Mistletoe: the Christmas tradition we show no sign of kissing goodbye to
The plant has been treasured for millennia, celebrated in mythology and is now the basis of a booming seasonal business
It’s not the holidays without Nat King Cole’s 1946 hit The Christmas Song blasting from your radio as you go to pick up your tree, and nowadays, that song might also remind you to pick up some mistletoe.
The strange tradition of kissing beneath mistletoe has withstood the test of time. The 19th-century American author Washington Irving wrote about the practice in one of his books, saying: “The mistletoe is still hung up in farm-houses and kitchens at Christmas,” documenting the ritual. “The young men have the privilege of kissing the girls under it, plucking each time a berry from the bush. When the berries are all plucked, the privilege ceases.”