page_title: Saint Lucy's Day
section_title: Sweden
hierarchical_section_title: Saint Lucy's Day / Celebration / In the Nordic countries / Sweden
caption_attribution_description: Depicted place: Västergötland, Bjärke hd, Lagmansered, Koberg (Sverige (SE)) Svenska: Luciafirande på Koberg i Västergötland 1848. Akvarell av Fritz von Dardel.
context_page_description: Saint Lucy's Day, also called Lucia Day or the feast of Saint Lucy, is a Christian feast day observed on 13 December. The observance commemorates Lucia of Syracuse, an early-4th-century martyr under the Diocletianic Persecution, who according to legend brought food and aid to Christians hiding in the Roman catacombs, wearing a candlelit wreath on her head to light her way and leave her hands free to carry as much food as possible. Her feast day, which coincided with the shortest day of the year prior to calendar reforms, is widely celebrated as a festival of light. Falling within the Advent season, Saint Lucy's Day is viewed as a precursor of Christmastide, pointing to the arrival of the Light of Christ in the calendar on Christmas Day.
  Saint Lucy's Day is celebrated most widely in Scandinavia and in Italy, with each emphasising a different aspect of her story. In Scandinavia, where Lucy is called Santa Lucia in Norwegian and Danish and Sankta Lucia in Swedish, she is represented as a lady in a white dress symbolizing a baptismal robe and a red sash symbolizing the blood of her martyrdom, with a crown or wreath of candles on her head.
context_section_description: The Swedish lyrics to the Neapolitan song Santa Lucia have traditionally been either Natten går tunga fjät (The Night steps heavily) or Sankta Lucia, ljusklara hägring (Saint Lucy, bright mirage). There is also a modern version with simpler lyrics for children: Ute är mörkt och kallt (Outside, it's dark and cold).
  Although St. Lucy's Day is not an official holiday in Sweden, it is a popular occasion in Sweden. At many universities, students hold big formal dinner parties since this is the last chance to celebrate together before most students go home to their families for Christmas.
  The modern tradition of having public processions in the Swedish cities started in 1927 when a newspaper in Stockholm elected an official Lucy for Stockholm that year. The initiative was then followed around the country through the local press. Today most cities in Sweden appoint a Lucy every year. Schools elect a Lucy and her maids among the students and a national Lucy is elected on national television from regional winners. The regional Lucies will visit shopping malls, old people's homes and churches, singing and handing out gingernut cookies (pepparkakor). Guinness World Records has noted the Lucy procession in Ericsson Globe in Stockholm as the largest in the world, with 1200 participants from Adolf Fredrik's Music School, Stockholms Musikgymnasium and Stockholmläns Blåsarsymfoniker.
  Boys take part in the procession, playing different roles associated with Christmas. Some may be dressed in the same kind of white robe, but with a cone-shaped hat decorated with golden stars, called stjärngossar (star boys); some may be dressed up as "tomtenissar" (Santa's elves), carrying lanterns; and some may be dressed up as gingerbread men. They participate in the singing and also have a song or two of their own, usually Staffan Stalledräng, which tells the story about Saint Stephen, the first Christian martyr, caring for his five horses.
  Some trace the "re-birth" of the Lucy celebrations in Sweden to the tradition in German Protestant families of having girls dressed as angelic Christ children, handing out Christmas presents. The Swedish variant of this white-dressed Kindchen Jesus, or Christkind, was called Kinken Jes, and started to appear in upper-class families in the 18th century on Christmas Eve with a candle-wreath in her hair, handing out candy and cakes to the children. Another theory claims that the Lucy celebration evolved from old Swedish traditions of “star boys” and white-dressed angels singing Christmas carols at different events during Advent and Christmas. In either case, the current tradition of having a white-dressed woman with candles in her hair appearing on the morning of the Lucy Day started in the area around Vänern in the late 18th century and spread slowly to other parts of the country during the 19th century.
  A special baked bun, Lussekatt (St. Lucy Bun), made with saffron and in use as early as November, is a very popular Christmas tradition.
  Since 2008 there has been some controversy over males as Lucy, with one male who was elected Lucy at a high school being blocked from performing, and another performing together with a female. In another case a six-year-old boy was not allowed to appear with a Lucy crown because the school said it couldn't guarantee his safety.
caption: Saint Lucy's Day 1848 by Fritz von Dardel.
exif: {"Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS3 Macintosh", "Image DateTime": "2010:11:18 22:32:27", "Image Artist": "Nordiska museet", "Image Copyright": "No known copyright restrictions", "Image ExifOffset": "236", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "374", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "8214", "EXIF ColorSpace": "Uncalibrated", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "1500", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1556"}