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Why do we celebrate Boxing Day?

Boxing Day is a British tradition which follows Christmas Day. It began sometime in the 1800s when Christmas gifts were received by the in a ‘Christmas box’. The following day, wealthier classes would fill the box with gifts to give to the poor – often servants and staff from their home who would traditionally be given Boxing Day off as a holiday. Alternatively, the box would be donated to a local church to help poorer people.

The feast of St Stephen is now known as Boxing Day thanks to the tradition of tradesmen calling on anyone who had employed them in the previous year to collect a monetary gift placed in special Christmas boxes.

The great Boxing Day walk

See our pick of the best Boxing Day walks in the UK

Unusual Christmas customs and events

In Britain, there are hundreds of Christmas customs, and many of the traditions we know now have unusual beginnings.

Christmas Day and Boxing Day swim

For those who don’t find December cold enough for their liking, there is always the option of a bracing 100-yard swim in Hyde Park’s Serpentine Lake on Christmas morning (temperatures usually below 4ºC!). This tradition dates back to 1864, but in 1904 playwright J.M Barrie donated a prize cup, and the event has been known as the ‘Peter Pan Swim’ ever since. (Participation in the race is only open to members of the Serpentine Swimming Club, but there is no charge to spectate.)

Burning barrels

If you need to warm up after that icy swim, then head up to Allendale in Northumberland on New Years Eve to take part in the Tar Bar’l (Barrel) festival. The origins of the festival are unclear, but today locals and visitors alike (men only, unfortunately) parade through the streets in fancy dress, carrying barrels of flaming tar on their heads.

After processing round the village they return to the square at midnight and throw their barrels onto the waiting bonfire to ignite it, and welcome in the new year in style. (Northumberland Fire and Rescue are on standby, just in case.)

Welsh Christmas tradition: Mari Lwyd

Mari Lwyd is a Welsh tradition that had almost died out, but is now being revived by students at the University of Wales. The tradition consists of a model horse’s skull being carried from door-to door on a pole by a young man, accompanied by his friends; Sergeant, Merryman, Punch and Judy. At each house the team recites a series of ‘impromptu’ verses begging admittance, while the occupants refuse (also in verse). Once the visitors inevitably win the contest and gain admittance, the Mari chases the young ladies, Judy pretends to clean the house and Punch engages in all kinds of mischief until they are offered food and drink to pacify them. Once they have feasted they go to the next house and begin all over again.

Ringing the bells – Devil’s Knell

Since the 1400s, Dewsbury in West Yorkshire has rung to the sound of the parish church’s bells tolling once for every year since Christ was born, to remind Satan that Christmas symbolises the beginning of his end. In the last century the only times the knell hasn’t been tolled is on the rare occasions when the bells were being cast or during the Second World War, when all church bells were silenced.

Singing Old Tup

Old Tup is a folk song about a monumental ram. It’s been sung throughout the country, but in the Sheffield area the ditty developed into a Christmas tradition where boys created a hobby horse and paraded through the streets. Other Christmas hobby horses include the hooden horse of east Kent and the macabre Mari Lwyd, a horse’s skull bedecked with false eyes and decorated by ribbons that is carried around Llangynwyd, Glamorgan, to this day.

Celebrating the Twelfth Night or Epiphany Eve

The eve of Epiphany or Twelfth Night was the traditional end of the festive season, and even as recently as the Victorian period was a time for one last party. The only real hangover from Twelfth Night is the modern superstition that you need to get your Christmas decorations down by 6 January. However, for the villagers of Haxey in Lincolnshire the revels still continue in the form of the Haxey Hood. The men of the village battle it out with their neighbours from Westwoodside to get or sway the hood – a piece of ribbon bound with leather – to either a pub in Haxey or Westwoodside. The custom comes from a story that 700 years ago a group of labourers competed to return the hood of the wife of the local landowner after it had blown from her head and begins with the ritual of the foot being smoked.

Wassailing

One of the oldest festive traditions, the term wassail comes from the Anglo-Saxon waes haeil, meaning to be whole or healthy. Farm workers would visit the Apple Tree Man, the orchard’s most prolific cropper, and pour cider over its roots while singing a toast to the tree. While this custom – which has seen somewhat of a revival in recent years – took place on Twelfth Night, there was also another wassailing festive tradition, which did not involve trees. This custom saw carol singers take with them a wassail cup, which they expected to be filled with drink in return for the song Here we come a wassailing, Among the leaves so green.

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