[Sca-cooks] Wassail was A college class... on Coffee

[Johnna Holloway]

OED has this long very complicated entry on wassail.
There's an association of it where it means basicly
a drinking salute...

A salutation used when presenting a cup of wine to a guest, or drinking 
the health of a person, the reply being drink-hail 
</cgi/o/oed/oed-idx?type=Lookup&q1=drink-hail&size=First+100>.
C. 1205 Lay. 14309 Reowen..bar an hir honde ane guldene bolle i-uulled 
mid wine..& þus ærest sæide in Ænglene londe Lauerd king wæs hæil [C. 
1275 wassayl].

Then later comes this--

The liquor in which healths were drunk; esp. the spiced ale used in 
Twelfth-night and Christmas-eve celebrations.

wine and wassail (now arch., echoing Shaks.): vaguely, strong drink in 
abundance (cf. sense 4).

C. 1300 Havelok 1246 Wyn and ale deden he fete, And made[n] hem glade 
and bliþe, Wesseyl ledden he fele siþe;
1494 in Househ. Ord. (1790) 121 When the steward cometh in at the hall 
doore with the wassell, he must crie three tymes, Wassell, wassell, 
wassell.A.
1548 Hall Chron., Hen. VIII, 9 Then was the wassaill or banket brought 
in, and so brake vp Christmas.

So by Tudor times there is an association with Christmas.
But remember that Yule at one time lasted for longer period

of  time.  I have references that say that the Christmas greenery ought 
to come
down at Candlemas... which is in February!

Johnnae


>> Wassail wasn't a holiday tradition? Mordonna
>>
>> "Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius" <adamantius.magister at verizon.net> 
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Although it was a holiday tradition and not an everyday thing,
>>> perhaps wassail is another, similar tradition. And that does go way
>>> back.
>>
>>
>> I dunno, maybe you're reversing something in your logical sequence. I
>> don't think these were holiday dishes/beverages in period, but have
>> since become associated with them. It's kind of like, how many
>> non-SCAdians make gingerbread in the summertime? I think it may be
>> more likely that we remember our old traditions around the holiday
>> season.
>>
>> Adamantius
>> -- 
>
>
> There's a logical fallacy somewhere in this: something about 
> inclusion, maybe, but it's too early in the morning for me to be sure 
> ;-). Wassail _is_ a holiday tradition, but not in addition to caudles 
> and possets, because they're basically not. They're cold-weather 
> drinks whose likelihood to be drunk on, say, Christmas has little or 
> nothing to do with the fact that it's Christmas, but rather with the 
> fact that it's cold. At the risk of belaboring the issue, how much 
> were possets and caudles drunk during the Christmas season in 
> 19th-century Australia? Or chicken soup and hot cocoa, today? They'd 
> more likely be drinking them in July, I think.
>
> Adamantius