Nisse

How he looks

Accounts agree that the nisse is small and shaped like a person. Peder Faye, writing in Norway, described him in grey clothes and a soft red cap without a brim. Danish tellers often gave him a long beard, but Axel Olrik and Hans Ellekilde argued that the older, plainer figure had a smooth face, like a child's. Swedish tradition put a lined, aged face under the same small red cap. The picture is homely rather than frightening. No account makes him large. He is always a small figure about the farm.

Names across the north

The word nisse runs through Scandinavia. Norwegians also say tufte, and many local names attach the being to a farm: tomtegubbe and tomtebonde in Sweden, gardvord and tunkall in Norway. In southern Sweden he can be goanisse, the good nisse. Finnish took tonttu from Swedish, though Finns now hold their spirit to be a separate one, and the literary Christmas elf is called tonttu-ukko. The name nisse itself is usually traced to Niels, a form of Nicholas, which makes him a distant cousin of the saint who brings gifts to children. Another old suggestion is niðsi, Old Norse for a dear young relative.

Origins and history

Where the nisse came from is disputed. Henning Frederik Feilberg argued that two older kinds of being merged: spirits of wild nature and the ghost of the first person to clear a farm, who then stayed to guard it. A 10th-century Icelandic tale of a man who honoured an idol kept in stone has been read as an early parallel. Two Old Swedish texts of the 14th century mention offerings to beings called tomta gudhane. Clergy urged congregations to stop making them. Reidar Thoralf Christiansen held that the word came to Norway from Denmark in the 1600s, though native Norwegian names for such a being are older.

In art and story

Pictures of the nisse go back a long way. Olaus Magnus, a Swedish churchman, included a woodcut in his 1555 history showing a spirit labouring in a stable at night. The same image appears on his earlier map of the north, and he wrote that such beings were commoner before the region became Christian. Later the nisse became a familiar figure in Scandinavian writing, and translators into English have called him a brownie, a goblin, an elf or a gnome, depending on the book. Hans Christian Andersen's tale set in a grocer's shop is one place where the Danish word was rendered as goblin.

Today and change

From the 19th century the nisse moved indoors and into Christmas. He became the Julenisse, a figure of the season who is linked with gifts, and his picture changed with the times. Some writers hold that American images of Santa Claus shaped how he is drawn, and he now looks a good deal like a garden gnome to many eyes. In Finland the tonttu-ukko belongs to Christmas as a literary character. Older beliefs have not vanished. The nisse still appears in Scandinavian books and stories, and the Christmas season is when he is most often remembered.

How Nisse is kept

Farm families kept the nisse in mind all year. He was credited with the night work of the place: watching the animals, keeping the stable, guarding the household. In return, once a year, food was set out for him. A woman in a medieval Swedish account laid the table again after her own meal for the beings she honoured, and when the food was eaten she took it as a sign that her livestock would be cared for. Clergy in the same period told congregations not to make such offerings.

When and where

The reward falls around the winter solstice, the northern turn of the year known as Yule. The sources give no single date, only an annual occasion. In the 19th century the whole custom shifted towards Christmas, and the nisse is now thought of chiefly as a figure of the Christmas season.

Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland are his home. Names cluster by district: tuftekall in Nordland and around Trondheim in Norway, gårdsrå in Uppland in Sweden, fjøsnisse in the Setesdal valley. One scholar placed the belief in the south and east of Norway. In Finland the tonttu is kept as a being with its own character.

What Nisse means

The nisse carries the luck of a farm. He is the unseen worker who keeps a household running and the guardian who watches over its people, animals and crops. Some scholars see in him an ancestor, the ghost of the first person to clear the land, who stayed on as its protector. Others describe a joining of two older ideas: a spirit of wild nature and a spirit of the family line. Setting out food for him is a way of keeping that bond alive.

Days Nisse is marked

Questions people ask about Nisse

See also

Friday the 13thA Western folk superstition regarding the unluckiness of a Friday falling on the 13th.MolybdomancyPouring molten lead or tin into water, then reading the shape as an omenHyggeA Danish word for unhurried time at home with others, kept with candles and cookingFinnish saunaA weekly bathing ritual of steam and heat, central to Finnish life and wellbeing.

Good reading and sources

• Encyclopaedia BritannicaArticle

• Nisse (folklore) on WikipediaEncyclopedia
• More photos on Wikimedia CommonsPhotos and video
• Wikidata recordOpen data

It may contain mistakes. Traditions differ from one family, village and community to the next, and the people who keep them know them best. If something is wrong, tell us. Last refreshed 2026-10-05.