CLAUS FOR THOUGHT

HE’S A MAN OF MYTH AND LEGEND. BUT HOW MUCH DO YOU KNOW OF THE ORIGINS OF SANTA CLAUS? WE TAKE A CLOSER LOOK AT HIS PAST AND PRESENTS

MEET SAINT NICHOLAS

Although his home may be disputed, the man who became Saint Nicholas (who became Santa Claus) didn’t reside in Finland or Greenland, but in southern Turkey. Until his death on 6 December in the year 343, he was Bishop of Myra. He came from a rich family and was known for his charity.

It wasn’t until medieval times, however, that he became ridiculously popular: as described in A Christmas Cornucopia by Mark Forsyth (Viking), in England alone, 800 churches were named after him. He was patron saint of more than 100 professions, as well as eight countries and innumerable towns, even children, orphans and those in financial need.

The custom began of giving children gifts on 6 December, saying Saint Nicholas had brought them. By the 12th century in France, children were leaving shoes out to be filled with gifts from Saint Nick. In Holland, despite an attempt to ban ‘Sinta Klaas’ under the Reformation, he survived – and in fact thrived. As the patron saint both of Amsterdam and of sailors, he was a special figure to sailors who set out in 1624 from Old Amsterdam. They founded New Amsterdam (now New York), the place where Sinta Klaas would become world-famous.

SANTA CLAUS I N NEW YORK

Fast forward a couple of centuries to 1804, the date the New York Historical Society was founded with Saint Nicholas as its patron saint. The activities of the society – and therefore also Saint Nicholas – were satirised by Washington Irving in his 1809 book, A History of the New-York from the Beginning

of the World to the end of the Dutch Dynasty. It was written under the name of Diedrich Knickerbocker and its success not only led to the naming of the New York Knicks baseball team but also gave us many of the tropes associated with Santa today, such as Christmas stockings and chimney access.

SANTA CLAUS v FATHER CHRISTMAS

If you’re raising an eyebrow that we’ve called him Santa Claus rather than Father Christmas, our defence is that they are not the same person. The latter is an Englishman, first recorded in a hymn from the 14th century – he was a personification of the season as is, for example, Jack Frost. Christmas was celebrated both as a religious festival, marking the birth of Jesus, and as an important holiday period. Father Christmas was a figure who oversaw the feasting, dancing and merriment surrounding Christmas. When the Puritans attempted to abolish many of the festival’s latter associations in the 1640s and ’50s, the figure came to be deployed in protest pamphlets. He was an old man with beard ( because Christmas was old) and fat and jolly ( because it was celebrated with food and drink).

In the 19th century, the likes of Dickens recast the idea of Christmas as a family celebration, and time to exchange presents (albeit on New Year’s Eve) – reflecting the gifts presented by the Magi to Jesus. These adjustments paved the way for the arrival of a certain Mr Claus from the States sometime in the 1860s, via North American literature.

ALL THE TRIMMINGS

Washington Irving wasn’t alone in his literary contribution to the Santa phenomenon. During the 19th century, poems and stories added to many of the ‘facts’ celebrated about him today. In 1821, Children’s Friend magazine illustrated a festive poem with one reindeer and a sleigh, while an 1869 poem ‘Santa Claus and His Works’ moved him to the North Pole. The elves are from an 1850 short story by Louisa May Alcott.

‘Twas the Night Before Christmas’ (officially ‘A Visit from St Nicholas’), written by New York Historical Society member, Clement Clarke Moore, gave Santa his named reindeer (minus Ruldoph). Incredibly, it also shifted the date that gifts were given from 6 December and New Year’s Eve (as it was in Britain) to Christmas Eve.

But what about Ruldoph? Well, a colouring book is to thank for that, commissioned by Montgomery Ward Department Store, Chicago in 1939, to hand out to their customers. Robert L May came up with poor Rudolph, bullied for a shiny nose. It became a bestseller in its own right. Six months later, it was May’s brother-in-law who wrote the famous song about it.

Oh, and that story that Santa only started wearing red and white after Coca-Cola advertising? It’s myth. He’s red-robed in a painting of 1837, commissioned by – who else? – The New York Historical Society.