In Ireland, women celebrate their own "Christmas" in January
Nollaig na mBan is an old tradition from the country's south that modern women have turned into a day to celebrate their labor during the holidays.
Christmas isn’t everyone’s favorite holiday in Ireland. For Tracey Groome, a 48-year-old deputy principal who lives in Kildorrey in County Cork, the highlight of the season is Nollaig na mBan (pronounced "Null-ig na Mahn"), also known as Women’s Christmas, Little Christmas or Little Women’s Christmas. It’s “the night that I get to really relax because there’s no pressure on me,” says Groome. On Nollaig na mBan, gender roles reverse and it’s a day for women to rest. The holiday, which is an Irish folk tradition, falls on January 6th, the twelfth and final day of Christmas and the Feast of Epiphany, when Catholics commemorate the visit of the three wise men.
This year, Nollaig na mBan falls on a Tuesday so Groome plans to celebrate with friends on Saturday January 3rd, before the busyness of the work week and school begins.
For Groome, who works full time in addition to mothering a 15-year-old and twin 12-year-olds, Christmas is a stressful period. Women often carry the emotional load of buying presents, decorating the house and cooking special meals, among other tasks. Once all the work of Christmas is done, Nollaig na mBan offers women a reprieve: a day (and night) to let loose and celebrate themselves.
The origins of Nollaig na mBan
It’s unclear when or how the tradition began. Nollaig na mBan is “really difficult to trace for sure," says Dr. Marion McGarry via email, a researcher and author on Irish customs and history. Generations of Irish women passed the tradition down orally. From at least the late 19th century, Irish women celebrated Nollaig na mBan, according to McGarry, particularly in Counties Kerry and Cork, both in the island’s southernmost province of Munster. “In Cork City, they would say the only man out in the city on Women’s Christmas was the bishop,” says Groome.
Although Ireland is a small country, there are diverse cultural practices in different regions, notes Mary McAuliffe, a historian and the Director of Gender Studies at University College Dublin. Nollaig na mBan remained unknown for many years in other parts of Ireland, localized to the southwest.
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Early celebrations of Nollaig na mBan were unpretentious, as most things were. “It was quite simply a gathering of female friends” says McGarry via email, who notes that a role reversal of the household chores, “which were carried out by the males of the house on that day,” is critical to the tradition. To relax and rest, women often gathered with their female friends, gossiping at a friend’s house, enjoying tea, a scone, sherry or Christmas cake, while others headed to a pub or restaurant.
McAuliffe was born in Kerry and grew up celebrating Nollaig na mBan. In her family, on the holiday there was a small dinner, and the women sat down and had a glass of wine and some treats. “This was a[n] . . . acknowledgement of all the work [the women] had put in through the Christmas period, and this was their Christmas dinner,” says McAuliffe. The Christmas decorations always came down the following day. (“The men and boys of the house can do that, and all the other chores like vacuuming and dusting too,” McGarry jokingly adds via email.)
Groome’s father owned a pub, The Clodagh, in County Tipperary, where she grew up. (Groome moved to Cork for college when she was 18.) On Nollaig na mBan, her father cooked dinner and cared for the kids. Groome also recalls that the men left the pub early and headed home. “Women’s Christmas was the night that there would be no man in the pub,” she says, an unusual scene in Ireland where men predominantly filled the pubs until the late 1970s. A female-only holiday was an anomaly, notes Groome, especially in rural Ireland where traditional gendered roles dominated. “I think this quaint looking Irish tradition was quite feminist really in its own way,” says McGarry via email. Nollaig na mBan acknowledged women’s labor and even rewarded women for it, even if just for one day.
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The (temporary) reversal of gender roles
By the mid-20th century, the holiday largely died out. McGarry it was less popular during her mother’s time, but that prior generations in her family celebrated. When McAuliffe first moved to Dublin in the 1990s as a student, no one knew about it, she says. In the last 20 years, a new generation discovered, or rediscovered, Nollaig na mBan, according to McAuliffe, who says it’s now celebrated nationally. “It’s pretty much written into the calendar,” she says.
Since the holiday’s inception, like in most parts of the world, gender roles have significantly changed: many more women work outside the home and many more men are involved with childcare. “It is a little bit outdated and we're all aware of that,” says 24-year-old Vivienne Sayers, who was born in Cork and who now promotes Irish language and culture on social media where a quarter of a million people follow her. “So now we're adapting it now to our more contemporary ideals of, ‘let's just have it as a day to partake and enjoy ourselves and celebrate women’.”
It’s an inclusive celebration, notes McAuliffe. “Young women, older women, married, single, straight, gay, trans all celebrate,” she says. In its essence, Nollaig na mBan is about women supporting women, celebrating women’s contributions and female friendships, says McAuliffe, Groome and Sayers. “We are claiming [the holiday] more as part of our identity and because of this resurgence now in Irish culture and language,” Sayers adds who shared a short video about Nollaig na mBan on Instagram in January last year, which over 18 thousand people liked.
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A night out to celebrate
This year, pubs and restaurants in Ireland will be filled with women celebrating on January 6th, but that’s not the only way women will mark the day. “What I love about [Nollaig na mBan] is that it's not only a day to go out and go to the spa, enjoy yourself, but it's also used as a day to raise awareness,” Sayers adds. Women participate in poetry events, lunches, and sea swims to fundraise for charities like Women’s Aid and many, like the National Women’s Council, also use the day to bring awareness to important issues affecting women like domestic violence and childcare policies.
Groome will trade her housework for a visit to her hairdresser. Along with 39 female friends, she will head to a female-owned restaurant, Thatch and Thyme, to enjoy local Irish food and dishes like creamy burrata, slow-cooked angus short rib and a white chocolate and raspberry meringue roulade. “It feels like a uniquely Irish tradition and it’s particularly strong here in Cork, which makes it even more special,” says Joanne McEldowney, the owner of The Thatch and Thyme, via email. The restaurant usually serves breakfast and lunch, but it has opened its door in the evenings to serve women celebrating dinner since it opened in 2013. "It's a part of our heritage that we wouldn't like to lose.”
All the women will be dressed up. “Gold sparkle, head-to-toe dresses, kind of what you might wear to the Oscars,” says Groome. After their meal, the ladies will head to a local pub, Ollie’s or Walshes, where their first drink will be free. The ladies will drink and dance at the pub disco that Groome says “is like a nightclub” into the early hours of the morning. “I love the dancing, and the fooling, and the messing, because I think that’s not what I do any other time of the year,” says Groome. When their feet hurt, the music stops or the pub stops serving alcohol, Groome says with a smile, the group of ladies will call some of the husbands for rides home.
