December 21 - Anniversary of a Solstice Eclipse

 Posted on December 21, 2021

This is an update of my post published on December 21, 2010:

A fairly rare event—the total eclipse of the moon—and a once-a-year event—winter solstice—happened on the same day on this date in 2010.

On that day, I wrote: "Here in Southern California, we seem to be living at the bottom of a very big shower stall right now, because it's been raining HARD for days. (I know many people have to deal with this much rain on a regular basis, but we're used to drought and earthquakes, not flooding and inundation!) ...The point is, we couldn't see the eclipse because of the total cloud cover."

A total lunar eclipse is when the Earth gets between the Moon and the Sun, and the Moon falls totally within Earth's shadow. The Moon, which is full or nearly full, usually shines (reflecting the Sun's light) a bright white color, but during an eclipse, the moon seems to become gray, then orange, then deep red.

Here are some photos of a more recent lunar eclipse,
all put together into one photo so we can see the
changing color of the Moon.

The winter solstice is the shortest day of the year—and, of course, the longest night. Most cultures nowadays count the winter solstice as the day that winter begins.

NOTE: Most of the world's population lives in the northern hemisphere. However, millions of people live in the southern hemisphere, and today is their SUMMER solstice—the shortest night and the longest day of the year!

How do (and have) people celebrate(d) the winter solstice?

Germanic countries (including the Scandinavian countries), long before Christianity in Europe, held a winter festival called Yule or Yule-tide during the solstice. Customs such as burning a Yule log, decorating the house with evergreen branches and wreaths, lighting candles, eating a Yule feast, and Yule-tide singing (or Wassailing)—all of these solstice customs are now commonly associated with Christmas. Characters that haven't made it into widespread use in Christmas traditions include the Yule goat, pictured here:

 

Yule Lads, from Iceland's Yule celebrations, haven't caught on in the U.S. - except maybe they have, in the form of elves and gnomes?

A Druidic tradition (think of the people who built England's Stonehenge) calls the winter solstice “Alban Arthuan,” which means Light of Arthur, or “Alban Arthan,” which means Light of Winter. A poetic interpretation of the Light of Arthur is that the legendary figure of King Arthur (of “Knights of the Round Table” fame) still sleeps in a mountain, ready to return to his people if he is needed. The Druidic holiday colors are red, green, and white—again, colors that today are often associated with Christmas.

Ancient Rome celebrated Saturnalia for a week around the solstice. There were some nice aspects of the holiday—wars were interrupted by temporary truces, for example, and slaves were served by their masters—and there were some familiar customs such as exchanging gifts and lighting candles. However, apparently the holiday eventually started to become less fun, with too much wild behavior and even crime.

Other places in the world celebrate the solstice with bonfires, ritual baths and purification rites, feasting, and even special dances.

Special places for celebrating the solstice...

• Newgrange is a beautiful megalithic site in Ireland, with a huge circular stone structure estimated to be around 5,000 years old (older, even, than the Egyptian pyramids at Giza!). It was built so that a shaft of sunlight would illuminate a particular special spot on the dawn of winter solstice.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

(By the way, a megalith is a huge stone used to build a structure or monument.)

• The Sun Dagger of Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, was built about a thousand years ago. A modern-day artist noticed that, during the summer solstice, a slender beam of sunlight passing between two rock monoliths exactly bisected a spiral-shaped symbol. She came back to the spot on the winter solstice and, sure enough, a ray of sunlight bisected another, smaller spiral. Unfortunately, so many people have gone to see the sight of these daggers of sunlight, the trail eroded, the monoliths shifted, and the Sun Daggers no longer bisect the spirals!
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

• The Great Zimbabwe in sub-Saharan Africa may have helped medieval astronomers track celestial bodies; modern-day scholars note that the brightest stars in Orion line up with several monoliths during the winter solstice.

Also on this date:

Anniversary of the premiere of Snow White  

International Dalek Remembrance Day

Bah, Humbug Day

Look on the Bright Side Day

Anniversary of the first crossword puzzle

Birthday of actress / activist Jane Fonda

National Flashlight Day in the U.S.A.
(Celebrated on Winter Solstice)

Celebrating short on the shortest day of the year

Yule

Winter Solstice, aka Yalda

Make Music Winter Day 

(on solstice)

Plan ahead:

Check out my Pinterest pages on:

• December holidays 
• December birthdays
• Historical anniversaries in December
  
  

And here are my Pinterest boards for:

• January holidays 
• January birthdays 
• Historical anniversaries in January

December 21 – Yule

Posted on December 21, 2014

Yule, or Yuletide, is a pagan religious festival that celebrates midwinter. It was celebrated by Germanic peoples way back in the Fourth Century and before.

Yuletide was more of a season than a day, but the festival lasts 12 days. Since today is Winter Solstice (the shortest day of the year) in the Northern Hemisphere, the biggest celebrations happen today!

We're talking burning a Yule log, Yule singing, roasting and eating a Yule boar, making Yule goat ornaments out of straw—and more!

Who are the Germanic peoples?

I mentioned that Yule was a festival celebrated by Germanic peoples. This name comes from the time of the Roman Empire, when a group of people called the Celtic Gauls lived in what is now France. North and east and northeast of the Gauls lived people who were then considered less civilized and more physical (bigger, stronger, tougher): the Germanic tribes.

Nowadays, we typically think of Germanic peoples as those who speak German or languages that are related to German: Norwegians, Swedes, Danes, Icelanders, Germans, Austrians, German Swiss, English, Dutch, Afrikaners, Flemish, Frisians, and Scots.

What is this pagan religion you speak of?

First off, let's get one thing straight: there is no one pagan religion!

The Latin word that pagan came from meant, roughly, “country bumpkin.” It had nothing to do with religion—but instead it hinted that someone lived far from the city, that someone wasn't very educated, that someone was a bit backwards, at least as far as culture went.

The Spirit of Yule, aka
The Green Man, aka
The Holly King

However, when Romans used the word to refer to unlearned folks, some later readers misunderstood it to identify the religion practiced by those unlearned folks. There was so much misunderstanding and then misuse of the word, that the word pagan eventually evolved to have a religious meaning. It now refers to a broad group of indigenous (native) religious traditions and beliefs, most of them polytheistic (having multiple gods and goddess).

For many people, the word pagan has a bad connotation. These days, it doesn't make people think, “Oh, wow, what an unsophisticated yokel!” But most people think of pagan religions as not nearly as respectable as the largest religions in the world (Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism); some people even think of them as some sort of devil-worshipping cults (although they would be wrong!).

The particular pagan religion connected with Yule is the old Norse faith. Scholars say that the festival is associated with the Wild Hunt (a group of ghostlike hunters who presumably parade across the sky), the god Odin (who is the Norse Allfather, father of all the rest of the gods and goddesses), and the holiday Modraniht (Mother's Night, which celebrates women and fertility).

In the U.S., the Yule goat never caught on.
But in some places in the world, the goat
that used to be part of the pagan Yule is
now a part of Christmas. Witness this
decorative window (above) and ornament
(below).

Hey, wait, isn't Yuletide a Christmas thing?

When most of the people in a particular Germanic area converted to Christianity, they kept up their old Yule traditions, but tweaked them a bit here and there to fit into their new religion. To this day, many people talk about Yule, Yuletide, and Yule logs being associated with Christmas—and these things HAVE been associated with Christmas for hundreds of years! But they were originally part of the folk religions that existed in Northern Europe well before Christianity made inroads into the region.

For more Winter Solstice celebrations, including Yalda, check out this earlier post:

Winter Solstice, aka Yalda 

Also on this date:

Night 6 of Hanukkah 

International Dalek Remembrance Day  

Bah, Humbug Day 

Look on the Bright Side Day 

Anniversary of the first crossword puzzle

Plan ahead:

Check out my Pinterest pages on:

• December holidays 
• December birthdays
• Historical anniversaries in December
  

And here are my Pinterest boards for:

• January holidays 
• January birthdays 
• Historical anniversaries in January

December 21, 2010

Happy Solstice and Eclipse Day!

A fairly rare event—the total eclipse of the moon—and a once-a-year event—winter solstice—are happening on the same day!

The total eclipse of the moon happened VERY early this morning (or even last night, for West-Coast types like me). Did you see it?

Here in Southern California, we seem to be living at the bottom of a very big shower stall right now, because it's been raining HARD for days. (I know many people have to deal with this much rain on a regular basis, but we're used to drought and earthquakes, not flooding and inundation!) ...The point is, we couldn't see the eclipse because of the total cloud cover.

A total lunar eclipse is when the Earth gets between the Moon and the Sun, and the Moon falls totally within Earth's shadow. The Moon, which is full or nearly full, usually shines (reflecting the Sun's light) a bright white color, but during an eclipse, the moon seems to become gray, then orange, then deep red.

The winter solstice is the shortest day of the year—and, of course, the longest night. Most cultures nowadays count the winter solstice as the day that winter begins.

NOTE: Most of the world's population lives in the northern hemisphere. However, millions of people live in the southern hemisphere, and today is their SUMMER solstice—the shortest night and the longest day of the year!

How do (and have) people celebrate(d) the winter solstice?

Germanic countries (including the Scandinavian countries), long before Christianity in Europe, held a winter festival called Yule or Yule-tide during the solstice. Customs such as burning a Yule log, decorating the house with evergreen branches and wreaths, lighting candles, eating a Yule feast, and Yule-tide singing (or Wassailing)—all of these solstice customs are now commonly associated with Christmas. Characters that haven't made it into  widespread use in Christmas traditions include the Yule goat, pictured here. 

A Druidic tradition (think of the people who built England's Stonehenge) calls the winter solstice “Alban Arthuan,” which means Light of Arthur, or “Alban Arthan,” which means Light of Winter. A poetic interpretation of the Light of Arthur is that the legendary figure of King Arthur (of “Knights of the Round Table” fame) still sleeps in a mountain, ready to return to his people if he is needed. The Druidic holiday colors are red, green, and white—again, colors that today are often associated with Christmas.

Ancient Rome celebrated Saturnalia for a week around the solstice. There were some nice aspects of the holiday—wars were interrupted by temporary truces, for example, and slaves were served by their masters—and there were some familiar customs such as exchanging gifts and lighting candles. However, apparently the holiday eventually started to become less fun, with too much wild behavior and even crime.

Other places in the world celebrate the solstice with bonfires, ritual baths and purification rites, feasting, and even special dances.

Special places for celebrating the solstice...

• Newgrange is a beautiful megalithic site in Ireland, with a huge circular stone structure estimated to be around 5,000 years old (older, even, than the Egyptian pyramids at Giza!). It was built so that a shaft of sunlight would illuminate a particular special spot on the dawn of winter solstice.

(By the way, a megalith is a huge stone used to build a structure or monument.)

• The Sun Dagger of Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, was built about a thousand years ago. A modern-day artist noticed that, during the summer solstice, a slender beam of sunlight passing between two rock monoliths exactly bisected a spiral-shaped symbol. She came back to the spot on the winter solstice and, sure enough, a ray of sunlight bisected another, smaller spiral. Unfortunately, so many people have gone to see the sight of these daggers of sunlight, the trail eroded, the monoliths shifted, and the Sun Daggers no longer bisect the spirals!

• The Great Zimbabwe in sub-Saharan Africa may have helped medieval astronomers track celestial bodies; modern-day scholars note that the brightest stars in Orion line up with several monoliths during the winter solstice.