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The history of Christmas trees goes
back to the symbolic use of ever-
greens in ancient Egypt and Rome
and continues with the German tra-
dition of candlelit Christmas trees
first brought to America in the 1800s.
Discover the history of the Christmas
tree, from the earliest winter solstice
celebrations to Queen Victoria’s dec-
orating habits and the annual lighting
of the Rockefeller Center tree in New
York City.
How Did Christmas Trees Start?
Long before the advent of Christi-
anity, plants and trees that remained
green all year had a special mean-
ing for people in the winter. Just as
people today decorate their homes
during the festive season with pine,
spruce, and fir trees, ancient peoples
hung evergreen boughs over their
doors and windows. In many coun-
tries it was believed that evergreens
would keep away witches, ghosts,
evil spirits, and illness.
Did you know? Christmas trees are
grown in all 50 states including Ha-
waii and Alaska.
In the Northern hemisphere, the
shortest day and longest night of the
year falls on December 21 or Decem-
ber 22 and is called the winter sol-
stice. Many ancient people believed
that the sun was a god and that winter
came every year because the sun god
had become sick and weak. They cel-
ebrated the solstice because it meant
that at last the sun god would begin
to get well. Evergreen boughs re-
minded them of all the green plants
that would grow again when the sun
god was strong and summer would
return.
The ancient Egyptians worshipped
a god called Ra, who had the head
of a hawk and wore the sun as a
blazing disk in his crown. At the
solstice, when Ra began to recover
from his illness, the Egyptians filled
their homes with green palm rushes,
which symbolized for them the tri-
umph of life over death.
Early Romans marked the solstice
with a feast called Saturnalia in hon-
or of Saturn, the god of agriculture.
The Romans knew that the solstice
meant that soon, farms and or-
chards would be green and fruit-
ful. To mark the occasion, they
decorated their homes and temples
with evergreen boughs.
In Northern Europe the mysterious
Druids, the priests of the ancient
Celts, also decorated their tem-
ples with evergreen boughs as a
symbol of everlasting life. The
fierce Vikings in Scandinavia
thought that evergreens were the
special plant of the sun god,
Balder.
Christmas Trees From Ger-
many
Germany is credited with start-
ing the Christmas tree tradition
as we now know it in the 16th
century when devout Christians
brought decorated trees into their
homes. Some built Christmas pyr-
amids of wood and decorated them
with evergreens and candles if wood
was scarce. It is a wide-
ly held belief that
Martin Luther, the
16th-century
Protestant
r e f o r m -
er, first
a d d e d
lighted
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SEXY GLAM
MAGAZINE - DECEMBER 2019