Bringing In The Boar’s Head From: 1873 January Harper’s New Monthly, Christmas Throughout Christendom.
Because wild boar was the most feared animal, serving it at a meal represented the victory of good over evil. During the 17th century, wild boar became extinct in Britain so a pig’s head was used instead. The head was often presented on a decorated platter with an apple in its mouth and carried in by bearers in a dramatic manner. The tradition of serving ham for Christmas lunch or dinner probably came from the idea of serving boar’s head or roasted boar joints to guests at Christmas.
To say nothing of the roast beef and plum-pudding, Christmas pies, furmity, and snap-dragons, the Yule-log and the mistletoe have not finally abdicated, while the boar’s head, decorated with rosemary or prickly holly, maintains its place at the English Christmas dinner, and is still served up in great state at the royal Christmas table. At Oxford, U.K., the boar’s head was carried in by the strongest of the guardsmen, singing a Christmas carol, and preceded by a forester, a huntsman, and a couple of pages dressed in silk and carrying the mustard which was regarded as a great luxury and an infallible digester.
The following celebrated carol of the Boar’s Head is found in the book of ‘Christmasse Carolles’ published in 1521 by Wynkyn de Warde:
The boar’s head in bande bring I,
With garlandes gay and rosemary,
I pray you all synge merely,
Qui estis in convivio.
“The bore’s head, I understande,
Is the chefe servyce in this lande.
Loke wherever it be fande,
Servite cum cantico.
“Be gladde, lordes, both more and lasse,
For this bath ordayned our stewarde,
To chere you all this Christmasse,
The bore’s head with mustarde.”
At Oxford, U.K., the boar’s head was carried in by the strongest of the guardsmen, singing a Christmas carol, and preceded by a forester, a huntsman, and a couple of pages dressed in silk and carrying the mustard which was regarded as a great luxury and an infallible digester. A similar custom appears to have prevailed in Genoa in the times of the Dorias when a boar decorated with branches of laurel and accompanied by trumpeters was annually presented to the Doria family by the Abbot of San Antonio at Pré at midday on the 24th of December.
I love finding out the tradition behind some of the things we do and say at Christmas, don’t you? So I am going to do a series of posts this week covering lots of the historical aspects of our celebrations. Why we say things, why we do things, and why we use things to decorate our houses. Enjoy the festive season with me with more posts to follow.
CHRISTMAS
The word has been around for centuries, with some dictionaries putting it in the late Old English period and others to the 12th century. Old forms include cristes masse and christmasse, meaning the festival (mass) of Christ. It replaced other pagan midwinter festivals when the church tried to persuade Romans to convert to Christianity.
XMAS
This abbreviation annoys a lot of people but it isn’ t simply modern shorthand. X was used to represent the Greek symbol chi, which is also the first letter in Christ. This has been used since Roman times.
DECORATE
The word means to adorn and is from the 16th century, but the seasonal meaning of to deck with ornamental accessories dates from the 18th century. The word originates from the Latin decoratus (beautify).
TINSEL
It was first seen in the expression tinsell saten which means strips of shining metal used for ornament. It also describes things that are showy and worthless. It is believed to have come from the Anglo Norman with ancestors in Old French.
The Lord of Misrule was generally a peasant, or sub-deacon, and the revelries followed the Pagan tradition of Saturnalia and was a time of drunkenness and wild partying. The Church’s festival with a Boy Bishop, the leader of children’s festivities in choir schools, was similar, but was abolished by Henry VIII in 1541, restored by the Catholic Queen Mary, but again abolished by Protestant Elizabeth I. On the Continent, the Council of Basle suppressed it in 1431 but the custom was revived in some places from time to time, even as late as the eighteenth century. After the death of Edward VI in 1553, the English court stopped appointing a Lord of Misrule.
From A Survey of London by John Stow: Reprinted from the text of 1603.
‘…in the feaste of Christmas, there was in the kings house, wheresoeuer he was lodged, a Lord of Misrule, or Maister of merry disports, and the like had yee in the house of euery noble man, of honor, or good worshippe, were he spirituall or temporall.’
During the late medieval and early Tudor periods in England, Lord of Misrule, also called Abbot Of Misrule, or King Of Misrule, was appointed to manage the Christmas festivities held at court, in the houses of great noblemen, in the law schools of the Inns of Court, and in many of the colleges at the universities of Cambridge and Oxford.
His reign lasted anywhere from 12 days to 3 months and his role was to direct the masques, processions, plays, and feasts. Although this was mostly a British custom, in ancient Rome from the 17th to 23rd of December, a Lord of Misrule took on the guise of Saturn for the feast of Saturnalia and the ordinary rules were changed so that masters became slaves and the offices of state were held by slaves. The Lord of Misrule presided and could command anyone to do anything. Our contemporary Christmas holidays seem to have originated from this idea of festive holidays.
The custom began in December 1551 when the Duke of Somerset, Edward VI’s uncle Edward Seymour, was in the Tower of London awaiting execution. He sent a note to the Master of Revels to appoint George Ferrers as Lord of Misrule. Ferrers was a courtier and poet who later contributed to A Mirror for Magistrates, described by Scott Lucas as a “compendium of tragic monologues” by a series of historical personages.
Scotland had the Abbot of Unreason (suppressed in 1555) as their equivalent to the Lord of Misrule and scholars believe both ideas came from the “king” or “bishop” who presided over the earlier Feast of Fools.
Santa Claus The origin of Santa Claus begins in the 4th century with Saint Nicholas, Bishop of Myra, an area in present day Turkey. By all accounts St. Nicholas was a generous man, particularly devoted to children. In the Western world, where Christmas is characterized by the exchange of gifts among friends and family members, some of the gifts are attributed to a character called Santa Claus. He is also known as Father Christmas, Saint Nicholas, St. Nikolaus, Sinterklaas, Kris Kringle, Joulupukki, Weihnachtsmann, Saint Basil and Father Frost.
In the 4th century, Saint Nicholas, Bishop of Myra, Turkey, was a kind and generous man who was particularly devoted to children. His kindness and reputation for generosity gave rise to claims he that he could perform miracles and devotion to him increased. Thousands of churches across Europe were dedicated to him and some time around the 12th century an official church holiday was created in his honor. The Feast of St. Nicholas was celebrated December 6 and the day was marked by gift-giving and charity.
Father Christmas, who predates Santa Claus, was first recorded in the 15th century and then associated with holiday merrymaking and drunkenness. In Victorian Britain, his image was remade to match that of Santa and France’s Père Noël (Papa Noël) evolved the same way and eventually began using the same Santa image.
Today’s version of Santa Claus was created by the German-American cartoonist Thomas Nast (1840-1902), who drew a new image of the character annually, beginning in 1863. By the 1880s, Nast’s Santa had become the one now know and in the 1920s, this image was used in most advertising. But it was the early to mid Coca Cola advertising that cemented the idea of Santa Claus as a jolly man with a white beard and wearing a red suit. He was portrayed as drinking a coke and smiling happily. Many famous artists started doing yearly illustrations of Santa Claus that were used for magazine covers and Christmas postcards.
First made in 1850 by a London sweet maker called Tom Smith who decided it would a fun idea if his sweets and toys opened with a crack when their fancy wrappers were pulled in half. In early 1830, Tom Smith started work in a bakers and ornamental confectioners shop in London, selling sweets such as fondants, pralines and gum pastilles. He worked hard and took particular interest in the wedding cake ornaments and decorations, experimenting and creating new, more exciting and less crude designs in his spare time. Before long he was successful enough to leave and start up his own business in Goswell Road, Clerkenwell, East London. On a trip to Paris in 1840, he discovered the ‘bon bon’, a sugared almond wrapped in a twist of tissue paper. He brought the ‘bon bon’ to London and they sold extremely well, but in January demand virtually ceased and once again he was reliant on sales of cake and table decorations and ornaments.
Anxious to stimulate sales, Tom placed a small love motto in the tissue paper and encouraged his regular customers to take supplies. Tom took a risk and concentrated on developing it further, while still running the wedding cake ornament and confectionery business. The majority of ‘bon bons’ were sold at Christmas so Tom thought up ways to capitalize on this short, but very profitable, season. It was the crackle of a log as he threw it on his fire that gave him the flash of inspiration which eventually led to the crackers we know today. A ‘ crackle’ added excitement to his novelty ‘bon bon’ so he experimented to find a compound which gave a satisfactory bang. He perfected his chemical explosion to create a ‘pop’ caused by friction when the wrapping was broken and the trade jumped at Tom Smith’s latest novelty.
He quickly refined his product by dropping the sweet and the ‘bon bon’ name, calling his new crackers Cosaques, but he kept the motto and added a surprise gift. Delighted at his overnight success, Tom took his cracker abroad but an Eastern manufacturer copied his idea and delivered crackers to Britain just before Christmas. So Tom designed 8 different kinds of cracker, working his staff day and night and distributing stocks in time for Christmas. He lived to see the new branch of his firm grow to swamp the original premises in Goswell Road and the company moved to Finsbury Square in the City of London where it remained until 1953. When he died he left the business to his three sons, Tom Henry and Walter. A few years later, a drinking fountain was erected in Finsbury Square by Walter Smith in memory of his mother, Mary, and to commemorate the life of the man who invented the great British Cracker.
His three sons developed the cracker designs, contents and mottoes. Walter Smith, the youngest son, introduced a topical note to the mottoes which had previously been love verses. Special writers were commissioned to compose snappy and relevant maxims with references to every important event or craze at the time from greyhounds to Jazz, Frothblowers to Tutankhamen, Persian Art to The Riviera. The original early Victorian mottoes were mainly love verses. Eventually these were replaced by more complicated puzzles and cartoons, and finally by the corny jokes and riddles which characterise our crackers today.
Walter also introduced the paper hats, many of which were elaborate and made of best tissue and decorative paper on proper hatmakers stands and he toured the world to find new, relevant and unusual ideas for the surprise gifts, such as bracelets from Bohemia, tiny wooden barrels from America, and scarf pins from Saxony. Some were assembled in the factory, like the thousands of tiny pill boxes filled with rouge complete with powder puff.
A six foot cracker decorated Euston Station in London, and in 1927 a gentleman wrote to the Company enclosing a diamond engagement ring and 10 shilling note as payment for the ring to be put in a special cracker for his fiancee. Unfortunately he did not enclose an address and never contacted the Company again; the ring, letter and 10 shilling note are still in the safe today. In the early days, there was a large variety of specialist boxes, including Wedgwood Art Crackers from original designs by permission of Josiah Wedgwood and Sons, and designs such as Japanese Menagerie crackers containing the latest novelties from Japan, including animals, birds, reptiles and mottoes in Japanese.
Crackers were created for the War Heroes, Charlie Chaplin, The Wireless, Motoring, The Coronation and even the Channel Tunnel in 1914. Exclusive crackers were also made for members of the Royal Family and still are to this day. During the Second World War restrictions were placed on the production of cracker snaps.
The Ministry of Defence commissioned Tom Smith to fold and tie bundles of three to six snaps together with special string and regulation knots. These bundles were then used by soldiers in training as, when the string was pulled, they mimicked the noise of machine gun fire. After the war, vast quantities of these surplus cracker snaps were released back into the cracker trade. As the demand for crackers increased, Tom Smith merged with Caley Crackers in 1953 taking over their headquarters and factory in Norwich, East Anglia.
Tom Smith Group Limited currently hold a royal warrant from: HM QUEEN ELIZABETH II Ê 1906: Tom Smith were granted their first Royal Warrant by the then Prince of Wales which entitled them in 1909 to become members of the Royal Warrant Holders Association. 1910: In December, the reigning monarch, King George V granted Tom Smith his warrant as suppliers of Christmas Crackers. Tom Smith still holds the honour of producing special crackers each year for the Royal Household.
In the countries that now use them, a cracker is set next to each plate on the Christmas dinner table and a colourful party hat, a toy or gift and a festive joke falls out when the cracker is pulled in half with a loud bang! The party hats look like crowns, supposedly to symbolise the crowns worn by the Wise Men.
Another British company strongly associated with the cracker business was Batger and Co. Like Tom Smith, they sold a wide variety of crackers in highly decorated boxes and once again many were themed or in commemoration of a special event. Batger’s Gretna Green Crackers for the famous place for eloping lovers where couples in the Regency period ran off in a carriage to Scotland to be married at the blacksmiths forge at Gretna Green.
Crackers were an incredibly expensive luxury at the time costing from 14 shillings to 30 shillings a box. Others were Peerless Crackers and Mead and Field Crackers. Cabaret Girl from the Peerless series of Christmas crackers, from 1933, which promises that each cracker contains ‘both a juvenile costume and fancy hat or cap, amusing joke or riddle, a good snap.’
At Christmas time, households had guests to stay and games were played to either fill in the time inside when the weather was too bad to venture out with sleds or skates, or to keep tradition. Blind man’s bluff, forfeits, and snap dragon were all played.
A list of some entertainments for Christmas…From The book Of Christmas by Thomas kibble Hervey. “jugglers, and jack-puddings, scrambling for nuts and apples, dancing the hobby-horse, hunting owls and squirrels, the fool-plough, hot-cockles, a stick moving on a pivot, with an apple at one end and a candle at the other, so that he who missed his bite burned his nose, blindman’s buffs, forfeits, interludes and mock plays :” — also of ” thread my needle, Nan,” ” he can do little that can’t do this,” feed the dove, hunt the slipper, shoeing the wild mare, post and pair, snap dragon, the gathering of omens….
Snap Dragon A favorite game was Snap Dragon, often played on Christmas Eve. Raisins were put into a large, shallow bowl and brandy was poured over them and then ignited. Lights were extinguished to increase the eerie effect of the blue flames playing across the liquor. The object of the game was to reach through the blue flames and grab as many raisins as possible from the flaming brandy and pop them into your mouth. The risk of burning yourself increased the excitement.
Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary of the English Language in 1755 describes the. game as “a play in which they catch raisins out of burning brandy and, extinguishing them by closing the mouth, eat them”. According to an eighteenth-century article in Richard Steele’s Tatler magazine, “the wantonness of the thing was to see each other look like a demon, as we burnt ourselves, and snatched out the fruit.”
Snap-dragon was played in England, Canada, U/S.A, and probably other countries with British backgrounds. The words snap-dragon and flap-dragon can refer to the game, the raisins used in the game, or the bowl with brandy and raisins.
The first reference to Snap-dragon as a game is in Francis Grose’s Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue in 1811. “Christmas gambol: raisins and almonds being put into a bowl of brandy, and the candles extinguished, the spirit is set on fire, and the company scramble for the raisins.” Snap-dragon as a Christmas parlour game was mentioned in 1836 in Charles Dickens’ The Pickwick Papers and in 1861, in Anthony Trollope’s novel Orley Farm. Lewis Carroll, in Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There in 1871 describes “A snap-dragon-fly. Its body is made of plum pudding, its wings of holly-leaves, and its head is a raisin burning in brandy.”
Agatha Christie’s book Hallowe’en Party describes a children’s party during which a child’s murder causes Hercule Poirot to be brought in to solve the case and at which Snap-dragon is played at the end of the evening.
Christmas: Wassail Bowl History #Christmas #holidays #Traditions #Customs
The term wasseling refers to the jovial revelry and carousing that went on in historic England when all classes of society would gather around a common banquet-table and the wassail bowl and indulge in the most unrestrained joviality and merriment around.
Wassail Bowl: Most great houses had a wassel-bowl, or cup, frequently of massy silver. Toasts were “Drine heil,” or “Was hail,” from which the howl derives its name but were replaced around the nineteenth century by “Come, here’s to you,” or “I’ll pledge you.” Now, we toast with the simplified version of ‘Here’s to you’. As the hour of twelve approached, carol-singers would prepare and bell-ringers would place themselves at their post to usher in the morning of the Nativity with lots of rejoicing and with bands of music parading the towns.
In some parishes in the West of England, carol-singers adjourn to the church to sing in Christmas-day, a remnant probably of popery, as in Catholic countries there were frequently church-services held at this time. In the 16th century, Tusser prescribed for Christmas: good drink, a good fire in the hall, brawn, pudding, and mustard withall, capon, or turkey, cheese, apples, nuts, and jolly carols. In rich houses, a wassail cup would be filled with rich wine, sweet and spicy, and with roasted apples bobbing on the surface. In poorer houses, the cup would hold ale with nutmeg, sugar, ginger, and roasted crab apples.
From Harper’s Bazaar:- ‘Advent is the herald of Christmas. In Protestant as well as Catholic countries, choristers and school-boys during the “holy-nights” go from house to house singing songs or Christmas carols to usher in the auspicious day. In the south of Germany, they accompany the singing by knocking at the doors with a little hammer, or throwing pease, beans, or lentils at the windows. Hence the origin of the name of “knocking nights.”
In Bohemia, Styria, Carniola, and other German provinces, people group together and perform Christmas plays during Advent, with simple plots about the story of the Savior’s birth, his persecution by Herod, and the flight of the Holy Family into Egypt. The players usually consist of the Christ-child, St. Nicholas or St. Peter, St. Joseph and the Virgin, Herod, the varlet Ruprecht, several angels, together with shepherds and other less conspicuous personages.
The devil is the merriest character because he capers about through the village and furiously blows his horn, frightening or bantering with, the old and young, despite portraying the humble rôle of a messenger. A handsome youth of the strictest morals is usually selected to represent the Virgin Mary. The rehearsal is usually accompanied by a certain rhythmical movement, the players going four steps to and fro, so that a meter or foot corresponds to every step, and on the fourth, which includes the rhyme, the performer turns quickly around. The holy personages sing instead of rehearsing their parts, but accompany their singing with the same rhythmical movement.
On the first Sunday in Advent the play is inaugurated by a solemn procession, headed by the master singer bearing a gigantic star, followed by the others drawing a large fir-tree ornamented with ribbons and apples; and thus they go singing to the large hall where the play is to be performed. On arriving at the door they form a half circle, and sing the star-song; then, after saluting sun, moon, and stars, the emperor, the government, and the master singer, in the name of all the “herbs and roots that grow in the earth,” they enter the hall, and the performance begins.
The prologue and epilogue are sung by an angel. As the whole stage apparatus often consists of only a straw-bottomed chair and a wooden stool, every change of scene is indicated by a procession of the whole company singing an appropriate song; after which only those who take part in the next act remain standing, while the remainder go off singing.
These dramatic representations are often very simple, or only fragmentary, consisting, it may be, of a troop of boys and girls disguised as shepherds and shepherdesses, who go about singing shepherd songs, thus announcing the approaching advent of our Savior. At other times, they are performed from house to house and are associated with the distribution of Christmas presents.
In such cases, they are made the occasion of a solemn inquest into the conduct of the children, and constitute in Germany — which appears to be at once the paradise and purgatory of Christmas-loving juveniles — a potential auxiliary of pedagogic and parental discipline.
The archangel Gabriel, it may be, first appears upon the scene, and thus announces his advent: “May God give you a happy good-evening! I am his messenger, sent from angel-land. My name is Gabriel. In my hands I bear the scepter which the Son of God has given me. On my head I wear the crown with which the Son of God has crowned me.”
Thereupon the Christ-child, wearing a gilded paper crown, and carrying a basket full of apples and nuts, enters, singing the song commencing,
“Down from the high heaven I come,”
and greets the company with a similar salutation.
In the course of his song he informs the children that the object of his coming is to learn whether they have been good and obedient, and if they “pray and spin diligently.”
If so, they are to be rewarded with gifts from his golden chariot which stands at the door; if not, their backs are to be belabored with rods. St. Peter or St. Nicholas, as the case may be, is then called in to furnish a faithful account of the children’s deportment.
If it be St. Nicholas, he enters with a long staff or crozier in his hand, and a bishop’s miter of gilt paper upon his head. His report is not usually a flattering one. On their way from school the children loiter in the streets, they tear their books, neglect their tasks, and forget to say their prayers; and as a penance for all this evil-doing, he recommends a liberal application of the rod. The Christ-child interposes, almost supplicating,
“Ah, Nicholas, forbear.
Spare the little child.
Spare the young blood!”
The two then join with the angel in singing a song, when St. Peter is summoned, who promptly enters, jingling his keys. The saint, who rather plumes himself on his high office of heavenly janitor, carries matters with a high hand.
He examines the children’s copy-books, it may be, bids them kneel down and pray, and then, by virtue of his high prerogative, pronounces sentence upon the unfortunate delinquents, and calls upon the black Ruprecht, who stands waiting outside the door, to execute his orders.
“Ruperus, Ruperus, enter!
The children will not be obedient.”
The frightful bugbear, dressed in fur, and covered with chains, with blackened face and fiery eyes, and a long red tongue protruding out of his month, stumbles over the threshold, brandishing an enormous birch, and as he falls headlong into the room, roars out to the children, “Can you pray?” Whereupon they fall upon their knees and repeat their prayers at the top of their voices.
The five heavenly visitors, standing in a half circle, then sing another song or two descriptive of the heavenly joys, or freighted with wholesome advice to both children and parents. The latter give them in return a few farthings, while the Christ-child scatters apples and nuts here and there upon the floor for the further edification of the children, and then Christ-child, St. Nicholas, St. Peter, the archangel Gabriel, and devil exeunt.
St. Nicholas, as all the world knows, is the patron of children, with whom he is the most popular saint in the calendar. Bishop of Myra, in Lycia, in the time of Constantine the Great, if we are to credit the Roman breviary, he supplied three destitute maidens with dowries by secretly leaving a marriage-portion for each at their window. Hence the popular fiction that he is the purveyor of presents to children on Christmas-eve.
He usually makes his appearance as an old man with a venerable beard, and dressed as a bishop, either riding a white horse or an ass, and carrying a large basket on his arm, and a bundle of rods in his hand. In some parts of Bohemia he appear dressed up in a sheet instead of a surplice, with a crushed pillow on his head instead of a miter.
On his calling out, “Wilt thou pray?” all the children fall upon their knees, whereupon he lets fall some fruit upon the floor and disappears. In this manner he goes from house to house, sometimes ringing a bell to announce his arrival, visits the nurseries, inquiries into the conduct of the children, praises or admonishes them, as the case may be, distributing sweetmeats or rods accordingly.
St. Nicholas is the Santa Claus of Holland, and the Samiklaus of Switzerland, and the Sönner Klâs of Helgoland. In the Vorarlberg he is known as Zemmikias, who threatens to put naughty children into his hay-sack; in Nether Austria as Niklo, or Niglo, who is followed by a masked servant called Krampus. In the Tyrol he goes by the name of the “Holy Man,” and shares the patronage of his office with St. Lucy, who distributes gifts among the girls, as he among the boys. Sometimes he is accompanied by the Christ-child. In many parts of Switzerland, Germany, and the Netherlands St. Nicholas still distributes his presents on St. Nicholas’s Eve — the 5th of December — instead of on Christmas-eve.
In the Netherlands and adjoining provinces he is especially popular, and is perhaps the only saint who has maintained his full credit, even among the Protestants. For days previous to his expected advent busy housewives have been secretly conspiring with the bakers in gilding nuts, cakes, and gingerbread, and torturing pastry, prepared with flour, sugar, honey, spices, and sweetmeats, into the most fantastical forms, from which the good saint may from time to time replenish his supplies.
As to the children, St. Nicholas or Sünder Klaas is the burden of their prayers, the staple of their dreams, and the inspiration of their songs. As they importune him to let fall from the chimney-top some pretty gift into their little aprons, they go on singing with childish fervor,
“Sünder Klaas da gode Bloot!
Breng’ mi Nööt un Zuckerbrod,
Nicht to veel un nich to minn
Smiet in mine Schörten in!”
In Belgium, on the eve of the good bishop’s aerial voyage in his pastoral visitation of his bishopric of chimney-tops, the children polish their shoes, and after filling them with hay, oats, or carrots for the saint’s white horse, they put them on a table, or set them in the fireplace. The room is then carefully closed and the door locked. Next morning it is opened in the presence of the assembled household, when, mirabile dictu! the furniture is found to be turned topsy-turvy, while the little shoes, instead of horse’s forage, are filled with sweetmeats and toys for the good children, and with rods for the bad ones. In some places wooden or China shoes, stockings, baskets, cups and saucers, and even bundles of hay, are placed in the chimney, or by the side of the bed, or in a corner of the room, as the favorite receptacles of St. Nicholas’s presents.
In the Western world, where Christmas is characterized by the exchange of gifts among friends and family members, some of the gifts are attributed to a character called Santa Claus. He is also known as Father Christmas, Saint Nicholas, St. Nikolaus, Sinterklaas, Kris Kringle, Joulupukki, Weihnachtsmann, Saint Basil and Father Frost.
Father Christmas, who predates Santa Claus, was first recorded in the 15th century and then associated with holiday merrymaking and drunkenness. Today’s version of Santa Claus was created by the German-American cartoonist Thomas Nast (1840-1902), who drew a new image of the character annually, beginning in 1863.
By the 1880s, Nast’s Santa had become the one now know and in the 1920s, this image was used in most advertising. In Victorian Britain, his image was remade to match that of Santa and France’s Père Noël (Papa Noël) evolved the same way and eventually began using the same Santa image.
Angels – Heralds for the news of the birth of a baby in a manger.
Bells – Bells have rung out for all important events for centuries, plus lost sheep are found by the sound of the bell.
Candy Cane – Symbolizes the crook of the shepherds who visited Christ. Red represents the blood that was spilled and white is for purity. The peppermint oil that flavors is known for its strong healing properties.
Cards – Produced in Britain in 1843 to be sent with love to family and friends around the world by the new Postal services.
Carols – Poems and stories of worship made into songs.
Carolers – Groups of people who strolled the streets singing Christmas songs
Feasting – To celebrate the joy of the baby’s arrival on the 25th December.
Gift Giving – The Wise Men bowed before the baby and gave him gold, frankincense and myrrh.
Gold – Decorating using the color of one of the gifts of the wise men.
Green – Decorating using the color of evergreens which show everlasting love.
Holly – Represents Eternal Life and the crown of thorns worn by Jesus.
Mistletoe: In the 18th Century, men kissed a woman who stood under mistletoe to show love, friendship and goodwill. If a woman was un-kissed, she would (supposedly) never marry.
Nativity: The birth of Jesus Christ
Poinsettia – Red flowers used in countries such as Mexico to symbolize Christmas time.
Stockings – Hung by children to receive gifts
Twelve Days of Christmas: Twelve days between the birth of Christ on December 25 and the coming of the Magi on January 6, the Epiphany.
Tree – Evergreen tree symbolizes eternal life and love
Wreath – Made of evergreens to symbolize never ending love
Early Christians appropriated pagan customs and turned them into religious observances and, therefore, a victory over Paganism and a way to win more souls. By the end of the second century, numerous dates were being proposed as the correct date for the birth of Jesus. One popular method, allegorical theology, thought Christ must have born on the same day the sun was created, though our modern theorists estimate that the birth of Jesus was between 7 and 4 BC.
Unlike Easter, the earliest Christians didn’t celebrate the nativity or Christmas, which began in the late 3rd century AD as an alternative to pagan winter holidays. In the beginning, Christians only celebrated the baptism and resurrection of Christ and the death of the martyrs. The first evidence of Christmas being celebrated is in Rome in 336 AD and by the early fourth century, the 25th of December became the celebration day for the birth of Jesus Christ.
Origen of Alexandria, amongst others, opposed the celebration of Christ’s birth and pointed out that only Pharaoh and Herod celebrate their birthdays in the Bible, and that birthdays were for pagans, not Christians. Jehovah’s Witnesses follow this belief and reject the celebration of both Christmas and birthdays. Early religious Christmas customs began with special services held by candlelight and often at midnight. In Bethlehem, Midnight Mass is celebrated at the place of Jesus’ birth in the ancient Church of the Nativity.
But as the years passed, going to church, especially at Christmas, was something done by villagers and landowners as a custom, an obligation, or to show respect to the local clergyman rather than for any great religious reasons. People attended Church services on Sunday and Holy Days and donated money to village or church causes but the religious fervor of early years had dimmed. If a person was particularly devoted, they would read the Bible, the Book of Common Prayer, or a book of sermons on a regular basis and probably attend the Church of England, which was the main church by the late Georgian and early Regency years.