.

Odin rode his lightning fast eight-legged Sleipnir, meaning the ‘Slipper’ or ‘Smooth,’ and children would leave their boots out by the hearth filled with straw, hay and sugar so that the divine horse could eat during the Hunt.

Odin would come down and visit homes of mortals, take the food for hungry Steipnir so that he could keep up the pursuit with renewed vigour and leave candies or gifts for the generous children in their boots in return.

A practice that certainly rings a bell and demonstrates that Odin has most likely been the inspirational figure behind far later Santa Claus (also known as ‘Father Christmas’ in an analogy to Odin’s ‘Jólfaðr’), a prominent Christmas tradition, rather than the ‘lame’ candidate of Saint Nicholas of Myra put forward by scholars and church.

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(1) ‘Old English’ is more of an exaggeration by modern historians and linguists as it was actually no more than a number of mainly Frisian and Low German as well as Norse dialects, some not mutually intelligible between them, that arrived along with the large numbers of Germanic and Norse peoples that settled in Britain in two extended waves over the second half of the first millennium AD.

(2) The Old Norse suffix ‘-(n)ir’ apparently carries the meaning of ‘bearer/bringer’ added at the end of verbs to form nouns.

(3) On the Gregorian calendar, which came in use in 1582 AD, December 25 from the preceding Julian calendar would translate to December 23 in the seventh century and December 22 in the eighth century AD for instance.

(4) English ‘winter’ most likely derives on Old Danish ‘wintær’ and that in turn on (East) Old Norse ‘vintr.’

(5) The Angle or Engle (Angles) came from what is south Denmark and part of northeast Germany nowadays so shared many similar or identical names with the Danes while their dialects were closely related.

(6) Middle English form apparently originating from Danish ‘Wes hál’ with the latter in turn ultimately out of the Old Norse ‘Ves heill’ meaning ‘be healthy/fortunate’ by means of wish

Origin of English surnames and placenames ending in ‘-by’

English place names and by extension so-called ‘locational’ surnames ending in ‘-by’ are Norse (Scandinavian) in origin, such as Derby, Whitby, Sotheby, Corby, Sommersby, Rugby or Carnaby.

That suffix ‘-by’ at the end comes, as a matter of fact, from the Old Norse ‘býr,’ an alternate form of ‘bǿr,’ which means something like ‘town/village/settlement.’

For instance, Derby more likely means ‘Village of the Deer’ coming from the Old English Dēoraby and that in turn from Old Norse Djúrabý, the latter breaking down as ‘dýr-‘ (deer, animal) and ‘-bý(r)’ (town/settlement).

Personally, I speculate an intermediate Norse form of ‘Dýrbý’ since ‘Djúra’ feels more of Proto-Norse in this case.

Whitby, in its turn, means ‘White town/settlement’ and comes from Old Norse ‘Hvítr-‘ (white) and ‘-bý(r)’ again.

Moving on, the well-known name Sotheby comes from a combination of ‘Soþe-‘ (true, real) and ‘-bý(r)’, where ‘þ’ (thorn) a letter inherited from the Norse tongues.

The almost identical Sotherby, on the other hand, very likely comes from the Old Norse ‘Suðr’ (south, southern) and ‘-bý(r).’

There is a possibility that ‘Sothe-‘ above could come from a form such as ‘Suð-‘ with the sense of ‘south, southern’ again come to that.

Corby may likely spell ‘Kori’s town’ where Kori was a leader of Danes that occupied this region in nowadays Northamptonshire (East Midlands) in the eighth century.

The alphabet used at the time was the Old English Latin so Kori’s name most likely appeared as ‘Cori’ in writing.

And, as a final example, Sommersby (narme) or Somersby (village in Lincolnshire) have both a first component that means ‘summer’ from a root such as Norn (extinct Norse dialect) ‘sommer,’ Old Swedish ‘somar’ or Old Danish ‘somær’ into a sense of ‘summer town/village.’

The Component ‘Don-‘ in Doncaster, South Yorkshire (England)

I’d like to say that in the case of Don-caster, spelling ‘Fort on River Don,’ I don’t think that the first component that doubles as the river’s name (Don) derives on the ancient Irish goddess Danu, it doesn’t quite add up.

On the contrary, I feel that it is actually Scythian in origin where ‘don’ means ‘river’ and most likely came along with the cavalry of about 5500 Sarmatians that were stationed in central and north nowadays England, many of whom in the area of modern Yorkshire, by Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius in 175 AD.

These Sarmatians apparently stayed there for whole generations while there is also the more known River Don, among the longest in Europe, that lay in the eastern reaches of their homeland (Sarmatia) in what is nowadays Russia.

Anglo-Saxon Runic Rings

This is a collection of five Anglo-Saxon runic rings, the two on top (middle) belonging to King Æthelwulf of Wessex (reigned between 839-858 AD), that date from the 9th and 10th century AD and are housed nowadays in the British Museum (London).

The writing in the ring bands is in Futhorc (fuþorc), or Anglo-Frisian runes, which first appeared in Frisia (nowadays northern Netherlands and parts of northwestern Germany) before the Frisians along with the Angles, Saxons and Jutes came over, bringing it over in the process, and settled in Britain in the second half of the 5th and the 6th century AD.

This runic writing system is a development of the Elder (or Older) Futhark, which is mainly attested in Scandinavia.

The name of Wales

I was particularly intrigued to find out, some time ago, that Spanish call Wales as ‘Gales’ which I don’t think actually derives on ancient ‘Wealas,’ a Low German name employed apparently by the West Saxons.

More likely, the name descends from Latin ‘Gallus’ via the Iberian ‘Galo’ for the Gauls (ancient equivalent to nowadays Celts). Or, alternatively, it came via the latter’s synonym ‘gaulês’ of the same meaning.

‘Wealas’ (probably meaning ‘foreigners,’ ‘Celts’), on the other hand, did not apply as a name only to what is now Wales but also comprised Cornwall below so apparently described all Brythons (Britons) that dwelt west of the (West) Saxons.

For that matter, they were distinguished between them as Westwealas (West Wealas, Cornwall) and Norðwealas (North Wealas, Wales).

I wonder, yet, whether ‘wealas’ could derive instead on Low German ‘weala’ (wealthy) since some Britons west were quite well off. On the other hand, the Britons settled around Strathclyde in the north were called ‘Stræcledwalas,’ namely without that ‘e.’

Wrapping things up, the modern name ‘Wales’ most likely draws on Norman ‘Waleys,’ or Low German ‘Waliesch’ of the same root, as it appears after the Norman conquest of Britain.

It originally carried the sense of ‘foreigner,’ ‘non-German’ or ‘Romance speaker’ but probably expanded later over the Celts too.

After all, Welsh is a (Brythonic) Celtic language, which fell under the Gallic ones, where ‘Waleys’ referred to the Gauls itself and is of German origin.

The suffixes of ‘-chester,’ ‘-cester’ and ‘caster’ in the names of English cities and towns

I don’t know whether you have ever noticed the second components in Man-chester, Lei-cester or Don-caster among several English cities that indicate the place of a Roman fort/camp during the Roman rule of Britain, formally regarded as coming from Latin ‘castrum’ or ‘castra’ (camp).

A reconstruction of the Roman fort of Segedunum that used to stand on the site of modern Wallsend in Tyne and Wear, northeast England

While ‘-caster’ seems to fall in accord, on the one hand, I feel that ‘-chester’ and ‘-cester’ could actually come from Latin ‘cestus,’ on the other hand, that has got a nuance of ‘belt’ as Roman walls did look like a belt around a camp, settlement or town where there can also be a sense of a bandlike section of land of specific respect.

I’m further under the impression that ‘-caster’ actually applied strictly to military camps, such as Doncaster (‘Fort on River Don’), where ‘-chester’ and ‘-cester’ applied to fortified towns and settlements instead.

Let me add that these names didn’t exist during the Roman occupation of Britain but came along later during the so-called Anglo-Saxon era.

Quite intriguing, finishing off, in the case of ‘-cester’ is that the ‘-e-‘ in the last but one syllable isn’t pronounced with the sole exception of Cirencester.

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City names ending in ‘-caster:’

• Doncaster, meaning ‘Fort on River Don,’ most likely from Scythian ‘don’ that means ‘river’ as Sarmatian cavalry were stationed in good numbers by the Romans in the area from the late second century AD,

• Lancaster, meaning ‘Fort on River Lune’ from Norman ‘Lǭncastre’ (mentioned thus in the Doomsday Book, 1086) and that most likely from Latin ‘luna’ (first component) due to the crescent shape of the river where the fort used to stand.

City names ending in ‘-chester:’

• Chester, meaning ‘Fortified Town/City’,

• Chichester, probably meaning ‘Town of Cissa,’ a Saxon invader (late fifth century) son of Ælle of Sussex (the latter’s name looking more of Dane/Norse though),

• Colchester, likely meaning ‘Colony/Outpost (fortified) Town’ from earlier ‘Colne’ and the early medieval form of Colneceastre (tenth century, effectively identical to and likely coming from Low German Cöln(e), an obsolete form of nowadays Köln as well, with the same meaning and root) out of Roman ‘Colonia,’

• Manchester, likely reading ‘Company (fortified) Town’ out of Latin ‘Manus’ (military company) as well as originating out of Mancunio (‘muddy company’ or ‘wedge company’) which was the Roman fort that originally stood there on a (muddy?) wedge of land on the river (the dialect and the people of Manchester carry the sobriquet Mancunian(s) even today).

City names ending in ‘-cester:’

• Leicester, likely spelling ‘Connecting/Connection (fortified) town’ which is given as coming all the way out of its old name ‘Ligera ceastre.’ Yet, personally I feel that its Middle English version of ‘Ledecestre’ suggests instead a Dane/Norse origin through ‘lede’ from Old Norse ‘leiða’ that would render it as either ‘Leading’ or ‘Connecting Town,’

• Worcester, potentially reading ‘(fortified) Town of Woergoran,’ a likely (West) Saxon people,

• Gloucester, spelling ‘Bright Town’ via the earlier form of ‘Glowecestre’ (Doomsday Book, 1086) very likely out of either Old Norse ‘glóa’ or Frisian ‘gloie’.