Christmas
The Origin and History of the Christmas Tree
Traditionally, an evergreen fir tree has been used for celebrating winter festivities (Christian and pagan) for thousands of years. Pagan used its branches for decorating their houses during the holiday season as this made them think about the arrival of spring. Also, Romans used these trees for decorating their worship places at the Saturnalia festival. Christians use them as a symbol of everlasting life with God.
Nobody is sure when a Fir tree was used first as a Christmas tree. Probably, it started in Northern Europe around 1000 years ago. Most early trees seem to have been turned upside down from the roof using chains. They were hung from lighting hooks or chandeliers.
Other early trees for Christmas were hawthorn or cherry plants, which were planted into pots and brought indoors so that they would flower hopefully at Christmas. People who could not afford a live plant used to make wood pyramids and decorate the same with candles, apples, and paper to make it look like a real tree. Sometimes, they used to carry it around from one home to another than displaying in their houses.
It is quite possible that wooden pyramid trees were intended to look like Paradise Trees. These trees were used in German medieval Miracle or Mystery Plays. These plays were acted on Christmas Eve in front of churches. In the saints’ church calendars, Adam and Eve’s day was celebrated on 24th December. Here, the Paradise tree used to represent the Garden of Eden. So, these plays told the stories of the Bible to illiterate people.
The first recognized use of an evergreen tree at celebrations like Christmas or New Year is argued between the cities of Estonia’s Tallinn and Lativa’s Riga. Both of them claimed that they had the first tree, Riga in 1510 and Tallinn in 1441. Both of these trees were placed by the ‘Brotherhood of Blackheads’, an association of local unmarried ship owners, merchants, and foreigners in Latvia and Estonia (earlier known as Livonia).
Nothing is known about these trees but one thing that they were placed in the town square. The Brotherhood of Blackheads used to dance around them and then, set them on fire. This is quite similar to the Yule Log’s custom. The term used for ‘tree’ can even mean a pole or mast. Also, these trees may have been tree-shaped wooden candelabras or ‘Paradise trees’ than a live Christmas tree.
In Riga’s town square, there’s a plaque engraved with the first New Year’s tree in 1510 in Riga in eight different languages. In 1521, a photograph from Germany shows a tree that is paraded through the streets, where a man is riding a horse behind the tree. This man is dressed like a bishop, representing possibly St. Nicholas.
In 1584, Balthasar Russow, a historian, wrote about one tradition in Riga about a decorated fir tree in the town square. Here, young men used to go with a flock of women and maidens. They used to first sing and dance and then, set the fir tree aflame. Also, in Breman, Germany, there is a record of a smaller tree, which is decorated with nuts, pretzels, apples, paper flowers, and dates. This tree was displayed in guild-houses, which used to be a meeting point for businessmen.
The first man to bring a tree into his home, the way we used to do today, may have been the German preacher of the 16th century, Martin Luther. There is a story that says that a night before Christmas, he was strolling through a forest and saw the stars shining through the branches. He found it so beautiful that he went home and told his babies that the landscape reminded him of Jesus, who left heaven’s stars to go to earth during Christmas. Some say that this tree is the same one as the Riga tree. However, it is not as the Riga tree took place originally several decades earlier.
The tradition of having a Christmas tree could have traveled from Latvia to Germany, along the Baltic sea. In the 1400s-1500s, Latvia and Germany, these two countries used to be a part of two large neighboring empires.
There is another story about the origin of a Christmas tree. This tells that St. Boniface of a small village, Credit on in Devon, UK, left England and went to Germany for preaching to the pagan tribes and converting them to Christianity. He came across a pagan group who was about to sacrifice a boy when worshiping an oak tree. St. Boniface cut down that oak tree in anger to prevent the sacrifice. However, a young fir Christmas tree sprang up from that oak tree’s roots to his amazement. He considered this a sign of the Christian faith. Then, his followers decorated that tree with candles so that he could preach at night to the pagans.
Not just this, but there is another story that talks about the origin of a Christmas tree. Once on a colder Christmas Eve night, a family of a forester was in a cottage, while keeping themselves warm by gathering around the fire. Suddenly, somebody knocked at their door. On opening the door, the forester found a little poor boy standing at the door, alone and lost. The forester took him into the house. They fed, washed, and put the boy in the bed of their youngest son.
The next morning i.e., Christmas morning, they woke up by a choir of angels and the little boy had transformed into Jesus. The Christ Child broke a branch of the fir tree from their garden and gave it to the forester’s family for thanking them. Since then, there is a concept of bringing a tree into the house.
So, this is all about the origin and history of the Christmas tree. These are some stories that people believe to be true about a Christmas tree. However, nothing can be said with quite a surety about the origin of a Christmas tree!
