"The Holly and the Ivy, when they are both full-grown, Of all the trees that are in the wood, The holly bears the crown.''

That's one of our most beautiful and popular Christmas carols yet, like many of the songs we enjoy at the festive season, has its roots in far older times.

The celebration of the holly harks back to pagan times when the old gods of the forest were worshipped and the evergreen leaves were celebrated for its strong life qualities at the dead of winter.

Bands of wrapped-up singers have strolled our streets and villages for centuries entertaining householders with festive songs.

Originally they were mummers, performing traditional plays, and they then became known as waits, who would tour the town every evening before Christmas.

Waits had instruments with them, including the now-forgotten serpent, a woodwind instrument.

As they went about their musical business, they were usually given money and almost always a drink, so the celebrations invariably grew raucous.

The songs they sang were traditional and tied in with pre-Victorian mid-winter celebrations where the Lord of Misrule presided over jollities which were wild at heart.

Our first proper carols came from the French in the 14th century. They put Christian words to old music because it was familiar to most people and had simple tunes.

Their usage spread widely - people like to sing. In fact, the Puritans were so alarmed by how much people enjoyed singing Christmas carols that they suppressed them in the mid-17th century.

With the explosion of enthusiasm for Christmas in the Victorian era, carols made a comeback.

It helped that when the waits were banned at the end of the 19th century for being too rowdy, choristers from local churches took over. With their lanterns and pure voices, they were welcome at every door.

And on Christmas Eve and morning, the parishioners whom they had entertained in the evening before would crowd into church to join their voices in song, too - never realising that the Christian tunes they enjoyed so much had an older, hidden rhythm.

December 21, 2001 16:00