Historic talk: a Tudor Christmas by Alison Weir and Siobhan Clarke

We might assume that our modern Christmas owes much to the Victorians. In fact, as Alison Weir and Siobhan Clarke reveal, many of our favourite Christmas traditions date back much further.

Carol-singing, present-giving, mulled wine and mince pies were all just as popular in Tudor times, and even Father Christmas and roast turkey dinners have their origins in this period.

The Tudor Christmas was a time of feasting, revelry and merrymaking, a twelve-day-long festival, over which the Lord of Misrule held sway, and convention was thrown to the winds.

Christmas was so beloved by English people that its traditions survived remarkably unchanged in this age of tumultuous religious upheaval.