Celebrated throughout Scandinavia and Italy, St. Lucia Day is
marked by girls in white dresses wearing candle-filled crowns
and bearing trays of baked-goods. How have I missed out on it
all these years? - Like most winter (and especially
Scandinavian) holidays, St. Lucia Day evokes the struggle
between light & dark, life & death. - First celebrated in Sweden
during the 18th Century, it spread throughout Scandinavia, faded
a bit, and then experienced a strong renewal during World War
II. For example, "In Denmark, the Day of Lucia (Luciadag) was
first celebrated on December 13, 1944. The tradition was
directly imported from Sweden by initiative of Franz Wend,
secretary of Föreningen Norden, as an attempt 'to bring light in
a time of darkness'. Implicitly it was meant as a passive
protest against German occupation during the Second World War
but it has been a tradition ever since." (Thanks, Wikipedia.)
The same holds true even for countries with a longer St. Lucia
tradition. - Early on the morning of December 13