Sailboat Charters Caribbean - Candles at Christmas - The Symbolism of Candles During the Holiday Season

Community over isolation, warmth over cold, candles have symbolized the triumph of light over darkness, since earliest times.

In many cultures throughout history people placed candles in their windows to welcome passing strangers into their homes where they could find food and a roof over their heads for the night. During Victorian times candles represented goodwill to folks who were down on their luck during the holiday season. Ancient Romans lit candles as a defense against evil and to entreat the sun to shine. Crude candles aided primitive peoples in creating artwork on cave walls deep beneath the Earth.

On that night no wayfarer was turned away, whom they believed wandered through the world in search of a place to stay; people put candles in their windows to guide the Christ child, during the Middle Ages. Who brought light into the world, candles symbolize Jesus, to Christians.

Candle holders didn't come into use until 1890. And families during Victorian times used pins or melted wax to attach candles to Christmas tree branches, during the Middle Ages people would light a large candle both at home and in church. Which guided the three wise men to Jesus' birthplace, candles also came to symbolize the Star of Bethlehem.

And Christians in some parts of India use clay oil-burning lamps, christians adorn their Christmas trees with lanterns, in China. Families light a candle above the door on Christmas Eve, in Spain.

Believing that they could predict tragic events, but some cultures have bestowed supernatural powers upon candles.

People believed that the Christmas candle dying before Midnight portended great disaster, in Scotland. Those who lived in the household would have misfortune for the coming year, if the candle went out before the day's end. Families would burn large candles on Christmas Day, instead of a Yule log, in England.

The first candle to burn out would foretell which one of them would be the first to die; danish families often lit a candle to symbolize the wife of the household and another to symbolize the husband.

Most likely because of the old Viking belief that during the winter solstice the dead rose to haunt the living, families would leave candles on the graves of their ancestors, in Scandinavian countries.

Dreary season, and beauty into what might otherwise be a cold, light, we do know that they bring a touch of warmth, although there has been no scientific study proving the ability of candles to tell the future.