When they are both full grown,
Of all the trees that are in the wood,
The holly bears the crown.
Actually, holly requires both a male and a female plant to set berries--and only the female produces fruit. Whoever had the "foresight" to bring the Christmas holly into the home, however, would supposedly dominate (or assume the masculine role) during the following year.
As with mistletoe, the most extensive use for holly was in birdlime, a sticky substance for trapping birds made from the rotted and pounded bark. Holly leaves were also brewed as a tea substitute and to treat catarrh, pleurisy, smallpox, fevers, rheumatism, jaundice, and broken bones. Holly berries are poisonous, however, and may cause vomiting if consumed.
Ivy represented woman in the Christmas decorating scheme. It also stood for intoxicating beverages. Besides being the symbol of Bacchus, the Roman god of wine, it was often featured on English tavern signs to indicate the excellence of the liquors served within. The ancients believed that the porous ivy wood could filter wine from water.
Scandanavians chose to quaff their meads around roaring December fires while entertaining each other with tall tales. Those fires supposedly encouraged the weak sun. That orb was believed to be a wheel which actually stood still for a period during the winter. The wheel was called hweol, from which we get “yule”. The yule log might be considered a more recent version of those ancient fires.
The log was always hauled in on Christmas Eve and lit with a piece saved from the previous year’s log. Thomas Cooper wrote:
Soak toasted crabs in ale
And while they sip, their homely mirth
Is joyous as if the whole earth
For man was void of bale.
The crabs mentioned were crabapples. In England the yule log was usually an ash tree, since the baby Jesus was supposed to have been first washed and clothed before a hurried ash fire made by the shepherds. Ash is one of the few woods that will burn well and without smoking when green. Perhaps its relationship to the olive tree also gave it almost-Biblical status.
And what, you may ask, of the Christmas tree? It originated in Germany where it was decorated with paper roses, fruits with gilded leaves, wafers, and sweets. These days the tree employed is usually fir or pine, standing for “time” and “pity” respectively or hemlock which predicts, “You will be the death of me.”
