Christmas Creeps: Yule Cat

I don't mean to harp on the Christmas horrors that naughty Icelandic youth have been faced with for centuries, but I figured I would keep it all in the family!  (And we're not done quite yet.)  I mentioned the Yule Cat of Iceland last Thursday, it lives with the supreme Christmas Ogress, or female Troll, of all time Gryla, her third husband the 13 Yule Lads (you know, the kids...talk about still living with the parents!).  

In some versions of this rather horrid family story, the Yule Cat, or Jólkötturinn in Icelandic, this overgrown feline, who like it's ghastly mistress, eats naughty children; only we all know house cat like to play with their food--it doesn't leave much to the imagination to feel the horror any kid would feel being simply "toyed to death," knowing that you might or might not be eaten, but at least part of you is going to to be "present dumped" on Gryla's door step (or cave step actually).

Another much more popular version of the story has to do with farm workers.  This aspect of the story will be recognized by Harry Potter fans.  The threat of being eaten by the yule cat was levied over rural farm workers during the fall wool processing.  Workers who worked as hard as they needed to help the farm finish it's wool processing for the year would be presented to with new clothes--this had to be done before Christmas Eve--the ones who were seen as lazy received to no new clothes.  Truthfully, if this was an actual practice, surely such people would die a lonely death of exposure.  Read the Wikipedia entry on the Yule Cat click here.

Ma, Pa and the family pet!