The “Twelve Days of Christmas” is today a popular fun Christmas song that most of us sing a long to without really knowing its origin or its meaning. While many may consider it a children’s nonsense song it is believed to have been written in England with hidden meanings to help English Catholic children remember different articles of faith during the persecution by Protestant Monarchs in the 16th century. This was a time when to be caught with anything in ‘writing’ indicating adherence to the Catholic faith could not only get you imprisoned, it could get you hanged!
During this time in England when it was a crime to be a Catholic, the “Twelve Days of Christmas” song has been suggested to originally have been an “Underground Catechism” used as an aid to understand and spread the teachings of the religion. It was a way to camouflage and uphold their religion which was illegal to be practiced publicly or privately!
Let’s take a look at the symbols. ‘True love’ does not represent a suitor in fact it represented ‘God’, the “me” who receives the gifts is suggested to be every baptized person. The gifts themselves represented different ideas as follows:
The “Partridge in a pear tree” was Jesus.
2 Turtle Doves = The Old and New Testaments of The Bible
3 French Hens = Faith, Hope and Charity – the Theological Virtues.
4 Calling Birds = the Four Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
5 Golden Rings = The first Five Books of the Old Testament, the “Pentateuch”, which relays the history of man’s fall from grace.
6 Geese A-laying = the six days of Creation.
7 Swans A-swimming = the seven sacraments – gifts of the Holy Spirit.
8 Maids A-milking = the eight beatitudes (solemn blessings)
9 Ladies Dancing = the nine Fruits of the Holy Spirit.
10 Lords A-leaping = the Ten Commandments.
11 Pipers Piping = the eleven faithful apostles.
12 Drummers Drumming = the twelve points of doctrine in the Apostle’s Creed.
However not all believe this version of the history of the song to be true. In the book “A Celebration of History” by Leigh Grand, the words to the song were written around the late 1700’s and the music came some time earlier from France. He suggests that the song is nothing more than a child’s memory game. According to Grand the song has no religious significance whatsoever! He says that the object of the song was to facilitate a game where the child had to remember which gift came next and loose a turn if forgotten.
No matter what version you believe this song reinforces the idea of gift giving associated with the history of festivities. If one gift is given each day in this song then we can recount a total of 364 gifts given with 184 of them being birds. Birds must have been a prized gift back in the old days!
In recent times an economist computes each year the cost for all the gifts in this song adjusted to inflation. In 2005 the computed Christmas Price Index cost for all the gifts in the song was $72,608. This is done purely for fun from an economist’s point of view!
If you want to listen to this famous Christmas song you can download or play it for free over the internet at: http://www.christmasgifts.com/music.html or you can purchase a copy from Amazon.com – Enjoy, sing-along, get into the festive spirit and see how good your memory is!
And the author Bernadette Dimitrov invites you to visit her radio podcast show “Conversations with Mrs Claus” http://www.TheFamilyYak.com, An inspirational show with fascinating guests world-wide with prizes to be won! Also come visit http://www.HoHoHoChristmas.com and join her free inspirational Christmas newsletter with great recipes, insights & gift ideas & receive inspirational free gifts including her free 10 day e-course with audio “Amazing Ways to Enrich Your Christmas Experience!”