It is said that the Romans often cutdowna fir tree to keep in their houses during the sparse winter months as a form of appeasement to the goddess Ceres (originally Demeter, Greek goddess of the hearth).
Two years later, in 2008, then-U.S. captain Paul Azinger was determined to make similar changes, including having atree limb cutdown after one team member found it was disrupting his tee shot on the 16th hole.
The tree is cutdown one day in November during a ceremony in which the Lord Mayor of Westminster, the British ambassador to Norway and the Mayor of Oslo take active part.