Merry Chistmas ‘n’

That

Secret Santa...• Most Christmas motifs have their roots in some kind of folk tradition or

practice, but are trotted out every year with little awareness of their origins.

• Note how every time a Hollywood film tries to meddle with Christmas folklore, a new generation takes on the previous one’s traditions and symbols in a superficial fashion and proceeds to ‘update’ them for ‘modern times’ - usually resulting a massively surreal mishmash of nonsensical, ill-fitting elements that they then have to try to force some kind of sense into. (Santa Claus the Movie, The Santa Clause, Fred Claus etc.)

• But this doesn’t just happen in films – it happens in society in general. When we look at other cultures’ rituals and traditions they often look utterly baffling, alien, and relentlessly oddball, and you wonder how they ever came up with that. Well, Santa Claus is a case in point. How would you explain Him and his world, in all its glorious absurd detail, to an alien?

Myth 1 # Coca-Cola invented Santa Claus

Coca-Cola’s Santa first appeared in 1931, and undoubtedly had a hand in making that the standard image of Him – but the character had already evolved to look like that, often (but not always) portrayed in red and white.

1931Haddon SundblomFirst Coca-Cola Santa

1955Haddon Sundblom

One of the earliest known portrayals of what is recognisably “our” Santa was by German-born illustrator Thomas Nast in around 1869.

ca 1869Thomas NastSanta Claus and his Works

1881Thomas NastHarper's Weekly

Postcards ca1900

1905Carl Stetson Crawford

1908E. Boyd SmithSanta Claus and All About Him

1925N. C. WyethOld KrisThe Country Gentleman

1922Norman Rockwell

1925J. C. Leyendecker

1939Norman Rockwell

• This image (Nast’s pictures in particular) were heavily influenced by two anonymous poems – one poem from the Children’s Friend in 1821 which had "Sante Claus" arriving from the North in a sleigh with a flying reindeer, rewarding good behaviour with educational toys and punishing bad by leaving birch rods to beat kids with.

• The other poem, more famous today, was A Visit from St Nicholas in 1823 – now also known as The Night Before Christmas, which has a full description of “jolly old elf” St Nicholas, his reindeer and his nocturnal activities.

1848T. C. BoydA Visit from Saint Nicholas

1862F. O. C. Darley

A Visit from Saint Nicholas

Sante ClausThe Children's Friend, 1821

Myth #2 – Santa Claus is Dutch

These were in turn influenced by the work of Washington Irving who, as a member of the New York Historical Society, wrote Knickerbocker's History of New York – a fictional satirical history of New York which had numerous references to a jolly St Nicholas character, portrayed as Dutch burgher with a clay pipe.

It said the first Dutch immigrant ship had a figurehead of St. Nicholas, that St Nicholas Day was observed in the colony, that the first church was dedicated to him, and that St. Nicholas comes down chimneys to bring gifts, but it wasn’t meant to be taken seriously - however, there is some truth to it - St Nicholas was an important figure to many European immigrants and the Society adopted St Nicholas as their patron saint in the first place to honour New York’s Dutch origins.

Myth # 3 – Our Santa is just St Nicholas

• The real St Nicholas was a 4th Century Bishop from Myra, an area now part of modern Day Turkey. His feast day was celebrated in the medieval church as December 6. He may have attended the Council of Nicea, and there are lots of stories surrounding him as a gift-giver and protector of children.

• The most famous has him hearing of a man who could not afford the dowries for his three daughters, with the result that he intended - regretfully - to send them to the brothel to work.  St Nicholas saves them from this fate by throwing three bags of gold through their window at night.

So is that it?• Was all that Lapland/Reindeer/Elves/Flying

Sleigh/Stockings by the chimney stuff just made up?

• No – a lot of older traditions seem to bear a striking resemblance to our modern Santa – it looks like a lot of pagan trappings were absorbed by Him along the way...

Norse Gods: Odin

Odin was sometimes recorded, at the native Germanic holiday of Yule, as leading a great hunting party through the sky. Odin was referred to by many names in Skaldic poetry, some of which describe his appearance or functions. These include Síðgrani, Síðskeggr, Langbarðr, (all meaning "long beard") and Jólnir ("Yule figure").According to some traditions, children would place their boots, filled with carrots, straw, or sugar, near the chimney for Odin's flying horse, Sleipnir, to eat. Odin would then reward those children for their kindness by replacing Sleipnir's food with gifts or candy.

Georg von Rosen - Oden som vandringsman1886 (Odin, the Wanderer)

Norse Gods: Thor"Thor was the god of the peasants 

and the common people. He was representedas an eld erly man, jovial and friendly, of heavy build, with a long white beard. His element was the fire, his color red. The rumble and roar of thunder were said to be caused by the rolling of his chariot, for he alone among the gods never rode onhorse back but drove in a chariot drawn bytwo white goats called Cracker and Gnasher. He was said to live in the 'North land' where he had his palace among icebergs. The fireplace in every home was especially sacred to him, and he was said to come down through the chimney into his element, the fire."- -Francis X. Weiser, Handbook of Christian Feasts and Customs (New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc., 1958)

"Thor was fighting the giants of ice and snow, and thus became the Yule-god. He was said to live in the "Northland" where he had his palace among icebergs. By our pagan forefathers he was considered  as the cheerful and friendly god, never harming the humans but rather helping and protecting them. The fireplace in every home was especially sacred to him, and he was said to come down through the chimney into his element, the fire." -(Guerber, H.A. Myths of Northern Lands. New York: American Book Company, 1895, p. 61)

Yule/Father ChristmasIn Scandinavian and Germanic countries, the festival of Yule was

celebrated at the winter solstice with a wild hunt and a bountiful feast and is tied to traditions such as the Yule log, the Yule goat or boar. With Christianisation many Yule traditions merged with Christmas festivities. The folkloric figure of Yule (aka Father Christmas) certainly predates the modern Coca-Cola Santa, and has the distinct whiff of a pagan green-man style nature spirit about him, as alluded to in Dickens’ Christmas Carol with the Ghost of Christmas Present.

Pagan Nature SpiritsThe figure of Yule was in turn almost certainly derived from the kind of wild nature spirits that

inhabit pagan traditions across Europe. There are echoes of the Santa figure in the furry, bearded, wilderness dwelling, magical wild-men figures of the middle ages, as well as linking with wild, untamed personifications of nature and fertility such as the “green man”, Dionysus and Pan – such figures, were of course, demonised in medieval times as the very image of the devil.

KrampusWhich is why “Krampus” looks so alarming.

In many countries St Nicholas (or Sinterklaas) retains the form of a saintly Bishop, but is accompanied by various “dark helpers” – in some Alpine countries (notably Bavaria) the figure of Krampus is a frightening-looking wild-man/goat-man figure and direct hang-over from pagan Yule festivities that was incorporated into Christian celebrations around the 17 th century.

Krampus is the dark side of St Nicholas – where he brings kindness, blessings and gifts for good children, Krampus takes children away in his sack to be punished – Our Santa is almost like an amalgam of the priestly St Nicholas and the pagan beast-man of Krampus – and, in a way, very possibly is. Variations on Santa’s “dark helpers” include the decidedly racist “Black Peter” of Belgium/Netherlands

Krampus

"In the English-speaking countries, we combined Santa and his helpers (Krampus and Black Peter) into a composite which arrives at Christmas time to stuff the stockings and reward children who have been naughty and nice.  But the pagan history shows that St. Nicholas is a vastly more complex being...“This ‘Yuletide’ spirit-being is a duality.  Part of him is the kindly priest in flowing robes and part of him is the evil fiend with slashing teeth and claws."- The Antinoopolis Gayzette, Meet Santa’s Helpers – Krampus and Antinous/Apollo 

  "What may surprise you is that 

Santa Claus has not always been  a jolly ole elf, or even human.  In fact, he has been depicted  as an evil gnome as well as a goat." - Will the Real Santa Claus Please Stand Up? The Many Faces of Santa Denise Alvarado

"Ol Saint Nick as it turns out  has a bunch of demonic buddies.  You wouldn't know it from the  Christian American Coca Cola  interpretation of Christmas  but there's some really disturbing  stories surrounding that special  time of the year..." - Monster Brains Presents... Krampus!  Aeron Alfrey

"And, of course, there’s Santa Claus. As the ancient beast-god of old, he continues to bring bounty and promise to us each year.  There are gods, religions, nations and even hominid species that have risen and fallen - while he somehow persists. No wonder he winks as he sips his Coca-Cola."- The Last Wild Man by PHYLLIS SIEFKER  FT 118 - January 2000 Fortean Times