Christmas Bells: A Special Guest Post by Tracey Warr, Author of Love's Knife (Trobairitz Sleuth Book 1) #HistoryWritersAdvent24

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1093. The music of murder. Beatriz de Farrera is a trobairitz (a female troubadour) at the court of Toulouse. She sings of love but intends to evade marriage and romantic entanglements.

Christmas Bells

One Christmas morning, my eight-year-old daughter ran to tell me she had heard Father Christmas’ sleigh bells in the night. Her bedroom backed onto the garden. We went into the garden to investigate and found Father Christmas’ elves had left her a note and present tied to the shed door, where we kept our rabbit and guinea-pig hutch, thanking her for looking after her animals so well. I guessed it was my neighbour, a keen animal rights campaigner, who had left the note and run up and down the garden with bells in the night, but that knowledge didn’t disperse the magic.

Bells are associated with Christmas, appearing on Christmas cards and Christmas trees. They are rung by carol singers and peal for the Christmas Eve midnight service. 

In December 1965, astronauts Tom Stafford and Wally Schirra, were orbiting the Earth, when they claimed to have spotted an unidentified flying object. 

‘We have an object, looks like a satellite going from north to south, probably in a polar orbit,’ Stafford told Mission Control in Houston, Texas. ‘Stand by one; it looks like he’s trying to signal us.’

The astronauts then played Jingle Bells with Schirra on harmonica and Stafford on bells. 

Mission Control responded, ‘You’re too much Gemini 6.’

Here is a medieval version of Jingle Bells for you to listen to. (The song was written in 1850 originally for Thanksgiving but became associated with Christmas.)

Jingle Bells (Medieval Style, Bardcore)

 

My historical novels are set in medieval Europe, so I investigated the significance of bells for medieval Christmas, especially in the area of southern France where I live. The nearby town of Castres has a famous carillon of 34 bells that are played at Christmas. 

A carillon is a large number of bells played from a keyboard. You can hear the bells and see the bellplayers in action in this video (in French).

Castres, Christmas carillon

Early civilisations, such as Babylon, Egypt, Greece, and Rome, used bells. Early Christians were called to worship with wooden clackers or trumpets but by the 6th century handbells, such as the clochette from Montauban in were in use. 

Church tower bells and the first large bells appeared from the 7th century on. Bell towers were often free-standing, such as this one dating to the 15th century at the village of Brousse-le-Chateau in the Tarn Valley in France. Visiting this village was the very first inspiration for me for writing historical fiction.

During a writing residency in the Catalan Pyrenees, I visited medieval gravestones in the village of Tirveu, including one for a bellmaker.

 The 9th-century iron bell above the black Madonna in the church at Rocamadour is said to ring on its own when somewhere in the world the Virgin performs a miracle. Many of these miracles are linked to sailors in peril at sea. A stone plaque on the wall lists fifteen years between 1385 and 1617 when the bell rang without human intervention.

New bells are often blessed, washed with holy water and might have godparents like a baptism. They have names and are often engraved and decorated. They have also been punished when they failed to magically sound an alarm. They were supposed to ring of their own accord in danger. If they didn’t ring, they were taken down and filled with thorns.

Bells have been prisoners of war. During the Muslim-Christian battles of the tenth century, bells as emblems of Christian culture were targeted in attacks and collected as trophies. In 997 the Cordoban ruler al-Mansūr sacked the town and shrine of Santiago de Compostela, razed the pilgrimage church, and took the bells to Córdoba. These bells were returned to Santiago in 1236 when Fernando III conquered Córdoba. 

Bell founders are known as saintiers in France and large bells, with their deep notes, are called bourdons. Bell casting was carried out by monasteries, and then by itinerant lay founders. Bell casting was often carried out on site. These bellmakers were skilled specialists and the skill was often handed down in families across generations. Bellmaking families in France have included the Farniers, the Drouots, the Cochois, and the Bollées. York Minster has a set of stained-glass windows depicting the founding of its bells. 

Happy Christmas! Listen out for Christmas bells where you are.

My latest novel Love’s Knife (Image 7) is Christmas-free since the action takes place January-September 1093. Nevertheless, it makes a great Christmas present or a book for you to curl up with over the winter holidays. A murder occurs in the wine cellar. Can you figure out, along with my medieval sleuth, Beatriz, who the murderer is and why they did it?

Tracey Warr

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About the Author

Tracey Warr was born in London and lives in a tiny medieval house in southern France, where she is surrounded by spectacular castles, such as Najac and Penne, and fascinating stories about their medieval occupants. She has published six historical novels. She draws on archeological sites, old maps, chronicles, poems and museum objects to create fictional worlds for her readers to step into. Before becoming a full-time writer, she worked as a contemporary art curator and art history academic. Her France-based novels are focused on the La Marche family in The Viking Hostage – 10th century and Almodis the Peaceweaver – 11th century. Her latest novel, Love’s Knife, is the first in the Trobairitz Sleuth series featuring a female troubadour and another woman descended from the La Marches – Philippa of Toulouse, who married Duke Guillaume IX of Aquitaine, the troubadour duke. Tracey Warr’s Conquest trilogy centres on the turbulent life of the Welsh noblewoman, Nest ferch Rhys, during the Norman conquest. Find out more at Tracy's website https://meandabooks.com  and Twitter @TraceyWarr1