The 25 Strangest days of Christmas Day 18 - Boars Head, No Not The Lunch Meat

0:00 Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome back to the Strange History podcast and day eighteen of our Victorian Christmas countdown the twenty five Strangest Days of Christmas. Let's talk about Victorian Christmas dinner tradition, the bore and head, well mostly the noggin. Victorian Christmas dinner could feature a boar's head centerpiece, carried in with ceremony like a celebrity guest who is not currently alive. This wasn't just decor, it was performance. Universities, gentlemen's clubs, and manor homes re enacted medieval banquet rituals where the boar's head was garnished with rosemary, surrounded by oranges, and escorted in by singing servants, Yes, singing servants.

0:41 Speaker 1: Queen's College in Oxford still performs the Boar's Head Gaudy, a tradition dating back to the thirteen hundreds. The official procession song includes the line caput apri de ferro I bring the boar's head translation, dinner has arrived and it is dramatic. Victorian's adored showman. Food was not just nourishment, it was theater with tusks.

1:04 Speaker 2: Today's sponsor is centerpiece Holiday table dramatics want your meal to enter the room with grandeur. We provide spotlight lighting, musical accompaniment, and optional theatrical fog centerpiece. Your ham deserves a moment next time.

1:22 Speaker 1: How Charles Dickens permanently rewired the global image of Christmas and why snow is involved even in places that do not get snow.