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| Sunday, 25 December 2005 |
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Junior Observer |  |
| News Business Features Editorial
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It is believed that the Christmas tree originated in Germany. Indeed, the earliest record of an evergreen tree being used and decorated (but without lights) for Christmas was in 1521, in the German region of Alsace. From the mid-seventeenth century on, the Christmas tree slowly grew in popularity and use. However, it was not until the beginning of the 19th century that the use of the Christmas tree grew into the general German custom that it is today. Also at this time it spread to the Slavic people of eastern Europe. The Christmas tree was probably first used in America about 1700 when the first wave of German immigrants settled in western Pennsylvania. It is widely held that the Christmas tree was first introduced into France in 1837 when Princess Helen of Mecklenburg brought it to Paris after her marriage to the Duke of Orleans. The Christmas tree made its royal debut in England when Prince Albert of Saxony, the husband of Queen Victoria, set up a tree in Windsor Castle in 1841. After this it grew in popularity, though in 1850 Charles Dickens was still referring to it as a "new German toy." But from where did Christians get the idea of the Christmas tree? Was it a new idea or was there a historical custom upon which they were building? The Christmas tree appears to be a descendent of the Paradise tree and the Christmas light of the late Middle Ages. From the eleventh century, religious plays called "mystery plays" became quite popular throughout Europe. These plays were performed outdoors and in churches. One of the most prevalent of these plays was the "Paradise play." The play depicted the story of the creation of Adam and Eve, their sin, and their banishment from Paradise. The play would end with the promise of the coming Saviour and His Incarnation (cf. Gen. 3:15). The Paradise play was simple by today's standards. The only prop on stage was the "Paradise tree," a fir tree adorned with apples. The people had grown so accustomed to the Paradise tree, however, that they began putting their own Paradise tree up in their homes on December 24 even after the plays were banned. They did so on Dec. 24 because this was the feast day of Adam and Eve (at least in the Eastern Church). The Paradise tree, as it had in the Paradise plays, symbolized both a tree of sin and a tree of life. For this reason, the people would decorate these trees with apples (representing the fruit of sin) and home-made wafers (like communion wafers which represented the fruit of life). Later, candy and sweets were added. Another custom was to be found in the homes of Christians on Dec. 24 since the late Middle Ages. A large candle called the "Christmas light," symbolising Christ who is the light of the world, was lit on Christmas Eve. In western Germany, many smaller candles were set upon a wooden pyramid and lit. Besides the candles, other objects such as glass balls, tinsel, and the "star of Bethlehem" were placed on its top.Though we cannot be certain, it seems highly likely that the first Christmas trees that appeared in Germany in the early sixteenth century were descendants of both of these customs: the Paradise tree and the Christmas pyramids and lights. The Paradise tree became our Christmas tree. Decorations that had been placed on the pyramids were transferred to the Christmas tree. * The first retail Christmas stand was set up by Mark Carr in New York City in 1851; * Franklin Pierce was the first president to introduce the Christmas tree to the White House in 1856 for a group of Washington Sunday School children; * The first lighted Christmas tree in public was in Boston in 1912. * The first national Christmas Tree was lighted in the year 1923 on the White House lawn by President Calvin Coolidge. Who first thought of bon bons In early 1830, Tom Smith started work as a small boy in a baker's and ornamental confectioner's shop in London, selling sweets such as fondants, pralines and gum pastilles. He worked hard and took particular interest in the wedding cake ornaments and decorations, experimenting and creating new, more exciting and less crude designs in his spare time. Before long he was successful enough to leave and start up his own business in Goswell Road, Clerkenwell, East London. He was adventurous and forward thinking, often travelling abroad to search for new ideas and it was on a trip to Paris in 1840 that he first discovered the 'bon bon', a sugared almond wrapped in a twist of tissue paper. It was a simple idea which, over the next seven years, would eventually evolve into the cracker. He decided to bring the 'bon bon' to London and during Christmas that year, they sold extremely well, but in January, demand virtually ceased and once again he was reliant on sales of cake and table decorations and ornaments. Anxious to develop the 'bon bon' idea further and stimulate sales, Tom decided to place a small love motto in the tissue paper and he encouraged his regular customers to take supplies, which many did, and within a short while, orders were sufficiently high and sales profitable enough for him to increase his staff. By now, Tom knew that he had a unique and potentially a very commercial idea. He decided to take a risk and concentrate on developing it further, while still running the wedding cake ornament and confectionery business which was by now very well established. At this time, the majority of 'bon bons' were still sold at Christmas and he began to think up ways to capitalise on this short but very profitable season and make his 'bon bons' even more appealing. It was the crackle of a log as he threw it on his fire that gave him the flash of inspiration which eventually led to the crackers we know today. What the story of the Christmas cake is The Christmas Cake as we know it today comes from two customs which became one around 1870 in Victorian England. Originally there was a porridge, the origins of which go back to the beginnings of Christianity. Then there was a fine cake made with the finest milled wheatflour, this was baked only in the Great Houses, as not many people had ovens back in the 14th century. Originally people used to eat a sort of porridge on Christmas Eve. Gradually, they began to put spices, dried fruits, honey etc in the porridge to make it a special dish for Christmas. Much later it was turned into a pudding. This turned into Christmas Pudding. Later, around the 16th century, it became popular to add butter, replace the oatmeal with wheatflour, and add eggs to hold it together better. This became boiled plumcake. So boiled plum pudding and boiled fruitcake existed side by side depending on which ingredients the housewife used. Only big houses had proper ovens to bake in. In the castles and fine homes, people would make a special cake for Easter, which was a rich fruitcake recipe with a topping of what we now call marzipan or almond paste. A similar cake was baked for the Christmas festivities, but whereas the Easter one was a plain cake with almonds, the Christmas one had dried fruits in season and spices. These represented the exotic spices of the East, and the gifts of the Wise Men . Such things were first brought to Europe and Britain particularly, by the Crusaders coming back from the wars in the Holy Land in the 12th century.But it was not a Christmas cake, but a Twelfth Night Cake. Twelfth Night is on January 5, and has been for centuries the traditional last day of the Christmas season. This is the Church festival of Ephiphany. The traditional day when Christians celebrate the arrival of the Magi or Three Kings at Bethlehem. It used to be the time when people exchanged their Christmas gifts. The feast was marked, as were all the old feasts, by some kind of religious observance; a visit to the church, a service of some kind, and then a folk observance which was tightly wrapped up as part of the Church activities. As we have seen, Twelve Day (the day following Twelfth Night) entailed the blessing of the home, and in some countries is still observed. But after the Reformation, these customs of the Church were banned by the Puritans, and fell into disuse, without its religious overtones. By 1870, Britain's Queen Victoria announced that she felt it was inappropriate to hold such an unChristian festival, and Twelfth Night was banned as a feast day. The confectioners who made the cakes were left with boxes full of figurines and models for Twelfth Night Cakes, and also had lost revenue by the banning of the feast. So they began to bake a fruitcake and decorate it with snowy scenes, or even flower gardens and Italian romantic ruins. These they sold not for January 5, but for December Christmas parties. And it was thus that we developed the Christmas cake. The Americans in turn were getting cakes sent from all parts of Europe by relatives in the 'Old Country'. Then in the 1890s, a German immigrant opened a cake bakery in a small town, and began to bake cakes which the Americans in turn would send to their relatives back in Europe. This cake was based on a traditional Christmas cake, but contained many of the fruits which were grown in the Americas. This cake is now sent out to countries all over the world by the bakery, today. Where Christmas cards originated A relatively recent phenomenon, the sending of commercially printed Christmas cards originated in London in 1843. Previously, people had exchanged handwritten holiday greetings; first in person, then via the post. By 1822, home-made Christmas cards had become the bane of the U.S. postal system. The first Christmas card designed for sale was by London artist John Calcott Horsley. A respected illustrator of the day, Horsley was commissioned in 1843 by Sir Henry Cole, a wealthy British businessman, who wanted a card he could proudly send to friends and professional acquaintances to wish them a "merry Christmas." The first Christmas card's inscription read: "Merry Christmas and a happy New Year to you." "Merry" was then a spiritual word meaning "blessed," as in "merry old England." Of the original one thousand cards printed for Henry Cole, twelve exist today in private collections. Printed cards soon became the rage in England; then in Germany. But it required an additional thirty years for Americans to take to the idea. In 1875, Boston lithographer Louis Prang, a native of Germany, began publishing cards, and earned the title "father of the American Christmas card." Today more than two billion Christmas cards are exchanged annually, just within the United States.Christmas is the number one card-selling holiday of the year. Who snowman is A snowman is a man-like figure constructed from compacted snow. The image of a snowman is popularly connected with Christmas and is embedded in Western culture. Building a snowman is a popular winter recreation for children. A snowman can be constructed by rolling a large ball of snow for a "body". A second (and often a third), smaller ball is placed on top, as a "head". Facial features, such as eyes and a mouth are traditionally added using coal or small stones, as are buttons. A nose may be added, using a piece of fruit or a vegetable, such as a carrot; sticks are sometimes added as arms. Snowmen are often depicted with a pipe and a hat. Japanese snowmen (snow daruma) usually consist of two, instead of three, snowballs. Twigs are used for arms, pieces of charcoal for facial features, and a bucket is used for a hat. Frosty the Snowman was a Tin Pan Alley novelty created by Jack Nelson and Steve Rollins in 1950, consciously made as a follow-up to "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" and sold to Gene Autry, who recorded it. The title was taken up for a children's book, illustrated by Corinne Malvern, and published in 1950 by Golden Books. It went on to become a popular children's television cartoon by Rankin and Bass in 1968. Frosty is the most famous snowman. The Snowman is also a children's story written by British author
Raymond Briggs which was turned into an animated film in 1982. |
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