FSogol's 2018 Advent Calendar Day 20: Wassailing-What's a little Xmas vandalism between friends?

[FSogol]

Recently, I wrote about sugar plums.

Another treat that lives on in song instead of practice is wassail from the Christmas Carol "Here We Come A-Wassailing." Wassailing simply means caroling. In the Victorian era, beggars and orphans would go door to door singing and hoping to get a bite to eat or a drink. The name comes from the Middle English phrase wæs hæil, which means "be healthy." Wassail is a drink made from ale or beer and spices, kind of like mulled wine. Other versions includes hard alcohol such as brandy or even rum. Most wassail recipes call for some kind of fruit, generally apples, which makes wassail remind me of a British version of sangria. Epicurious has a version made from sherry, brandy and plenty of spices. Chow's recipe includes cranberry juice, apple cider and an apple brandy.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/the-stories-behind-forgotten-holiday-treats-75781340/#lqSwEBtRzMTo0r89.99

The article isn't exactly correct about Wassailing meaning caroling. It was much more.

But first, there are two types of wassailing. It started as a celebration of the harvest in the Fall. People would sing and parade around trees to insure a good harvest by banning evil spirits. Here's an example

Roger Wilkins' grandfather began making cider on his Somerset farm 100 years ago. The farm's annual wassail event - a tradition said to banish evil spirits from the orchard - is becoming increasingly popular.

With video: https://www.bbc.com/news/av/uk-england-somerset-42844637/wassailing-drinking-to-a-good-harvest
and https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-north-west-wales-42589356
It would go like this:

A wassail King and his wassail Queen would lead a throng, banging on pots and pans, in procession, wandering from orchard to orchard and singing. At each stop, the Queen would be lifted into a tree, carrying the Clayen Cup filled with wassail. Once up there, she would leave some of the toast, as an offering to the good spirits of the tree, a way of showing the tree what amazing use its fruit has been put to.

Then there’s a brief chant, which goes something like “here’s to thee, old apple tree, That blooms well, bears well. Hats full, caps full, Three bushel bags full, An’ all under one tree. Hurrah! Hurrah!” and they’re off to another orchard.

http://www.bbcamerica.com/anglophenia/2011/12/frasers-phrases-a-wassailing-we-will-go

Christmas wassailing is slightly different and usually occurred on the 12th night of Christmas. this practice became prevalent in the medieval Days due to feudalism:

Wassailing is also the act of going from house to house and demanding hospitality – wassail, presumably – as a kind of grown-up version of Hallowe’en. The Lord of the manor would provide a certain amount of refreshments and people would carouse about the village, singing festive songs and generally mingling. There was even a wassail bowl, to put your wassail in.

From the song Here We Come a Wassailing, “we are not daily beggars that beg from door to door but we are friendly neighbours whom you have seen before.”

Of course, things could turn nasty, with small gangs arriving on your doorstep, demanding hot booze. But nowadays, through the healing veil of time, it’s all become confused with general carol singing. Wassail itself, if it is mentioned at all, has become any mulled alcohol with fruit in it. The toast is less common, unless used by cider-farming wassailers.

If the land-owner didn't offer up the goods,

he could expect his reputation to plummet and possibly his property vandalized. The old Yuletide holiday was celebrated in a fashion more similar to Halloween and trick-or-treat than to our modern Christmas. This drunken disorderliness is one of the reasons used to outlaw Christmas celebrations by the newly empowered puritans in the Commonwealth of England during the mid seventeenth century. Over the past few centuries, the roving gangs of wassailers have become tamed into the serene image of the Christmas caroler singing from door to door in the white winter weather, sipping on hot apple-cider. The hooligan shaking down the neighborhood for treats has been reserved for Halloween.

http://moodyview.com/come-wassailing-roots-christmas-tradition/

So the puritans, who took the fun out of everything, modified the pagan ritual of drunken wassailing and vandalism into the wholesome practice of caroling.

Wassailing lines in a few Christmas carols sometimes interchangeably use wassailing or caroling. Compare the songs "Here We Come a Wassailing" with "Here We Come a Caroling."

They also depict the demands from wassailing like in "We Wish you a Merry Christmas" were the singers demand figgy pudding and then state, "we won't go until we get some, we won't go until we get some, so bring some right here."

So if you decide to inflict your drunken self onto some richer neighbors this Christmas with demands for food and drink, relax, it's a normal Christmas tradition. Tell them FSogol said so!

(For an explanation of my advent project and a link to last years posts, see
https://www.democraticunderground.com/10181152160 )