Since it's Christmas time, I've delved into the myths and misconceptions we have about this holiday: Misinformation about yuletide is rampant, and I'm setting the record straight. Last week I was digging Who is Santa Claus really?with side quests about St. Nicholas raising children from the dead and a religious war between Santa and Kris Kringle. One thing I didn't talk about? His elves.
Christmas elves seem like they've always been around, and people have surprisingly consistent ideas about what they are – they're small, they wear green, they make toys out of some innate magical compulsion, they love shelves – but this species of elf is a recent invention; “Real” elves were often anything but cheerful little pieceworkers. The millennia-long transition of elves from supernatural nightmare creatures to friendly factory workers is a cultural Rorschach test of Western culture's changing attitudes toward work, wealth, and what it means to be a “contributing” member of society.
Dark elves of the past
To understand how we arrived at our current vision of elves, you'll have to rewind past Will Ferrell's cars, Christmas offerings and Victorian holiday bauble, into the colder heart of Western culture – an old, strange world populated by supernatural forces, and elves weren't creatures you'd ever want to spy on your kids.
The early origins of elves cannot be precisely determined because the idea of ​​elves predates the written word. Magical humanoid races have been mentioned in the mythology and oral traditions of cultures around the world; but elves in particular were a common feature in Scandinavian and Germanic folklore. This variety of elves (usually) looked more like Legolas than Hermy from Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer –human-sized and magical, although sometimes mischievous.
However, elves in Anglo-Saxon England were assholes. Old English medical texts attributed various diseases to the elves. If you felt sharp, unexplained pain, it was probably the result of “elven shot– an elf who shoots an invisible arrow at you. Elves were also associated with witchcraftnightmares and mental disorders.
Various elven misdeeds
The elves did all sorts of bad things. Anyway, sort of: the names and actions of elves, fairies, hobs and other creatures were mostly interchangeable and regional, so it's hard to attribute anything specifically to elves (it could have been a nixie or a brownie, after all).
In the Middle Ages, elves/fairies/other little wizards stole babies from people, replacing them changelings— sick impostors remained in the man’s place. They can curse your livestock, spoil your milk, or lead travelers astray in the forest. Elves were blamed for the sudden deaths of infants or in cases where children developed unexplained illnesses. “elven castle“there was a particularly nasty mischief where the elves would tangle your hair into impossible knots while you slept – bastards! In other words, these were not the kind of people who would help make toys. stranger– creatures that operate by rules that humans cannot understand and that they certainly cannot trust – and they are not created for entertainment or for children. They were deadly serious and considered very real.
The emergence of transitional elf helpers
So how did we go from disease-causing, child-stealing nightmare creatures to Santa's personal toy-making proletariat? During the medieval and early modern period in Britain there was widespread belief in what I call “transitional elves”. These were household spirits that came out at night to do housework while families slept. Useful, of course, but these elves were fickle and easily offended. They would leave forever if they felt insulted or used. You couldn't even do anything good for them – if you sewed clothes for them, they may decide to leave forevershouting, “Give Brownie a coat, give Brownie a sark, You won't get anything more from Brownie.”
These “au pair” folk beliefs often portray elves as artisans, which brings them one step closer to toy makers. These stories formed the basis of the text that gave rise to The Christmas Elves: the Brothers Grimm fairy tale “The Elves and the Shoemaker.” In this story, the shoemaker has his last piece of leather left, but he wakes up and finds a pair of shoes made by elves. He sells them and continues to receive free labor to make shoes until he becomes rich. He then makes the fatal mistake of rewarding his unpaid workers with their own clothes and shoes. The elves are so impressed by their stylish new outfits that they leave for good, apparently because they now consider themselves too good for the working class life. Moral: Don't treat your employees too well or they will think they are your equal.
What are your thoughts so far?
How elves became associated with Christmas
Along with creating much of Santa's mythology, Clement Clarke Moore's 1823 poem “Visit of Saint Nicholas(better known as The Night Before Christmas) described Santa Claus himself as “a real jolly old elf.” This line laid the foundation for the association of elves with Christmas. An 1857 poem entitled “Miracles of Santa ClausThe poem states that Santa “puts many elves to work” making “a million beautiful things” such as “cakes and sugar plums and toys.”
Reflecting the Industrial Revolution that took place far from the North Pole, elves were not house spirits helping one family, but a labor force producing toys en masse in a factory. And what can be seen as an expression of sentimental Victorian ideas about class, elves loved working in a sweatshop; this is what they are born for!
Here's the first photo of Santa's Workshop from Lady Godey's Book in 1873. At the time, Godey's book had a huge circulation in the United States, and this image cemented the modern idea of ​​Santa's Workshop.
Credit: Public Domain
Modern Christmas elves
1964 Rankin/Bass TV Special Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer put the finishing touches on the lore of the Christmas elves with a deeper look into how the North Pole workshop works. Perhaps prompted by growing cultural anxieties about modernization and capitalism, Santa's workshop in Rudolf replete with vicious internal policies, forced conformity, employees whose dreams and ambitions are dashed (He just wanted to be dentistSanta!), and a boss who is completely disconnected from his employees. The only major innovation in elf lore since Rudolph is Elf on the Shelf, but he's a damn snitch so we won't talk about him.
The next time you see a green-suited helper in a Christmas movie, remember that the jolly little toymaker was cobbled together from medieval folklore, German fairy tales and 19th-century magazine illustrations, and shaped by the rise of industrialization. The modern elf is the domesticated, purified, capitalist-approved descendant of the supernatural beings who stole children, drove people mad, and shot invisible arrows at your ancestors. Merry Christmas!
