I was going to shut up till next Friday, but this post at News from the Past is timely and makes me think (as if I didn’t already) that the spirit of love and joy struggles to hold its own against the spirit of outrage and complaint. It’s about Christmas carols and the great offense they caused in Victorian times. Have fun.
Very interesting. I’d no idea Christmas carolling could be so dangerous!
LikeLiked by 2 people
Who’d’ve thunk? I did know they were looked down on, and almost banned, when the purest of the Protestants were in power, but this was news to me.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thank you for sharing . Happy Christmas!
LikeLiked by 1 person
And thanks for making it sharable.
LikeLiked by 1 person
A wonderful link on a cold Sunday, hope you have a terrific Christmas 💐😀
LikeLiked by 1 person
And you, Charlie.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Times were tough back in those days.
I went caroling a few times in my small town back in the early fifties. We sounded pretty good. Parents would ask us in for hot chocolate and give us small treats. Don’t think anyone goes caroling anymore.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I knew a few people in Minnesota who tried reviving the custom, but given how thick Minnesota doors need to be and how reluctant people are to stand outside listening (or worse yet, inside with their doors open) it didn’t go well.
LikeLike
We have thin doors and very little insulation down south. Drives the northerners that move here crazy. They miss their warm houses.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes. But not, I suspect, the reason they needed those warm houses.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Obviously those news clippings are fake. Which means? Early on the British Victorians one-upped us in the fake news department. Another reason we need to build that wall…nothing worse than gangsta Christmas carolers. Happy Christmas, Ellen to you and Your Better-Half.
LikeLiked by 1 person
My thanks. And hers.
So far, our neighborhood’s safe from hooligan carolers, but the season’s not over so no one’s safe.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Wow! Who knew? Great post, Ellen. A Merry Christmas to you! 🎄
LikeLiked by 2 people
And to you. I really will shut up now–at least till after the holiday. This time I really mean it.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Haha! Talk away. 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
Nope. Not saying a word. Except these eight.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I love it! 😀
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hahaha I couldn’t get past “The victim Thomas William Boyden told the court it was three o’clock on a Monday morning and he was smoking in his greenhouse.” made my day! Cheers and Happy Festering Season!
LikeLiked by 1 person
That stopped me in my tracks as well. There’s got to be more to the story than he told the court.
LikeLiked by 1 person
How very interesting!
A Merry Christmas (with only well-behaved carollers) and a Happy New Year to you,
Pit
LikeLiked by 2 people
So far the neighborhood seems safe. Hope yours is as well. Enjoy the holidays–cautiously.
LikeLiked by 1 person
:)
LikeLiked by 1 person
Should have known there was something nefarious about the whole thing… ;-)
Who knew indeed?
Thanks for the share and Merry Christmas!
LikeLiked by 2 people
And to you. And–this time I really mean it–I’m offline till Friday.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I mean it too! Be gone with you and enjoy yourself!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hear the silence on my end?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Nope… but then, the Christmas music is drowning it out.
LikeLiked by 1 person
It’s those damn carolers, fighting again.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I know, right?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Caroling, a dangerous occupation? Who knew?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Strictly for hooligans.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Today, instead of carolers slugging it out for a few pence we have moms and dads slugging it out for the children’s “gift of the year”. Peace on Earth?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Well, yeah, but that’s appropriate, don’t you think?
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’ve always had doubts about the intentions of those who sing the Figgy Pudding carol…
LikeLiked by 2 people
How wise of you.
LikeLike
Merry Christmas!!! Stay warm and safe!
LikeLiked by 2 people
Thank you. And you.
LikeLiked by 1 person
They probably had singing voices like mine! 😝
LikeLiked by 2 people
That’s possible, but given that I haven’t heard yours….
Or theirs.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Lucky you.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Okay. I’m going to take your word on that and head for my stash of earplugs right now. Just in case.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Since you like educating us poor Yanks, here’s a question that has always bugged me, from an English Christmas carol:
Here we come a-wassailing
Among the leaves so green;
Here we come a-wand’ring
So fair to be seen.
Love and joy come to you,
And to you your wassail too;
What is a wassail? It seems to be taking on two contexts:
Here we come a wassailing
And to you your wassail too
To quote a great American sage, “Things just don’t add up!”
LikeLiked by 1 person
Neat question. A wassail’s a drink–spiced ale or mulled wine–and wassailing’s going from house to house singing Christmas carols. And, I’d assume, getting plastered on the stuff, maybe even asking for it, or demanding it, or assuming it’ll be offered at each house. Oh, those rowdy, rowdy carolers. That only leaves us to figure out what “to you your wassail too” means. Maybe offering you some of your own mulled wine? I can’t entirely make sense of it, but we’re closer than we were at the start.
I seem to remember that someone in the village tried to revive some version of the tradition by gathering people and pouring cider (hard–almost the only kind you find here) on her apple trees and singing. It had a pagan tinge, which generally, at least to my mind, means an attempt to revive lost pre-Christian traditions by applying copious amounts of imagination. But that’s a cynic’s view. Take it with a grain or six of salt.
LikeLike
Well, the first part makes sense, “here we come a drinking” seems to fit with that era (~1850’s or so), lots of drinking back then. Ale was healthier than water.
But the second part? Love and joy come to you, and to you your cider too? I guess if they’re wishing them plenty of cider?
Now, about auld lang syne? ;-D
LikeLiked by 1 person
A-drinking and a singing. Don’t forget the singing. People around here are prone to sing when they drink. Maybe the second part is a promise not to drink all of the wassail they’re offered. I’m making this up as I go along, so here’s a link to a Wikiwhatsia article that may well be accurate. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wassailing. Wikipedia has more or less the same accuracy record as standard encyclopedias.
Auld lang syne? At that point, we’re into Scots and I’m completely out of my depth. I’m living in the wrong part of the island.
LikeLike
My, how things have changed. When I taught in college we regularly rejected Wiki as a valid source for anything. Either they have raised standards and accuracy, or people have come to accept unverified postings as fact.
I can see the promise as valid. And, yeah, Scots are a people/culture of their own. I have enough problem figuring out my Irish wife.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I have enough problems trying to figure out myself.
I can see the point of steering clear of Wikipedia, and if I were teaching I suspect I’d do the same. When I can, I try to find some more authoritative source. But there are times when it offers a well-targeted answer to something I can’t find anywhere else. And as someone or other said, I can resist anything but temptation.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Wassail—anglo saxon for “be hale” ie whole and healthy. The text is “and to you A wassail too.” (Like commonwealth, which means good, not money.) Next time, the true meaning of Rudolf the red nosed reindeer.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes! Please! Right now, while we still remember what Christmas is!
Oh, and thanks for the explanation. I appreciate it.
LikeLike
Many many years ago, at the time that the Viking Eric first landed his small Kontiki boat in New York, at Sutton Loo, now called Soho, his main helmsman was a Lapp, called Rud, who had brought his favorite reindeer along for company. The reindeer was named Dolph. Unfortunately, Rud was a short-tempered and violent man, who beat his too full of Christmas spirit reindeer unmercifully with a wooden riding crop. But Eric, being a gentle man, and an animal lover, took the crop from him, and used it to smash Rud’s most highly prized Ostrich egg, gathered during a previous journey around the world. This gave him such pleasure, he then developed the game of Dolph, later known as golf by the first New Yorkers, who have a slight problem with Ds. It was practiced on that very spot ever since by the animal protection people of New York, in commemoration of the bloody nose given by Rud to the most famous reindeer of all, Rud’s Dolph, the red nosed reindeer.
LikeLiked by 1 person
And here–silly me–I thought golf was invented in Scotland. I learn so much from the comments people leave.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I knew the singers wanted a couple “pennies” or somewhat, like getting treats at Halloween. I think the public over-reacted. I will continue to envision the “Christmas Card” images of them!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Over-reacting seems to be something we as a species are good at.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Wonderful. I went Carol singing as a teenager with friends but I am not aware that people do it around here at all, thank goodness!
LikeLiked by 2 people
Not a fan of carols, then.
LikeLiked by 1 person
No. It’s like torture when they play them in shops. The only ones I can abide are the Motown ones, “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” and the Pogues “Fairytale of New York” etc.
LikeLiked by 1 person
The ones on loops? Absolutely. I can make peace with the ones actual humans sing, but that’s my limit.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Carols in church are great, however. Yes, real people singing.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Wow! sounds almost like now and religious observation politics!
LikeLiked by 2 people
Religious observation politics?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Meaning we let the ideas that others push on us for spiritual preference.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Odd how maleable our ideas can be, isn’t it?
LikeLiked by 1 person
There was a terrible cacophony outside our front door here, one Christmas – from what I recall it was a group formed from a young farmers’ club… maybe I should have had them fined! Haha! Good share, Ellen, thanks.
Have a happy-whatever-you-celebrate (I forgot about Chanucah til too late, so it’ll have to be Christmas!)
LikeLiked by 2 people
We kind of lost Hanukkah ourselves this year. I’m not sure where it got to. But a merry whatever to you as well.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks for sharing — and happy Christmas to you!
LikeLiked by 2 people
And–I’m late–to you.
LikeLiked by 1 person
People never change; just their causes. Remember there is always someone who knows better than you do what is best for you. ;)
LikeLiked by 1 person
Oh, they do, they do. And of course, I know better than you what’s best for you. And you probably know better than me what’s best for me. It’s so nice to make these judgements in the absence of the complicating facts.
LikeLiked by 1 person