Wassailing 2025
Sadly, the Wassail has been postponed
due to unforseen circumstances
Wassailing in the Orchard. Music and dancing led by 'That Blue Patch' - good fun to be had by all own a winter's day....
If you have never Wassailed before, now is the time to experience the Broomfield Wassail . . . we wake up the trees from their winter slumber; we thank them for last year's crop; we drive out evil spirits and wish them the best for the new year!
What is wassailing?
The purpose is to encourage the spirits into ensuring a good harvest the following season. It takes place on the twelfth night after Christmas and involves a visit to a nearby orchard for singing, dancing, drinking and general merrymaking.
The joys of Christmas past
In contemporary Britain, we’re accustomed to the festive season beginning in early December and ending on New Year’s Day. It’s so ingrained in our cultural calendar, that it’s easy to forget that Christmas once looked very different before the industrialisation of the 18th and 19th centuries.
The popular carol ‘The Twelve Days of Christmas’ and Shakespeare’s play 'Twelfth Night' are two cultural survivors offering clues to some of the ways people celebrated Christmas in the past. Advent, a time of fasting, was observed from the 1st to the 24th of December. Christmas would then last 12 days, ending with feasting and revels on the 5th of January – the eve of Epiphany in the Christian calendar – with wassailing a key part of the celebrations.
