[Durus]

When did "christmas" trees get co-opted into being a Christian tradition anyway?

[Arthalion]

Well, honestly, the winter tree is more of a European cultural tradition than a religious one. The exact manner of its association with Christianity is still debated, but it is clear that bringing trees indoors around the time of the winter solstice was common long before Christianity spread across the continent.

I saw an interesting theory once that examined the true origin of the tradition, and postulated that the winter tree may have originally had a very utilitarian purpose and that it didn't pick up any religious or cultural significance until later. What was that utility? They were history's first deodorizer. In ancient Europe, people bathed in streams and lakes, which meant that they didn't bathe at all during the winter when everything was either frozen or extremely cold. Since homes of that time were extremely small (a family of 7 or 8 could live in a single room 20x20 hovel), and because people generally didn't venture outside in winter, the odor in those homes would have been unbearable after a couple of months. Cutting a tree and dragging it indoors may have originally been nothing more than a way to make their homes smell better. Since winter solstice was one of the few wintertime social events that occurred in pre-Christian Europe, making your home smell better before a visit from guests would have quickly become a yearly tradition. It's easy to see how it would have acquired religious significance from that point on.

Unfortunately, nobody thought to write these things down back then, so all of this is little more than informed conjecture at this point. Still, the theory makes practical sense and it's a likely explanation.

The tree entered the home for practical reasons, and became a religious symbol because it continually happened around a pagan holiday. When Christians co-opted another pagan holiday and invented Christmas, it also inherited the solstice tree tradition from central and northern Europe. The evolution of the solstice tree to the Christmas Tree was inevitable, however it actually occurred.