I love a good Christmas book, and this was absolutely brilliant. It’s a full blown history of Christmas, from even before its origins, through to more recent traditions and I think literally everything in between! And yes, I know we’re well into January now, but I started this at the end of last year, so it’s ok!
Paul Kerensa is a comedy writer (he’s written on Miranda and Not Going Out), comic, media history enthusiast (he did a whole thing for 100 years of the BBC the other year and has really old copies of the Radio Times), and he’s a Christian (I think he sometimes does Pause for Thought on Radio 2). So he comes at this with all sorts of knowledge, but it feels really well researched on top of that, as well as being easy to read in his light-hearted style.
Here are some of the things I learnt
- The immaculate conception refers to Mary’s birth, not Jesus’.
- The 12 days of Christmas comes from a compromise between the Western church celebrating on 25th December, and the Eastern church on 6th January.
- Good King Wenceslas was only made a king after he died – when he was alive he was a duke.
- Christmas pies were rectangular (to look like a crib) meat pies. When Christmas was cancelled in the 1600s, people made them round and put mincemeat in to get around the ban.
- Joy to the World was written about Jesus’ return, not His birth.
- Knickers, Knickerbocker Glories, and the New York Knicks all trace their names back to a pseudonym used by Washington Irving who popularised the idea of St Nick in America.
- Originally there were key differences between Father Christmas and Santa Claus:
“Santa brings presents; Father Christmas just brings winter. The American version is child-friendly; the English version less so. Mr Claus wears a two-part suit and hat with white bobble; Mr Christmas wears a long one-piece habit with a hood. To this day the only major difference in appearance is in the subtlety of their headwear – hat versus hood is a handy way to spot an American Santa from an English Father Christmas.” - Dicken’s A Christmas Carol, Christmas Cards, and the carol “O Come All Ye Faithful” all appeared within a week of each other in December 1843.
- Boxing day used to be the first weekday after Christmas. (And yes, that’s when we’d get a bank holiday now, but we don’t call that day Boxing day).
- When a drawing of Victoria & Albert and their children admiring their 15ft Christmas tree was published in the USA, they removed Victoria’s crown and Albert’s moustache.
- Dickens was in love with Queen Victoria:
“On the royal wedding night at Windsor Castle in 1840, the already-married Dickens protested beneath the newlyweds’ bedroom window by rolling around in the mud.” - The original Miracle on 34th Street film was released in cinemas in May.
- Star Wars did a Christmas special in 1978. It seems there’s a reason we haven’t heard about it….
I don’t normally enjoy history, but this was just fantastic, highly recommended if you are interested in where our modern day Christmas with all its quirks comes from.
ineke.co.uk 