As a professor of medieval history, I can assure you the popular belief that the lives of peasants were little more than misery is a misconception. They enjoyed rich social lives – maybe richer than ours – ate well, celebrated frequently and had families not unlike our own. For them, holiday festivities didn’t begin with Christmas Eve and end with New Year’s.
The party was just getting started.
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Today, many people start thinking about Christmas after Thanksgiving, and any sort of holiday spirit fizzles by early January.
In the Middle Ages, this would have been unheard of.
Advent – the period of anticipation and fasting that precedes Christmas – began with the Feast of St. Martin.
Back then, it took place 40 days before Christmas; today, it’s the fourth Sunday before it. During this period, Western Christians observed a fast; while less strict than the one for Lent, it restricted meat and dairy products to certain days of the week. These protocols not only symbolized absence and longing, but they also helped stretch out the food supply after the end of the harvest and before meats were fully cured.
Christmas itself was known for feasting and drunkenness – and it lasted nearly six weeks.