A Little Christmas Carol Trivia…

There’s a few songs in our Christmas Carol repertoire that really don’t have much to do with the 25th of December.

I’m not sure if The Twelve Days of Christmas is considered a carol or a popular song, but the days mentioned therein (pardon my old English verbiage, Scribe got a (facsimile) 1540 Anglican missal for Christmas!) are the twelve days after the Nativity of Christ.

Today, though, is a much better one because most people sing the song Good King Wenceslas, never knowing exactly what “The feast of Stephen” is.

Easy enough to explain!  This would be the feast day for St. Stephen, the first martyr in the church, which just happens to be….

The 26th of December.

Thus, on the Feast day of St. Stephen (today in the Christian calendar), King Wenceslas looked out his window to see the poor man trying to find sticks and twigs, amongst the winter snow.

And so the story goes on from there.

It’s an important one, too: the story is based on a real person, St. Wenceslaus I, Duke or Bohemia (907 – 935) , and speaks of a ruler who was so very pious and brave in his ruling of the people that, when he ventured out in the bad weather to help the poor, his page was able to survive by walking in the King’s footsteps, warmed by the heat emanating from the king’s feet. Wenceslaus was considered a martyr of the Church and saint, immediately after his death. He was beloved so much as a fair and passionate ruler that Cosmos of Prague wrote this about him in 1119:

But his deeds I think you know better than I could tell you; for, as is read in his Passion, no one doubts that, rising every night from his noble bed, with bare feet and only one chamberlain, he went around to God’s churches and gave alms generously to widows, orphans, those in prison and afflicted by every difficulty, so much so that he was considered, not a prince, but the father of all the wretched.

A few centuries later Pope Pius II claimed the Wenceslas legends as truth and himself walked 10 miles barefoot in ice and snow as a Thanksgiving. Ah – those were the days!

The carol’s lyrics were written by English hymn writer John Mason Neale – a big fan of “High Church” traditions – and for some reason set it to the tune of “Tempus Adest Floridum” (“It is time for flowering”) which was a Springtime carol, some time in the 1830s.

Here is a link to a public domain version of the song, with singers:  Good King Wenceslas

And this is a mixed-voice choral version with organ, featuring the usually-expected shift to minor key in the 4th verse as the page is freezing in the cold snow:

Good King Wenceslas

lyrics by: John Mason Neale
hymn tune: Tempus Adest Floridum

Good King Wenceslas looked out, on the Feast of Stephen,
When the snow lay round about, deep and crisp and even;
Brightly shone the moon that night, tho’ the frost was cruel,
When a poor man came in sight, gath’ring winter fuel.

“Hither, page, and stand by me, if thou know’st it, telling,
Yonder peasant, who is he? Where and what his dwelling?”
“Sire, he lives a good league hence, underneath the mountain;
Right against the forest fence, by Saint Agnes’ fountain.”

“Bring me flesh, and bring me wine, bring me pine logs hither:
Thou and I will see him dine, when we bear them thither.”
Page and monarch, forth they went, forth they went together;
Through the rude wind’s wild lament and the bitter weather.

“Sire, the night is darker now, and the wind blows stronger;
Fails my heart, I know not how; I can go no longer.”
“Mark my footsteps, good my page. Tread thou in them boldly
Thou shalt find the winter’s rage freeze thy blood less coldly.”

In his master’s steps he trod, where the snow lay dinted;
Heat was in the very sod which the saint had printed.
Therefore, Christian men, be sure, wealth or rank possessing,
Ye who now will bless the poor, shall yourselves find blessing.

————–

Keep the faith!

- Amen

Tags: Christians, grace, Hymns, Inspiration