Pagan Christmas by Christian Rätsch Read Free Book Online Page A

oldest incense substance of all. The use of fir for incense started long before trade in exotic resins began. In early modern times, fir resin was well known and often used as ersatz frankincense (olibanum).
    Dried fir needles burn loudly and quickly. They produce a white smoke that is full of resin and smells like fir but disperses in a short time. The white or noble fir contains 0.5 percent essential oils in its needles and cones, consisting of bornyl acetate, pinene, limonene, and more. Turpentine, including so-called Strasbourg turpentine, is another product of fir. It consists of 34 percent essential oils, 72 percent resin, and some succinic acid. When turpentine is reduced to essential oil, the residue left behind is rosin.
    On the trunk of this holy fir near Ruswil, Switzerland, there is a Christian cross and a memorial plate.
    MAGICAL AND FOLK USE
    Like many other plants with a longstanding symbolic association with Christmas, fir branches are believed to serve a guardian function and are used to ward off harmful influences. “In some places the fir branches are in front of doors and animal stalls on Christmas Eve, to prevent illnesses and epidemics. The servants are not to be paid for collecting these branches; and are therefore given cakes and clothes as a gift” (von Perger 1864, 343). In rural areas they are also used for weather forecasts. “Fir branches are used to show the weather when you balance them horizontally on a wall and their top goes up or down for an inch or so, to show if the weather turns either good or bad” (von Perger 1864, 343).
    Spruce
    Picea spp., Pinaceae
    Picea abies (L.) Karst. (Norway spruce)
    Picea engelmannii Parry ex Engelm. (Engelmann spruce)
    Picea mariana P. Mill. (black spruce)
    OTHER NAMES
    Black fir, cross fir, fiotha (Old High German), forest incense, gräne; grötzli, kynhol(t)z (“firewood”), red spruce, red fir, resin fir, tar fir
    As mother tree and tree of life, the spruce is symbolic of the female’s nurturing and life-renewing power. Pagan German tribes venerated the Irmin pillar as a tree sanctuary (or holy tree). The sacred Irmin pillar was a spruce and later became the May tree.
    STRASSMANN 1994, 135
    Spruce trees are found in Europe, North America, and as far east as Asia. In some areas, it is a more popular Christmas tree than the fir. In western Europe, the spruce is sometimes called by the common name fir, but nobody ever seems to call fir trees “spruce.”
    MAGICAL AND FOLK USE
    Many of the qualities mentioned above for the fir tree may also be attributed to the spruce. By using spruce, one called upon its ability to ward off evil forces: “Bringing the spruce into the room had originally to do with the worshipping of the spirits that guarded the forest” (Schöpf 1986, 86). The calming effects of spruce needle essential oil in tonic bath cures made it useful for revitalizing the nerves. “A spruce smudging has a calming effect on the body, and allows it to center itself again” (Strassmann 1994, 138).
    The spruce is identified not only with the fir, but also with the pine.6 Thus the Gallic Rhine Celts made offerings of pine and spruce cones to the gods associated with the sources of springs and fountains (Höfler 1911, 20). Natureoriented people in some regions still believe that witches dance near spruces, and that blue lights seen dancing around holy spruces in the night are the souls of the dead, drawn to the trees (Fink 1983, 46).
    Pine
    Pinus spp., Pinaceae
    Pinus sylvestris L. (Scots pine)
    Pinus nigra Arnold (Austrian pine, European black pine)
    Pinus palustris P. Mill. (longleaf pine, pitch pine)
    Cultivated pine: Pinus pumila “Globe.”
    OTHER NAMES
    Fire tree, föhren (“pine bud” or “pine wood”), heiligföhre (“sacred pine wood”), kienbaum, red pine
    Witches also, yes, even the devil, are hiding in the old pine wood (föhren). In the branches of a pine wood tree in Villanders the witches played enchanting music. This is the