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People once believed Lussi wreaked havoc on the night of 13 December "We children were afraid"
That's what a Norwegian man said about growing up in the 1800s.
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"We children were afraid and didn't dare to go out into the farmyard," Kristofer Haga said in 1913.
Kristofer grew up on a large farm in Hardanger, Western Norway, in the 1800s. There, he heard about Lussi Night – a night when a being called Lussi ran rampant.
If she encountered people, she became violent.
The elders on the farm told the children frightening tales, including stories of Lussi throwing people up onto the roof of the barn.
A procession of ghosts and criminals
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The Lucia celebrations we know today are relatively recent.
Long before white dresses, candles, and saffron buns called lussekatter became part of the tradition, there existed a far darker version.
The night of 13 December was believed to be magical, says researcher Kyrre Kverndokk at the University of Bergen.
This was when the wight Lussi rampaged.
Often with an entourage of ghosts, criminals, and other mysterious beings. They flew across the sky and swept through farmyards.
If they encountered people along the way, they might snatch them up and carry them off.
Possible links to Lucia and Lucifer
Christianity has also likely influenced the superstition about Lussi.
Her name has something in common with the Italian Lucia, says Kverndokk. Both stem from the word lux, which means light in Latin.
For a long time, 13 December was a Catholic feast day honouring Saint Lucia. Also in Norway.
"But this had nothing to do with the modern Lucia celebrations we see in kindergartens today," says Kverndokk.
Some researchers also believe that the devil Lucifer may have inspired the being Lussi.
Believed that animals could talk
As with most old traditions, there was no single, unified story.
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Different versions existed across Norway.
In Balestrand in Western Norway, people believed that animals could talk on Lussi Night.
Cows were said to chew at their tethers and sigh, “Lussi Night is long.”
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And the ram was said to reply that it was as long as two nights.
Skipped 11 days
The date itself is a bit confusing.
Why was the night of 13 December considered unusually long?
Today we know that this is not correct. The day with the fewest hours of daylight is 21 December in 2025.
The explanation lies in something that happened in the year 1700, explains Kverndokk.
That was when Norway adopted a new calendar.
The old one had fallen out of sync with the solar year – the time it takes for the Earth to orbit the sun.
To correct this, 11 days were skipped.
As a result, before the calendar change, 13 December really was one of the darkest days of the year.
Have collected old memories
Many of the old stories about Christmas blend into one another, explains Kverndokk.
Much of what we know today was collected by folklorists.
They travelled around and asked people about customs, folktales, and beliefs. And then they wrote it down.
Researchers at institutions such as the University of Bergen have now made these records available digitally at samla.no.
"Everything we know about older Christmas traditions can be found there," says Kverndokk.
Without this effort to preserve the stories, we would know very little about how people celebrated Christmas in the old days, he adds.
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Translated by Alette Bjordal Gjellesvik
Read the Norwegian version of this article on ung.forskning.no
References:
Folklore about Lussi from Kvam on samla.no.
Folklore about Lussi from Balestrand on samla.no.
Article about Lussi in the Great Norwegian Encyclopedia.
Article about the celebration of St. Lucia's Day on Science Norway.
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