Christmas Custom of the Wassail and Wassailing
An English Holiday Tradition That Is Rarely Practiced Today
Nov 11, 2009
Here we come a-wassailing/Among the leaves so green,/Here we come a-wassailing,/So fair to be seen:/Love and joy come to you,/And to you your wassail too,/And God bless you and send you,/A happy New Year,/And God send you,/A happy New Year.
The last part of this well known old English carol is easy to understand. It simply wishes a Happy New Year to a person or group. The first part is more puzzling. What is “wassailing?” What is a “wassail?”
The word wassail derives from an Anglo-Saxon phrase, “waes hael,” which means “be hale or healthy.” Over the centuries, the term evolved from a greeting or blessing to a ritualized holiday tradition involving a particular drink. Geoffrey of Monmouth in his History of the Kings of Britain (1135) told of the origin of the term.
The Story of Rowena and Vortigren
According to Geoffrey, in the 5th century, a Saxon maiden coming before the King of the Brits, Vortigren, offered him a chalice of spiced wine along with the words “waes hael.” Smitten by her charm and beauty, the king took a drink and offered her one in return, saying “drinc hael” (drink healthy). After a whirlwind courtship, they married.
Over the next few centuries, the terms wassail and wassailing, used to mean a toast, appeared in the eighth-century poem Beowulf and in an account of the Battle of Hastings in 1066.
Wassail As a Drink
By the 12th century, the word wassail came to also mean a drink consisting of mulled ale, curdled cream, roasted apples, eggs, cloves, ginger, nutmeg and sugar. Sometimes cake or toasted bread was added (hence, the origin of giving a "toast”). Because of the frothy appearance that the roasted apples sometimes gave, the drink was also known as Lamb’s Wool because of its resemblance to that animal’s fleece.
This drink was often served among the wealthy in large silver or pewter wassail bowls, sometimes garnished with holly. For the less fortunate, less expensive mixtures were served in bowls made of white maple, this particular wood not interfering with the taste of the drink.
Wassailing and Orchards
In some areas of Medieval England, farmers encouraged their animals to be fertile by going to their barns with the wassail bowl and drinking to the animals’ health. Another form of wassailing was used to drive away evil spirits from fruit trees, particularly apple, and assure a bountiful harvest for the following season.
Residents would gather on Twelfth Night and select a “king and queen” in elaborate ceremonies. This pair would then lead the group to nearby fruit orchards where toast soaked in wassail would be placed by the “royalty” on branches. While this was being done, the others would bang pots and pans and, in later years, fire guns.
Sometimes songs, such as the following, would be sung:
Old apple tree, old apple tree;/We’ve come to wassail thee;/To bear and to bow apples enow;/Hats full, caps full, three bushel bags full;/Barn floors full and a little heap under the stairs.
Wassailing As a Christmas Social Custom
By 1600, the practice of wassailing included not only animals and fruit trees, but also human beings. Although the rituals would vary from area to area, the basics remained the same and were always performed during Christmastide, particularly on New Year’s Eve and Twelfth Night.
In rural areas, renters would serenade landowners with songs such as the one at the start of this article or perhaps this one:
We are not daily beggars/That beg from door to door/But we are friendly neighbors/Whom you have seen before.
In return for their blessings and song, the landowner would provide food, a wassail drink, and sometimes gifts or money.
In urban areas, groups of carolers would go from house to house, wassail bowl in hand. In return for a song and drink, the owner would give money or small gifts. In a similar version, the roles were reversed. For the price of a carol, the owner would offer each of the group a drink from his wassail. One example of an urban song is this stanza from the Gloucestershire Wassail:
Wassail! Wassail! All over the town,/Our toast is white and our ale it is brown:/Our bowl it is made of the white maple tree;/With the wassailing bowl, we’ll drink to thee.
Wassail Recipes
The true traditions of wassailing are no longer practiced, except in some rural areas of Great Britain. However, the custom of offering Holiday drinks has not. Although there are hundreds of wassail recipes, here is one that is close to the original and one that is non-alcohol.
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