Santa Claus
Santa Claus, also known as Father Christmas, Saint Nicholas, Saint Nick, Kris Kringle, or simply Santa, is a legendary character originating in Western Christian culture. He is said to make lists of children throughout the world, categorising them according to their behavior, and bringing gifts on Christmas Eve of toys and candy to well-behaved children, and coal to naughty children. Martin Luther first suggested the Christkind as the bringer of gifts.
About Santa Claus in brief
Santa Claus, also known as Father Christmas, Saint Nicholas, Saint Nick, Kris Kringle, or simply Santa, is a legendary character originating in Western Christian culture. He is said to make lists of children throughout the world, categorising them according to their behavior, and bringing gifts on Christmas Eve of toys and candy to well-behaved children, and coal to naughty children. Santa Claus is generally depicted as a portly, jolly, white-bearded man, often with spectacles, wearing a red coat with white fur collar and cuffs. This image became popular in the U.S. and Canada in the 19th century due to the significant influence of the 1823 poem \”A Visit from St. Nicholas. Martin Luther first suggested the Christkind as the bringer of gifts. Father Christmas dates back as far as 16th century in England during Henry VIII, when he was pictured as a man in green robes lined with fur. He typified the good cheer at Christmas, bringing peace, good food and wine and revelry. The Victorian revival of Christmas included Father Christmas as the emblem of good good cheer, with one famous image being John Leech’s illustration of him in A Christmas Carol. The current current image of Father Christmas is a great genial man in a green coat lined with green fur who takes a sprinkling of Scrooge through the streets of London on Christmas morning on December 25. The modern character of Santa Claus was based on traditions surrounding the historical Saint Nicholas, the English figure of Father.
Christmas, and the Dutch figure of Sinterklaas. The character of Saint Nicholas is usually portrayed as a bearded bishop in canonical robes. He was famous for his generous gifts to the poor, in particular presenting the three impoverished daughters of a pious Christian with dowries so that they would not have to become prostitutes. During the Middle Ages, often on the evening before his name day of 6 December, children were bestowed gifts in his honour. This date was earlier than the original day of gifts for the children, which moved in the course of the Reformation and its opposition to the veneration of saints in many countries on 24 and 25 December. The custom of gifting to children at Christmas has been propagated by Martin Luther as an alternative to the previous very popular gift custom on St. Nicholas, to focus the interest of the children to Christ instead of the venerated of saints. St. Nicholas was later claimed as a patron saint of many diverse groups, from archers, sailors, and children to pawnbrokers, He is also the Patron saint of both Amsterdam and Moscow. The bones of St Nicholas’ skeleton were taken by Venetian sailors during the First Crusade and placed in Venice, where a church to St. Nick, the patron of sailors, was built on the San Nicolò al Lido. This tradition was confirmed in two important scientific investigations of the relics in Bari and Venice, which revealed that the relics belong to the same skeleton.
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This page is based on the article Santa Claus published in Wikipedia (as of Dec. 25, 2020) and was automatically summarized using artificial intelligence.
