A Quick History of Christmas Meals
"From earliest times this has been the occasion of revelry, feasting and rejoicing among all peoples. Among the Phoenicians it was the feast of Baal, or Bel, the Sun God;…
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In the celebration of the Christmas festival on the 25th of December, Christian nations are in reality perpetuating the older pagan feasts which marked the period of the winter solstice, the time when the sun begins his upward climb in the heavens, the return to light and warmth.
From earliest times this has been the occasion of revelry, feasting and rejoicing among all peoples. Among the Phoenicians it was the feast of Baal, or Bel, the Sun God; among the Romans, the feast of Saturn, or Saturnalia, and it is from the customs of this celebration that the masking, mumming, or pantomime, so characteristic a part of the Christmas festivities in the Old World, is derived. Among our Teutonic ancestors, it was the Feast of Odin, and our name of Yule-tide, and the ceremonial of the Yule-log, are reminders of these older forms of Druid worship, to mark the turn of the year, or the "wheeling" of the sun in the heavens.
The canny fathers of the church endeavored, in so far as was possible, to make the high-days and holy-days of the Christian calendar coincide with the periods of traditional celebration among the people, thus making a painless transition. And in their successful carrying out of this policy, hosts of customs in no way connected with the Christian character of the celebration were transferred bodily.
Thus mince-pie, a characteristic Christmas dish, is the lineal descendant of the old Teutonic "blood-pudding'' or sausage, which differed from common sausage by being sweetened and having plums mixed with it. Not until a comparatively late date was it baked in a crust; and indeed plum-pudding and mince pie are first cousins, both springing from this famous dish. We may include here, too, the old plum-porridge, or pottage, with which the Christmas feast always opened, for it belongs with the other two in point of derivation.
In England, the main dish of the Christmas feast was the boar's head. It was prepared by pickling, then roasted, and served on a platter of gold or silver, its tusks gilded, a roast apple in its mouth, sprigs of rosemary and bay to deck it, and the inevitable mustard to season it. So important was its place in the feast that its entrance was preceded by heralds or trumpeters, and it was borne in, held aloft by the chief steward himself. None meaner in degree than a knight might carve it. The old Oxford carol, "Caput apri defero," was sung as it was borne around the board.
Another dish in high favor for this feast was the peacock. One can only account for the esteem in which this bird was held by the fact of its rarity and beauty, for even after all the elaborate preparation and the lavish use of good materials to make it palatable (one old recipe calls for the flesh of three wethers, tender and good, to make the gravy for a single bird), the meat was dry, stringy, and tasteless. The bird was first carefully skinned, then stuffed with minced flesh, savory herbs, and a dressing of yolks of eggs, then roasted and dressed with the before-mentioned gravy. The skin with the plumage was then sewn in place, the tail spread to display its full beauty, the beak gilded, and a bit of cotton soaked in brandy inserted therein. It was borne to the table with this ablaze, and only the ladies might bring it in, or carve it and serve it.
Sometimes it was baked in a pie, and then in serving, the head protruded from one end, the full-spread tail from the other. An oath taken upon this pie was peculiarly sacred, and knights swore upon it their devotion to the lady of their choice. Hence comes the old expression "by cock and pie."
Swans were sometimes given the place of honor when peacock could not be obtained, and brawn and sirloin of beef were other Christmas favorites. In France and Spain as well as in England, the oyster occupies a prominent place at the feast, and a gift of a barrel of oysters is a delicate attention from one friend to another. While we find frequent mention of, venison-pasties, this is not a distinctively Christmas dish in any country.
The Christmas cake is an institution in every land. It is of the richest composition the means of the household can afford; old tradition says it should be baked a month before it is to be eaten, and dipped in spiced ale or brandy every day for a fortnight. It usually contains fruits and nuts, and in the old days was sometimes so huge as to be baked in sections, as a single oven could not accommodate it. It was iced and built up with sugar devices, much as bride-cakes sometimes are.
Sometimes it was called Twelfth-cake, and then in the baking, a bean, a pea, and a clove were put in it. When it was cut, the person to whose portion the bean fell was king, she who had the pea was queen, and the clove designated the knave. These dignitaries were installed with revelry, and ruled till Twelfth Night, being absolute in all commands for their little reigns.
The wassail-bowl was another famous Christmas institution. The derivation of the word signifies a health, and in the older days, before wines were common and easily obtainable, it was composed of spiced ale, with roasted apples bobbing in it. In later days, mulled wine was its basis. It was passed round the board, hot and spicy, and each took a deep draft from the common cup. It is not until the sixteenth century that we find individual cups used for this drink, for the ceremony of partaking of it was in itself of a certain democratic significance.
Frumenty, a dish of wheat cakes seethed in milk, with pounded almonds, was a great standby, served sometimes with venison, sometimes as a dish by itself. Geese, capon, pheasant, and carp-tongue pie are all mentioned as Christmas dishes. Hares, venison, a fine piece of brawn, were all customary Christmas gifts from one householder to another. Originally such gifts were made on New Year's Day, and this is still the custom in some continental countries. New Year's day marked the height of the Roman Saturnalia, and this is but another relic from that time.
Certain games and folk-customs, which with us are associated with Hallowe'en, really belong to the Yule celebration. Among these are bobbing for apples, and jumping for the cake. This last was a rude sport, where a cake, daubed with treacle, was suspended by a string from a beam in the ceiling, and the contestants, with arms bound behind them, jumped and tried to bite the cake. Then there was the Christmas Eve blessing of the orchards, where the whole company, after partaking, offered the remnants of the cake to the largest apple tree, and sprinkled the ground with the wine, thus assuring abundance for the coming year.
On Christmas morning all the children of the community could go from house to house, asking for simnel cakes, and no one would refuse them. Their elders made similar calls, but instead of the simnel cakes, they were served with "egg-hot," a forerunner of our own "egg-nogg," made with cider, and with cakes of pounded almonds, our marzipan. Everywhere extravagance of provision, hearty eating and deeper drinking were the rule of the day.
With the Period of the Reformation, and especially with the rise of the Puritans in England, all observation of Christmas and of Twelfth-night as times of feast and revel was not only frowned on, but forbidden both by law and by church authority. But the love of the festival was too deeply implanted to be thus uprooted, and with the passing of Cromwell, we see the old spirit breaking out again in even wilder rejoicing.
Our own Puritan ancestors came to America while Christmas was in eclipse, and consequently New Englanders kept the day as a fast, till their Knickerbocker neighbors had corrupted them. Much of the character of the celebration in America to-day is borrowed from our German settlers, and dates back only to the middle of the last century.
For excellent descriptions of Christmas celebrations, see:
Scott—Marmion, 1808
Chambers—Book of Days, 1888
Hackwood—Good Cheer, 1911
Irving—Bracebridge Hall, 1818
Dickens—Pickwick Papers, 1837
Dickens—Christmas Carol, 1843.
Dickens—Cricket on the Hearth, 1844
Ashton, John—A Righte Merrie Christmasse, 1894
Hervey, T. K—Book of Christmas, 1888;
Sandys, Wm—Christmas Tide, 1852
Schauffler, R. H—Christmas, 1907
Anna, Barrows. Outline on the History of Cookery. Teacher's College, Columbia University, 1915.
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