Georgian Christmas

What the Georgians Did at Christmas

As the Merrion Hotel’s beautiful Georgian dining and drawing rooms set the scene for Christmas 2021, we look back at how their original occupants would have celebrated the season.

Feasting, family gatherings, parties and presents. A Georgian Christmas doesn’t sound too dissimilar from our own, but a closer look shows some different traditions, plus a few surprises too. Back in the 1600s, Christmas was a gloomy affair. Oliver Cromwell, never a man for pursuing, or allowing for pleasure had banned the celebration all together. Carols were forbidden, and you could even be fined for cooking a goose.

Thank goodness for Charles II, who restored the holiday, but it was the Georgians who brought it back to its fuller glory. Families gathered, often including quite distant relatives, meaning food and entertainments were to the fore. Without television, they had to make their own fun. Reading Jane Austen’s novels, you can discover seasonal balls, masquerades and plays staged at home. With everyone in the one place for once, weddings were also often a Christmas feature.

Tis the Season for Gifting

The fun began on St Nicholas Day, December 6^th, when friends would exchange presents, and ran until Twelfth Night, January 6^th, when it was the family’s turn for gift giving. And despite the feast day of Santa Claus kicking things off, Santa himself didn’t feature in the Irish or English Christmas until the Victorian era. Queen Victoria also popularised the Christmas Tree, but its arrival in these islands was a Georgian innovation. Queen Charlotte, the wife of George III was from Hanover, and she brought the idea of the tree to England back in 1800. From then on a tree would be unveiled on Christmas Day at the Queen’s Lodge in Windsor, and the aristocracy were quite to emulate the new custom.

Most of us can’t wait that long to get our trees up, and while the Georgians were no slouches when it came to decking their halls, it was thought to be unlucky to bring the decorations in until Christmas Eve. Then, all manner of winter greenery including holly, mistletoe, ivy and rosemary would be used, sometimes tied with ribbons, or dotted with candles. Oranges, apples and spices quite literally spiced things up. The more religious weren’t so keen on mistletoe on account of its pagan associations, but few could resist creating a “kissing bough”, an arrangement of decorated greenery under which anyone was fair game for a peck.

Yuletide Feasting

Just as in the Merrion’s lovely Drawing Rooms, blazing fires were a major feature, and a huge log was chosen as the Yule Log. Traditionally lit from a piece of the previous year’s log, the longer it burned, the luckier your coming year would be. And just like today, all the decorations had to be down again by Twelfth Night, when they were burned, alongside a traditional Twelfth Night party, when an early version of our own Christmas Cake would feature. Known as the Twelfth Cake, it has echoes of Barmbrack, as it would include a dried pea and a dried bean. The finder of the Bean was King for the night, while the pea crowned the Queen. Everyone in the household got a slice, so sometimes the servants were toasted as Royalty for the evening.

Plum Pudding also reappeared in the Georgian period. Banned by Cromwell and his Puritans, who rather strangely considered it a “lewd custom”, King George I was served it as part of his first Christmas feast as the new monarch. This also, rather unfortunately gave rise to his nickname as The Pudding King, but if you’re going to be remembered for something, you could do worse!

A Twist on Tradition

Dinner itself, as was the Georgian custom, included a huge amount of foods, all served at the same time. There was turkey and goose, and gilded fruit, but the main event was roast beef or venison. Turkey and beef are a feature on The Garden Room’s December menu, as is plum pudding, and Executive Chef Ed Cooney and his team have also come up with a delicious Iced Mincemeat Parfait with poached oranges and crispy tuile wafers for a festive desert. But back in Georgian times, mincemeat was a savoury affair, made with actual meat, and mince pies were shaped like little cradles, which does sound deliciously adorable.

And the giving continued. The day after Christmas, St Stephen’s Day in Ireland, was when the English upperclasses gave the servants gifts of money and food. Known as the Christmas Box, this led to the name used across the water: Boxing Day. The Georgian Christmas was the last hurrah of such an extended season of parties and pleasure. Even though the Victorian period popularised many of today’s Christmas customs, it also shortened the season, as the Industrial Revolution changed the way of life – and people, quite simply, had to get back to work. So, while some complain that Christmas starts earlier and earlier each year, perhaps we have come to a happy medium. Work AND play, and a very very merry Christmas to you all.