Author: Liam Hall

The most wonderful time of the year has become quite a secular holiday in the English-speaking world. The modern holiday is obviously Christian as the name of Christ begins its most common name. Christmas is an old name, but not as old as the holiday. And of the various names found in Great Britain for one of Christianity’s largest feasts, where do they come from?

Christmas has been celebrated on the 25 of December for a long time, at least as far back as 336 in Rome, showing up in The Chronography of 354 AD, which is also the first reference to Sol Invictus on the same date. The Latin name is used in this record for the holiday, natus Christus, the Birth of Christ, and variations on this are popular in Romance languages and others. For example, French has Noël, from Latin natalis, literally birth, with an implied dies Domini–of the Lord. 

English Nativity comes from Latin nativitas, which could be calqued into English as birth-dom. It is first attested in the 12th century. Latin held special prestige in Britain for centuries as the language of the church. So, it is unsurprising that many of the words denoting the feast come from Latin. For example, Welsh has Nadolig, from Latin natalicius (birthday-itious), and was likely borrowed so long ago that the language was a more uniform Proto-Brythonic, rather than strictly Welsh. Similarly, Scottish Gaelic has Nollaig, from Old Irish Notlaic, which comes from a Latin natalicia, essentially the same source as the Welsh. 

English is the odd language out in Britain, as the current most popular name, Christmas, is not related to a Latin word for birth or natal. 

Christmas is an obvious formation, the first element is Christ, from the Greek for “the anointed one” which has become quite popular in various languages. The second element, -mas, is akin to modern English mass, and denotes a festival or feast day (such as Childermas, Marymas, Michaelmas, Candlemas, etc.) This is -mæsse in Old English, so unsurprisingly, Christmas is Cristesmæsse during that stage of the language: the Feast of Christ. 

But the story doesn’t end there. Christmas is a rather late attestation in Old English; it is from the early 11th century, only a hundred years earlier than Nativitiy. The first usage is found in a sermon by Wulfstan, a man who was Bishop of London, Bishop of Worcester, and Archbishop of York in his lifetime. In his piece titled Be Cristendome (Concerning Christendom), he states:

“Leohtgescot gelæste man be wite to cristesmæssan and to candelmæssan and to eastron”

“A person should fulfill the light-fee for payment at Christmas and at Candlemas and at Easter,”

Being written down here, it likely was already in use for some years beforehand, but we have no earlier evidence. But English as a language has been attested from the 7th century, shortly after conversion, and Christmas is one of the largest feasts in Christianity; the laws of Alfred the Great record that people were to get all twelve days off work; so what did they call Christmas then?

The other word that shows up in traditions, and more particularly in certain northern dialects today, is Yule. We see it in the 9th century Martyrology:

“Feowertig daga ær Criste acennisse, þæt is ær geolum”

“Forty days before Christ’s birth, that is before Yule”

Yule is an older word than Christmas, so old that it probably even predates conversion. It comes from the Old English Geol. Bede mentions that New Year’s (with the winter solstice) was celebrated on December 25, and that December was called Before Yule and January was After-Yule (geola or giuli, note that g- in these instances makes the same sound as a modern consonant y-) in the Anglo-Saxon calendar. Seemingly, Yule denoted a season more so than a day. In modern English, Geol became reinforced by the Norse language Jól/Júl, a word exactly cognate with the English, which also had two months called ýlir (again, the exact form as English giuli, though Old Norse had a loss of the j- in this case). But for all the relation evident between the kindred tongues, it is not actually clear what Yule means etymologically. 

But that solves the question, right? An originally pagan holiday name was repurposed after conversion? While this is true, Yule, like today in the most popular dialects, was not a common name for the holiday. Someone who recognizes that modern German and English are related may expect something like Weihnachten (Holy Nights), but this is actually first mentioned in the 12th century, after English and German have had some notable cultural splits. And even then, the Weih- element is akin to Old English weoh-, which is rather rare there. Let’s turn back to the sources.

When William the Conqueror was crowned at Westminster in 1066, it was on December 25. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records the event as: 

“Ða on midwintres dæg hine halgode to kynge Ealdred arcebiscop on Westmynstre,”

“Then on Midwinter’s Day he was hallowed as king by Ealdred, Archbishop of Westminster.”

Midwinter is the name of Christmas that appears most commonly. Like Yule, it seemingly predates conversion and had something to do with the winter solstice. While the solstice today marks the beginning of winter, in the early medieval period, winter began in early November, and so Christmas was just about the middle point. This one bears some relation with Midsummer, the 24th of June, which was also the celebration of a solstice and the feast of John the Baptist. As that day denoted a day that wanes in length until Midwinter and a saint that heralded the coming of Christ, likewise does Midwinter, as the symbolic birth of Christ, heralds the increasing of light in the depths of winter. A physical light calculated by the medieval science of computus, but also the spiritual light of the birth of the Savior, come to heal mankind from its wounds.

A brief afterword feels appropriate, as the common abbreviation of Xmas for Christmas gets flak as a modern deletion of Christ. In reality, this tradition goes back to the 12th century, where Χp̃es mæssa is a nomen sacrum of Christ (which is often abbreviated in medieval sources) within the name of Christmas, which uses the first two Greek letters of Christ, the so-called chi-ro. The superscript above the letter that looks like a Latin P marks that the rest is being left out. The specific Xmas abbreviation is from the 18th century. From the E text of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, and entry for the year 1100:

“On þison geare se cyng Willelm heold his hired to xp̃es mæssa on Gleaweceastre.”

“In this year King William held his court at Christmas in Gloucester.”

Liam Q. D. Hall is a student of the arts, particularly literature—from long ago to current publications. He is currently studying Germanic philology for an MA in Language and Literature. He resides near the mountains around Yellowstone. You can follow his Youtube channel here.