[Hellsgate] Yule Traditions
Erwin Simmons
ESIMMONS001 at HOT.RR.COM
Wed Dec 18 11:32:51 PST 2013
Wassailing Away
/Here we come a-wassailing
among the leaves so green
Here we come a-dancing
so fair to be seen!
Love and Joy come to you
and to you your wassail, too!
And God rest you and bring you a Happy New Year
And God bring you a Happy New Year!/
Like many lasting customs, wassailing is associated with an ancient
legend. A beautiful Saxon princess named Rowena offered Prince Vortigen
a bowl of wine while toasting him with the phrase, "Waes hael," which is
an Anglo-Saxon phrase meaning "good health."
In Saxon times you would have said "/Waes hael,/" not "Waaassup," to
greet or say goodbye to somebody; it literally meant, "be in good
health." By the 12th century, "/Waes hael/" had become the salutation
one offered as a toast, to which the standard reply was, "/drinc hail/",
"drink to your good health." ("/Hail/" is an older form of our modern
word "hale," meaning "health or well-being" and is closely related to
our word "hail" meaning "to salute, greet, or welcome.") Eventually, the
word came to be associated with the alcoholic beverage used for
toasting, especially the spiced ale or mulled cider that was drunk on
Christmas Eve and Twelfth Night.
If you are having a traditional holiday party and want to incorporate
this custom, here is the old way to share wassail. While everyone is
gathered, shout "Wassail!" before sipping from a large, festively
decorated cup. Then pass the cup to your neighbor. That person replies
"Drinkhail," to you and takes a sip. He shouts "Wassail!" to the next
person, and passes the cup along, giving a kiss to the recipient who
says, "Drinkhail!" Though pre-dating Christianity, this kind of cup
sharing custom later became known as "the loving cup" in Christian
circles. Unlike the church custom, traditional wassail toasting could
get very rowdy and flirty. If you don't wish to drink from the communal
cup when offered, you may drink from your own cup and pass the wassail
cup with a kiss. If you don't want to be kissed on the mouth, turn your
cheek or offer your hand.
The kissing tradition known as "Cloven fruit" probably originated from
the wassail bowl fruits which were studded with cloves. In this game
someone starts by inserting cloves into a lemon, orange, apple, or pear.
Then he offers a cloven fruit to a woman he fancies. If she accepts, she
is indicating her willingness to be kissed. If she pulls out a clove
with her fingers, she wants to be kissed on the hand. If she pulls one
out with her teeth, she wants to be kissed on her lips. After she
receives her kiss she is free to offer the cloven fruit to anyone other
that one who offered it to her.
Wassail is also a tradition of blessing the crops especially
fruit-bearing trees. Wassailers would gather after dark in the orchard
and choose the most imposing tree to represent the whole orchard. A
young lad would scale the tree and sit in the branches to represent the
spirit of the tree. He would be offered gifts of bread, cheese, and
cider. Then wassailers sang orchard blessing songs, put bread soaked in
cider in the crook of the tree trunk, and poured wassail on the roots of
the tree. This would be followed with bells, gunfire, horn-blowing, and
other noise to frighten away malevolent spirits and awaken the trees
from winter slumber. In Sussex this was called "howling" the orchard.
Another wassail tradition sounds like "Trick or Treat" for grown ups and
calls for a group of caroling revelers to carry a pitcher or bowl,
festooned with ribbons, from house to house, where they sing and offer
the homeowner a cup. At each home the revelers are treated with a refill
of their the vessel. This hodgepodge cocktail of varied ingredients may
be the reason there is such a diversity of wassail recipes and the
origin of frat parties. Here are three Wassail recipes based on cider,
ale, rum, and wine for your holiday fare!
...Wassail Recipes on Renstore.com
<http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?e=0018HNXpnAyM-d-eyPXOyE4wKOGYKvXUUjeXKNT4u7OQ5qcLyo0Z04ZdRqXa7jubn3nS8TkhnLsf_TMJQxnRYPVTUpolSx85aLn7AnB6sOwWSAW23IniCLADOvI2Ers953K5g5IdXP72qyNr1eAPhPiOWCZXOmuRuCremAlvpcp367crN4a93FkjA==>
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