JACKSON, Wyo. — ‘Tis the season for Christmas trees, a tradition that dates back so far it predates the term “Christmas tree” itself.
The use of branches and greenery to celebrate Christmastime dates all the way back to the 15th century. According to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, a group of English Christmas carols from that time provides some of the first evidence that holly and ivy branches were part of a medieval ceremony related to the holiday.
Judith Flanders, author of Christmas: A Biography, notes that holly and ivy also decorated a parish pole, reminiscent of a winterized version of a Maypole, as a precursor to the Christmas tree. Trees decorated with thread, apples, nuts, straw and other items are documented as part of medieval “Paradise Plays.” These plays celebrated the feast day of Adam and Eve, a holiday aligning with Christmas Eve.
Time magazine acknowledges the myth of St. Boniface, which was popular in the 15th century, as a potential place where the idea of a Christmas tree originated. In the eighth century, St. Boniface was in Germany as a missionary working to convert pagans to Christianity. According to legend, St. Boniface witnessed a group of pagans worshiping under an oak tree (in some versions, a sacrifice is about to be made) and thwarted the activities by cutting down the oak tree. In the oak’s place, a fir tree allegedly grew spontaneously to represent the image and power of the Christian god.
The tradition of hanging trees upside-down also originates in the myth, when St. Boniface cuts the fir and hangs it from its roots to represent the Holy Trinity.
The town of Tallinn, Estonia, claims to be the first place in Europe to have a public Christmas tree in 1441, put up by a medieval guild known as the Brotherhood of Black Heads. The first decorated indoor tree wasn’t recorded until almost two centuries later, in 1605 in Strasbourg, which was German at the time. Flanders writes the tree was decorated with roses, apples and other sweets, and her research reveals that demand for Christmas trees became so high in this city that laws were passed to prevent people from cutting too many pine branches.
Strasbourg is also where the term “Christmas tree” might have first been recorded. A comprehensive history found in Professor Frank C. Senn’s Introduction to Christian Liturgy confirms that 16th century records report a Christmas tree was placed in the Cathedral of Strasbourg in 1539.
The History Channel suggests the Protestant reformer Martin Luther was the first to add lighted candles to the tree. Legend has it that Luther was awed by the stars he saw twinkling through the branches of evergreens.
Accounts from Flanders and The History Channel also suggest German communities in places like Pennsylvania and Texas were likely the places that Christmas trees began to become popularized in the States.
But early on in American history, the government of Massachusetts confirms holiday festivities and decorations like the Christmas tree were prohibited. In 1659, a Massachusetts Bay Colony law banned all Christmas celebrations except going to church, because of the pagan histories associated with the festivities brought over from other countries.
By the 1850s, though, the National Christmas Tree Association says Christmas trees were being sold commercially and collected from local forests in the U.S. This popularization aligns with the publication of a famous illustration of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert posing with a decorated Christmas tree and presents underneath.
“This single image cemented the Christmas tree in the popular consciousness,” Flanders writes in her book.
On Dec. 24, 1923, the White House Historical Society writes that the first National Christmas Tree lighting ceremony was held. In December 1931, a 20-foot high balsam fir became the first public Christmas tree displayed at Rockefeller Center.
The tradition remains in full-force today, with the Jackson Hole Town Square annual Christmas tree lighting and personal Christmas trees cut for individual homes. Cutting down a Christmas tree in local national forests can also help contribute to larger goals of the U.S. Forest Service’s land management; read more about that here and here.
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