The History of Christmas Traditions in Rauma
Uutinen
Text: Hanna-Leena Salminen, Museum Curator, Rauma Cultural and Museum Services, Rauma resident since 2010
Pictures: Rauman museum
Christmas Calendar Windows in Old Rauma
The Old Rauma Association has been organizing Christmas calendar windows with Old Rauma residents for several years now. The calendar windows, freely designed by residents, gives you something to look at throughout the countdown to Christmas during the darkest season. A stroll through the idyllic lanes and alleys of Old Rauma with the Calendar windows in mind, is a refreshing experience for the mind and body. During your walk, you can enjoy a coffee or a good meal in one of Old Rauma’s charming cafés or restaurants.
Christmas lights and Christmas in the shops
When were the first Christmas lights switched on in Rauma? If anyone has any information, please let the museum know. The museum’s collections include one photo of a Christmas tree lit up in the market square, but the exact age of the photo is not known. It is probably from the 1930s, as the word “museum”, which was removed from the façade of the Old Town Hall in 1941, can still be seen in this picture. The current Christmas lights overlooking Kauppakatu and Kuninkaankatu have been in use for over the past 20 years..
The shops have always invested in the Christmas season by decorating the stores and shop windows with various decorations, and the same continues today, with plenty to see for children and adults alike.
years ago.
Small Christmas
Before the current, perhaps a bit boisterous, Christmas parties (pikkujoulu in finnish) organized before Christmas in the workplaces or among friends, people used to celebrate a small Christmas party with family and friends. According to memoirs, a little Christmas might also have included bringing home a small Christmas tree, well before the actual Christmas season. Are you familiar with this tradition??
The most beautiful Christmas carols
The Church of the Holy Cross, built in late medieval times, provides a magnificent setting for the Most Beautiful Christmas Carols event. Events are also held elsewhere in Rauma in the weeks leading up to Christmas, but at the Church of the Holy Cross you can sing along while admiring the fine decorative paintings and medieval altarpiece, among other things, of this stone church, originally built as a Franciscan convent church. Located across the Rauma River, next to Old Rauma, the church is a wonderful attraction and is open daily all year round.
The declaration of Christmas Peace
Did you think that Turku was the only place where Christmas peace was declared? This is not the case, but Christmas peace has been declared in other old Finnish towns also, including Rauma of course.
Everyone in Finland is familiar with Turku’s declaration of Christmas peace, which has been broadcast throughout the country, first by radio and later by television, since 1935. For many people, the Turku Christmas Peace declaration is the one and only. The majority of people in Rauma probably disagree.
Indeed, Rauma has a long tradition of proclaiming its own Christmas peace, and the declaration is still being read out from the old town hall on Christmas Eve. The current Rauma declaration dates back to 1919, and this latest one is more of a wish for a Merry Christmas than the older versions, in which the list of rules governing behaviour during the festive season and the penalties for breaking them played a major role.
The Rauma Register Office archives have the oldest written declaration of Christmas peace in Finland. The document bears the date 1776, but it is likely that the declaration, written on rag paper, is even older, perhaps dating back to the mid-17th century.
There have not been many occasions when the Christmas Peace has not been declared in Turku. The only time after the start of radio broadcasting the declaration nationwide was not declared, was after the outbreak of the Winter War, in 1939. The fact that a declaration of Christmas peace was broadcast from Rauma during the Second World War in 1943 when Turku was under threat of bombings, is a very good quiz question.
Although the declaration of Christmas Peace still reflects the Christian background of the tradition, everyone can draw important ideals from it, which are summed up in the final wish for ‘peace on earth and goodwill towards others’.
Lanterns along the Rauma River
One of the traditions of Christmas Eve in Rauma is the lighting of lanterns along the Rauma River by the Old Rauma Association and the residents of Old Rauma. As Christmas Eve fades, the lanterns bring atmosphere to the narrow riverbank.
St. Knut´s day traditions
In Western Finland, especially in Satakunta and Vakka-Finland, the old traditions of the St. Knuts Day (Nuutin päivä) are linked to the end of the Christmas season. Traditionally, the Christmas period has begun with St. Thomas’ Day on 21 December and ended with St Knut´s Day, nowadays on the 13th January. As the old saying goes, “Good Tuomas brings Christmas – bad Knut takes it away”. Originally young men, dressed up as actual goats went around the villages and towns visiting houses.
It became a children’s tradition after the Second World War, and today it resembles the Easter tradition of the Eastern Finland. Children go around the neighborhood dressed in costumes. At first they ask if they can come – if they do, they can sing a song or recite a short poem and then get a treat in the form of sweets or other goodies. In some municipalities, there are still Nuutti Day events for both “nuuttipukki” and, later in the evening, Nuutti dances for the older crowd. As someone who moved to Rauma from Pirkanmaa, I was surprised by the Nuuttipukki tradition, and I still have to apologise to Spiderman and Princess, who had to leave my house with some rather stale Christmas candy more than 10 years ago. Since then, of course, my preparations have been better.
