Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Icelandic Christmas (But Were Afraid to Ask)

The 13 Yule Lads. | By Hugleikur Dagsson, courtesy of the Reykjavik Grapevine

I’m from Iceland, a tiny little island off the coast of Europe, that you probably don’t know much about—and if you do, you will probably inform me, “Oh wait, isn’t Iceland green and Greenland is ice?” (Thank you, Mighty Ducks). And you might have also heard that our singers sometimes wear strange swan dresses to the Academy Awards. (There is, in fact, an entire Wikipedia page dedicated to this dress).

To me, Iceland is a magical place with a lunar-like landscape unlike any other. The sea surrounds the jagged coastline of bays and fjords; a majority of the island is a treeless moonscape of vast craters, volcanoes, hot springs, and fields of lava rock—but enough of that spiel.

While carolers start to fill the streets in America, Iceland welcomes Christmas cheer a bit differently.

In Iceland, there is not one Santa Claus that hails from the North Pole to come squeeze down chimneys and place presents under the tree. Instead, there are 13 Jólasveinarnir, or the Yule Lads in English. They are descendents of mountain trolls with an especially gruesome mother, Grýla, who eats children.

The mischievous creatures come down from the mountains in the 13 days leading up to Christmas and steal household times, slam doors and harass sheep. They have descriptive names that range from Gluggagægir, meaning window-peeper, and my personal favorite, Kertasníkir, or candle-stealer, who comes the night before Christmas.

The Yule Lads were once used as a scare-tactic for children to frighten them into behaving around Christmastime, but they have softened up in commercial society and are now similar to their cheerful grandfather-like counterpart. Icelandic children put their nicest shoe on their windowsill, and the Yule Lads come down from the mountains one by one each night as Christmas Eve approaches, bringing small treats just the right size to fit in their shoe. Disobedient children receive a potato.

Their pet is the ever so delightful Jólakötturinn, the Christmas Cat, whose sole purpose in life is to eat children (and sometimes adults) that do not wear a new piece of clothing on Christmas. This lovely gem in Icelandic folklore forces Icelanders into somewhat of a stylistic submission: you must buy the latest trend or else a gigantic cat will come and eat you.

Although these Nordic tales seem more gruesome than most, the idea of sitting on a fat man’s lap and asking him for things you want doesn’t sound very appealing to me either.

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