Yule lights and yule decoration, good taste, bad taste, fun, irony and old pagan ornaments like straw bock, straw buck and many other old stuff. We celebrate
Joulu, Jul, Yule on 24.12. although pagan day is originally 21.12. when is
winter solstice. We have all the good thing from
Kekri celebration, this Kekri -called harvester feast in our new Yule.
Kekri is our
Samhain and Halloween. From Kekri feast into Yule feast: We eat well on 24.12. It is pagan way to cherish and celebrate upcoming new prostective year
Kekri fest in
wikipedia: "Kekri tradition began to disappear with industrialization and urbanization of Finland, and many customs and traditions associated with kekri have been transferred to Christmas and the modern New Year holiday. "
From Kekri to Christmas
page jyu.fi/tdk/museo/kekri_en/kekri2_en.html: " Kekri, or Köyry, was the deity of cattle, farming, and fertility. In vernacular language kekri also meant being the last in something, the end of something. Either the last shepherd to return home on All hallows eve or his cattle would be called köyri. Kekri, or köyri, was traditionally also the god of land. In Häme and Satakunta, people spoke of köyri’s crops or köyri’s rye. This was sown just before winter. Köyri’s crops were traditionally kept separate from other crops, and people used to sow some köyri grain among barley and turnips in hope of a good harvest, but that crop was never harvested. People believed that cattle prospered if they ate köyri’s crops. Köyri rye was the base of kylvöleipä or “sowing bread”. The harvester who made the last sheaf was called köyry. "
and more: "Christmas preparations usually started around All Saints’ Day, when the harvest year was over and food was plentiful. The actual Christmas started on 21st December, and ended around Epiphany. This period was the equivalent of the Medieval Nordic “Christmas peace”. "
I eat vegetarian food because I don´t appreciate animal cruelty. I just love ethical and ecological vegetarian food. Local, homemade, handmade. On that day evening we share gifts, packets. Before that we visit our family and relatives in graveyard and leaving candles there. We take joulu sauna, nice sauna. That is quiet and peaceful and we wash ourselves from all kinda dirt and stress and depression, too... In old days we left sauna for sauna tonttu ( sauna nisse, sauna gnome )
About
joulupukki - I juist love how Paul Giamatti pronounce the word Joulupukki in finnish tv interview - some years ago. Joulupukki in english
wikipedia: "The name "Joulupukki" literally means "Christmas goat" or "Yule Goat" in Finnish; the word pukki comes from the Teutonic root bock, which is a cognate of the English "buck", and means "billy-goat". An old Scandinavian custom, the figure eventually became more or less conflated with Santa Claus."
Jólnir in
wikipedia: "It was named for Jólnir, a Norse god (usually identified as a second name for Odin)."
Nuuttipukki is
Nuutti Goat, Nuutti Bock, Nuutti Buck in
christmasisawesomeandsoshouldyou.blogspot.fi blog: "Nuuttipukki is perhaps the very most original ancient Santa Claus, next to the Yule Goat. "
Joulupukki, Joulu + Buck, Yule Goat,
Yule Bock, Yule Buck
Yule Goat in
patheos.com/blogs/matauryn/2017/11/30/the-yule-goat/ blog: "The Yule Goat has an ancient history. While associated with Thor, the Yule Goat is the remnant of a Proto-Indo-European deity that predates the Norse pantheon. In Norway he is Julebukk, in Findland he is Joulupukki, and in Sweden he was known as Julsven and then later Julbock. Sometimes he’s depicted as a bearded figure, sometimes a goat, and other times a variation of a mix of the two. It is believed that the Yule Goat’s origins are that of the Bukka or Bucca, a horned deity spirit related to the Baltic ‘puk’, Irish concept of the ‘pooka’, and the English “Puck”. "
Tonttu in Finland is in other nordic countriues called
Nisse or
tonttu or
tomtenisse or
tomte ( or other european countires sligfhly familiar
gnome or garden gnome or
goblin or
brownie or
hob) in folklore in
wikipedia: "The nisse/tomte is an echo of ancient ancestral cult. He was sometimes seen as the farmer who cleared the forest to build the farm and who in pre-Christian times would have been buried on the farm in a mound. He was sometimes referred to as the haugkall or haugebonde, from the Old Norse haugr meaning mound. Other names are tuftekall, tomtegubbe, all names connecting the being to the origins of the farm (the building ground) or a burial mound. It was thought that the nisse was a more generalized spirits of previous generations at the homestead, and there are references to them following the family/clan, when they are moving."
When it comes 9.1. on january we take yule ornaments off. This year we had fake yule tree. It is new tradition.
How does Yule look like in Finland? Miltä joulu näyttää Suomessa. Kaamoksen keskellä on monenlaista jouluvaloa.
This is last orkidea like Örkidea, Örkkidea, that dropped her last flower. That looks like pareidolia goat face. Nature is fascinating in inventions and movements. And lure ;)
© Satu Ylavaara Photography 2017
