account for Christmas customs we must be mindful, therefore, of the
tentative nature of the theories put forward. Again, it is important to
remember that ritual practices are far more enduring than the
explanations given to them. "The antique religions," to quote the words
of Robertson Smith, "had for the most part no creed; they consisted
entirely of institutions and practices ... as a rule we find that while
the practice was |165| rigorously fixed, the meaning attached to it was
extremely vague, and the same rite was explained by different people in
different ways."{7}

Thus if we can arrive at the significance of a rite at a given period, it
by no means follows that those who began it meant the same thing. At the
time of the conflict of the heathen religions with Christianity elaborate
structures of mythology had grown up around their traditional ceremonial,
assigning to it meanings that had often little to do with its original
purpose. Often, too, when the purpose was changed, new ceremonies were
added, so that a rite may look very unlike what it was at first.

With these cautions and reservations we must now try to trace the
connection between present-day or recent goings-on about Christmas-time
and the festival practices of pre-Christian Europe.

* * * * *

Christmas, as we saw in Chapter I., has taken the date of the _Natalis
Invicti_. We need not linger over this feast, for it was not attended by
folk-customs, and there is nothing to connect it with modern survivals.
The Roman festivals that really count for our present purpose are the
Kalends of January and, probably, the _Saturnalia_. The influence of the
Kalends is strongest naturally in the Latin countries, but is found also
all over Europe. The influence of the _Saturnalia_ is less certain; the
festival is not mentioned in ecclesiastical condemnations after the
institution of Christmas, and possibly its popularity was not so
widespread as that of the Kalends. There are, however, some curiously
interesting Christmas parallels to its usages.

The strictly religious feast of the _Saturnalia_{8} was held on December
17, but the festal customs were kept up for seven days, thus lasting
until the day before our Christmas Eve. Among them was a fair called the
_sigillariorum celebritas_, for the sale of little images of clay or
paste which were given away as presents.[81] Candles seem also to have
been given away, perhaps |166| a