11th Day of Yuletide: Saturnalia

The Christmas season is full of many traditions that have their roots in the rivulets and estuaries of folklore. From flying reindeer to fruit cakes, there is a rich tapestry of customs woven between the old gods and the new. Christmas is simply the newest name for a time period that required merriment. Why? Because we all need to lift our spirits in the heart of winter. Do you think we’re the first generation to experience Seasonal Affective Disorder? Definitely not. When your life literally depends on the sun coming back to warm the land and make crops grow, seasons become awfully important. This time of year was about prophecy, divination, offerings, celebration, song, storytelling, nourishment and giving. And though we may not like to remember it, in our tidy, holy days, this time of year has also always been about getting it on. If you need any clues just look at the trailing star leading from mistletoe to the New Year’s Eve kiss. From whence does such amorous behaviour stem? Well, from every culture dealing with long nights, spicy brews and close quarters. But also, from the Greek and Roman winter celebrations such as Saturnalia and the winter feasts of Poseidon and Dionysus. These were feasts that carried on for days if not the whole damn month and required an “anything goes attitude”. Let’s all remember, that before the shitty Patriarchal oppression of women by the Church, folk had a much more realistic attitude toward sex. As in, it happened, often. Both men AND women enjoyed it. Women created life from it. It was pleasurable for women (and men). And sometimes, in the dark of winter, it could really just lift the spirits and bring about a little more of that sacred fertility every culture since forever has been celebrating.

Saturnalia, the most well known of these festivals, was a time for merriment, drunkenness, and the breaking of social rules. Servants were served by masters. Clothing was swapped, nakedness abounded, and much banter was to be had. There were even honey cakes shaped like male and female sexual organs paraded around and, erm *coughs*…consumed. 

It was your everyday bacchanalia. The gods of love and wine ruled. This was one of the first origins of Christmas. That’s right. Folks celebrated the return of the light (read: the return of fertility and life) by exchanging gifts, songs, kisses and oh so much more. Speaking of Bacchus, did you know that Dionysus was also a sun god reborn and that his festival was on the winter solstice? Brumalia, was the Greek winter holiday associated with Dionysus and wine. It wasn’t only his, in early days this winter festival of rebirth and the “Waxing of the light” was also associated with the parthenogenetic (virgin birth) Goddess Demeter and her underworld daughter Persephone. Life meets death meets life again. Shall we go back even further? There we find the ancient death and resurrection of the Sumerian goddess of the light, Inanna. What sits between the powerful force of death and the ever-renewing spring of life? Sex, of course. And so when all gets upended on its head and the gifts have been given…when the songs have been sung and the wine all drunk, people kiss beneath the mistletoe and at the strike of twelve because: life. Life. Life. Life. In the face of dark winter’s death, we insist on life.