Christmas Stuff

THREE SAINTS FOR THE PRICE OF ONE - SWITZERLAND

Switzerland is another country with several traditions and languages.
So it is not surprising there are several different St. Nicholas traditions.
In German-speaking areas Saint Nicholas is known as Samichlaus and he rides upon a white horse and is followed by the wicked Ruprecht.
In the French-speaking area Saint Nicolas is known as Père noel and he leads a donkey carrying baskets full of gifts and he is followed by the sound of Père Fouettard's chains.
In the Italian quarter the tradition is much more reverent when they celebrate the arrival of St Nicholas’s relics in the Italian city of Bari in the year 1087.
But all the celebrations have in common the great color music and excitement generated by the enthusiastic revelers.

WHAT WOULD SANTA LIKE FOR CHRISTMAS?

The Hollywood child star Shirley Temple stopped believing in Santa Claus when she was six because the Department store Santa asked for her autograph in a shopping center.

CHRISTMAS FOLKLORE – LA BEFANA

The three wise men stopped at La Befana’s house on route to Bethlehem.
After dining with her, she was invited to travel with them on their search for the Christ child but she declined on some flimsy pretence.
After a while she regretted her action and gathering up some things from her home to give to the Christ child she set off after them.
But alas, she was unable to find either the wise men or the baby Jesus.
La Befana has been searching ever since and every January 5th the kindly witch rides her broomstick down the chimneys of Italian homes to fill the stockings of lucky children with sweets and candy.

CHRISTMAS FOLKLORE - BLACK PETER

In Holland, sinter Klaas has a faithful servant called black peter who rides on the sleigh and its Peter’s job to throw the children’s presents down the chimney.
In addition it is black peter that doles out the punishment to the naughty children by wrapping the offenders in bags and delivering them to Spain.

CHRISTMAS FOLKLORE – THE JOLLY ELF

In Finland Santa is a kind and jolly elf called Joulupukki and he doesn’t drive a sleigh but He rides a straw goat called Ukko.
The Scandinavians call the jolly elf Jultomten who is thought to deliver gifts in a sleigh drawn by goats.

CHRISTMAS IN RUSSIA

During the days of the Soviet Union, the people were not free to practice their religion or to celebrate Christmas so it was the New Year which was the most important time when 'Father Frost' brought presents to children.
With the breakup of the Soviet Union the Communist regime fell and religious freedom abounded and Christmas was once again openly celebrated but not on December 25th but on January 7th which is Christmas Day for the Russian Orthodox church, who use the old 'Julian' calendar for all holy days.

CHRISTMAS FOLKLORE – CHRISTKIND

Christ kind or Christ Child is an angel-like figure who often accompanied St. Nicholas on his holiday missions and Kris Kringle is believed to deliver presents to well-behaved Swiss and German children.

CHRISTMAS FOLKLORE – FILLING THE SHOE’S

In France Père Noel is responsible for filling the shoes of French children with gifts.
While in Spain the children place their shoes under the tree on the night of January 5th and the next morning they find they have been filled with gifts by the three kings.
The luckiest children of Spain receive small presents from papa noel on Christmas Eve as well.

A NATIVITY FACT

Traditionally in the nativity scene there is almost always a donkey or an ass depicted.
However in the gospels telling of Christ’s birth they are not mentioned.
But as Jesus was born in a stable and lain in a manger it would seem logical to conclude that some animals where present.

OUR GOOSE IS COOKED

By all accounts the eating of Goose at Christmas as part of the festivities came about because on Christmas Eve 1588 queen Elizabeth I was dining on Goose at Greenwich palace when the long awaited news reached her that the Spanish Armada had been defeated.
Relieved and delighted she decreed that roast goose should be served at Christmas to mark the historic event.
It was her father Henry VIII who is widely regarded to be the first person known to eat Turkey on Christmas day.

THE FEAST’S OF ST NICHOLAS

The feast of St Nicholas is widely celebrated though what they believe and the way it is celebrated varies from place to place for example in the Czech republic they believe on the eve of St. Nicholas Day the Angels lower St. Nicholas, or Svaty Mikuláš, down to earth on a rope of gold and he carries a basket of apples, nuts, and candies for the children.
He is accompanied by a devil rattling his chains who comes to carry off the bad children and a sweet angel who pleads for them.
While In Slovenia The night before the Feast of St. Nicholas, children put a shoe outside the door in the hope it will be filled with various treats of fruit, sweets or money.
Here the saint is accompanied by the devilish Parkel who might leave coal for the naughty children.
More often than not, a mixture of the two are left as most children are good and bad.
On the night of December 5th in Romania, boots are carefully polished to be put by the door or by the window to wait for the visit of Sfantul Nicolae.
In Bulgaria Nikulden is a great winter festival when Bulgarians celebrate St Nikolay, the protector of sailors and fishermen.
St. Nicholas or Svaty Mikul arrives in many Slovakian towns and villages, in a horse drawn coach, along with an angel and the devil who rattles a chain.
And On St. Nicholas Eve all the children polish their boots to leave on the windowsill or at the doorstep. In the morning they hope to find nice surprises and not the dreaded coal.
Hungarian children must polish their best boot and put it on the windowsill to be filled by St. Nicholas, Szent Mikulás.
The good saint comes with a big sack full of presents and a large record book containing the children's good and bad deeds. He has his two helpers, the good angel who helps give out presents and the mischief making devil.
And In the morning the good children hope to find candies, tangerines, walnuts, apples, dates and chocolate Mikulás figures.
St. Nicholas, called in Poland Sw. Mikolaj, is a saintly, dignified figure in Poland; he Descends from Heaven with an angel helper, and travels in a sleigh pulled by a white horse as he visits homes in the countryside.
In parts of the Caribbean like Aruba and Antilles where the Dutch settled the celebrations still involves SinterKlaas sailing into harbor from Spain with his white horse and a collection of helpers, one of these helpers is Zwarte Piet or black Peter who is ready to put the naughty children in his sack and carry them back to Spain.
But in Curaçao however and reflecting changing times, the "horse" is more symbolic and Sinterklaas rides in a white Ford Mustang!

So from being lowered from heaven on a golden rope to riding in a Ford Mustang it cant get much more diverse than that.

THE TWELVE DAYS OF CHRISTMAS

On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me
A best of Sinatra CD

On the second day of Christmas my true love gave to me
Two nylon socks
And a best of Sinatra CD

On the third day of Christmas my true love gave to me
Three fountain pens
Two nylon socks
And a best of Sinatra CD

On the fourth day of Christmas my true love gave to me
Four woolen scarfs
Three fountain pens
Two nylon socks
And a best of Sinatra CD

On the fifth day of Christmas my true love gave to me
Five puzzle things
Four woolen scarfs
Three fountain pens
Two nylon socks
And a best of Sinatra CD

On the sixth day of Christmas my true love gave to me
Six novelty ties
Five puzzle things
Four woolen scarfs
Three fountain pens
Two nylon socks
And a best of Sinatra CD


On the seventh day of Christmas my true love gave to me
Seven garden tools
Six novelty ties
Five puzzle things
Four woolen scarfs
Three fountain pens
Two nylon socks
And a best of Sinatra CD

On the eighth day of Christmas my true love gave to me
Eight tins of talc
Seven garden tools
Six novelty ties
Five puzzle things
Four woolen scarfs
Three fountain pens
Two nylon socks
And a best of Sinatra CD

On the ninth day of Christmas my true love gave to me
Nine crisp white hankies
Eight tins of talc
Seven garden tools
Six novelty ties
Five puzzle things
Four woolen scarfs
Three fountain pens
Two nylon socks
And a best of Sinatra CD

On the tenth day of Christmas my true love gave to me
Ten car air fresheners
Nine crisp white hankies
Eight tins of talc
Seven garden tools
Six novelty ties
Five puzzle things
Four woolen scarfs
Three fountain pens
Two nylon socks
And a best of Sinatra CD

On the eleventh day of Christmas my true love gave to me
Eleven handy hint books
Ten car air fresheners
Nine crisp white hankies
Eight tins of talc
Seven garden tools
Six novelty ties
Five puzzle things
Four woolen scarfs
Three fountain pens
Two nylon socks
And a best of Sinatra CD

On the twelfth day of Christmas my true love gave to me
Twelve months subscription
Eleven handy hint books
Ten car air fresheners
Nine crisp white hankies
Eight tins of talc
Seven garden tools
Six novelty ties
Five puzzle things
Four woolen scarfs
Three fountain pens
Two nylon socks
And a best of Sinatra CD

THE HIDDEN MEANING OF THE TWELVE DAYS OF CHRISTMAS

Everyone is familiar with the famous Christmas song, "The Twelve Days of Christmas" and we have all at some time happily sung along to it.
But delightful though it is it believed that it had a more serious purpose when it was first written and that it was certainly much more than a repetitious piece of nonsense.
It is said it came about at a time when the Catholics in northern Europe were prevented from practicing their faith openly or otherwise by law and especially In England during the years of 1558 to 1829 it was to all intents and purposes a crime to BE a Catholic.
So "The Twelve Days of Christmas" was written in England as a kind of Underground Catechism.
In fact it was one of the "catechism songs" to help young Catholics learn the tenets of their faith.
In short it was a memory aid at a time when to be caught with anything in written form indicating adherence to the Catholic faith could lead to imprisonment or even death.
The contained hidden meanings for example the “true love” mentioned in the song in fact refers to God.
While the songs gifts hide the meanings to the teachings of the faith.
The "me" who receives the presents symbolizes every baptized person and a partridge in a pear tree refers to Jesus Christ and the two turtle doves are The Old and New Testaments.The three French Hens are Faith, Hope and Charity, the three great Theological Virtuesthe four Calling Birds are the Four Gospels and the five Golden Rings, The first Five Books of the Old Testament.
The six Geese A-laying are the six days of creation while seven Swans A-swimming represent the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, the seven sacraments.The eight Maids A-milking are the eight beatitudes with nine Ladies Dancing representing the nine Fruits of the Holy Spirit.the ten Lords A-leaping are the ten commandments and the eleven Pipers Piping stand for the eleven faithful apostles and last by no means least twelve drummersdrumming represent the twelve doctrinal points in the Apostle's Creed.

The may be fact or it may be fiction but I know which I would like it to be.

ILLUMINATING THE CHRISTMAS TREE

The practice of using small candles to decorate Christmas tree’s is said to date back to the middle of the 17th century in Germany.
However it was to be 150 years before the custom became firmly established.
In the beginning the candles where made of tallow, derived from animal fat, which gave off equal amounts of smoke and odor.
There was also the risk of the tree catching fire although tree’s were normally cut fresh of Christmas eve and therefore more difficult to ignite however a bucket of water always stood by the tree just in case.
The first candles were glued to the branches with wax but eventually candleholders appeared and then an American called Frederick Artz invented a candle holder made of tin with a tray to catch the drips of wax and a spring clip to attach it to the branch.
A Christmas tree was lit by electricity for the first time in New York in 1882 when Edward Johnson, a colleague of Thomas Edison, lit a Christmas tree with a string of 80 small electric light bulbs which he had made himself.
As the bulbs were all hand made they were two expensive to be commercial viable however by 1900 some large stores put up large illuminated trees to attract customers.
It was in 1903 when The Every Ready Company of New York began to make strings of 28 lights which cost the equivalent of a week’s wages.
It wasn’t until 1927 when the General Electric Company of America produced strings of miniature bulbs like we get today.

THE YULE TIDE ROBIN

The Robin although synonymous with Christmas in most people’s minds has in fact no connection to the Christmas story what so ever.
So what is the reason that the Robin has managed to ingrain itself in to our Christmas consciousness.
I think it’s probably because the Robin’s select their mates in December so their birdsong is at its best and the male’s plumage is at its brightest while all the other
Birds are dull and quiet.
The bright red breasts of the birds stand out so vividly against any snowy winter backdrop as to make them an obvious choice to adorn a Christmas card.

THE ST STEPHEN’S DAY MASSACRE

The Wren is a bird with a rather unfortunate connection to Christmas.
There is an old Irish legend that claims that when St Stephen was imprisoned he would have made good his escape had it not been for the chirping of the Wrens.
As a result from that day forward in Ireland every St Stephen’s day, December 26th, in a ceremony called “the Wren massacre” Wrens were stoned to death.
Since the 1920’s the custom has thankfully died out.

MIDDLE AGED SPREAD

During the Middle Ages Christmas was the most popular of the religious holidays as it was generally the happiest and undoubtedly the longest, lasting from Christmas Eve until the feast of Epiphany on January 6th.
In the royal or wealthy houses Christmas preparations would begin as early as November when beasts were slaughtered and this would have happened in spite of Christmas rather than because of it as there was normally not enough food to keep large numbers of beasts through the long winters.
Nothing was wasted and every part of the animals was used and the meat was preserved with salt and spices or pickled in vinegar or smoked and cured by a fire.
Quinces, apples, pairs, plums and assorted other fruits were exceeding popular in the Middle Ages and were dried and stored for the winter.
The poor celebrated the two week holiday as best they could with the luckiest workers being given some time off and they might even receive gifts of ale, food or firewood.
The wealthiest in the land would lay on great banquets and entertainments and the more important of the local workers or villagers were sometimes invited to the lords hall for a feast, though they had to take there own cup and plate.

STREET LIGHTS

So many people decorate the outside of there house’s now with colored lights that the big London Christmas displays like oxford street or Regents street It don’t seem such a big deal now.
But when they first began it was a different story.
They came about after an article in the daily telegraph commented that during Christmas London looked so drab and grey.
As a result in 1954 the Regent Street association decided to take decisive action and organized themselves to decorate the buildings with electric lights.
These became so popular that people would travel for miles to see them and turning the lights on became such an event that thousands of people would turn up to see a celebrity flick the switch.

CHRISSIE POSTIE

It was in 1843 when Christmas cards first came into being and with the advent of cheap postage and the appearance of envelopes the practice of sending Christmas greetings cards took off.
The postmen of the day were dressed in scarlet tunics and as a result quickly became known as Robin postmen.
So quite understandably the Robin Redbreast very soon began to appear on the cards themselves.

CHRISTMAS CANDLES – A SIGNAL

The placing of lighted candles in the windows in England harks back to a time when the Catholic religion was banned.
A lighted candle would be placed in the window of a Catholic family as a signal that it was safe for a priest to come into their home to celebrate Mass.
WHAT A CRACKER

It was In Victorian England that one of the largest Christmas crackers’s ever to be created.
It was made for a renowned actor called Harry Payne.
Payne was appearing as a clown in a Pantomime at the Drury lane theatre when the cracker was delivered.
It was over seven feet in length and contained a change of costume for the whole cast as well as hundred of small crackers that the cast threw to the children in the audience to their great excitement.

A CRACKING IDEA

The origins of the Christmas cracker lie in France where bags of bon-bons where wrapped in paper which two children would then pull apart.
While on holiday in Paris in the 1860’s an English confectioner named Tom Smith noticed the paper wrapped bags of sugared almonds and bon-bons in many shop windows.
When he returned to London he decided he would sell these bags of sweets in his shop but they where not to the English taste so he formulated an idea to improve on the French idea adding a printed motto or riddle this did not help.
It was only when he was sitting quietly by his fireside listening to the logs burning and cracking that the idea hit him.
Make them bang.
He was a very resourceful man and experimented with various chemicals before he succeeded in impregnating two strips of cardboard which when pulled apart, as a result of friction, would then cause a small explosion.

When they went on sale they contained mottoes written by popular writers of the day and quality novelties in the form of games, puzzles, toys and curiosities, a far cry from the cheap plastic imports and paper hats we get today.
Tom Smiths Christmas Crackers became an instant success.

THE ORIGINS OF THE CHRISTMAS TREE
– WOULD YOU ADAM AND EVE IT

In the 11th century during advent short plays were performed called mysteries and these were very popular.
There was one in particular about paradise in which a tree was decorated with red apples to symbolize the tree of paradise this eventually led.to the 15th century practise of the faithful putting up small trees in their own houses on december 24, which was the feast day of Adam and Eve

THE ORIGINS OF THE CHRISTMAS TREE
– BELIEVE IT OR NOT

Some people believe the origins of the Christmas tree lie in a kind of mystical symbolism. In fact a mixture of symbols showing us glimpses of what the creator has to offer.
Representing light and the movement of angels, the gifts of orchard and field, forest and sea, all capped off by the star that pointed to the end of the journey, the place of peace.
You may well think what a load of contrived tosh or you may not.
Or you may decide the truth of it is that the Christmas tree is as a result of the merging or fusion of Christian and pagan festivals namely Christmas and the winter solstice, saturnalia or mithras.

THE ORIGINS OF THE CHRISTMAS TREE
– BY ROYAL APPOINTMENT

The first Christmas tree as we have come to know it, minus the light and tinsel, appeared in Alsace in arround 1521 and by the 18th century the custom was well established in Germany and Austria
It was then spread far and wide due to the Royal families and the aristocrats.
It was introduced into France by the princess Hélène de Mecklenburg who brought one to Paris in 1837 after her marriage to the duke of Orleans.
In 1841 it reached England when Prince Albert, a German, husband of Queen Victoria, set up a christmas tree at Windsor castle.
From then on the Christmas tree custom spread quickly through the middle class and then to working people.
Once the custom had firmly taken hold in England it quickly spread around the globe through the British Empire.