Have you had many Christmas cards this year? I’ve had a nice mixture of traditional paper cards and illustrated or even animated electronic ones (some of which are lovely!). And something that really jumped out at me was how many animals there are on them! Now, of course I’m a vet so it’s quite possible that people deliberately choose animal-themed cards for me. But my friends and family seem to get a lot of animal designs too. And it got me thinking – how many animals do we associate with Christmas? And why?
So, I’ve been doing some digging into modern consumer culture, ancient folk tales, and much more, to bring you a range of different Christmassy animals. Some you’re doubtless familiar with (hello, Rudolf), while others (like the famous Japanese Eels) you may not have come across before. So let’s take a look at the Twelve Animals of Christmas!
Table of contents
Reindeer
Lets start with an old-favourite, the reindeer – or is it so old? Well, reindeer were relatively recently domesticated – perhaps as little as 2000 years ago. But their association with Christmas seems logical. They come from cold, snowy parts of the Arctic Circle. And with Christmas occurring in midwinter in the Northern Hemisphere, it sort of makes sense.
Reindeer (or Caribou – both terms used for Rangifer tarandus) are specialists at living on very little, largely eating a type of lichen called reindeer moss. They’re also excellent swimmers and can easily travel hundreds of miles in a few weeks, trotting along at 25mph.
However, despite the logic of St Nicholas’ sleigh being drawn by such hardy and rapid creatures, it wasn’t until 1828 when the two came together, in Clement Clark Moore’s poem “A Visit from St. Nicholas”.
So very Christmassy, but not an ancient tradition!
We do see a lot of domesticated reindeer out and about at the moment; with their keepers bringing them into city centres and towns all over the country. And that’s lovely, but do remember that these animals need very, very specialised care in a country as warm (for them!) as the UK.
Deer
While we’re on the subject of deer, let’s think more generally about these agile ruminants. I seem to see a lot of these on my Christmas cards at the moment, often in association with other (slightly generic!) “woodland creatures”.
Nowadays, we tend to see them mainly on cards, and remember them in the words of the carol,
“O the rising of the sun,
And the running of the deer…”
Which gives us a clue as to their association with Christmas in the medieval and early modern European mind. They were one of the preferred dishes at Christmas for the nobility and royalty. And the stag hunt was a critical Christmas tradition. The running of the deer was originally a tactful way of describing the joys of the Christmas hunt for the nobility.
Most of us nowadays, however, can enjoy them on our cards or, if you’re lucky, watching a small herd of red, fallow or roe deer in the early morning in the fields, copses, or even sometimes our gardens.
Turkey
Of course, nowadays we’re more likely to have a turkey on the Christmas table, if we even have a meat course. So when did the turkey become associated with Christmas?
Well, we know that the first turkeys seem to have arrived in England in the 1520s, brought from the Americas on Spanish ships (where they were known as huehxolotl – a name that never caught on). And every country came up with its own name for them, leading to some confusion. In fact, in 2022, the country of Turkey formally changed its name at the UN to Türkiye; among other reasons, to dissociate itself from the bird.
It is, however, almost certainly true that Henry VIII enjoyed turkey at his Yuletide feasts by the 1540s, in fact, the amount of indulgence over Christmas (an early version of consumerism!), that the Archbishop of Canterbury of the time, Thomas Cranmer, banned clergy from having more than one bird per meal!
Huge numbers of turkeys are reared in the UK, in all sorts of conditions. If you can, research the farm in advance, and make sure the conditions are as good as possible. Some “free range” birds just have access to outside, but others live a largely independent life. So don’t just read the label, but try and find out where they’ve come from.
Partridge
While we’re on the subject of birds, what about the partridge? These turn up all over the place, hidden in the corners of Christmas illustration and even wrapping paper!
Well, this one comes back to the Twelve Days of Christmas (which I really had to include in this blog somewhere!), with the “Partridge in a pear tree”.
So what’s the significance of it? Well, there have been lots of theories over the years, especially around the idea that it was a secret test for Catholics who wanted to keep knowledge hidden – the Partridge, for example, being Jesus. However, this idea really doesn’t hold up to scrutiny. And it’s probably just a children’s memory game that somehow caught the attention of a wider public!
However, there is an alternative version of the song which makes a bit more sense, and is supposed to represent the making of a giant stuffed-meat pie… which might explain why the “lads are leaping”, trying to get it all ready in time. I imagine that they didn’t have to deal with the requirements for a vet to certify animal products as fit for consumption (OV health stamping) back then!
Lambs, cattle, donkeys and camels
These of course are all mainstays in Nativity plays up and down the country at this time of year. Although actually, none of them are specifically listed in either of the Bible passages (Luke and Matthew). However, we’re told there were shepherds in Bethlehem, and so that definitely implies sheep and maybe lambs (depending on when they lambed down – in December, not so likely, but in March, more probable).
Mary and Joseph travelled to Bethlehem from their home, and while they might have walked, for many centuries the idea that a donkey carried Mary when she was pregnant with Jesus has been mainstream. In fact, there’s even a tradition that the cross on a donkey’s back comes from carrying Jesus; either as a baby, or when grown and he rode into Jerusalem before his execution. Either way, a donkey was a key beast of burden then as now in the Middle East, so its presence seems reasonable.
No cattle either you’ll notice – but Jesus is described as being laid in a manger, so again, a reasonable addition.
Finally, of course, we have the Wise Men from the East with their camels. Current thinking is that these probably depict Zoanastrian priests or Magi. And so camels are definitely the most likely mode of transport.
While camels aren’t a mainstay of the British farm, increasingly, their close cousins llamas and alpacas are. There’s even a British Veterinary Camelid Society for their particular care, and the RCVS has just admitted the first ever Advanced Practitioner in Camelid Medicine, my friend and colleague Ami Sawran.
Robins and wrens
So, leaving the Nativity for a moment, what about the famous robin? With their bold and curious nature, bright plumage, and the fact we rarely see them except in autumn and winter, it’s a logical connection.
It’s widely believed that the association with Christmas goes back to the Victorian period, with the introduction of the penny post. Christmas cards took off in a big way, delivered by postmen (yes, it was always men in those days) wearing bright red uniforms. As early cards wanted to associate themselves with the postal service – (to encourage people to post them!), robins were used as a visual shorthand for the postal service. And so the tradition began!
However, as with most traditions, it’s not quite that simple. Because there was an older medieval tradition that the robin got its red breast by being scorched as it fanned the flames of a fire, to keep the baby Jesus warm. The Victorian card makers might just have been pushing at an open door!
But there’s a darker – and even older – tradition, around both robins and wrens. In some Celtic nations, the robin was the Oak King of Summer, and his counterpart was the Holly King of Winter, a wren. On the winter solstice, the wren had to give way to the robin, to allow the sun to return and winter to end. And this led to the rather grim tradition of Hunting the Wren on the winter solstice; to find and kill him, so that the sun could return.
Not a tradition I think we should be trying to reintroduce!
Spider
How many of us have tinsel in your homes this Christmas? I certainly do – but if you have both tinsel and cats, do be careful. Some cats do love to pounce and it can make them really ill!
However, one reason we have tinsel is that there’s a tradition that when Jesus’ family were refugees, fleeing from tyrants in Judea to go to Egypt, a spider wove a web over the cave they were hiding in. The dew on the web made it look like no-one was in there, and so the soldiers searching for them missed it. The tinsel is supposed to represent that dew, or even frost, on the web.
There’s also a number of eastern European versions. One I like best is that a poor family couldn’t afford to decorate their tree, and so a spider decorated it with his web. In some versions, the silk even turns to gold and silver.
We often hate and despise spiders, which is a shame. They do excellent ecological work for us, and many people do keep exotic spiders as pets. Did you know, there’s even a Veterinary Invertebrate Society for the vets who work with these fascinating animals?
Eels
I love to finish on a random one: so what do eels have to do with Christmas? The famous Tokyo Electric Eel powered Christmas tree! (And yes, there is a Fish Veterinary Society too!).
The moral of the story?
Whatever animals you have, large or small, there’s a vet in the UK who can treat them if they get ill or injured. And over Christmas, by law, every practice must have arrangements for emergency care. Even if your practice is closed, call them and there should be a message or a link telling you who is on duty to provide emergency care for your animals, whatever they are.
Of course, I hope you don’t need it – but if you do, my colleagues are on duty ready to help.
Wishing all our readers and their animals, whatever they might be, a very peaceful and merry Christmas, and a happy New Year, from all of us at VetHelpDirect.
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