In Sweden on St Lucia's day, each home's daughter wakes up the family bringing coffee and plaited buns. She wears a white dress with a red belt and carries a crown with lit candles on her head. She is often accompanied by "star boys" dressed with a pointed cap and holding a magic stick.

The Christmas meal includes a rice cake baked with a single almond. Whoever gets the almond will marry within the year.

Saint Lucia's Day

This Swedish celebration probably replaced the pagan worship of light. The likeness between the words "lux" (light in Latin) and Lucia, a martyr in the 4th century, would have made this exchange possible.

Lucia lived in Italy nursing her mother. She went on a pilgrimage, where Saint Agnes appeared in her dreams and promised that her mother would be healed. This came true, and Lucia decided to devote herself to Christ. Her pagan fiancé accused her of being a Christian and the court sentenced her to death. Prior to execution, she was to be pulled by oxen throughout the city. They were unable to move her one inch. She ended up stabbed to death.