Yule is another word for Christmas. Yuletide means the Christmas season. The origin of the word Yule probably goes back to a pre-Christian harvest festival held in November. Germanic tribes called Goths used the word qiul or hiul for wheel. Some scholars suggest that yule refers to the annual revolution, or wheel, of the sun. When Christian culture advanced northward, the customs of the harvest festival became part of Christmas.
The burning of the Yule log was a popular custom that survived into Christian times. On Christmas Eve, a huge log, often an oak, was brought in and lit with much celebrating. A torch from the previous year’s log was used to light the new fire. Each night until the feast of Twelfth Night, the log would be burned for a while. The ashes and charcoal were used during the year to ward off evil and even to cure cattle diseases.
