Book of Days

FIFTH DAY of CHRISTMAS:
Bring in the Boar

On this Fifth Day of Christmas, tradition for an old English Christmas would have us focus on feasting. In particular, we would “bring in the boar.” We tend to remind you here at the Convivio Book of Days blog each Fifth Day of Christmas about the Boar’s Head Carol… mainly because our Convivio Bookworks name comes from that same carol. It is an ancient carol that comes out of Queen’s College, Oxford. As the story goes, a young student of the university many centuries ago was out in the surrounding woods when he was charged by a wild boar. The student saved himself with the only weapon he had upon him: a dusty old volume of Aristotle, which he shoved down the throat of the charging beast and which did the beast in. He then brought the boar’s head back to the college and had it for dinner… with the fanfare of this carol:

The Boar’s head in hand bear I
Bedecked with bays and rosemary
And I pray you, my masters, be merry
Quot estis in convivio! [So many as are at the feast!]

The Boar’s head, as I understand,
Is the rarest dish in all the land
When thus bedecked with a gay garland
Let us servire cantico! [Serve with a song!]

Caput apri defero,
Reddens laudes Domino! [The Boar’s head I bring, giving praises to God!]

Our steward hath provided this
In honor of the King of bliss,
Which on this day to be served is.
In Reginensi atrio! [In the Queen’s Hall!]

Caput apri defero,
Reddens laudes Domino!

We have never served a boar’s head and don’t ever plan on doing so, but we have served other feasts during Christmases past. It is appropriate, I think, to sing the boar’s head song while serving up any great feast… you might just change the words a bit. (“The crown roast in hand bear I,” for instance, works really well.)

Aside from the Queen’s College story and our old Boar’s Head Carol, there are other associations between the boar and these darkest nights of midwinter. Pigs were especially sacred to the Celts, for they provided the winter’s meat and the belief was that pigs were a gift from the underworld. And in the Scandinavian countries, Frey, the sun god, rode across the sky on a boar with golden bristles that shone like rays of the sun.

There is, as well, a fun old carol that is sung by the Revels children’s chorus. It’s all about animals, but it begins with a pig. Seth and I were singing it just last night, in fact. I don’t even know why. Perhaps it is just the persistence of memory and the timely reminder that the focus for this next day of Christmas would be on the boar.

There was a pig went out to dig
Chris-i-mas Day, Chris-i-mas Day,
There was a pig went out to dig
On Chris-i-mas Day in the morning.

There was a cow, went out to plow,
Chris-i-mas Day, Chris-i-mas Day,
There was a cow went out to plow
On Chris-i-mas Day in the morning.

There was a sparrow, went out to harrow,
Chris-i-mas Day, Chris-i-mas Day,
There was a sparrow, went out to harrow
On Chris-i-mas Day in the morning.

And so on it goes with crows and sheep and drakes and minnows. But it is the pig this Fifth Day of Christmas that steals the show. Whatever your feast may be this day, I pray you, my masters, be merry, quot estis in convivio!

Image: Seth discovered this image of a wild boar depicted in one of the stained glass windows at Bethesda by the Sea Episcopal Church on Palm Beach. We don’t go there very often, but we do make it one of our stops on our annual Maundy Thursday pilgrimage to three churches. Each year we visit this boar, like an old bristly friend.

FOURTH DAY of CHRISTMAS:
The Feast of Fools

Chaos reigns today. It’s the Feast of Fools, a direct descendant of the Roman Saturnalia that many say inspires our Christmas traditions. For both the Saturnalia and this Fourth Day of Christmas, the normal order of things is ceremoniously reversed. And it is with a day like this that we see why our ancestors for the most part ceased all labor during the Christmas season. Who could possibly get any work done when chaos ensues? Why even bother?

In times more ancient, some lucky (and hopefully brave) soul would be elected Lord of Misrule for the Feast of Fools and would lord over the day’s revels. The election might come through the finding of a coin baked into a pudding. The Lord of Misrule was in charge of everything for the day, and much like a jester at court, could say and do what he or she wished without fear of repercussion, often revealing truths that the rest of the company would not dare speak. This, done under the guise of humor to make things more palatable… and hopefully to effect some positive change once the Feast of Fools was past. While the Feast of Fools and the Lord of Misrule are mostly things of the past, one can see the usefulness of these things. One might say that we could use a healthy dose of this right now.

All of this chaos is the result of the old year dying. It is falling apart at the seams. But the old year must die for the new year to be born. As the year goes, so have gone other things this time of year: the sun must die at the solstice to rise again, the son born at Christmas must die to rise again at Easter. The story is an ancient one, told over and over again, in many guises. The story never grows old, and it is the story even of our Convivio Book of Days: it is the wheel of the year, turning always, renewing always, and yet the story is the same. It is, to me, both comforting and perplexing.

Image: “Folly Governeth the World” by Alfred Henry Forrester. It is the frontispiece to The Marvellous Adventures and Rare Conceits of Master Tyll Owlglass by Kenneth R.H. Mackenzie, 1860. Some things never change.

THIRD DAY of CHRISTMAS:
Holy Innocents’ Day, Childremas

The focus this Third Day of Christmas is on children, so go on: dote on your kids. Equally important, though, I think, is to reconnect this day and every now and again with the children we once were. Are there favorite things you used to do then that you just don’t do anymore? What was your favorite book when you were a kid, or your favorite movie, or your favorite thing to eat? Today, Childremas, is a good day to go back and give those things another try. It is a day to reconnect and speak, as Garrison Keillor once said, our very first language. Christmas gives us this excuse, and Childremas does especially.

While the focus is on children, Childremas takes its name from the darker side of the Christmas story. When King Herod learned of the star over Bethlehem and the child that was born there, he became anxious about his throne. These are some of the most dangerous people: insecure people in positions of power who feel threatened. And so Herod ordered the slaughter of all the children of Judea. They are remembered as the Holy Innocents, and another name for this day is Holy Innocents’ Day. It is considered the unluckiest day of the year, and not a day to begin a new project or business. It’s probably better all around if we just take the day to play.

Image: “Children by the Christmas Tree” by Leopold Graf von Kalckreuth. Oil on canvas, c. early 20th century. [Public domain] via Wikimedia Commons.