Wassailing a celebration of Dorset’s cider making tradition...
Hundreds of people gathered to bless the apple orchards at Purbeck Cider Farm this winter - in a magical, ancient Wassailing ceremony.
Last year’s wet spring and unsettled summer were certainly not great for apple growing, with national production down by around 40 percent. So the team at Purbeck Cider Farm are hoping this year’s Wassailing may help bring in a better harvest for 2025!
Here’s visit Purbeck guide to Wassailing in Dorset…
Wassailing in Dorset - a history
The word ‘wassail’ comes from the Saxon, ‘Waes Hael’, which means ‘Good Health’. It was a toast commonly associated with the new year. The wassail was traditionally held on Twelfth Night, which marks the end of the Christmas feasting. People would drink from a large communal wassail bowl, filled with hot wine, cider or beer. Many other rituals, some pagan, are associated with the wassail including mumming – a symbolic play with mask wearing actors.
Wassailing and the apple orchard…
Wassailing the apple tree is documented from the 14th century but is believed to date back much earlier. Local villagers and farm workers would visit the orchards on Twelfth Night, banging pots and pans and singing loudly to scare off evil spirits. Then they would ask the trees for a good harvest in the coming year, and some of the wassail drink would be poured on the roots of the trees. The custom continued into the beginning of the nineteenth century and, in some places, beyond that.
Wassailing in Dorset - at Purbeck Cider Farm
In 2022, Joe and Kate Hartle, who stated Purbeck Cider Farm, re- introduced the Wassailing ceremony as an annual event on their farm near Corfe Caste. The traditional event proved popular with locals and 2025 saw their best attended Wassail yet!
The evening starts off with entertainment from local music and dance groups in the barn. This is followed by a Purbeck Mummers play, dating from the Middle Ages age, with symbolism of death and resurrection.
The crowds of spectators are then led out, in a torchlit procession to the apple orchards. Crowds gather around one of the oldest trees in the orchard, decorated with 12 candles, one to symbolise each month of the year. Cider from last year’s harvest is poured around its roots as a blessing to the tree. A shotgun is fired into the air to scare away any evil spirits followed by the singing of a wassail song to the health of the apple trees, and loud cries of ‘Wassail!’ The crowd are asked to make as much noise as possible to ensure that all bad spirits are driven out of the orchard.
Dorset’s cider origins
The first recorded reference to cider was 55 B.C when the Roman Empire found the local celts of Britain drinking a cider-like drink. Soon enough, cider spread throughout the Roman Empire and across Europe.
As Christianity took hold monasteries started to establish apple orchards and cider production. In fact it is believed that England’s first ‘modern’ cider, similar to the drink we know today, was first produced in Dorset by monks from northern France, In fact cider orchards mentioned in the Doomsday book (1086), are just a stone’s throw from the Purbeck Cider Farm!
Illustration in Vinetum Britannicum: or A Treatise of Cider, published in 1678
Purbeck Cider Farm
Purbeck Cider started life in 2006, the dream of local farmer Joe Hartle. Having grown up on his family’s dairy farm, Joe started to experiment with producing small batches of cider. He was bitten by the bug, and after extensive research into apple growing saw an opportunity to put Purbeck’s traditional cider production back on the map!
Lots of hard work and determination have led Joe, Kate and the Purbeck Cider Company to where it is today. The family run business makes cider from 100% single pressed British apples, including heritage cider varieties specific to Dorset – such as Woodbine, Golden Ball and Tom Putt – grown in their Purbeck orchards.
In 2021 Joe and his wife Kate opened their Cider Farm at Lower Bushey Farm, just off the Studland Road near Corfe Castle. Here they have a pressing room, tap room and shop where you can sample their cider range. For spring they are offering Cider Farm Tours and Cider Tastings during April and May. More details on their website at:
