Folk-Lore of West and Mid-WalesDavies, Jonathan Ceredig
History
Folk-Lore of West and Mid-Wales
Davies, Jonathan Ceredig
Folklore -- Wales; Wales -- Social life and customs
There was a custom once at Tenby, in Pembrokeshire, for the young
men of the town to escort the Rector, with lighted torches from his
residence to the Church to the early service on Christmas morning. They
extinguished their torches as soon as they reached the porch, and
went in to the early service in the Church, and at the conclusion
of it, the torches were re-lighted, and the procession returned to
the Rectory, the chimes ringing till the time of the usual morning
service. Lighted torches were also carried through the streets by a
procession on Christmas Eve, and cow-horns were blown, and windows
of houses were decorated by evergreens.
In North Pembrokeshire the holidays commenced, especially amongst
the farmers, on Christmas Day, and were continued for three weeks,
viz., till Epiphany Sunday. The Rev. O. Jenkin Evans, writing in
"Pembrokeshire Antiquities," page 47, says:--"On the 25th day of
December, the farmers with their servants and labourers suspended
all farming operations, and in every farm the plough was at once
carried into the private house, and deposited under the table in the
'Room Vord' (i.e., the room in which they took their meals), where
it remained until the expiration of "Gwyliau Calan." During these
three weeks, parties of men went about from house to house, and were
invited into the "Room Vord," where they sat around the table, regaling
themselves with beer, which was always kept warm in small neat brass
pans in every farm-house ready for callers. But the peculiar custom
which existed amongst these holiday-makers was that they always wetted
the plough which lay dormant under the table with their beer before
partaking of it themselves, thus indicating that though they had
dispensed with its service for the time, they had not forgotten it,
and it would again, in due course, be brought out on the green sward
and turn it topsy-turvy. These bands of men would sometimes carry
with them the "Wren," singing simple popular ditties. On Christmas
Day, a sumptuous dinner was prepared at the principal farms in every
neighbourhood to which all the others, including the cottagers,
were invited. The repast consisted of geese, beef, pudding, etc."
One of the most curious customs which was once in vogue about Christmas
time was the procession known as "Mari Lwyd Lawen" ("the Merry Grey
Mary"), which was a man wearing the skeleton of a horse's head decked
with ribbons and rosettes.
The man was enveloped in a large white sheet, and proceeded round
the houses, followed by a merry procession, singing songs and playing
merry pranks, collecting Christmas boxes:
"Mari Lwyd lawen,
Sy'n dod o Bendarren," etc.
(Merry grey Mary,
Who comes from Pendarren.)
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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