What Is Epiphany And When Is Twelfth Night?

Well Christmas has come and gone for yet another year. We have also celebrated a new year but Christmas doesn’t end when the decorations come down!

Epiphany or The Feast of the Three Kings is a Christian feast day celebrated each year on the 6 January. The Church of England says Twelfth Night is 12 days after Christmas Day, which means Twelfth Night would fall on 5 January.

Epiphany is the day that the three kings (or wise men) visited Jesus in Bethlehem, after following a bright star, and presented their gifts to the baby Jesus of gold (to symbolise his royal birth), frankincense (to represent his divine birth) and myrrh (to recognise his mortality).

In some countries Epiphany is a national holiday but not in the UK. All through history it has been a time of fun, feasting and celebration.

The 12 days of Christmas is the period in Christian theology that marks the time between the birth of Christ and the coming of the Magi or the three wise men.

It begins on 25 December (Christmas) and runs through to 6 January (the Epiphany, sometimes also called Three Kings' Day). Christmas Day is considered the first day of Christmas, so the Epiphany is on 6 January, meaning that the Twelfth Night is the night before on 5 January each year.

The word Epiphany comes from the Greek, meaning “manifestation or to reveal”, in this case the manifestation of Christ to the Magi (Three Kings).

Twelfth Night

However, today we mainly refer to Twelfth Night as the end of Christmas and the day when traditionally the decorations should be taken down for another year.

Some people believe that you will have bad luck all year if the decorations are left up beyond Twelfth Night or Epiphany.

So Twelfth Night (5 January) is the time to take down your tree and decorations and pack then away in the loft, cellar or garage for another year. How amazing is it that the decorations are a joy to put up but somehow a chore to take down.

It was the tradition in medieval times right up to the 19th century to celebrate Christmas for 12 days and so 5 January (Twelfth Night) was just as important a day to celebrate as Christmas Day is to us today.

Shakespeare's play Twelfth Night (or What You Will) has an association with feasting and merriment. It is thought that it was performed on Twelfth Night in Tudor times as a fitting end to the Christmas season.

The Victorians are believed to have started the tradition of taking down decorations and Christmas trees so that everybody could return to work after the festivities.

Epiphany Eve/Candlemas

Twelfth Night is also known as Epiphany Eve, which is the end of the traditional Christmas celebrations, but some people do chose to leave them up until Candlemas.

Candlemas is on 2 February, 40 days after Christmas. This is the time when Mary and Joseph took the baby Jesus to be presented at the Temple in Jerusalem. This is an important day in some Orthodox and Catholic churches even today. It gets it's name from the fact that the candles are blessed at the service and then given out to the people, or used in the church all year.

Candlemas is a Christian holiday, but had its roots in pagan times when it was the festival of light.

In Spanish speaking countries Candlemas is also known as Candelaria.

During a Candlemas service the candles are blessed for use during the year and some are given out to the people to use in their own homes.

Many Christians observe Candlemas by putting lighted candles in their windows, but it is not a public holiday in lots of countries.

Candles are often lit during Candlemas to symbolise Jesus as the ‘light of the world’.

So when the Christmas festivities are over for yet another year, most of us will be back at work, even though some of us are now working part of the time from home.

So don't forget to recycle the tree and cards and pack away the decorations until next Christmas, which hopefully will again be a great time for celebration.

Candlemas Bells

So after Christmas and New Year what is there to look forward to?

Well after the cold and dreary days of winter the first flowers to appear in the garden are the delicate snowdrops, which are often known as Candlemas Bells. This is because they bloom early in the year and emerge even through the frozen soil from January and flower until late-February.

It is very easy to see the appeal of snowdrops as they show us that spring is round the corner and appear when other bulbs are still lying dormant in the ground.

There is a lot of symbolism surrounding snowdrops. They can mean purity, innocence and sympathy.