Welcome back, wayfarers! This is the first of eight short lore essays on the Wheel of the Year festivals in the Feengrenze. Given the time of year, we will start with Feengrenze’s New Year festival, Yuletide.

The Festival of Yuletide

Yuletide is one of the most cherished holidays in the great Wheel of the Year and serves as the Feengrenze calendar. It is the New Year festival, celebrating the death of the old year and the start of the new. Yuletide is a three-day festival that begins around the 20th day of the month of December and culminates on the winter solstice, marked by feasts and festivities that honor the return of light after the longest night of the year. Among the eight great festivals, Yuletide is uniquely consistent in its celebration across the Feengrenze, observed similarly by cultures as diverse as the sultans of Lysandor, the Clockfolk of Mainspring, and the people of New Mountainheart.

Origin and Mythological Context

The exact origin of Yuletide has been lost to the mists of time. However, it is well-documented that this festival, along with the other major festivals of the Wheel of the Year, originated in old fey paganism. This ancient belief system centered around the worship of the deified first two archfey, the Lord and Lady, who embody and govern various aspects of the Feywild. Though old fey paganism has largely faded in the greater Feywild due to the influence of the Summer and Gloaming courts, it persists in certain fey domains of the Feengrenze, such as Loch Slanach.

The festivals of the Wheel of the Year are thought to have arisen when the first fey arrived in the Feengrenze and encountered its bewildering, cyclical seasons—a stark contrast to the unchanging twilight of the Feywild. Faced with the chilling darkness of winter and the lengthening nights, these early inhabitants turned to their faith. They offered sacrifices to the Lord and Lady, lit bonfires, and chanted to ward off the encroaching gloom. When the sun returned on the morning of the solstice, they feasted in celebration.

Over time, these rituals evolved from desperate acts of survival into joyous renewal traditions. As old fey paganism waned and mortals from the Material Plane arrived, Yuletide absorbed elements from other midwinter festivals, becoming the merry celebration dedicated to cheer and goodwill. It is today.

Traditions Associated with Yuletide

While regional variations exist, the core traditions of Yuletide are generally consistent throughout the Feengrenze. These include:

Decorating with Holly and Evergreens

Evergreen plants and trees have long been attributed magical properties by the feyfolk. In ancient times, decorating with holly and evergreens was believed to empower the Lord and Lady to bring back the sun. Today, this tradition persists, with homes adorned with evergreen boughs and holly.

Bonfires

One of the oldest Yuletide traditions is lighting massive bonfires on the eve of the solstice. Over the centuries, these desperate attempts to drive back the dark evolved as communities grew more confident in the natural cycles of the seasons, transforming into occasions of joyous celebration rather than solemn ritual. Typical community bonfires on the isles of Lysander, Dunkelmire, and Tír na Caillte will feature dancing, caroling, and large amounts of alcohol.

Feasting and Merrymaking

Feasting has always been central to Yuletide. The third and final day is traditionally reserved for the Great Feast of the Solstice; however, revelry, drinking, and merrymaking usually span all three days. Pub crawling is a favored pastime during the festival, and most taverns and bars are generally packed during the holiday. It is also common for the merriment to spill out of the homes, halls, and pubs into the streets, becoming a roving party.

Pageants

Yule pageants are a beloved tradition in towns, cities, and noble courts. These may include parades of lights, mummers’ plays in pubs and town squares, or elaborate masques in theaters and royal courts. Elmwood Hall in Sliberberg hosts a famous annual pageant that follows a plot similar to Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol.

The Lord of Misrule

In noble households, a servant is often appointed as the “Lord of Misrule.” Chosen months in advance, they plan the festivities and, during Yuletide, are elevated to the head of the household. The Lord of Misrule issues playful orders and orchestrates mirthful chaos, ensuring the festival is filled with laughter and joy.

Regional Variations

While the broad traditions of the festival of Yule stay consistent across all the lands of the Feengrenze, their some regional variations to the celebrations as well

Yule Logs

On the heavily wooded lands of Tír na Caillte, it is a common tradition for families to venture into the woods to select a Yule log. They decorate it with spices and holly before burning it in their hearth. If the log burns for the entire festival, it is said to bring good luck to the household in the coming year.

Wassailing

Popular in New Mountainheart and the surrounding lands, wassailing is a variant of the yuletide caroling that serves as a blessing ritual and a means to spread communal goodwill. A group of wassailers would go door to door, bestow a blessing on the residents of the home in the form of the carol, and offer a drink of a type of spiced cider, wine, or ale punch called wassail in exchange for small gifts or food. Typically, the wassailers would be common folk who would go door to door in wealthier neighborhoods. For example, in Sliberberg, wassailing is typically done by the residents of the lower ward who would go door to door in Alteburg and Kronenhöhen.

Yule trees

The New Mountainheartians are also usually accredited with introducing Yule trees to the holiday. According to legends, although it is widely disputed by historians, the first yule trees were the trees of the city’s central marketplace, Market Grove Bazaar. During the busy shopping season before Yuletide, the keepers of the marketplace would adorn the trees that form the indoor marketplace’s roof with lanterns and fairy lights to extend shopping hours into the night. Eventually, the merchants would hang decorations from the boughs near their stalls with ornaments to better attract customers, turning the marketplace into a sparkling wonderland. In response, the nobility and gentry began decorating their trees to assert their social status.

An alternative explanation for the origin of Yule trees states that the first was an evergreen pine planted in the gardens of Castle Sliberberg. The castle staff festively decorated it yearly to raise King Fredrick’s spirits in a typically lonely part of the year. Soon, decorated Yule trees caught on with the peerage and gentry, who would adorn their parlors with young pines decorated for the season.

Regardless of their origin, yule trees are typically a tradition for the well-to-do, although communal trees that use living pines are not uncommon.

Masquerades and Balls

In the lands under the sway of the Fionnuala the fair, it is common for Yuletide to be the peak of the social season, with rulers throwing elaborate festive-themed balls and Masquerades. Fionnuala herself is known to throw a massive ball at Aisling Tír.

Supernatural Happening

Yuletide is often considered the most magical time of the year. It is the one time of year when Whimwhirls do not occur, and storms never happen. It is also a time when several supernatural entities are abroad.

Grandfather Yule

A more recent addition to Yuletide lore is the figure of Grandfather Yule, an archfey who is considered to embody the holiday in its purest fashion. He appears as a hobgoblin with red skin, white hair, a long white beard, and a staff adorned with holly. He is usually depicted either wearing white robes and a holly wreath or a red fur-lined robe with a stocking cap.

Grandfather Yule’s domain of delight, Yulemore, is located deep within the icy reaches of northern Dunklemere, supposedly close to the eye of frost. It is said that Yulemore takes the form of a small village of charming alpine-style cottages and toymaking workshops, in the center of which is Grandfather Yule’s grand castle of the same name. It is in this castle that Grandfather Yule and his small army of goblin, pixie, and gnome helpers spend the year making toys and goodies. On the eve of the solstice, he rides forth on a sleigh driven by 4 unicorns named Star, Merry, Holly, and Joy to deliver the presents he and his followers have created to children all over the Feengrenze.

In the relatively short time since he made his first ride, Grandfather Yule has become a beloved figure. He and his granddaughters, the snowmaidens, frequently appear on yuletide cards, decorations, and in Yuletide Pageants.

The Snow Maidens

Yulemore is also the home of three snowmaidens, Gleise, Eira,  and Siocán. These three hobgoblin sisters, the granddaughters of Grandfather Yule, are responsible for creating the Yuletide snow and aiding their grandfather with his deliveries on the solstice. Of the three sisters, Gleise, the maiden of ice, is the eldest; she is calm and regal, serving as her grandfather’s stewardess; she dresses in a dress of the deepest ice blue and wears a tiara of ice. Eira, the maiden of snow, is the middle child; playful and mischievous, she revels in creating the yuletide snow; she dresses in a white dress with a white fur coat and a silver tiara. Siocán, the maiden of frost and the youngest of the sisters is kind and warm; she is dressed in a silver dress with a flowing cape and golden circlet. On the night of the solstice, they ride forth ahead of their grandfather on their own Unicorns: Gleise on Crystal, Eira on Twinkle, and Siocán on Shine to create the perfectly frosty scenery for the Yuletide celebrations in the morning. Like their grandfather, the snowmaidens are a beloved part of the holiday.

The Wild Hunt

Yuletide is also one of the times of the year the wild hunt can be seen charging across the sky, although nobody knows why. The wild hunt is a massive host of ghosts mounted on ghostly steeds charging across the sky, shooting and hollering after some unseen quarry. Almost every culture in the Feengrenze has its own tale about the origin of the hunt, but the most popular is that the original members of the hunt were a fey nobleman and his hunting companions who broke an oath to a powerful fey not to hunt and where cursed to hunt forever for their transgression. However, what is well known is that encountering the wild hunt is considered a faith worse than death. The hunt seems ever in need of new huntsmen, and they recruit by snatching those caught outside away, never to be seen again.