The traditions surrounding the Lucia celebration represent strong childhood memories for many. There was magic and excitement attached to it. White robes, candles, December darkness, singing and not least delicious eternally shaped “lussekatter” (buns). It is now the “Yule mood” is increasing. It is something special to see our hopeful children in procession, in song, gathered in a common tradition.
Most people know that Lucia was a saint of the Catholic Church. But beyond that, the knowledge is little.
Lucia postcard by Adèle Söderberg (1880-1915)
St. Lucia (originally the symbolic Frøya) is delivering the traditional "skuebrødet" (round bread).
The celebration falls in the month of Himinbjörg ("hidden / sky mountain" - home to the god / natural force Heimdal). The month was also called Mörsugr, Jólmánaðr (Yule month, “fat month”) in the Iron Age calendar. The god / natural force Heimdal represents transition, the counter of time, mercy, transitions in the seasons, transition from peace to war, from war to peace, from life to death and from death to life etc. He blows in his Gjallarhorn, the birch tree horn, which marks all transitions. This also marks Langnótt (the long night), which is above all a transitional rite.
We are approaching Christmas (Yule / solstice), and it is on this evening that Christmas begins. Most of the Christmas preparations were now complete. Following the Roman calendar, the night between December 12 and December 13 is "the longest of the year". This is not cosmologically correct, but after the forced Christianization of Scandinavia and the introduction of the Gregorian calendar, this pagan celebration was moved to December 13, following the alleged saint's day of death. Originally, the celebration was around December 21, or more specifically the night before the solstice. Looking at the content of this tradition, it is also far more logical that it was originally celebrated just before or in connection with the winter solstice. It is completely related to ancestral cult and the beginning of Christmas, and was originally the longest night of the year.
Our Norse tradition was almost identical to the one we have today. This is for the simple reason that this tradition is also pagan and Norse in origin and content. To understand the content of this celebration, we have to understand what elves are;
Elves are the spirits of our ancestors. They are light. They are our "intuition", your "vardøger" (foresight / “stomach feeling” / “sixth sense”). Figuratively, they were often made with wings, much like the much later copied Christian angels. The Dance of the Light Elves is a picture of the Northern Lights itself.
Our ancestors had a different and more logical view of body and soul than the later introduced monotheistic and Christian. By our ancestors man was divided into five main constituents, which in pairs give ten.
Lík (corpse: physical body, skuggi: shadow / silhouette), Vörðr (fylgja: follower, protector / guardian angel. Hamingja: accumulated honor and luck), Hamr (the astral body, shape, minni: memory), Hugr (mind, thought, desire. Sál: soul). Önd (spirit).
Your spirit (Odin) was thus considered as a sum of your experiences (and the experiences of your ancestors), accumulated in the kin's eternal cycle - accumulated in you, reincarnated. We recognize the constituents of man in the mythology represented as Odin's ring Draupnir. Of this ring, every nine nights, eight equally wonderful rings drip. Odin's number is nine, just as a pregnancy lasts for nine months. There are a total of ten different components of a human being, but only eight of them are associated with Odin (the metaphysical). Lík and Skuggi are associated with his mythological wife Frøya. Lík is associated with the physical aspect of the process - lovemaking. Skuggi is linked to her pig Gyllinburst, which is a personification of the sun. The sun / light creates the shadow. Frøya is the equivalent of Frigg, where the latter personifies the feminine and metaphysical sides - spiritually.
Älvalek, (Dance of the elves) by August Malmström, 1866.
Our dead ancestors are therefore also mythological light elves, and they come to us, and are with us in the Yule tide (in mind, they are no longer physical in the form of lík). A light elf is thus the spirits of our dead ancestors, waiting to be reborn in the kin, as a chosen one (as a Vali, as an Einherjer). Just like a dead ancestor lying in a burial chamber in a burial mound (Hel) in the form of lík. These, our ancestors called dwarfs, as they are underground, they are "incomplete", master many crafts and arts, and are rich in gold and goods. These dwarfs (ancestors), we called black elves (they lie in the earth), they were buried with all the knowledge they had accumulated, and also the valuable earthly goods they had accumulated - to be inherited by a named descendant on the winter solstice (Yule night).
A light elf is thus the free spirits of the ancestors. A black elf / dwarf is the physical aspect of the ancestors, their physical body (lík), and their physical assets. A light elf is the metaphysical. Thus, spirit and body were separated in the transaction between life and death in our ancestors' view of life. The conditions, states and realms of it are personified as, for example, Midgard, Hel, Valhall, Vanaheim, Alfheim etc. in our mythology.
When a human was born again, our ancestors considered their accumulated honor, luck (Hamingja) (vörðr) to continue from previous life, which had to be cultivated and accumulated further in this life. Their memory, their blood heritage had to be rediscovered and remembered through hugr. This accumulates in Önd (Odin).
To invoke the light, the spirits of our dead ancestors (the light elves), and the light itself - the sun (Balder), we dressed in bright robes. We carried candlelight. The maiden bride / queen [1] who represents and personifies Frøy / Frøya - the "king / queen of the elves" in our mythology, were chosen, and they led the white dressed and luminous procession, in honor of our ancestors - in honor of the sun and the kin's cyclical reincarnation.
The "Lucia" herself we recognize as the German Frau Holle - which is related to Frøya, Frigg and Hel. She personifies all these goddesses, with different names - in different states / realms. Frau Holle personifies the "midwife" physically and spiritually. Frau Holle performs in the Brother Grimm folk fairy tale, where the roots are on par with the Scandinavian folk fairy tales. Frau Holle, who is originally Frøya / Frigg is Odin's (spirit) wife. She is the feminine side of Odin - and you could say she symbolically plays the role of the spiritual midwife [1], in what our ancestors called "Mother's Night."
Grimms Frau Holle, originally a personification of Frigg / Frøya / Hel. She also personifies the goddess Idun equivalent to Frøya / Frigg), who is married to Brage. He is Odin's equivalence (another name for Odin's attributes). Idun is known for her symbolic apples she gives to the other gods so that they can stay eternally young. Idun's apples symbolize the reincarnation itself, and for the kin - the eternal cycle of the family and tribe - that you, as chosen and honored, are reborn by your descendants and remain eternally young.
The garland worn by the symbolic Frøya in our ancestral processions was either of mistletoe, representing the sun / Balder, or of yew representing our ancestors. Yew is most often used as decoration on graves, and is the "Christmas wreath" above all, with its red berries to this day [2].
A typical Christmas wreath. Few know about the extensive pagan symbolism in this one.
To this night, what was perhaps called "long night cakes" was baked. These are similar to today's "lussekatter". These are pastries that are shaped like the sun's eternal cycle, in an octagon - representing the sun wheel and eternal cycle. This is also known as swastika [3], or the northern star in what is known as “the big dipper”.
The Greeks Pytheas and Prokopios already tell from ancient times (over 300 years before our time zero) about the long night celebration in Scandinavia. In the fragments left after these ancient writings, we can read that bonfires were lit on mountain tops and high ridges. This was done as a sign that the rise of the sun had been seen, far away, and to alert the tribe that "the 40-day-old night was soon over." [4]
The women brought out torches and bright white dresses with red belts around their waists. Straw belts were also used. This symbolizes blood, rebirth and reincarnation.
The last night before the sun turned and everything in the whole of Mother Nature was born again, was another fantastic high festival of light. A feast for our ancestors, kin, the light, the sun and reincarnation at all levels. It was filled with beautiful processions, singing, joy, food and drink. That the processions consisted of children even in pagan times is natural. It was precisely the children who were to find their honor and luck, their ancestors and their memory. It was the children who were the future, and those the kin and lineage was to be reincarnated in.
In the middle Ages it was death penalty for marking this pagan feast in Scandinavia, and it was strictly forbidden. The church later plagiarized this pagan tradition after the forced Christianization, when it did not manage to destroy it. It probably returned in the Renaissance, but was moved to December 13, following the Gregorian calendar. The celebration was dedicated to the "handpicked" Catholic Saint Lucia. A woman who, according to the monotheistic writings, suffered martyrdom in the 300s, at least 600 years after the Greeks' accounts of the celebration in Scandinavia. According to the church's own history, Lucia used a candle wreath to find her way down into the dark catacombs of Rome, where she hid from the emperor. The original pagan content was hollowed out and replaced with the church's history of torture and suffering propaganda. Fortunately, our symbolism is completely intact and survived the liquidation attempt and later plagiarism.
We have had the “long night celebration” for many, many thousands of years. Long before the figures of Jesus and Lucia were “conceived” and invented. Primstaven is marked with a bonfire or candle. It is as pagan as it always has been.
[1] Midwife, as of English "midwife". - mid of "between" (the middle world), which in our mythology is personified as Midgard (the state between life and death). Frøya is a goddess with many attributes. The goddess Saga represents one of these attributes, namely the physical birth of a woman. Archaeologist M. Gimbuta's book, The Civilization of the Godess: The World of Old Europe, explains well for Frau Holle / Frøya / Frigg: "Frau Holle holds domination over death, the cold darkness of winter, caves, graves and tombs in the earth ... but also receives the fertilized egg, which transforms the tomb into a womb for the gestation of new life." Frøya is not only receiving the egg, but is the egg herself – and Frøy the seed.
[2] After sports and knowledge competitions, the May Queen and King were selected as the tribe's symbolic representatives of the gods / forces of nature - Frøy and Frøya for one year at a time. The couple, who wore the symbolic, luminous wreath of yew and the symbolic attributes at the front of the procession, was pre-selected by their own - as the best and most beautiful, after competition. Note: "beautiful" of Norse vakkr means healthy and whole. It is still common today to have a rating of who should be St. Lucia, and this is therefore connected. Unfortunately, this has become a politically correct question, like so much else. This part of the tradition, which cultivated pride for knowledge, ability, progress and strength, has also been de-constructed. Today, this has very good living conditions at the headline level in the "sensational tabloid press" and in an otherwise morbid "culture of infringement" with gender-neutral propaganda.
[3] Today the Christmas wreath may be made of plastic or other materials, but they all imitate the yew. Yew grows slowly, is evergreen with berries, and the tree can live for many generations. It is therefore linked to Frøy / Frøya and ancestral cult.
[4] The politically charged swastika, which for many provides only negative associations of World War II. The National Socialists are not the only ones who have used this symbol. Our ancestors have used it since the dawn of time. It represents the eternal cycle of the sun and nature, like Thor's hammer that always returns to his hand.
[5] "The 40-day night" symbolizes a 40-week pregnancy - where everything is born again at the winter solstice.