Christmas Every Day

It was customary in 19th-century American cities for certain tradesmen to solicit tips at Christmas by distributing a poetic broadsheet explaining why they deserved a seasonal gratuity — carriers, scavengers, and, particularly, town watchmen all touted their indispensability in verse. Here is the “Address of the Watchmen of the city and county of Philadelphia, on the Return of Christmas for the year 1818”. In it the author makes the unassailable theological point that, until God brings justice and peace to the world in the End Times, watchmen will always be necessary to guard the innocent householder.

Old custom calls a feast today,
Bids other bus’ness cease awhile
And liberal patrons think or say,
“Christmas repays the Watchman’s toil.”

His year is up–his labours claim
From generous friends a recompence,
‘Midst num’rous gifts, it were a shame,
To send him disappointed hence.

Thanks should inspire his breast, and yours,
That he who slumbers not, nor sleeps
Whose “mercy evermore endures,”
Our city still in safety keeps.

For vain the Watchman’s homely voice,
His rattle too and staff in vain
Useless each effort he employs,
If GOD should not our guard remain.

Him for our refuge–then no more,
With deep design or inward hate
Shall foes succeed at midnight hour,
To murder or to conflagrate.

Alas! what heart but throbs with shame,
What eye the rising tear denies!
At thought of man’s dishonour’d name,
To see the sad effects of vice.

 The court, the jail, the fetters whence,
But from this source their power obtain ?
Hence springs the whole, and only hence,
Of human woe, distress and pain.

The beasts, which tread the forest o’er,
And ocean’s monsters all are seen,
Not stain’d with half the horrid score
Of deeds, that marks the lives of men.

And shall the long expected day
Arrive, and all these mis’ries end ?
Shall peace and truth regain their sway,
And man become his fellow’s friend ?

Yes! for this DAY ensures that hour,
When HE, who cloth’d himself in clay
By his own “word” and “mighty power,”
Shall scatter crime from earth away.

Then shall the “leopard with the kid,”
The “lion with the lamb lie down;”
Blessings creation overspread,
And every name his kingdom own.

No Watchman then his post need stand,
His “rattle” or his voice employ:
The land will be “Immanuel’s land,”
Where none shall “hurt” or aught “destroy”.

Yet till that period approach,
Your liberal feelings can’t refuse
A GIFT; we do not say how much,
But leave it with yourselves to choose.

This will encourage us the more,
Our nightly hardships to sustain ;
To guard from felons every door,
‘Midst driving snow or pelting rain.

The Brothers Grimm, Jacob (1785-1863) and Wilhelm (1786-1859) were indefatigable students of the German language and mythology, producing monumental works on linguistics and folklore. Among the numberless myths, stories, and sayings they collected were dozens of folk beliefs about Christmas and the Twelve Days. Here are some, mostly involving predictions of one kind or another.

When a maid wants to know if she shall keep her place, let her on Christmas Eve turn her back to the door, and fling the shoe off her foot over her head: if the tip of the shoe is towards the door, she’ll have to go; if the heel, she will stay.

He that is born at sermon-time on a Christmas morning, can see spirits.

 To find out if she’ll get husband during the year, let the damsel knock at the hen-house on Christmas-eve or at midnight: if the cock cackles, she’ll get one; if the hen, she won’t.

 On Christmas-eve the girls of Saalfeld sit up from 11 to 12. To find out if they shall get married the next year, they strip themselves naked, stick their heads into the copper, and watch the water hissing. If that does not answer, they take a broom and sweep the room backwards, and see the future lover sitting in a corner: if they hear the crack of a whip, he is a waggoner, if the sound of a pipe, a shepherd. Some rush out of doors naked, and call the lover; others go to a cross-road, and call out his name.

Tying wet strawbands round the orchard-trees on Christmas Eve makes them fruitful.

In the Twelve-nights neither master nor man may bring fresh blackened shoes into the stable; else the cattle get bewitched.

A hoop coming off a cask on Christmas Eve shows that some one in the house will die that year.

If from the fires of the three holy eves (before Christmas, New Year and High New Year [Epiphany]) glowing embers be left the next morning, you’ll want for nothing all that year.

He who walks into the winter corn on Holy Christmas-eve, hears all that will happen in the village that year.

A reminder that earlier times saw Christmas as a long-extended season. From the wonderful blog “A Clerk of Oxford” some medieval English verse on the subject, followed by its translation. (The letter “þ” is pronounced like “th”, so “þe” becomes “the”.)

After Crystenmasse com þe crabbed lentoun,
Þat fraystez flesch wyth þe fysche and fode more symple;
Bot þenne þe weder of þe worlde wyth wynter hit þrepez,
Colde clengez adoun, cloudez vplyften,
Schyre schedez þe rayn in schowrez ful warme,
Fallez vpon fayre flat, flowrez þere schewen,
Boþe groundez and þe greuez grene ar her wedez,
Bryddez busken to bylde, and bremlych syngen
For solace of þe softe somer þat sues þerafter
bi bonk;
And blossumez bolne to blowe
Bi rawez rych and ronk,
Þen notez noble innoȝe
Ar herde in wod so wlonk.

After Christmas comes the crabbed Lent,
Which tests the flesh with fish and simpler food;
But then the weather of the world wages war against winter,
Cold clears away, clouds lift,
Brightly sheds the rain in warm showers
And falls upon fair fields, where flowers appear.
Both the ground and the groves put on green garments;
Birds begin to build, and brightly sing
For delight in the soft summer coming thereafter
To the banks;
And blossoms burgeon into bloom
In rows rich and abundant;
Then notes noble indeed
Are heard in the woods so wild.

Having been converted in AD 330, Ethiopia is one of the oldest Christian nations in the world and Christmas there is quite unlike anywhere else. It is primarily a religious observance, largely untouched by the commercialization and emphasis on gift-giving that has spread elsewhere, and begins with a 40-day fast. Though the fast is not as strict as that Lenten period that precedes Easter it is still a time for physical and spiritual disciplines which prepare the body and soul for Christmas.

 Ethiopians, following the Coptic calendar, celebrate Christmas on January 7. In churches around the country candle-lit processions take place and people stand (there are no pews in an Ethiopian church) for the mass that may last up to three hours. In the country’s spiritual capital Lalibela, home to ancient churches, thousands come every year in pilgrimage. They spend the night before Christmas in a vigil of prayer, singing and dancing. In the morning a great procession carries the Ark of the Covenant to the top of a nearby hill where the liturgy is celebrated. After the service there is more dancing, feasting and, for the men and boys, a game of genna, a kind of hockey played only on Christmas. This game is said to date from the time of the birth of Jesus when the shepherds who had just heard the good news from the angels waved their staffs in joy.

 Food served at Christmas will include injera, a spongy flat bread on which doro wat, a chicken stew (spicy like every other Ethiopian dish) or other main course, will be spread. A piece of the injera is then broken off to to scoop up the stew. Gift giving is a very small part of Christmas in Ethiopia and is usually directed only toward children who will receive something simple such as new clothes.

One foreign custom that has crept into Ethiopian Christmas celebrations is the Christmas tree. Such is the demand for the trees in the area of the capital Addis Ababa that the government has had to impose conservation measures to save the local juniper trees from extinction.

Two weeks after Christmas is Timket, or Epiphany, (pictured above) which is an even greater festival lasting three days in honour of the baptism of Jesus and St. Michael. More gift-giving takes place and more feasting.

 Because the Christmas season ends in many parts of the world on January 6, Twelfth Night became a time of raucous celebration, associated with masking, mumming, drinking and social inversion. This misrule may have been a carry-over to some extent from the riotousness of the pagan Kalends. In Byzantium for example church councils had to legislate against the dancing and transvestism that went on in early January. During the reign of Michael III (842-67) the emperor and his court went so far as to use the occasion to mock the Patriarch of Constantinople and the Mass itself. Mock coronations and consecrations become common in medieval Europe with clerical hijinks, cross-dressing, noise and laughter the order of the day on Twelfth Night.

To commemorate the visit of the Magi who brought gold, frankincense and myrrh to the infant Jesus, Epiphany became the day for giving gifts, especially to children. In the Spanish-speaking world the eve of the day of Los Tres Rejes Magos is when the three wise men pass through on their way to Bethlehem and leave presents for kids who, in turn, leave out snacks for the kings and their camels. In Spain their Majesties and their attendants can be seen processing through the city streets on January 5 in great splendour. In Italy the night of January 5 sees the visit of the Befana (the name itself is a corrption of Epiphania), an old lady who refused to spare time from her housekeeping to accompnay the Three Kings on their journey. She soon repented of her decision and tried to join the Magi but has never succeeded to this day. She therefore visits each home in search of the Christ Child and leaves presents for the little ones that she finds sleeping there.

The custom of the King’s Cake, Twelfth Night Cake, Dreikonigskuchen, gâteau des rois, etc., can be traced back to the thirteenth century. A bean or a pea or a coin was baked into the cake and the lucky finder was named king or queen of the party and could direct others to do his bidding for the evening. Though the tradition lingers in much of Europe (as well as French America) the custom in England was displaced to December 25 where it became the Christmas cake. In medieval France it was customary to put a piece of the cake aside for the poor or to collect money from the rich for their share of the cake and use the money for a charity.

For much of the 19th century there was no single, universally-recognized version of Santa Claus. Depending on the author or the artist, the magical gift-bringer could be young or old, bearded or not, tiny, half-sized, adult-sized or gigantic. His clothes could be those of a pedlar, a farmer, Robin Hood, a king, or a Chinese mandarin.

Truly one-of-a-kind is the character trying to pass himself off as St Nick in Santa Claus and Jenny Lind, likely a promotional piece for the P.T. Barnum-sponsored tour of America in 1850 by the Swedish Nightingale. For this book Santa Claus has dressed up as George Washington (presumably to associate himself with patriotic impulses) complete with eighteenth-century bicorn hat, pigtail and spurs on his boots, and sits astride a winged broom piloting a soprano through the skies singing: “I’m a jolly old man – I ride the wind; / The lady behind me is Miss Jenny Lind;/ The horse that we ride is a broomstick, you see –/ Oh! This is the horse for Miss Jenny and me.”

So much about this Santa Claus is different from his rivals: he carries no sack and all his toys emerge from his pockets; he is a clean-shaven, full-sized gentleman of late-middle years with nothing Dutch, elfin or fur-clad about him; he goes through the world during the hours of daylight and instead of waiting for Christmas Eve to reward the good behaviour he finds, he disburses his praises and gifts then and there. His behaviour is neither solemn nor jolly but rather downright queer – a word he uses several times to describe himself – and if he were to enter a doctor’s office today, he might not escape without a diagnosis of Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder. His mental focus seems very weak; on the least impulse he bounds away over the landscape: “I was happy to see such a good little boy,/ And took from my pocket a beautiful toy:/ I shouted and threw it, I couldn’t keep still,/ And then I was off, over valley and hill.” He won’t stay in one place long enough even to hear Jenny Lind sing; he hies himself to a mountain top “where winds whistle bleak,” and confesses, “I am dancing a jig, I am having a freak.”

The night of January 5, the vigil or eve of Epiphany, is so called because it is the twelfth night from Christmas, if Christmas is counted as the first. (The Twelve Days are not calculated in the same way everywhere. In some places Christmas is counted making Epiphany the thirteenth day. In England it is particularly confusing because January 6 is Twelfth Day but January 5 is Twelfth Night.)

In England, Twelfth Night had long been a period of partying marking the end of the Christmas season. Masquerading was a common activity on Twelfth Night along with dancing, cross-dressing, and gambling. It was a time of social inversion when a mock king was elected to supervise the misrule. 

By the nineteenth century its reputation of riotousness was working against it and Twelfth Night was losing out to Christmas as the date for festivities. Victorian values were making the season more respectable and domestic. The gender-swapping and role reversals were theatricalized and absorbed by the pantomime where they became harmless family fare.

Since January 6, Epiphany, is celebrated as the arrival of the Magi or Three Kings, it is customary in many parts of the world to eat a “king cake”, a treat that comes in all shapes and sizes. Readers who remember the Second Gulf War may recall that American petulance at the French refusal to join in the coalition invading Iraq led to many renaming “French fries” as “Freedom fries.” Those who scorned such linguistic pettifoggery may be surprised to learn that our Gallic cousins were first into this fray. During the French Revolution of the 1790s, bakers were told that “gateaux des rois” were no longer politically correct — king cakes now had to be gateaux de Liberté: freedom cakes.

From an article on the blog of The Golden Glow of Christmas Past:

In 1937, Charles W. Howard established the first Santa Claus School which today is the oldest continuously-run Santa school in the world. At the suggestion of a local journalist, he opened a Santa Claus School in Albion New York, to disseminate his Santa philosophies and methods. He initially held classes in his own home. In the late 1940s, he developed Christmas Park adjacent to his house, an attraction for children throughout western New York, which had space for his school’s classroom and dressing room. New Santas could get practice interacting with children by portraying Santa and his helpers at the park. Department stores across the country sent Santas and executives both to his school.

There have been changes to the School since that article. Under new management the School’s website proclaims:

In 1937, Charles W. Howard a farmer in Albion, New York established a Santa school in direct response to his displeasure with seeing other Santas in frayed suits and cheap beards, and a shockingly inadequate knowledge of reindeer. He decided that he could start a school to make a better Santa. The first class consisted of three men, including a welder from New Jersey, his friend, and a neighbor. Charles eventually had a Christmas-themed park, with several barns, a train and some reindeer. Children for miles around would visit, including Tom Valent, who is originally from a town called Salamanca, about an hour’s drive from Albion.

“As a little girl I sat on Charles Howard’s lap, too,” Holly Valent said. “We were from a small town. Every child wanted to go to Christmas Park.” From 1948 to 1965, Charles Howard was the featured Santa Claus in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, perhaps the most visible Santa in the United States.

The school was taken over by Nate Doan in the 1960s, another famous Santa who in 1968 moved the school to Bay City, Michigan. Tom first attend the CH Santa School in 1975 when expecting his first child.
Today, the Charles W. Howard Santa Claus School continues running under the direction of Tom and Holly Valent and is carried on in Midland, Michigan with an eager student body of about 300 joyful and jolly new and returning students each year.

In 1995, Tom and Holly conducted the first World Santa School in Illulisatt, Greenland. The participating countries included: Germany, Ireland, England, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Canada, Spain, Australia, Greenland, South Africa, Switzerland, as well as the United States.  This Santa School has been taught in Australia, Greenland, and England. Tom and Holly have participated in the weeklong St. Nicholas festivities in Zurich, Switzerland, Oslo, Norway and Stockholm Sweden.

About that foreskin. Yesterday’s blog post was about the medieval celebration of the Circumcision of Jesus and curious readers may be asking: whatever happened to that particular prepuce? Thereby hangs a tale.

While the bodies of Christian saints have yielded thousands of relics, the bodies of Christ and the Virgin Mary, both of which were taken into Heaven, are much less productive of remains. The faithful believed that some of the Virgin’s breast milk and hair were preserved for veneration and that drops of the blood of Jesus at his crucifixion had been saved, but the only body part of Christ that was available as a relic was his foreskin.

How it came to be safeguarded is told in a pseudo-gospel called the Arab Infancy Gospel from the fifth or sixth centuries: And when the time of his circumcision was come, namely, the eighth day, on which the law commanded the child to be circumcised, they circumcised him in a cave. And the old Hebrew woman took the foreskin (others say she took the navel-string), and preserved it in an alabaster-box of old oil of spikenard. And she had a son who was a druggist, to whom she said, “Take heed thou sell not this alabaster box of spikenard-ointment, although thou shouldst be offered three hundred pence for it.” Now this is that alabaster-box which Mary the sinner procured, and poured forth the ointment out of it upon the head and feet of our Lord Jesus Christ, and wiped it off with the hairs of her head.

In the year 800 the Frankish emperor Charlemagne gave the relic to Pope Leo III, telling him that he had received it from an angel. It was preserved in Rome until the city was sacked by Germans in 1527 when it was stolen. The Italian village in which it was recovered kept the foreskin in its reliquary until it disappeared either in 1945 or 1983.

But fear not, because as many as 18 other foreskins of Christ were said to be in circulation during the Middle Ages, though none now can be found. The Catholic Church eventually grew weary of celebrating the Feast of the Circumcision and removed it from the church calendar.