Boring History for Sleep Boring History For Sleep | The 12 Days of Tudor Christmas: Feasting, Flexing & Full Madness 🏰🔥
Dec 12, 2025
Discover the fascinating world of Tudor Christmas traditions, where twelve nights of feasting and merriment ruled the season. Explore the essential role of pigs in the celebrations and the unique ceremonial significance of the boar's head. Delve into festive games, the social chaos of the Lord of Misrule, and the enchanting Yule log rituals. Savor tales of exotic spices and the creation of shred pie, while uncovering the magic of wassailing and community bonding. Join a whimsical journey through a time of joyous revelry!
AI Snips
Chapters
Transcript
Episode notes
Christmas As Syncretic Solar Festival
- Christmas evolved from solstice and Saturnalia traditions that the Church absorbed rather than erased.
- By Tudor times the 12-day festival unified pagan, Roman and Christian elements into a potent social ritual.
Advent Made The Feast Meaningful
- Advent in Tudor England was a strict season of fasting, prayer and saving resources for the feast.
- That enforced scarcity made the subsequent Christmas feast psychologically and materially intense.
Boar's Head Ceremony In Practice
- Cooks processed the salted pig's head days before Christmas, simmering and garnishing it for a ceremonial entrance.
- The decorated head was processed, paraded with music, and presented for the host's first cut.