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Wassail is a hot, spiced punch
Punch (drink)

Punch is a general term for any of a wide assortment of mixed drinks, either Soft drink or Alcoholic beverage, often rum, generally containing fruit or juice.....
 often associated with Christmas. Particularly popular in Germanic
Germanic peoples

File:Germanische-ratsversammlung 1-1250x715.jpgThe Germanic peoples are a historical Ethnolinguistics group, originating in Northern Europe and identified by their use of the Indo-European languages Germanic languages which diversified out of Common Germanic in the course of the Pre-Roman Iron Age....
 countries, the term itself is a contraction of the Middle English
Middle English

Middle English is the name given by historical linguistics to the diverse forms of the English language spoken between the Norman conquest of England of 1066 and about 1470, when the #Chancery Standard, a form of London-based English, began to become widespread, a process aided by the introduction of the printing press into England by William...
 phrase wæs hæil, meaning "be healthy". The origins of the practice of wassailing
Wassailing

Wassailing as a practice falls into two distinct categories. The House-Visiting wassail, very much similar to caroling, is the practice of people going door-to-door singing Christmas carols....
 are closely connected with the history of the wassail.

e the beverage typically served as "wassail" at modern holiday feasts with a medieval theme most closely resembles mulled cider
Cider

Cider is an alcoholic beverage usually made from the fermentation juice of apples, although pears are also used.While any variety of apple may be used, certain cultivars are preferred in some regions, and these may be known as cider apples....
, historical wassail was completely different, more likely to be mull
Mulled wine

Mulled wine, variations of which are popular around the world, is wine, usually red, combined with spices and typically served warm. In the old times, wine often went bad....
ed beer
Beer

Beer is the world's oldest and most widely consumed alcoholic beverage and the third most popular drink overall after water and tea. It is produced by the brewing and Fermentation of starches, mainly derived from cereal?the most common of which is malted barley, although wheat, maize , and rice are widely used....
 or mead.






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Wassail is a hot, spiced punch
Punch (drink)

Punch is a general term for any of a wide assortment of mixed drinks, either Soft drink or Alcoholic beverage, often rum, generally containing fruit or juice.....
 often associated with Christmas. Particularly popular in Germanic
Germanic peoples

File:Germanische-ratsversammlung 1-1250x715.jpgThe Germanic peoples are a historical Ethnolinguistics group, originating in Northern Europe and identified by their use of the Indo-European languages Germanic languages which diversified out of Common Germanic in the course of the Pre-Roman Iron Age....
 countries, the term itself is a contraction of the Middle English
Middle English

Middle English is the name given by historical linguistics to the diverse forms of the English language spoken between the Norman conquest of England of 1066 and about 1470, when the #Chancery Standard, a form of London-based English, began to become widespread, a process aided by the introduction of the printing press into England by William...
 phrase wæs hæil, meaning "be healthy". The origins of the practice of wassailing
Wassailing

Wassailing as a practice falls into two distinct categories. The House-Visiting wassail, very much similar to caroling, is the practice of people going door-to-door singing Christmas carols....
 are closely connected with the history of the wassail.

History of the drink

While the beverage typically served as "wassail" at modern holiday feasts with a medieval theme most closely resembles mulled cider
Cider

Cider is an alcoholic beverage usually made from the fermentation juice of apples, although pears are also used.While any variety of apple may be used, certain cultivars are preferred in some regions, and these may be known as cider apples....
, historical wassail was completely different, more likely to be mull
Mulled wine

Mulled wine, variations of which are popular around the world, is wine, usually red, combined with spices and typically served warm. In the old times, wine often went bad....
ed beer
Beer

Beer is the world's oldest and most widely consumed alcoholic beverage and the third most popular drink overall after water and tea. It is produced by the brewing and Fermentation of starches, mainly derived from cereal?the most common of which is malted barley, although wheat, maize , and rice are widely used....
 or mead. Sugar
Sugar

Sugar is a class of edible crystalline substances, mainly sucrose, lactose, and fructose. Human taste buds interpret its flavor as sweet. Sugar as a basic food carbohydrate primarily comes from sugar cane and from sugar beet, but also appears in fruit, honey, sorghum, sugar maple , and in many other sources....
, ale
Ale

Ale is a type of beer brewed from malted barley using a top-fermenting yeast brewers' yeast. This yeast Fermentation the beer quickly, giving it a sweet, full bodied and fruity taste....
, ginger, nutmeg
Nutmeg

The nutmegs Myristica are a genus of evergreen trees indigenous to tropical southeast Asia and Australasia. They are important for two spices derived from the fruit, nutmeg and mace....
, and cinnamon
Cinnamon

Cinnamon is a small evergreen tree 10?15 metres tall, belonging to the family Lauraceae, and is native to Sri Lanka.The leaf are ovate-oblong in shape, 7?18 cm long....
 would be placed in a bowl, heated, and topped with slices of toast
Toast

Toast is sliced bread which has been browned by exposure to dry heat . This browning reaction is a form of the Maillard reaction. Toasting warms the bread, making it more pleasant to eat for some, and makes it crisp such that it holds toppings more securely....
 as sop
SOP

A sop is a piece of bread soaked in a liquid. SOP is an acronym for any of the following:*Standard Operating Procedure*Start of Production, an important milestone in the automotive industry timing plans...
s.

Hence the first stanza of the traditional carol the dating back to the Middle Ages
Middle Ages

File:Karl 1 mit papst gelasius gregor1 sacramentar v karl d kahlen.jpgThe Middle Ages of European history are a period in history which lasted for roughly a millennium, commonly dated from the fall of the Roman Empire in the 5th century to the beginning of the Early Modern Period in the 16th century, marked by the division of Western Christi...
:
Wassail! wassail! all over the town,
Our toast it is white and our ale it is brown;
Our bowl it is made of the white maple tree;
With the wassailing bowl, we'll drink to thee.


At Carhampton, near Minehead
Minehead

Minehead is a coastal town and civil parish in the west of the the England Ceremonial counties of England of Somerset. It has a population of approximately 10,000....
, the Apple Orchard Wassailing is held on the Old Twelfth Night (17 January). The villagers form a circle around the largest apple tree, hang pieces of toast soaked in cider in the branches for the robins, who represent the 'good spirits' of the tree. A shotgun is fired overhead to scare away evil spirits and the group sings, the following being the last verse:
Old Apple tree, old apple tree;
We've come to wassail thee;
To bear and to bow apples enow;
Hats full, caps full, three bushel bags full;
Barn floors full and a little heap under the stairs.


British pubs named "Pig and Whistle"


The Norse
Old Norse

Old Norse is a North Germanic languages that was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and inhabitants of their overseas settlements during the Viking Age, until about 1300....
 word for Barley was "byg", as in modern Danish. This terminology still persists in areas of Britain formerly part of the Danelaw
Danelaw

The Danelaw, as recorded in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle , is a historical name given to the part of Great Britain in which the laws of the "Danes" dominated those of the Anglo-Saxons....
, for example the "Bigg Market" in Newcastle on Tyne, the former barley market. Today many British pubs are still named "Pig and Whistle", a corruption of the name of an early Medieval feast known as the "Byggen Wassail", celebrated at the end of the barley harvest, malted barley being the main ingredient of ale.

Culture

This drink would be the equivalent to beer or wine in many of the more prominent and better-known cultures of today. People drank it at parties and was the main ale of the day. "Come butler, come fill us a bowl of the best/... please god send our master a good cask of ale..." sang throughout the towns of the germanic nations, sending good luck to even one's own master in the new year.

Bibliography

Bladey, Conrad, Jay,(2--2) "Do the Wassail", Hutman Productions, Linthicum,ISBN 0970238673. Gayre, G.R. (1948). Wassail! In Mazers of Mead. Pub. Phillimore & Co.Ltd. London.

External links