We find such sports as "Hunting the Wren," "Hunting the squirrel," and "Hunting the lamb" prevailing towards the close of the winter season in many parts of Britain. Waldron, in his account of the first-mentioned pastime as it was carried out in his day in the Isle of Man, tells us that formerly it had been generally observed on December 24, though this was transferred to St. Stephen's Day (December 26). The current legend ran that a fairy of unusual beauty had lured numerous men of the island into the sea, but that a certain hero had laid a trap for her, to avoid which she took the form of a wren. The powers that be, however, ordained that she must assume this form on the same day annually. This placed her for a day in the power of the male inhabitants of the island, who, incensed by her treatment of their sex, vowed to avenge the same, and pursued her without mercy. When captured, the wren was placed on the end of a long pole with its wings extended, and after being carried in procession, was solemnly buried in the churchyard to the accompaniment of funeral dirges. By Waldron's time, we are told, the observance had fallen into the hands of boys alone.
Hardwicke says that the wren was believed by the Manx fishermen to be a sea-spirit which haunted the "herring track," and he observes that many of them refused to go to sea unless a dead wren was placed aboard the vessel, as its presence there would protect them from storms. In Ireland the bird was also hunted at Christmas, and a catch was sung describing it as "the king of all birds." To kill a wren in some parts of France was regarded as a crime which might "bring down the lightning," and the same held good in Lowland Scotland, where a popular rhyme called down curses on those who robbed the bird or chased it :-
Malisons, malisons, mair than ten
That harry the Lady's of Heaven's hen,
and the same holds good of English practice, for the most part. In Essex, however, wrens were formerly chased by boys and killed, and carried in procession to the following chant :-
The wren, the wren, the king of the birds
St. Stephen's Day was killed in the furze;
Although he be little his honour is great,
And so, good people, pray give us a treat.
But in one part of France the youth who killed the wren was dubbed "King," and this brings us back to the theory of certain scholars who have especially studied Hellenic games, that these were in some manner associated with the divine kingship and its ritual, that the victors at the games "were the successors of kings who became kings as the result of success in a ritual contest." Whatever we may think of the soundness of this view, we may at least see in the killing of the wren the last remnant of a Celtic rite, for the bird was certainly sacred to the Druidic Celts because of the alleged ominous character of its song. Canon MacCulloch seems to suspect that it may have been a totemic animal, and that it was carried round the community to obtain its divine influence, and was then eaten ceremonially and buried. According to Manx belief, as we have seen, the wren may have been regarded as a spirit of nature protective of man against the forces of the winter, storms, and tempests. It may thus have had a solar connection, as the robin certainly appears to have had, and its dead body may have been considered as a species of solar talisman emanating solar virtues.
Myth and Ritual in Dance, Game, and Rhyme. Lewis Spence. pp 44-45.
