by Taylor RippyThe History of Christmas Trees
There is a great video on the history of Christmas trees that you can find here. It’s where I got most of this information. If you want to do a deep dive, that is a great place to start. But for now, I’ll share a little bit of the history that was interesting to me.
Evergreens and Solstices
There are two main types of trees: Deciduous and Evergreen. Deciduous trees are trees where leaves fall off in the fall. Evergreen trees do not lose their leaves in the fall (forever green!). Christmas trees are evergreen trees.
There are 2 solstices every year: Summer and Winter. The shortest day and longest night of the year happen on the 21st or 22nd of December, which is called the winter solstice. It has been celebrated by tons of cultures, old and new. For almost all of human history, evergreen trees have been used to celebrate the winter solstice because the forever green aspect reminded them of warmer months and food. A few examples are the Egyptians, the Romans, the Druids of Europe, and the Vikings of Scandinavia.
The Ancient Traditions of Evergreens and The Winter Solstice
The Egyptians had many gods, one of which was called Ra, the sun god. They thought that he got weak and tired during the colder months and the winter solstice was when he would start to recover, which meant warm weather and good crops were just around the corner. To celebrate, they covered their homes with green palm rushes (a type of evergreen), as a symbol for life over death. The Vikings of Scandinavia believed evergreens were a special plant from their sun god, Baldr. The Romans had a feast during the winter solstice called ‘saturnalia’ in honor of their god of agriculture, Saturn. To mark the coming of green farms and lots of food, they decorated their temples and homes with evergreen bows. The European druids did the same as a symbol for everlasting life.
So when did our people in the west start using Christmas trees? We don’t know for sure. It’s widely held that Martin Luther, the father of protestant reform, was the first person to start the tradition of the Christmas Tree. Supposedly, he was amazed at the evergreen trees being lit up by the stars in the night sky. He was so enthralled that he cut down a tree, put it in his home, and hung small lit candles from its branches. He told his family that it was to be a symbol of the beautiful Christmas night sky. Some credit the western tradition of Christmas trees to 16th century Germany, when Christians started bringing decorated trees into their homes. Some of these people built Christmas pyramids of wood and covered them in evergreens and candles. Some credit it to middle age Christians who held a celebration called, “The Feast of Adam and Eve”. It was always held on December 24th. During this celebration, they put on a play that featured the “Paradise tree”, which people would decorate with apples. Some time later, the “Paradise Tree” was renamed the “Christ Balm” or “Christ Tree”, aka Christmas Tree.
As you can see, there is a ton of history that points to people using the Evergreen tree to celebrate the winter solstice. It’s a bit of a mystery when it became popular in the West, but what we do know is that now more than 30,000,000 Christmas Trees are sold within the US each year. It makes you think.