I know I said I was only going to post about Christmas carols, but check this out: a fantastic blog about pencils. Example: 100 Years of the Tombow Pencil Co. I didn't even know!

Let's talk holly. The standard translation (by Matsuzaki Isao 松崎功, about whom I know nothing) of Deck the halls starts out:

Hiiragi kazarou, fa ra ra etc.
Haregi ni kigaete, fa ra ra etc.
Karoru o utaou, fa ra ra etc.
Tanoshii kono toki, fa ra ra etc.

Let us decorate with [false] holly, fa la la etc.
Changing into our best clothes, fa la la etc.
Let us sing carols, fa la la etc.
[At] this jolly time, fa la la etc.

It's rearranged and simplified a bit, but you can see it's all there. But what's up with the holly?

Hiiragi is often pressed into service as a Japanese translation for "holly" (in the Christmassy sense), but in fact it's a different plant: Osmanthus heterophyllus, a.k.a. "false holly". Completely different order from actual holly.

As Wikipedia notes, the Old Japanese ancestor of hiiragi appears in the Kojiki. Etymologically it's supposed to be mimetic of the painful aftereffects of touching the plant (and therefore related to words like modern-day piri-piri, signifying among other things the mouthfeel of a spicy curry). The word also appears in the 10th-century Tosa Nikki:

元日、なほ同じとまりなり。白散をあるもの夜のまとてふなやかたにさしはさめりければ、風に吹きならさせて海に入れてえ飮まずなりぬ。芋しあらめも齒固めもなし。かやうの物もなき國なり。求めもおかず。唯おしあゆの口をのみぞ吸ふ。このすふ人々の口を押年魚もし思ふやうあらむや。今日は都のみぞ思ひやらるゝ。「九重の門のしりくめ繩のなよしの頭ひゝら木らいかに」とぞいひあへる。

In Flora Best Harris's translation:

1st Day, First Month.—New Year's day; but the ship still remains in the same place. Expecting to make use of the spicy flavor provided for our wine, it had been fastened on the roof of the cabin at nights, but the wind happening to rise, it was carried away, and lost in the sea. Besides, as this place is in the rural regions, we were not able to purchase potatoes, rice cakes, or edible seaweed; so that our only feast was soup made with the fish called "ai" dried and pressed; and with this as a relish we sipped our wine.

No doubt the ai, as he entered our lips, thought to himself:

"How luckless am I to be saluted by the lips of ancients like these!"

We on our part thought only of Kyoto with longings in which regret was mingled. "I wonder," we said to each other," how it is in Kyoto to day. Are the decorations of straw rope, the Nayoshi's head, holly, and the like displayed before the Imperial Gateway?"

As you can see, it isn't translated "holly," but rather — oh. Come on, Flora Best Harris, you had one job!

Merry Christmas, thanks for reading, and see you next year!