The Yule Log
“Come, bring with a noise,
My merry, merry boys,
The Christmas Log to the firing;
While my good Dame, she
Bids ye all be free;
And drink to your hearts desiring.
With the last year’s brand
Light the new block, and
For good success in his spending,
On your Psalteries play,
That sweet luck may
Come while the log is a-tinding.
Drink now the strong beer,
Cut the white loaf here,
While the meat is a-shredding,
For the rare mince pie
And the plums stand by
To fill the paste that’s a-kneading.”
Robert Herrick (1591-1674)
The Yule Log – A Holiday Tradition
By Ellen Evert Hopman
Humans have regarded fire as a source of comfort and protection for millions of years. We cooked our food, told our stories, and danced around the fire. Fire heated our homes, and bonfires kept predators away from the herds during the calving and lambing seasons. When we wished to offer up a prayer seeking comfort, help or support, we would light a candle, a small personal fire. Fire carried our wishes and needs to the heavens, where the powers we worshiped might yet hear our pleas.
The Yule Log is a long-lasting, continuous ritual fire that protects the home during the most frightening time of year. The tradition of burning a large piece of wood in the hearth during the Winter Solstice and Christmas season was first known in the Italian Alps, in the Balkans, Scandinavia, France, and Iberia. Britain adopted the custom later (except for Lowland Scotland, where Calvinist Protestants suppressed it).
French families went out together to seek the Buche de Noel (Christmas log), while in Norway, only the father of the house performed this duty. In England the log was selected at Candlemas (February 1-2) and set aside to dry for the next Yule celebration. In the USA, it was considered good luck to harvest the log from one’s own property, while in Serbia, it was cut in the dark, early on Christmas Eve morning, and transported by candlelight to the house that evening.
The log was carried or dragged into the house in high spirits, decorated with ribbons and leaves or flowers if such could be found. In some areas, bread was laid upon the log, or juniper was placed under it. Coins might be placed on top and then given away for luck. The smallest revelers hitched a ride as it was pulled across the snow, and once the log crossed the threshold, it was sprinkled with grain and spirits.
It is worth noting that bread and grain carry the luck of the harvest and the protective energy of the Sun. Coins are solar symbols, too, and alcoholic spirits are liquids of fire, bringing the promise and blessings of the hot Sun to the darkest and coldest days. Juniper is an herb of immortality (because it is an evergreen) and an herb of purification.
Once inside the home, the head of the family took a drink of wine, passed the cup to all family members, and then poured the remaining liquid onto the log three times. The family might carry the log three times around the kitchen (after all, the central hearth fire of the home) before laying it in the fireplace and kindling it with a piece of last year’s log.
In Germany, the log was placed in the hearth on Christmas Eve or day and only lightly burned. It was kept all year and when storms threatened, this now magical log was set alight as protection.
The ashes of a Yule Log might be mixed with the cow’s fodder as the cinders were believed to aid the cows in giving birth. When mixed with soil, the ashes helped the crops, and when dropped in the well, they were said to purify the water.
In the Scottish Highlands, a twisted stump or root was carried home on Christmas Eve and carved into the figure of an old woman, the Cailleach Nollaig (Christmas Hag or Goddess). The Cailleach was burned in the hearth to protect the home from misfortune. 1 Yule Logs, hearth fires, candles, bonfires, and flames of all kinds are still part of traditional Yuletide ceremonies. In Scandinavia, huge bonfires were once lit to entice the Sun to return and in honor of the God Thor as part of the Jól (Yule) festival. In modern urban areas, we still hang lights on our Christmas trees in imitation of the candle flames that once illuminated their boughs.
In England, oak is the traditional wood for a Yule Log; in France, it is cherry; and in Scotland, it is birch. In ancient times the Yule Log could be an entire tree – the trunk was dragged into the house, and the butt end pushed into the fireplace. As it gradually burned through the twelve days of Christmas, from Christmas Day through the evening of the 5th of January, known as Twelfth Night, it was repeatedly driven deeper into the hearth.
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About the Author
Ellen Evert Hopman is a master herbalist and homeopath who has been a Druidic initiate since 1984. A member of the Grey Council of Mages and Sages and a former professor at the Grey School of Wizardry, she has presented at schools and workshops across the United States and Europe. She is the author of several books, including Secret Medicines from Your Garden, The Sacred Herbs of Spring, and The Sacred Herbs of Samhain. She lives in Massachusetts. https://elleneverthopman.com
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