yule

‘Yule’ is a word that gets thrown around a lot at this time of year, mainly in terrible puns like ‘yule love our Christmas discounts!’. But how many of us know what it actually is?

Like a lot of stuff to do with Christianity, yule has its roots in paganism. It’s still with us thanks to a process called ‘Christianised reformulation’ (a fancy name for the way Christianity nicked certain traditions and symbols from pre- or non-Christian cultures as a way to ease conversion). In this case, yule comes from the word jól, a shortened version of Jólablot, the name of a Norse midwinter feast. This took place in the 12 days leading up to 25 December, and celebrated the change of the seasons. We added the word jól to Old English as ġéol, which morphed into ‘yule’ some time in the middle of the 1400s. It also made its way into Old French as ‘jolif’, which is where we get ‘jolly’ from.

You might well have heard of the yule log, which I totally thought was only a cake, but is in fact, an actual log (there is a cake version too – called a Bûche de Noël – but the woody version came first). Lighting the yule log was another pagan tradition, and a symbol of the sun’s return after the winter solstice. People believed that doing this would protect their homes from fire and lightning during the coming year. In some cultures, families kept the remaining burned log underneath the homeowner’s bed (which seems like a great way to start a fire in your home, but whatever). Once lit, the yule log had to burn for 12 days to get the luck. You also had to find your Yule log yourself – buying one from the log shop was considered bad luck.

Yule is also connected to the myth of the wild hunt, a spectral hunting party said to pass through forests at the coldest, stormiest time of the year (AKA Christmas time). Anyone unfortunate enough to be outdoors when the hunt passed by would be swept up into the hunting party then dropped miles from where they started. While the members of the wild hunt vary, it’s almost always led by Odin, the head of the Norse gods (Anthony Hopkins in the Thor films). He’s also known as Jólnir or Jauloherra, which translates as ‘Master of Yule’.

Here’s one last yule-based myth, which I think is my favourite. The Yule Lads are a group of mischievous beings from Icelandic folklore, similar to elves or dwarves, who visit children on the 13 nights leading up to Christmas. They’re the sons of Gryla, an ogress, and her husband Leppalúði. Gryla is said to kidnap and eat children who misbehave, so you don’t want to mess with her.

Each Yule Lad has his own weird personality and behaviour (some might say fetish). Here are a few of the best – or worst, depending on how you feel about sheep harassment and crockery/cutlery licking:

• Stekkjastaur: harasses sheep but is hampered by stiff legs, dammit

• Þvörusleikir: his name literally means ‘spoon licker’ and he steals wooden spoons to lick – there’s also Askasleikir which translates as ‘bowl licker’. You can probably guess what he does

• Hurdaskellir: slams doors in the night

• Bjúgnakrækir: steals sausages

• Gáttaþefur: means ‘door sniffer’.

Icelandic children leave their shoes on windowsills during the 13 nights of Christmas for the Yule Lads to give them small gifts or treats – but only if they’re well behaved. Get on the Yule Lads’ naughty list and you might end up with a potato in that shoe. Although we are in a cost-of-living crisis, so a few potatoes might come in handy just before Crimbo…

monster

You know what a monster is – a large, frightening, usually imaginary (although there are plenty of real-life monsters, sadly) creature that’s generally trying to hurt or kill someone or something. But have you ever wondered where the word ‘monster’ came from?

‘Monster’ is a pretty old word, first appearing in the English language somewhere between 1000 and 1200 AD, when Willy the Conk invaded England and brought the French language with him (from which we borrowed lots of words, especially legal ones). The particular French word we’re interested in here is ‘monstre’. It comes from the Latin word ‘monstrum’, the past participle of ‘monere’, meaning ‘to warn’. So how did that turn into the gruesome noun we know today? Well, in ancient Rome ‘monstrum’ was used to describe anything strange or grotesque that could be seen as a warning from the gods or a bad omen – like a two-headed calf, for example. Over time the term evolved to cover anything a bit scary and/or weird.

One of the most famous monsters in my neck of the woods is probably Black Shuck, a ghostly black dog said to silently prowl the dark country lanes and coastal footpaths of East Anglia (and one of several black dog myths found all over the UK). Black Shuck is sometimes seen as an omen of death, but is also described as being quite friendly. Its size varies from that of a large dog to a horse. Black Shuck was first described in print by one Reverend ES Taylor in an 1850 edition of a journal called ‘Notes and Queries’ as ‘Shuck the Dog-fiend’. He said:

‘This phantom I have heard many persons in East Norfolk, and even Cambridgeshire, describe as having seen as a black shaggy dog, with fiery eyes and of immense size, and who visits churchyards at midnight.’

According to the OED, the name Shuck comes from the Old English word ‘scucca’, meaning 'devil’ or ‘fiend’.

One of the most famous reports of Black Shuck is of its appearance at the churches of Bungay and Blythburgh in Suffolk. On 4 August 1577, Black Shuck is said to have burst through the doors of the Blythburgh Holy Trinity Church accompanied by a clap of thunder. It ran up the nave, killed a man and boy in the congregation and somehow caused the church steeple to collapse through the roof. It left via the north door leaving scorch marks, which you can still see to this day. It also later appeared in St Mary’s Church in Bungay on the same day, which was recorded in ‘A Straunge and Terrible Wunder’ by Abraham Fleming:

Suffolk’s finest rockers The Darkness wrote a pretty awesome song about Black Shuck (which also mentions Blythburgh) on their 2003 album ‘Permission to Land’, which you can listen to below.

rebarbative

‘Rebarbative’ is an adjective (AKA a describing word) you can use for someone (or something) that’s repellent, irritating or unattractive. And as they probably won’t know what it means, they won’t realise you’re insulting them. Winner winner chicken dinner.

‘rebarbative’ is a word of two halves, It comes from the Latin word ‘rebarbare’, which is made up of ‘re-’ meaning ‘against’, and ‘barba’ which means ‘beard’ or ‘hair’. Why is it hairy? Well, rebarbative was originally used to refer to something that was so horrible it caused your hair to stand on end. Like spiders. Or Donald Trump.

The record for the world’s longest beard is currently held by one Hans Langseth, even though Hans is no longer with us. He was a Norwegian-American who lived in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and his beard was a whopping 17.5 feet (approximately 5.33 meters) long. I realised when I googled Hans that I’d already written about him for former word of the week pognophile, so head to that post if you’d like to know more about him.

Growing your beard super long can be a hazardous business. In 1567, another man called Hans died when he tripped over his own beard. Hans Steininger, or Staininger depending on which page of the internet you look at, was the burgomaster (i.e. head honcho, or mayor) of Branau, a town then in Bavaria but now in Austria. He usually kept his beard, which was 4.5 feet (1.4 metres) long at the time, rolled up and tied with a leather strap to keep it out of the way. But on that fateful day in 1567, he was responding to an emergency (possibly a fire) and forgot to roll it up and out of the way. When rushing down some stairs he fell over it and broke his neck. Poor old Hans.