Got Your Goat Again

Ah, Christmas traditions. The cutting down (or buying) followed by the trimming of the tree. The hanging of the greens. The wassail. The gift-giving. The torching of the sacrificial giant straw goat. What, you’ve never heard of that last one? If you lived in Gavle, Sweden you’d know all about it. Sweden, like the bulk of the Scandinavian countries, skews a little closer to its pagan roots when it comes to the annual celebration of Christmas, which we all know was simply overlaid, grafted onto, the preexisting pagan celebrations of Yule (in Scandinavia), Saturnalia (Roman/Greek) and the celebration of the Winter Solstice. (Common throughout all the northern hemisphere in ancient times.) In Sweden, their Santa Claus figure bears neither the name of the form of the Christian Saint Nicholas. In Sweden, the bringer of gifts to well-behaved children is a goat. The Yule Goat, it’s called, and fashioning effigies of the Yule Goat out of straw is one of those old and cherished traditions we talked about.

In Gavle, theirs is bigger than most. Each year they erect a giant one in the city square. And each year, as often as not, someone sets it on fire. In a properly WICKER MAN-style display, the “Gavlebocken” goat goes up in flames. The city authorities try to prevent it, and the vandals have to figure out ways around the measures taken to protect the goat. Fun times, sounds like.

By The Evil Cheezman

WAYNE MILLER is the owner and creative director of EVIL CHEEZ PRODUCTIONS (www.evilcheezproductions.blogspot.com, www.facebook.com/evilcheezproductions), specializing in theatrical performances and haunted attractions. He has written, produced and directed (and occasionally acted in) over a dozen plays, most of them in the Horror and Crime genres. His first novel, THE CONFESSIONS OF SAINT CHRISTOPHER: WEREWOLF, is available for purchase at https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/734763 MORTUI VELOCES SUNT!

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