Appalachian Christmas Traditions and Superstitions

18°f this morning, about -8°C, clear and frosty.

Wasn't the moon lovely last night? I grabbed a few shots out the truck window as we were returning from town. She looked pretty eerie then, with clouds scuttling by.

Blurry, but I like it. Those spooky dark trees!

Continuing the Christmas theme, some years ago I found a list of Appalachian Christmas superstions on a website called Roadside Theater. The website, or at least the link I had appears to be defunct, so I am glad I had saved this in a document. Most of these seem to have their roots in Celtics traditions. Here are a few from that list. 

Children born on January 6, which is Old Christmas, are said to have special powers for healing the sick. Link is to a post I wrote a while back, which has an interesting story poem included. 

I think we have all heard this one: animals kneel at midnight on Christmas Eve as they did by the manger when Christ was born. They also talk during this time. I remember my boys going to the goat barn once to see if this was true. I believe they came back disappointed.  This poem by Thomas Hardy is one of my favorites this time of year.

The Oxen

Christmas Eve, and twelve of the clock.

“Now they are all on their knees,”

An elder said as we sat in a flock

By the embers in hearthside ease.

We pictured the meek mild creatures where

They dwelt in their strawy pen,

Nor did it occur to one of us there

To doubt they were kneeling then.

So fair a fancy few would weave

In these years! Yet, I feel,

If someone said on Christmas Eve,

“Come; see the oxen kneel,

“In the lonely barton by yonder coomb

Our childhood used to know,”

I should go with him in the gloom,

Hoping it might be so.

Certain trees and plants bloom on Christmas Eve. (The legend is probably derived from the English legend of the Glastonbury Thorn. This link takes you to my post about our visit to Glastonbury and the famous tree).

If you sit under a pine tree on Christmas Day you can hear angels sing. But, beware! If you hear them, you’ll be on your way to heaven before next Christmas.

Christmas Day visits to neighbors’ houses require eating a piece of stack cake or mince pie to insure good luck. Visits from twelve neighbors ensure good luck for the whole year – and certainly bring a lot of people closer together.

What is stack cake? Check it out in this link. I have never made one, but maybe I should try it this year?

It is bad luck for a cat to meow on Christmas Day. If it does, evil spirits will visit every day during the coming year. God help us, Clyde meows loudly and often every day!

Coals and ashes from the Christmas fire should never be thrown out that day, and no coal of fire or light should be given away. (The Druids believed that each individual coal represented the spirit of a dearly departed kinsman and that they protected the home during the Yule season.)

A crowing cock on Christmas Eve scares away evil spirits. Shooting off guns and fireworks also works.

Angels are so busy celebrating the birth of Christ that one hour before Christmas the gates of heaven are left unattended. Anyone passing over at this hour has a good chance of sneaking into heaven without having to give account.

To hear the chirp of a cricket on the hearth is a good luck omen for the coming year.

Eating an apple as the clock strikes midnight brings good health.

Single girls who visit the hog pen at midnight on Christmas Eve can find out the kind of man they’ll marry. If an old hog grunts first, she will marry an old man. If a shoat grunts first, her husband will be young and handsome.

Bees hum from dusk until dawn on Old Christmas (January 6). Some say they sing the hundredth Psalm, come out of the hive at midnight, and swarm as they do in summer.

Storytelling was a big part of this dark time of year, and oddly ghost stories were quite the thing. Seems very odd, doesn't it? But this is linked to the idea that the veil between the spirit world and the living world was thinnest at this time. Indeed, people refrained from bringing in greenery until after the Solstice so as not to alert evil spirits to party plans! My mother always waited until Christmas Eve to decorate, as we used a lot of evergreens and vines in our house. The tree wasn't decorated until after midnight. She and Daddy kept some late hours getting it done.

And of course, mistletoe. Larry plans to get me some this weekend from a tree on our property. My bunch from last year is still hung up, supposedly protecting us from evil, fire, and other nastiness. I will burn it on Solstice night. Here's a link to another old post about mistletoe that includes a lot of lore and legend, and another post here that includes a ghost story.

Christmas Day weather forecasts the kind of weather we’ll have for the rest of the year: a warm Christmas foretells a cold Easter; a green Christmas, a white Easter; a windy Christmas means a good corn crop.

Christmas trees must never be removed before January 2; they must be down before Old Christmas on January 6 or bad luck will follow. 

Okay, enough already! Do you have anything to add to this list?

Copyright Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.