THE 1st DAY OF CHRISTMAS: BOXING DAY/THE FEAST OF STEPHEN

On the feast of St. Stephen, my true love gave to me/A partridge in a pear tree!

 Happy Christmas, all! But know that Christmas Eve is not the First Day of Christmas--nor is Christmas Day, itself.  "The First Day of Christmas" is Boxing Day/The Feast of Stephen, a holiday traditionally celebrated the 26th of December. 

Boxing Day has nothing to do with pugilism, rather it was a day when servants and tradespeople would receive gifts, known as a "Christmas box", from their bosses or employers.  That's according to one story.  According to the other, people collected money throughout the year in clay "boxes," like altruistic piggy banks, which they would break on Boxing Day to distribute the cash inside to the poor.  Either or both of these occurred in the various countries associated with the British Empire, plus Norway, Sweden, and South Africa. Today, Boxing Day is the bank (public) holiday that takes place on this day in Britain, but in the spirit of giving the whole world can certainly celebrate it by clearing out unwanted (but still usable) items and donating them to those who could use them, or by simply donating to charity.  

 

So far, so simple.  But the traditions associated with Saint Stephen are...rich, let's say.  On the one hand, the "Stephen" associated with St. Stephen's Day is most famously the first martyr (besides Jesus himself) killed for defending his Christian faith.  In this glorious bloodbath he preceded even the Apostles.  He had smoked the Pharisees and Saducees in a debate--which prompted them to stove his head in, an atrocity for which Stephen forgave them in advance (in another version, Stephen, the Jew, had simply had a vision of the risen Jesus seated at the right hand of the Father--which was already blasphemy enough).  So Stephen, and St. Stephen's Day, are associated with steadfast faith, with forgiveness, with telling the truth and with headaches (and these last two go together)--and with Israel.

However, this same Stephen is, by strength of legend, inextricably linked with horses.  And SWEDEN....Say what?


Let me explain:  he was, by legend, the first to spread the gospel in Sweden and did so making extensive journeys with five horses (two red, two white, and one dappled), rotating his ridership between them so as not to tire them out.  Presumably he'd arrived on horseback--from Israel--but, alas and halleluiah,  some forest thugs killed him, and his holy martyred body was strapped to the back of an "unbroken" colt (I love that detail!).  The colt carried him all the way back (without stopping) to the Holy Land--or just to his Swedish hometown of Norrala, Sweden, depending on the version....Huh?  Meet Stephen, the first Swedish Jew--I mean, Christian?  You know, the one from Jerusalem--I mean Norrala?  Let's just say that legends are not known for keeping their story straight.

So, dead or alive, from Sweden to Israel, St. Stephen was a man who could stick to his guns and stay on his horse! And so he is also the patron saint of Wild West rodeo.  Ahem.

You see, there was St. Stephen the very first martyr, who lived and got stoned--in the very worst possible way--in Jerusalem, Israel; and there was St. Stephen, the man who'd spread the gospel of Christ and humane horse treatment--in Sweden.  These two were almost certainly not the same fella.  History and legend have bled these two men together (much like they did with Santa Claus, a pole climbing Lapland shaman figure; and St. Nicholas, a Turkish bishop).

 

 

They conflated this man, Stephen Martyr:

 

 

 

...with this one, Stephen the evangelist & horse lord:

 

Furthering the horsiness of the latter, a 10th-century poem told the story of Stephen's
"seeing the light" when the risen Jesus miraculously healed his horse, and thus made him St. Stephen, patron saint of horses and the first born-again Christian.

It may be that all this horsing around with history had to do with the Germanic folks' habit of sacrificing equines at Yuletide time, and/or (and this is nicer) the giving to draft animals a time of rest starting around the Solstice.  ("Ja, fee vill eizer kill you, or giff you a niiiiice rest, Gustave, mein Pferd!")  Later on, horses came to be blessed at the church (sometimes the riders even entered and circled its perimeter a few times) on the Feast of Stephen, or simply ridden around to the tune of folk songs and the promise of beer when a village was reached.  Alternatively/additionally, the people rode them in races.

 

At home, we will festoon our "altar" (wash-stand table) with toy horses in honor of St. Stephen, the horseman.  But we have yet to become martyrs, ineffective rebels that we are.  No matter--we can still celebrate Stephen's sacrifice and the blessings thereof by tossing oats or walnuts at each other (this is a Polish custom), as symbolic of both the stoning and blessings.

This begs the question of whether the Polish would see throwing grain at a wedding as an act of aggression. 

By the way, praying for someone you resent is a very effective way to remove the resentment, although studies show that if your cranium has been caved in by a rock, it will then become difficult to pray at all.  If you can manage to avoid that fate, though, just pray, as ardently as you can, that the person you are now hating receive everything that you would dearly love to receive.  Turn self-centeredness on its head in this fashion daily for two whole weeks, and watch your ego squirm while the resentment itself relaxes.  Ahhh!

 
Skipping across Europe, and the English Channel, we come to the wren boys of Ireland.  There, legend has it that Stephen was hiding out from the stoners--and by that I don't mean the boys in black smoking weed on the heating grate behind the school.  Stephen was about to get his head smashed in, if they could but find him.  Well, his hiding place was given away by a wren, which perched above him and sang, undoubtedly using that extra-loud wren trill that sounds way too loud to be coming out of that tiny bird body.  And the rest of St. Stephen, as they say, was history.  Thus, in the Emerald Isle, "...In retribution for this the Wren is traditionally hunted in Ireland  (and some other Celtic countries) on St Stephen’s Day – December 26th, and groups of Wrenboys carry the bird from door to door – slung from a pole or interred in a small wooden coffin: there was a time when the poor Wren himself would have been stoned to death." (https://roaringwaterjournal.com/tag/st-stephens-day/).  From Wiki: "Wren Day (Irish: Lá an Dreoilín) is celebrated...in a number of countries across Europe. The tradition consists of "hunting" a fake wren and putting it on top of a decorated pole. Then the crowds of mummers, or strawboys, celebrate the wren (also pronounced wran) by dressing up in masks, straw suits, and colourful motley clothing. They form music bands and parade through towns and villages. These crowds are sometimes called wrenboys."

 

Further traditions involve folk plays acted by all-male casts of rhymers, or local amateur actors.  Roaringwater Journal comments: "When I was a boy we went out every Boxing Day morning to Crookham in Hampshire to watch King George slaying Bold Slasher, who was miraculously brought back to life by the quack Doctor, after which the young fertility figure Trim Tram Jolly Jack ‘…wife and family on my back…’ killed Old Father Christmas – something which must have seemed odd to a child, who might not have understood the symbolism of the  old, dark winter giving way to the new life of spring. Danny tells me that when he was growing up in Limerick he saw the Strawboys or Rhymers performing the same play on the streets."

 

Roaringwater continues:  "Troglodytidae (cave dweller--the taxonomic name of the wren family) is such a small bird: here at Nead an Iolair we occasionally catch sight of him darting out from thick, seemingly impenetrable bushes close to the bird feeder – his movements seem more like a mouse. Small, yet in mythology he’s a giant – King of the Birds in several traditions: Koning Vogel in German, Konije in Dutch, Reytelet in French, Bren in Welsh – all mean King or Little King. When the birds were electing their king they decided that whoever could fly the highest would win the contest; the Eagle easily outflew everyone else but the Wren was hiding in his wings until the Eagle had exhausted himself and then flew on up to claim the title. But there’s more: the Wren is forever associated with that turning point of the year when everything goes topsy turvy: the Twelve Days of Christmas. At this time the Lord of Misrule presides and traditional roles are reversed; it’s not surprising, then, that the tiniest of the birds should become the most important. But, like all kings, his reign is finite – and he is sacrificed at the dark year’s end to ensure that the sun will rise again."

This is wonderful:  the smallest humbles the greatest by way of a trick, and is then sacrificed, whereupon death becomes new life--humility and joy all around.   And that, perhaps, sums up this St. Stephen's Day ramble about horses and wrens, boxes and stones, walnuts and oats, wrenboys and rhymers.

Enjoy your Boxing Day, my friends.  But stick to your guns, no matter what sticks and stones may come your way.  If you're lucky, King Wren will choose YOU to rat out, and you will join the dance of life and death, humility and greatness.

To sum up Boxing Day celebration, we can:
1. Give to those who need it; give away unused but usable stuff
2. Pray for someone you hate
3. Celebrate all things horse--for example, put a toy horse or two in your nativity scene
4. Put suet and mealworms out for the wrens
5. Sing "Good King Wenceslaus" together after eating a nice minced meat pie (or the reasonable equivalent)
6. Sweetly throw oats, or savagely throw walnuts at each other (from my boyhood I can tell you that a walnut, whipped at your victim, causes quite a sting, or knock to the head, with minimal actual damage)

8. No songs of traveling while dead on a young horse, but there are plenty of horse songs, and a couple about Boxing Day, and a bunch about martyrs and saints.  So we can listen to and/or sing and/or dance the following selections:

MUSICAL CHOICES (playlist on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKVU8BoKLMQ&list=PLdartdqjh56AqAo2O8Qymeigl4rY8TJdE :

THE FEAST OF STEPHEN: "Good King Wenceslaus"  (I really enjoy Loreena McKennitt's version); "Boxing Day" by blink-182;  "St. Stephen's Day Murders" by Elvis Costello (there is a version with The Chieftains!); "St. Stephen's Day" by The Tossers;

MARTYRDOM/SAINTHOOD: "Even Unto Death" by Audrey Assad, "I Would Die For You" by Prince, "When the Saints Go Marchin' In" by Louis Armstrong, "The Martyr Song" by Susie Yaraei, "The Only Difference Between Martyrdom and Suicide Is Press Coverage" by Panic! at the Disco, "A Martyr For My Love For You" by The White Stripes, "Martyr" by Rusted Root, "The Martyr" by Cursive, "Sympathy For the Martyr" by Straylight Run, "Martyr" by Estrella, "The Martyr" by John Paul White, and "Accidentally Like a Martyr" by Warren Zevon, "It's So Hard to Be a Saint in the City" by Bruce Springstein/David Bowie,

HORSES: "Horse With No Name" by America; "Old Paint" (American folk song); "Wildfire" by Michael Martin Murphy; "Bring On The Dancing Horses" by Echo & The Bunnymen (featuring--a cow); "Horses" by Patti Smith; "Dead Horse" by Guns 'n' Roses; "One Horse Town" by The Thrills;  "High Horse" by Jim Jones Revue; "Who's Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses?" by U2; "Back in the Saddle Again" by Aerosmith; "Wild Horses" by The Stones; "Run For the Roses" by Dan Fogelberg, RIP; "Black Horse and the Cherry Tree" by KT Tunstall; "Chestnut Mare" by The Byrds; "Heavy horses" by Jethro Tull; "Tennessee stud" by Johnny Cash; "Three Horses" by Joan Baez; "All the Pretty Little Horses" by Odetta; "All the Pretty Little Ponies" by Kenny Loggins.

WRENS: The Wren, The Wren - Lisa O'Neill (wonderful Irish fiddling here)