Fun fact about mistletoe: In Norse mythology, it was a symbol of peace and friendship, and the plant has been used medicinally in Europe for centuries when treating epilepsy, infertility, hypertension, and arthritis.
just as much as the next eggnog-guzzling nut, but we're hitting pause on the festivities to find out why being urged to kiss someone ifis a thing. Tiny as it might be, the plant has a layered history chronicled in legends from Norse, Greek, Roman, Christian, and Druidic mythology — many of which have contributed to the blossoming of this sometimes awkward Yuletide ritual.
"Due to the links with sex, it doesn’t take too much imagination to see how a kissing tradition has grown up around the plant," says, director of the Museum of British Folklore and the Museum of Witchcraft and Magic. To the Celts, he explains, mistletoe berries were known as the semen of the thunder god while ancient Greeks referred to them as oak sperm. In the Middle Ages, decorations called kissing boughs were made from holly-covered hoops with a sprig of mistletoe tied below.
But the mistletoe is far more than the decorative fixture it's become known as today and can actually be extraordinarily powerful depending on where you get it from. There are over 1,500 species of mistletoe, some of which are toxic and can cause blurred vision, vomiting, and even cardiac arrest . In Norse mythology, it was a symbol of peace and friendship, and the plant has been used medicinally in Europe for centuries when treating epilepsy,, hypertension, and arthritis.
The varied meaning and functions of the mistletoe explain why you can find it crawling along the border of a
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