Hone's Every-Day Book

William Hone, The Every-Day Book, or Everlasting Calendar of Popular Amusements (2 vols, 1825-1827).

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Two volumes, 1825 to 1827. Later editions bind it with the Table Book, and old sets turn up second-hand.

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401 to 411 of 411 entries

25 December

Folklore from the old calendars

Christmas weather lore Lore and belief Devon, England, ScotlandAn old song in the Harleian manuscripts foretold the year by the weekday of Christmas: a Sunday Christmas meant a good winter, a fair summer and peace, while a Saturday one brought storms that killed man and beast, failing crops and dying children.
The bells under the valley Lore and belief NottinghamshireNear Raleigh in Nottinghamshire, a Hone correspondent wrote, there was a valley said to have been made by an earthquake centuries before, which swallowed a whole village and its church.
The boar’s head at Queen’s College Still kept OxfordshireThe boar's head was once the first dish of every great Christmas dinner, carried in with minstrelsy and a carol, and Aubrey said that before the civil wars it came to the table in gentlemen's houses with a lemon in its mouth.
The Bungay watchmen’s Christmas verses No longer kept SuffolkAt Christmas the night watchmen of Bungay printed a copy of verses for the townspeople in the hope of a Christmas gift.
The hackin No longer kept EnglandAn old tract called Round about our Coal Fire described how an English gentleman had all his tenants and neighbours into his hall at daybreak on Christmas morning.
West Country church carols Still kept Cornwall, DevonDavies Gilbert, who published the old carols of the West of England with their tunes, said that on Christmas Day they were sung in place of the psalms in all the churches, above all at the afternoon service, with the whole congregation joining in.
Wrestling for the boar’s head No longer kept EssexAt Hornchurch the lessee of the tithes, which belonged to New College, Oxford, provided a boar's head, dressed and garnished with bay leaves, every Christmas Day.
Yule doughs No longer kept County Durham, EnglandBakers once baked a little image of paste at Christmas, called a yule dough or dow, and gave one to each of their customers, just as chandlers gave their customers Christmas candles.

Hone's Every-Day Book

25 December

26 December

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