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<!DOCTYPE html> <html lang="en"> <head> <title>CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Christmas</title><script src="https://dtyry4ejybx0.cloudfront.net/js/cmp/cleanmediacmp.js?ver=0104" async="true"></script><script defer data-domain="newadvent.org" src="https://plausible.io/js/script.js"></script><link rel="canonical" href="https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03724b.htm"> <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1"> <meta name="description" content="Provides a detailed overview of the holiday from the fourth century through the modern age. 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Includes the Catholic Encyclopedia, Church Fathers, Summa, Bible and more  all for only $19.99...</a></em></p> <h2>Origin of the word</h2> <p>The word for Christmas in late Old English is <em>Cristes Maesse</em>, the Mass of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>, first found in 1038, and <em>Cristes-messe</em>, in 1131. In <a href="../cathen/10759a.htm">Dutch</a> it is <em>Kerstmis</em>, in Latin <em>Dies Natalis</em>, whence comes the French <em>Noël</em>, and <a href="../cathen/08245a.htm">Italian</a> <em>Il natale</em>; in German <em>Weihnachtsfest</em>, from the preceeding sacred vigil. The term <em>Yule</em> is of disputed origin. It is unconnected with any word meaning "wheel". The name in Anglo-Saxon was <em>geol</em>, feast: <em>geola</em>, the name of a month (cf. <a href="../cathen/07615b.htm">Icelandic</a> <em>iol</em> a feast in December).</p> <h2>Early celebration</h2> <p>Christmas was not among the earliest <a href="../cathen/06021b.htm">festivals</a> of the <a href="../cathen/03744a.htm">Church</a>. <a href="../cathen/08130b.htm">Irenaeus</a> and <a href="../cathen/14520c.htm">Tertullian</a> omit it from their lists of <a href="../cathen/06021b.htm">feasts</a>; <a href="../cathen/11306b.htm">Origen</a>, glancing perhaps at the discreditable imperial <em>Natalitia</em>, asserts (in Lev. Hom. viii in <a href="../cathen/10290a.htm">Migne</a>, P.G., XII, 495) that in the <a href="../cathen/13635b.htm">Scriptures</a> sinners alone, not <a href="../cathen/04171a.htm">saints</a>, celebrate their birthday; <a href="../cathen/01746c.htm">Arnobius</a> (VII, 32 in P.L., V, 1264) can still ridicule the "birthdays" of the gods.</p> <div class="CMtag_300x250" style="display: flex; height: 300px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; "></div> <h3>Alexandria</h3> <p>The first evidence of the feast is from <a href="../cathen/05329b.htm">Egypt</a>. About A.D. 200, <a href="../cathen/04045a.htm">Clement of Alexandria</a> (<a href="../fathers/02101.htm"><em>Stromata</em> I.21</a>) says that certain <a href="../cathen/05329b.htm">Egyptian</a> <a href="../cathen/14580a.htm">theologians</a> "over curiously" assign, not the year alone, but the day of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> birth, placing it on 25 Pachon (20 May) in the twenty-eighth year of <a href="../cathen/02107a.htm">Augustus</a>. [Ideler (Chron., II, 397, n.) thought they did this <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">believing</a> that the ninth month, in which Christ was born, was the ninth of their own calendar.] Others reached the <a href="../cathen/04636c.htm">date</a> of 24 or 25 Pharmuthi (19 or 20 April). With <a href="../cathen/04045a.htm">Clement's</a> evidence may be mentioned the "De paschæ computus", written in 243 and falsely ascribed to <a href="../cathen/04583b.htm">Cyprian</a> (P.L., IV, 963 sqq.), which places <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> birth on 28 March, because on that day the material sun was created. But Lupi has shown (Zaccaria, Dissertazioni ecc. del p. A.M. Lupi, <a href="../cathen/05751b.htm">Faenza</a>, 1785, p. 219) that there is no month in the year to which respectable authorities have not assigned <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> birth. <a href="../cathen/04045a.htm">Clement</a>, however, also tells us that the <a href="../cathen/02326a.htm">Basilidians</a> celebrated the <a href="../cathen/05504c.htm">Epiphany</a>, and with it, probably, the Nativity, on 15 or 11 Tybi (10 or 6 January). At any rate this double commemoration became popular, partly because the apparition to the shepherds was considered as one manifestation of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> glory, and was added to the greater manifestations celebrated on 6 January; partly because at the <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">baptism</a>-manifestation many <a href="../cathen/04080b.htm">codices</a> (e.g. <a href="../cathen/04083a.htm">Codex Bezæ</a>) wrongly give the Divine words as <em>sou ei ho houios mou ho agapetos, ego semeron gegenneka se</em> (Thou art my beloved Son, this day have I begotten thee) in lieu of <em>en soi eudokesa</em> (in thee I am well pleased), read in <a href="../bible/luk003.htm#vrs22">Luke 3:22</a>. <a href="../cathen/01057a.htm">Abraham Ecchelensis</a> (Labbe, II, 402) quotes the Constitutions of the Alexandrian Church for a <em>dies Nativitatis et Epiphaniæ</em> in Nicæan times; Epiphanius (Hær., li, ed. Dindorf, 1860, II, 483) quotes an extraordinary <a href="../cathen/06592a.htm">semi-Gnostic</a> <a href="../cathen/03538b.htm">ceremony</a> at Alexandria in which, on the night of 5-6 January, a cross-stamped Korê was carried in <a href="../cathen/12446c.htm">procession</a> round a <a href="../cathen/04558a.htm">crypt</a>, to the chant, "Today at this hour Korê gave birth to the Eternal"; <a href="../cathen/03404a.htm">John Cassian</a> records in his "Collations" (X, 2 in P.L., XLIX, 820), written 418-427, that the <a href="../cathen/05329b.htm">Egyptian</a> <a href="../cathen/04340c.htm">monasteries</a> still observe the "ancient custom"; but on 29 Choiak (25 December) and 1 January, 433, Paul of <a href="../cathen/05402a.htm">Emesa</a> preached before <a href="../cathen/04592b.htm">Cyril of Alexandria</a>, and his <a href="../cathen/07448a.htm">sermons</a> (see <a href="../cathen/09609c.htm">Mansi</a>, IV, 293; appendix to Act. Conc. Eph.) show that the December celebration was then firmly established there, and <a href="../cathen/03158a.htm">calendars</a> prove its permanence. The December feast therefore reached <a href="../cathen/05329b.htm">Egypt</a> between 427 and 433.</p> <h3>Cyprus, Mesopotamia, Armenia, Asia Minor</h3> <p>In <a href="../cathen/04589a.htm">Cyprus</a>, at the end of the fourth century, Epiphanius asserts against the <a href="../cathen/01331b.htm">Alogi</a> (Hær., li, 16, 24 in P.G., XLI, 919, 931) that <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> was born on 6 January and <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">baptized</a> on 8 November. <a href="../cathen/05498a.htm">Ephraem Syrus</a> (whose <a href="../cathen/07595a.htm">hymns</a> belong to <a href="../cathen/05504c.htm">Epiphany</a>, not to Christmas) proves that Mesopotamia still put the birth feast thirteen days after the winter solstice; i.e. 6 January; <a href="../cathen/01736b.htm">Armenia</a> likewise ignored, and still ignores, the December festival. (Cf. Euthymius, "Pan. Dogm.", 23 in P.G., CXXX, 1175; Niceph., "Hist. Eccl,", XVIII, 53 in P.G., CXLVII, 440; Isaac, <a href="../cathen/03454a.htm">Catholicos</a> of <a href="../cathen/01736b.htm">Armenia</a> in eleventh or twelfth century, "Adv. Armenos", I, xii, 5 in P.G., CXXII, 1193; Neale, "Holy Eastern Church", Introd., p. 796). In Cappadocia, <a href="../cathen/07016a.htm">Gregory of Nyssa's</a> sermons on <a href="../cathen/02330b.htm">St. Basil</a> (who died before 1 January, 379) and the two following, preached on St. Stephen's feast (P.G., XLVI, 788; cf, 701, 721), prove that in 380 the 25th December was already celebrated there, unless, following Usener's too ingenious arguments (Religionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen, Bonn, 1889, 247-250), one were to place those sermons in 383. Also, <a href="../cathen/02018a.htm">Asterius of Amaseia</a> (fifth century) and <a href="../cathen/01438a.htm">Amphilochius of Iconium</a> (contemporary of Basil and <a href="../cathen/07016a.htm">Gregory</a>) show that in their <a href="../cathen/05001a.htm">dioceses</a> both the feasts of <a href="../cathen/05504c.htm">Epiphany</a> and Nativity were separate (P.G., XL, 337 XXXIX, 36).</p> <div class="CMtag_300x250" style="display: flex; height: 300px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; "></div> <h3>Jerusalem</h3> <p>In 385, Silvia of Bordeaux (or Etheria, as it seems clear she should be called) was profoundly impressed by the splendid Childhood feasts at <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a>. They had a definitely "Nativity" colouring; the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishop</a> proceeded nightly to <a href="../cathen/02532e.htm">Bethlehem</a>, returning to Jerusalem for the day celebrations. The <a href="../cathen/03245b.htm">Presentation</a> was celebrated forty days after. But this calculation starts from 6 January, and the feast lasted during the octave of that <a href="../cathen/04636c.htm">date</a>. (Peregr. Sylv., ed. Geyer, pp. 75 sq.) Again (p. 101) she mentions as high festivals <a href="../cathen/05224d.htm">Easter</a> and <a href="../cathen/05504c.htm">Epiphany</a> alone. In 385, therefore, 25 December was not observed at <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a>. This checks the so-called correspondence between <a href="../cathen/04595b.htm">Cyril of Jerusalem</a> (348-386) and <a href="../cathen/08561a.htm">Pope Julius I</a> (337-352), quoted by <a href="../cathen/08475a.htm">John of Nikiû</a> (c. 900) to convert <a href="../cathen/01736b.htm">Armenia</a> to 25 December (see P.L., VIII, 964 sqq.). Cyril declares that his <a href="../cathen/04049b.htm">clergy</a> cannot, on the single feast of Birth and Baptism, make a double procession to Bethlehem and Jordan. (This later practice is here an anachronism.) He asks Julius to assign the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> date of the nativity "from census documents brought by Titus to <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a>"; Julius assigns 25 December. Another document (Cotelier, Patr. Apost., I, 316, ed. 1724) makes Julius write thus to Juvenal of <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a> (c. 425-458), adding that <a href="../cathen/07010b.htm">Gregory Nazianzen</a> at Constantinople was being criticized for "halving" the festival. But Julius died in 352, and by 385 Cyril had made no change; indeed, <a href="../cathen/08341a.htm">Jerome</a>, writing about 411 (in Ezech., P.L., XXV, 18), reproves Palestine for keeping <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> birthday (when He hid Himself) on the Manifestation feast. <a href="../cathen/04404a.htm">Cosmas Indicopleustes</a> suggests (P.G., LXXXVIII, 197) that even in the middle of the sixth century <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a> was peculiar in combining the two commemorations, arguing from <a href="../bible/luk003.htm#vrs23">Luke 3:23</a> that <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">baptism</a> day was the anniversary of His birthday. The commemoration, however, of <a href="../cathen/04642b.htm">David</a> and James the Apostle on 25 December at <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a> accounts for the deferred feast. Usener, arguing from the "Laudatio S. Stephani" of <a href="../cathen/02330a.htm">Basil of Seleucia</a> (c. 430.  P.G., LXXXV, 469), thinks that Juvenal tried at least to introduce this feast, but that Cyril's greater name attracted that event to his own period.</p> <h3>Antioch</h3> <p>In Antioch, on the feast of St. Philogonius, <a href="../cathen/08452b.htm">Chrysostom</a> preached an important sermon. The year was almost certainly 386, though Clinton gives 387, and Usener, by a long rearrangement of the <a href="../cathen/04171a.htm">saint's</a> sermons, 388 (Religionsgeschichtl. Untersuch., pp. 227-240). But between February, 386, when Flavian <a href="../cathen/11279a.htm">ordained</a> Chrysostom <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">priest</a>, and December is ample time for the preaching of all the sermons under discussion. (See Kellner, Heortologie, Freiburg, 1906, p. 97, n. 3). In view of a reaction to certain Jewish rites and feasts, Chrysostom tries to unite Antioch in celebrating <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> birth on 25 December, part of the community having already kept it on that day for at least ten years. In the West, he says, the feast was thus kept, <em>anothen</em>; its introduction into Antioch he had always sought, conservatives always resisted. This time he was successful; in a crowded church he defended the new custom. It was no novelty; from Thrace to <a href="../cathen/03131b.htm">Cadiz</a> this <a href="../cathen/06021b.htm">feast</a> was observed  rightly, since its <a href="../cathen/10338a.htm">miraculously</a> rapid diffusion <a href="../cathen/12454c.htm">proved</a> its genuineness. Besides, Zachary, who, as <a href="../cathen/12407b.htm">high-priest</a>, entered the Temple on the <a href="../cathen/02054a.htm">Day of Atonement</a>, received therefore announcement of John's conception in September; six months later Christ was conceived, i.e. in March, and born accordingly in December.</p> <p>Finally, though never at <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a>, on authority he knows that the census papers of the Holy Family are still there. [This appeal to Roman archives is as old as <a href="../cathen/08580c.htm">Justin Martyr</a> (<a href="../fathers/0126.htm#chapter34"><em>First Apology</em> 34-35</a>) and <a href="../cathen/14520c.htm">Tertullian</a> (Adv. Marc., IV, 7, 19). Julius, in the <a href="../cathen/04592b.htm">Cyriline</a> forgeries, is said to have calculated the date from <a href="../cathen/08522a.htm">Josephus</a>, on the same unwarranted assumptions about Zachary as did <a href="../cathen/08452b.htm">Chrysostom</a>.] <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a>, therefore, has observed 25 December long enough to allow of Chrysostom speaking at least in 388 as above (P.G., XLVIII, 752, XLIX, 351).</p> <h3>Constantinople</h3> <p>In 379 or 380 <a href="../cathen/07010b.htm">Gregory Nazianzen</a> made himself <em>exarchos</em> of the new feast, i.e. its initiator, in Constantinople, where, since the death of <a href="../cathen/15253b.htm">Valens</a>, <a href="../cathen/11330a.htm">orthodoxy</a> was reviving. His three Homilies (see Hom. xxxviii in P.G., XXXVI) were preached on successive days (Usener, op. cit., p. 253) in the private <a href="../cathen/03574b.htm">chapel</a> called Anastasia. On his exile in 381, the feast disappeared.</p> <p>According, however, to <a href="../cathen/08475a.htm">John of Nikiû</a>, Honorius, when he was present on a visit, arranged with Arcadius for the observation of the feast on the Roman date. Kellner puts this visit in 395; Baumstark (Oriens Chr., 1902, 441-446), between 398 and 402. The latter relies on a letter of <a href="../cathen/08277b.htm">Jacob of Edessa</a> quoted by George of Beeltân, asserting that Christmas was brought to Constantinople by Arcadius and Chrysostom from <a href="../cathen/08208a.htm">Italy</a>, where, "according to the histories", it had been kept from Apostolic times. Chrysostom's episcopate lasted from 398 to 402; the feast would therefore have been introduced between these dates by Chrysostom <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishop</a>, as at Antioch by Chrysostom <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">priest</a>. But Lübeck (Hist. Jahrbuch., XXVIII, I, 1907, pp. 109-118) proves Baumstark's evidence invalid. More important, but scarcely better accredited, is Erbes' contention (Zeitschrift f. Kirchengesch., XXVI, 1905, 20-31) that the feast was brought in by Constantine as early as 330-35.</p> <h3>Rome</h3> <p>At <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a> the earliest evidence is in the Philocalian Calendar (P.L., XIII, 675; it can be seen as a whole in J. Strzygowski, Kalenderbilder des Chron. von Jahre 354, Berlin, 1888), compiled in 354, which contains three important entries. In the civil calendar 25 December is marked "Natalis Invicti". In the "Depositio Martyrum" a list of Roman or early and universally <a href="../cathen/05188b.htm">venerated</a> <a href="../cathen/09736b.htm">martyrs</a>, under 25 December is found "VIII kal. ian. natus Christus in Betleem Iudeæ". On "VIII kal. mart." (22 February) is also mentioned <a href="../cathen/03551e.htm">St. Peter's Chair</a>. In the list of consuls are four anomalous <a href="../cathen/03744a.htm">ecclesiastical</a> entries: the birth and death days of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>, the entry into <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a>, and <a href="../cathen/09736b.htm">martyrdom</a> of Saints Peter and Paul. The significant entry is "Chr. Cæsare et Paulo sat. XIII. hoc. cons. Dns. ihs. XPC natus est VIII Kal. ian. d. ven. luna XV," i.e. during the consulship of <a href="../cathen/02107a.htm">(Augustus) Cæsar</a> and Paulus <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Our Lord Jesus Christ</a> was born on the eighth before the calends of January (25 December), a Friday, the fourteenth day of the moon. The details clash with tradition and possibility. The <a href="../cathen/05480b.htm">epact</a>, here XIII, is normally XI; the year is A.U.C. 754, a date first suggested two centuries later; in no year between 751 and 754 could 25 December fall on a Friday; tradition is constant in placing <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> birth on Wednesday. Moreover the date given for <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> death (<em>duobus Geminis coss.</em>, i.e. A.D. 29) leaves Him only twenty eight, and one-quarter years of life. Apart from this, these entries in a consul list are manifest interpolations. But are not the two entries in the "Depositio Martyrum" also such? Were the day of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> birth in the flesh alone there found, it might stand as heading the year of <a href="../cathen/09736b.htm">martyrs'</a> spiritual <em>natales</em>; but 22 February is there wholly out of place. Here, as in the consular <em>fasti</em>, popular feasts were later inserted for convenience' sake. The civil calendar alone was not added to, as it was useless after the abandonment of <a href="../cathen/11388a.htm">pagan</a> festivals. So, even if the "Depositio Martyrum" dates, as is probable, from 336, it is not clear that the calendar contains evidence earlier than Philocalus himself, i.e. 354, unless indeed pre-existing popular celebration must be assumed to render possible this official recognition. Were the Chalki <a href="../cathen/09614b.htm">manuscript</a> of <a href="../cathen/07360c.htm">Hippolytus</a> genuine, evidence for the December feast would exist as early as c. 205. The relevant passage [which exists in the Chigi <a href="../cathen/09614b.htm">manuscript</a> Without the bracketed words and is always so quoted before <a href="../cathen/06463a.htm">George Syncellus</a> (c. 1000)] runs:</p> <blockquote><p><em>He gar prote parousia tou kyriou hemon he ensarkos [en he gegennetai] en Bethleem, egeneto [pro okto kalandon ianouarion hemera tetradi] Basileuontos Augoustou [tessarakoston kai deuteron etos, apo de Adam] pentakischiliosto kai pentakosiosto etei epathen de triakosto trito [pro okto kalandon aprilion, hemera paraskeun, oktokaidekato etei Tiberiou Kaisaros, hypateuontos Hrouphou kai Hroubellionos.</em>  (Comm. In Dan., iv, 23; Brotke; 19)</p> <div class="CMtag_300x250" style="display: flex; height: 300px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; "></div> <p>"For the <a href="../cathen/07706b.htm">first coming of Our Lord in the flesh</a> [in which He has been begotten], in <a href="../cathen/02532e.htm">Bethlehem</a>, took place [25 December, the fourth day] in the reign of <a href="../cathen/02107a.htm">Augustus</a> [the forty-second year, and] in the year 5500 [from Adam]. And He suffered in His thirty-third year [25 March, the <a href="../cathen/11476a.htm">parasceve</a>, in the eighteenth year of <a href="../cathen/14717b.htm">Tiberius Cæsar</a>, during the consulate of Rufus and Rubellio]."</p></blockquote> <p>Interpolation is <a href="../cathen/03539b.htm">certain</a>, and admitted by Funk, Bonwetsch, etc. The names of the consuls [which should be Fufius and Rubellius] are wrong; Christ lives thirty-three years; in the genuine <a href="../cathen/07360c.htm">Hippolytus</a>, thirty-one; minute data are irrelevant in this discussion with Severian <a href="../cathen/10307a.htm">millenniarists</a>; it is incredible that <a href="../cathen/07360c.htm">Hippolytus</a> should have known these details when his contemporaries (<a href="../cathen/04045a.htm">Clement</a>, <a href="../cathen/14520c.htm">Tertullian</a>, etc.) are, when dealing with the matter, <a href="../cathen/07648a.htm">ignorant</a> or silent; or should, having published them, have remained unquoted (Kellner, op. cit., p. 104, has an excursus on this passage.)</p> <p><a href="../cathen/01383c.htm">St. Ambrose</a> (de virg., iii, 1 in P.L., XVI, 219) preserves the sermon preached by <a href="../cathen/09217a.htm">Pope Liberius I</a> at St. Peter's, when, on <em>Natalis Christi</em>, <a href="../cathen/01383c.htm">Ambrose'</a> sister, Marcellina, took the veil. This <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">pope</a> reigned from May, 352 until 366, except during his years of exile, 355-357. If Marcellina became a <a href="../cathen/11164a.htm">nun</a> only after the canonical age of twenty-five, and if Ambrose was born only in 340, it is perhaps likelier that the event occurred after 357. Though the sermon abounds in references appropriate to the <a href="../cathen/05504c.htm">Epiphany</a> (the marriage at Cana, the multiplication of loaves, etc.), these seem due (Kellner, op. cit., p. 109) to sequence of thought, and do not fix the sermon to 6 January, a feast unknown in <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a> till much later. Usener, indeed, argues (p. 272) that <a href="../cathen/09217a.htm">Liberius</a> preached it on that day in 353, instituting the Nativity feast in the December of the same year; but Philocalus warrants our supposing that if preceded his pontificate by some time, though Duchesne's relegation of it to 243 (<a href="../cathen/03052b.htm">Bull</a>. crit., 1890, 3, pp. 41 sqq.) may not commend itself to many. In the West the Council of Saragossa (380) still ignores 25 December (see can. xxi, 2). <a href="../cathen/14026a.htm">Pope Siricius</a>, writing in 385 (P.L., XII, 1134) to Himerius in <a href="../cathen/14169b.htm">Spain</a>, distinguishes the feasts of the Nativity and Apparition; but whether he refers to Roman or to Spanish use is not clear. Ammianus Marcellinus (XXI, ii) and <a href="../cathen/15764a.htm">Zonaras</a> (Ann., XIII, 11) date a visit of <a href="../cathen/08558b.htm">Julian the Apostate</a> to a church at Vienne in Gaul on <a href="../cathen/05504c.htm">Epiphany</a> and Nativity respectively. Unless there were two visits, Vienne in A.D. 361 combined the feasts, though on what day is still <a href="../cathen/05141a.htm">doubtful</a>. By the time of <a href="../cathen/08341a.htm">Jerome</a> and <a href="../cathen/02084a.htm">Augustine</a>, the December feast is established, though the latter (Epp., II, liv, 12, in P.L., XXXIII, 200) omits it from a list of first-class festivals. From the fourth century every Western calendar assigns it to 25 December. At <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a>, then, the Nativity was celebrated on 25 December before 354; in the East, at Constantinople, not before 379, unless with Erbes, and against <a href="../cathen/06780a.htm">Gregory</a>, we recognize it there in 330. Hence, almost universally has it been concluded that the new date reached the East from <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a> by way of the Bosphorus during the great anti-Arian revival, and by means of the <a href="../cathen/11330a.htm">orthodox</a> champions. De Santi (L'Orig. delle Fest. Nat., in Civiltæ Cattolica, 1907), following Erbes, argues that <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a> took over the Eastern <a href="../cathen/05504c.htm">Epiphany</a>, now with a definite Nativity colouring, and, with as increasing number of <a href="../cathen/05230a.htm">Eastern Churches</a>, placed it on 25 December; later, both East and West divided their feast, leaving Ephiphany on 6 January, and Nativity on 25 December, respectively, and placing Christmas on 25 December and <a href="../cathen/05504c.htm">Epiphany</a> on 6 January. The earlier hypothesis still seems preferable.</p> <h2>Origin of date</h2> <h3>The gospels</h3> <p>Concerning the date of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> birth the <a href="../cathen/06655b.htm">Gospels</a> give no help; upon their data contradictory arguments are based. The census would have been impossible in winter: a whole population could not then be put in motion. Again, in winter it must have been; then only field labour was suspended. But <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a> was not thus considerate. Authorities moreover differ as to whether shepherds could or would keep flocks exposed during the nights of the rainy season.</p> <h3>Zachary's temple service</h3> <p>Arguments based on Zachary's temple ministry are unreliable, though the calculations of antiquity (see above) have been revived in yet more complicated form, e.g. by Friedlieb (Leben J. Christi des Erlösers, Münster, 1887, p. 312). The twenty-four classes of Jewish <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">priests</a>, it is urged, served each a week in the Temple; Zachary was in the eighth class, Abia. The Temple was destroyed 9 Ab, A.D. 70; late rabbinical tradition says that class 1, Jojarib, was then serving. From these untrustworthy data, assuming that <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> was born A.U.C. 749, and that never in seventy turbulent years the weekly succession failed, it is calculated that the eighth class was serving 2-9 October, A.U.C. 748, whence <a href="../cathen/01541c.htm">Christ's conception</a> falls in March, and birth presumably in December. Kellner (op. cit., pp. 106, 107) shows how hopeless is the calculation of Zachary's week from any point before or after it.</p> <h3>Analogy to Old Testament festivals</h3> <p>It seems impossible, on analogy of the relation of <a href="../cathen/11512b.htm">Passover</a> and Pentecost to <a href="../cathen/05224d.htm">Easter</a> and <a href="../cathen/15614b.htm">Whitsuntide</a>, to connect the Nativity with the feast of Tabernacles, as did, e.g., Lightfoot (Horæ Hebr, et Talm., II, 32), arguing from <a href="../cathen/14526a.htm">Old Testament</a> prophecy, e.g. Zacharias 14:16 sqq.; combining, too, the fact of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> death in Nisan with Daniel's prophecy of a three and one-half years' ministry (9:27), he puts the birth in Tisri, i.e. September. As undesirable is it to connect 25 December with the Eastern (December) feast of Dedication (Jos. Ant. Jud., XII, vii, 6).</p> <h3>Natalis Invicti</h3> <p>The well-known solar feast, however, of Natalis Invicti, celebrated on 25 December, has a strong claim on the responsibility for our December date. For the history of the solar cult, its position in the Roman Empire, and <a href="../cathen/14383c.htm">syncretism</a> with <a href="../cathen/10402a.htm">Mithraism</a>, see Cumont's epoch-making "Textes et Monuments" etc., I, ii, 4, 6, p. 355. Mommsen (Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum, 1<sup>2</sup>, p. 338) has collected the evidence for the feast, which reached its climax of popularity under <a href="../cathen/02108b.htm">Aurelian</a> in 274. Filippo del Torre in 1700 first saw its importance; it is marked, as has been said, without addition in Philocalus' Calendar. It would be impossible here even to outline the history of solar symbolism and language as applied to <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>, the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messiah</a>, and <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> in Jewish or Christian canonical, patristic, or devotional works. Hymns and Christmas offices abound in instances; the texts are well arranged by Cumont (op. cit., addit. Note C, p. 355).</p> <p>The earliest <em>rapprochement</em> of the births of Christ and the sun is in Cyprian, "De pasch. Comp.", xix, "O quam præclare providentia ut illo die quo natus est Sol . . . nasceretur Christus." — "O, how wonderfully acted Providence that on that day on which that Sun was born . . . <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> should be born."</p> <p>In the fourth century, Chrysostom, "del Solst. Et Æquin." (II, p. 118, ed. 1588), says: "Sed et dominus noster nascitur mense decembris . . . VIII Kal. Ian. . . . Sed et Invicti Natalem appelant. Quis utique tam invictus nisi dominus noster? . . . Vel quod dicant Solis esse natalem, ipse est Sol iustitiæ." — "But <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Our Lord</a>, too, is born in the month of December . . . the eight before the calends of January [25 December] . . ., But they call it the 'Birthday of the Unconquered'. Who indeed is so unconquered as <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Our Lord</a> . . .? Or, if they say that it is the birthday of the Sun, He is the Sun of Justice."</p> <p>Already <a href="../cathen/14520c.htm">Tertullian</a> (Apol., 16; cf. Ad. Nat., I, 13; Orig. c. Cels., VIII, 67, etc) had to assert that Sol was not the Christians' God; <a href="../cathen/02084a.htm">Augustine</a> (Tract xxxiv, in Joan. In P.L., XXXV, 1652) denounces the <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heretical</a> identification of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> with Sol.</p> <p><a href="../cathen/09154b.htm">Pope Leo I</a> (Serm. xxxvii in nat. dom., VII, 4; xxii, II, 6 in P.L., LIV, 218 and 198) bitterly reproves solar survivals — <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christians</a>, on the very doorstep of the Apostles' basilica, turn to adore the rising sun. Sun-worship has bequeathed features to modern popular worship in <a href="../cathen/01736b.htm">Armenia</a>, where Christians had once temporarily and externally conformed to the cult of the material sun (Cumont, op. cit., p. 356).</p> <p>But even should a deliberate and legitimate "baptism" of a <a href="../cathen/11388a.htm">pagan</a> feast be seen here no more than the transference of the date need be supposed. The "mountain-birth" of <a href="../cathen/10402a.htm">Mithra</a> and <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> in the "grotto" have nothing in common: <a href="../cathen/10402a.htm">Mithra's</a> adoring shepherds (Cumont, op. cit., I, ii, 4, p. 304 sqq.) are rather borrowed from <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> sources than vice versa.</p> <h3>Other theories of pagan origin</h3> <p>The origin of Christmas should not be sought in the Saturnalia (1-23 December) nor even in the midnight holy birth at Eleusis (see J.E. Harrison, Prolegom., p. 549) with its probable connection through Phrygia with the Naasene <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heretics</a>, or even with the Alexandrian <a href="../cathen/03538b.htm">ceremony</a> quoted above; nor yet in rites analogous to the midwinter cult at Delphi of the cradled Dionysus, with his revocation from the sea to a new birth (Harrison, op. cit., 402 sqq.).</p> <h3>The astronomical theory</h3> <p>Duchesne (Les origines du culte chrétien, Paris, 1902, 262 sqq.) advances the "astronomical" theory that, given 25 March as <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> death-day [historically impossible, but a tradition old as <a href="../cathen/14520c.htm">Tertullian</a> (Adv. Jud., 8)], the popular <a href="../cathen/08050b.htm">instinct</a>, demanding an exact number of years in a Divine life, would place His conception on the same <a href="../cathen/04636c.htm">date</a>, His birth 25 December. This theory is best supported by the fact that certain <a href="../cathen/10521a.htm">Montanists</a> (<a href="../cathen/14165c.htm">Sozomen</a>, <a href="../fathers/26027.htm"><em>Church History</em> VII.18</a>) kept <a href="../cathen/05224d.htm">Easter</a> on 6 April; both 25 December and 6 January are thus simultaneously explained. The reckoning, moreover, is wholly in keeping with the arguments based on number and <a href="../cathen/02025a.htm">astronomy</a> and "convenience", then so popular. Unfortunately, there is no contemporary evidence for the celebration in the fourth century of <a href="../cathen/01542a.htm">Christ's conception</a> on 25 March.</p> <h3>Conclusion</h3> <p>The present writer in inclined to think that, be the origin of the feast in East or West, and though the abundance of analogous midwinter festivals may indefinitely have helped the choice of the December date, the same <a href="../cathen/08050b.htm">instinct</a> which set Natalis Invicti at the winter solstice will have sufficed, apart from deliberate adaptation or curious calculation, to set the <a href="../cathen/06021b.htm">Christian feast</a> there too.</p> <h2>Liturgy and custom</h2> <h3>The calendar</h3> <p>The fixing of this date fixed those too of <a href="../cathen/03779a.htm">Circumcision</a> and <a href="../cathen/03245b.htm">Presentation</a>; of <a href="../cathen/05712a.htm">Expectation</a> and, perhaps, <a href="../cathen/01542a.htm">Annunciation B.V.M.</a>; and of Nativity and Conception of the <a href="../cathen/08486b.htm">Baptist</a> (cf. Thurston in Amer. Eccl. Rev., December, 1898). Till the tenth century Christmas counted, in <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">papal</a> reckoning, as the beginning of the <a href="../cathen/03744a.htm">ecclesiastical</a> year, as it still does in <a href="../cathen/03052b.htm">Bulls</a>; <a href="../cathen/02662a.htm">Boniface VIII</a> (1294-1303) restored temporarily this usage, to which <a href="../cathen/06484b.htm">Germany</a> held longest.</p> <h3>Popular merry-making</h3> <p>Codex Theod., II, 8, 27 (cf. XV, 5,5) forbids, in 425, circus games on 25 December; though not till Codex Just., III, 12, 6 (529) is cessation of work imposed. The Second Council of <a href="../cathen/15002a.htm">Tours</a> (can. xi, xvii) proclaims, in 566 or 567, the <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">sanctity</a> of the "twelve days" from Christmas to <a href="../cathen/05504c.htm">Epiphany</a>, and the <a href="../cathen/05215a.htm">duty</a> of <a href="../cathen/01165a.htm">Advent</a> fast; that of <a href="../cathen/01206b.htm">Agde</a> (506), in canons 63-64, orders a universal communion, and that of <a href="../cathen/02728a.htm">Braga</a> (563) forbids <a href="../cathen/05789c.htm">fasting</a> on Christmas Day. Popular merry-making, however, so increased that the "Laws of King Cnut", fabricated c. 1110, order a fast from Christmas to <a href="../cathen/05504c.htm">Epiphany</a>.</p> <h3>The three Masses</h3> <p>The Gelasian and Gregorian Sacramentaries give three Masses to this feast, and these, with a special and sublime <a href="../cathen/09741a.htm">martyrology</a>, and <a href="../cathen/05041a.htm">dispensation</a>, if <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a>, from abstinence, still mark our usage. Though <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a> gives three Masses to the Nativity only, Ildefonsus, a <a href="../cathen/14169b.htm">Spanish</a> <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishop</a>, in 845, alludes to a triple mass on Nativity, <a href="../cathen/05224d.htm">Easter</a>, Whitsun, and <a href="../cathen/15019b.htm">Transfiguration</a> (P.L., CVI, 888). These Masses, at midnight, dawn, and <em>in die</em>, were mystically connected with aboriginal, Judaic, and <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> <a href="../cathen/05041a.htm">dispensations</a>, or (as by <a href="../cathen/14663b.htm">St. Thomas</a>, <a href="../summa/4083.htm#article2">Summa Theologica III:83:2</a>) to the triple "birth" of Christ: in <a href="../cathen/05551b.htm">Eternity</a>, in Time, and in the Soul. <a href="../cathen/04134a.htm">Liturgical colours</a> varied: black, white, red, or (e.g. at Narbonne) red, white, violet were used (Durand, Rat. Div. Off., VI, 13). The <a href="../cathen/06583a.htm">Gloria</a> was at first sung only in the first Mass of this day.</p> <p>The historical origin of this triple Mass is probably as follows (cf. Thurston, in Amer. Eccl. Rev., January, 1899; Grisar, Anal. Rom., I, 595; Geschichte Roms . . . im Mittelalter I, 607, 397; Civ. Catt., 21 September, 1895, etc.): The first Mass, celebrated at the <em>Oratorium Præsepis</em> in St. Mary Major  a church probably immediately assimilated to the Bethlehem basilica  and the third, at St. Peter's, reproduced in <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a> the double Christmas Office mentioned by Etheria (see above) at Bethlehem and <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a>. The second <a href="../cathen/10006a.htm">Mass</a> was celebrated by the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">pope</a> in the "chapel royal" of the Byzantine Court officials on the Palatine, i.e. St. Anastasia's church, originally called, like the basilica at Constantinople, Anastasis, and like it built at first to reproduce the <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a> Anastasis basilica  and like it, finally, in abandoning the name "Anastasis" for that of the <a href="../cathen/09736b.htm">martyr</a> <a href="../cathen/01453a.htm">St. Anastasia</a>. The second Mass would therefore be a <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">papal</a> compliment to the imperial church on its patronal feast. The three stations are thus accounted for, for by 1143 (cf. Ord. Romani in P.L., LXXVIII, 1032) the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">pope</a> abandoned distant St. Peter's, and said the third Mass at the <a href="../cathen/07346b.htm">high altar</a> of St. Mary Major. At this third Mass <a href="../cathen/09157b.htm">Leo III</a> inaugurated, in 800, by the <a href="../cathen/04380a.htm">coronation</a> of <a href="../cathen/03610c.htm">Charlemagne</a>, the Holy Roman Empire. The day became a favourite for court ceremonies, and on it, e.g., <a href="../cathen/15642c.htm">William of Normandy</a> was <a href="../cathen/04380a.htm">crowned</a> at <a href="../cathen/15598a.htm">Westminster</a>.</p> <h3>Dramatic presentations</h3> <p>The history of the dedication of the <em>Oratorium Præsepis</em> in the Liberian basilica, of the <a href="../cathen/12734a.htm">relics</a> there kept and their imitations, does not belong to this discussion [cf. <a href="../cathen/04488c.htm">C<font size=-2>RIB</font></a>; <a href="../cathen/12734a.htm">R<font size=-2>ELICS</font></a>. The data are well set out by Bonaccorsi (Il Natale, Rome, 1903, ch. iv)], but the practice of giving dramatic, or at least spectacular, expression to the incidents of the Nativity early gave rise to more or less <a href="../cathen/09306a.htm">liturgical</a> mysteries. The <em>ordinaria</em> of <a href="../cathen/13208b.htm">Rouen</a> and of <a href="../cathen/07356b.htm">Reims</a>, for instance, place the <em>officium pastorum</em> immediately after the <a href="../cathen/14468c.htm">Te Deum</a> and before Mass (cf. <a href="../cathen/05181b.htm">Ducange</a>, Gloss. med. et inf. Lat., s.v. <em>Pastores</em>); the latter Church celebrated a second "prophetical" mystery after <a href="../cathen/14514c.htm">Tierce</a>, in which Virgil and the Sibyl join with <a href="../cathen/14526a.htm">Old Testament</a> <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophets</a> in honouring Christ. (For Virgil and Nativity play and prophecy see authorities in Comparetti, "Virgil in Middle Ages", p. 310 sqq.) "To out-herod Herod", i.e. to over-act, dates from <a href="../cathen/07289c.htm">Herod's</a> <a href="../cathen/15446a.htm">violence</a> in these plays.</p> <h3>The crib (creche) or nativity scene</h3> <p><a href="../cathen/06221a.htm">St. Francis of Assisi</a> in 1223 originated the crib of today by laicizing a hitherto <a href="../cathen/03744a.htm">ecclesiastical</a> custom, henceforward extra-liturgical and popular. The presence of ox and ass is due to a misinterpretation of <a href="../bible/isa001.htm#vrs3">Isaiah 1:3</a> and <a href="../bible/hab003.htm#vrs2">Habakkuk 3:2</a> ("Itala" version), though they appear in the unique fourth-century "Nativity" discovered in the St. Sebastian <a href="../cathen/03417b.htm">catacombs</a> in 1877. The ass on which <a href="../cathen/02214b.htm">Balaam</a> rode in the <a href="../cathen/07356b.htm">Reims</a> mystery won for the feast the title <a href="../cathen/01798b.htm"><em>Festum Asinorum</em></a> (<a href="../cathen/05181b.htm">Ducange</a>, op. cit., s.v. <em>Festum</em>).</p> <h3>Hymns and carols</h3> <p>The degeneration of these plays in part occasioned the diffusion of noels, pastorali, and carols, to which was accorded, at times, a quasi-liturgical position. Prudentius, in the fourth century, is the first (and in that century alone) to <a href="../cathen/07595a.htm">hymn</a> the Nativity, for the "Vox clara" (<a href="../cathen/07595a.htm">hymn</a> for <a href="../cathen/09038a.htm">Lauds</a> in <a href="../cathen/01165a.htm">Advent</a>) and "Christe Redemptor" (<a href="../cathen/15381a.htm">Vespers</a> and <a href="../cathen/10050a.htm">Matins</a> of Christmas) cannot be assigned to <a href="../cathen/01383c.htm">Ambrose</a>. "A solis ortu" is certainly, however, by Sedulius (fifth century). The earliest German Weihnachtslieder date from the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the earliest noels from the eleventh, the earliest carols from the thirteenth. The famous "Stabat Mater Speciosa" is attributed to <a href="../cathen/08263a.htm">Jacopone da Todi</a> (1230-1306); <a href="../cathen/01142b.htm">"Adeste Fideles"</a> is, at the earliest, of the seventeenth century. These essentially popular airs, and even words, must, however, have existed long before they were put down in writing.</p> <div class="CMtag_300x250" style="display: flex; height: 300px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; "></div> <h3>Cards and presents</h3> <p><a href="../cathen/11388a.htm">Pagan</a> customs centering round the January calends gravitated to Christmas. Tiele (Yule and Christmas, London, 1899) has collected many interesting examples. The <em>strenæ</em> (<em>eacute;trennes</em>) of the Roman 1 January (bitterly condemned by <a href="../cathen/14520c.htm">Tertullian</a>, de Idol., xiv and x, and by <a href="../cathen/10081a.htm">Maximus of Turin</a>, Hom. ciii, de Kal. gentil., in P.L., LVII, 492, etc.) survive as Christmas presents, cards, boxes.</p> <h3>The yule log</h3> <p>The calend fires were a <a href="../cathen/13506d.htm">scandal</a> even to <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a>, and <a href="../cathen/02656a.htm">St. Boniface</a> obtained from <a href="../cathen/15743b.htm">Pope Zachary</a> their abolition. But probably the Yule-log in its many forms was originally lit only in view of the cold season. Only in 1577 did it become a public <a href="../cathen/03538b.htm">ceremony</a> in <a href="../cathen/05445a.htm">England</a>; its popularity, however, grew immense, especially in Provence; in <a href="../cathen/15103b.htm">Tuscany</a>, Christmas is simply called <em>ceppo</em> (block, log  Bonaccorsi, op. cit., p. 145, n. 2). Besides, it became connected with other usages; in <a href="../cathen/05445a.htm">England</a>, a tenant had the <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> to feed at his lord's expense as long as a wheel, i.e. a round, of wood, given by him, would burn, the landlord gave to a tenant a load of wood on the birth of a child; <em>Kindsfuss</em> was a present given to children on the birth of a brother or sister, and even to the farm animals on that of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>, the universal little brother (Tiele, op. cit., p. 95 sqq.).</p> <h3>Greenery</h3> <p><a href="../cathen/06536c.htm">Gervase of Tilbury</a> (thirteen century) says that in <a href="../cathen/05445a.htm">England</a> grain is exposed on Christmas night to gain fertility from the dew which falls in response to "Rorate Cæli"; the tradition that trees and flowers blossomed on this night is first quoted from an <a href="../cathen/01663a.htm">Arab</a> geographer of the tenth century, and extended to <a href="../cathen/05445a.htm">England</a>. In a thirteenth-century French epic, candles are seen on the flowering tree. In <a href="../cathen/05445a.htm">England</a> it was <a href="../cathen/08520a.htm">Joseph of Arimathea's</a> rod which flowered at <a href="../cathen/06579a.htm">Glastonbury</a> and elsewhere; when 3 September became 14 September, in 1752, 2000 people watched to see if the Quainton thorn (<em>cratagus præcox</em>) would blow on Christmas New Style; and as it did not, they refused to keep the New Style festival. From this <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">belief</a> of the calends practice of greenery decorations (forbidden by Archbishop <a href="../cathen/09731b.htm">Martin of Braga</a>, c. 575, P.L., LXXIII  mistletoe was bequeathed by the Druids) developed the Christmas tree, first definitely mentioned in 1605 at <a href="../cathen/14313c.htm">Strasburg</a>, and introduced into <a href="../cathen/06166a.htm">France</a> and <a href="../cathen/05445a.htm">England</a> in 1840 only, by Princess Helena of Mecklenburg and the Prince Consort respectively.</p> <h3>The mysterious visitor</h3> <p>Only with great caution should the mysterious benefactor of Christmas night — Knecht Ruprecht, Pelzmärtel on a wooden horse, St. Martin on a white charger, <a href="../cathen/11063b.htm">St. Nicholas</a> and his <a href="../cathen/12700b.htm">"reformed"</a> equivalent, Father Christmas — be ascribed to the stepping of a saint into the shoes of Woden, who, with his wife Berchta, descended on the nights between 25 December and 6 January, on a white horse to <a href="../cathen/02599b.htm">bless</a> earth and men. Fires and blazing wheels starred the hills, houses were adorned, trials suspended and feasts celebrated (cf. Bonaccorse, op. cit., p. 151). Knecht Ruprecht, at any rate (first found in a <a href="../cathen/10348a.htm">mystery</a> of 1668 and condemned in 1680 as a devil) was only a servant of the <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Holy Child</a>.</p> <h3>Non-Catholic observances</h3> <p>But no doubt aboriginal <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> <em>nuclei</em> attracted <a href="../cathen/11388a.htm">pagan</a> accretions. For the calend mumming; the extraordinary and obscene <em>Modranicht</em>; the cake in <a href="../cathen/07462a.htm">honour</a> of <a href="../cathen/15464b.htm">Mary's</a> "afterbirth", condemned (692) at the <a href="../cathen/04311b.htm">Trullan Council</a>, canon 79; the Tabulæ Fortunæ (food and drink offered to obtain increase, and condemned in 743), see Tiele, op. cit., ch. viii, ix  Tiele's data are perhaps of greater value than his deductions  and <a href="../cathen/05181b.htm">Ducange</a> (op. cit., s. vv. Cervula and Kalendæ).</p> <p>In <a href="../cathen/05445a.htm">England</a>, Christmas was forbidden by Act of Parliament in 1644; the day was to be a fast and a market day; shops were compelled to be open; plum puddings and mince pies condemned as <a href="../cathen/11388a.htm">heathen</a>. The conservatives resisted; at <a href="../cathen/03299b.htm">Canterbury</a> blood was shed; but after the Restoration Dissenters continued to call Yuletide "Fooltide".</p> <div class='catholicadnet-728x90' id='cathen-728x90-bottom' style='display: flex; height: 100px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; '></div> <div class="cenotes"><h2>Sources</h2><p class="cenotes">Besides the works mentioned in the article see also, Die Geschichte des deutschen Weihnachts (Leipzig, 1893); MANN-HARDT, Weihnachtsblüthen in Sitte u. Sage (Berlin, 1864); RIETSCHEL, Weihnachten in Kirche, Kunst u. Volksleben (Bielefeld and Leipzig, 1902); SCHMID, Darstellung der Geburt Christin der bildenden Kunst (1890); MÜLLER, Le costumanzi del Natale (Rome, 1880); CORRIERI, Il Natale nelle letterature del Nord in Cosmos Cath. (December, 1900); ERBES, Das Syrische Martyrologium, etc., in Zeitschr. F. Kirchengesch. (1905), IV (1906), I; BARDENHEWER, Mariä Verkündigung (Freiburg, 1905); DE KERSAINT-GILLY, Fêtes de Noël en Provence (Montpellier, 1900); DE COUSSEMAKER, Drames Liturgiques du Moyen Age (Paris, 1861); DOUHET, Dict, des mystères in MIGNE, Nouv, encycl. théol., XLIII; PÉREMÈS, Dict. De Noëls, ibid. LXIII; SMITH AND CHEETHAM, dict. Christ. Antiq., s.v. Christmas.</p></div> <div class="pub"><h2>About this page</h2><p id="apa"><strong>APA citation.</strong> <span id="apaauthor">Martindale, C.C.</span> <span id="apayear">(1908).</span> <span id="apaarticle">Christmas.</span> In <span id="apawork">The Catholic Encyclopedia.</span> <span id="apapublisher">New York: Robert Appleton Company.</span> <span id="apaurl">http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03724b.htm</span></p><p id="mla"><strong>MLA citation.</strong> <span id="mlaauthor">Martindale, Cyril Charles.</span> <span id="mlaarticle">"Christmas."</span> <span id="mlawork">The Catholic Encyclopedia.</span> <span id="mlavolume">Vol. 3.</span> <span id="mlapublisher">New York: Robert Appleton Company,</span> <span id="mlayear">1908.</span> <span id="mlaurl"><http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03724b.htm>.</span></p><p id="transcription"><strong>Transcription.</strong> <span id="transcriber">This article was transcribed for New Advent by Susanti A. Suastika.</span> <span id="dedication"></span></p><p id="approbation"><strong>Ecclesiastical approbation.</strong> <span id="nihil"><em>Nihil Obstat.</em> November 1, 1908. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor.</span> <span id="imprimatur"><em>Imprimatur.</em> +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York.</span></p><p id="contactus"><strong>Contact information.</strong> The editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is webmaster <em>at</em> newadvent.org. Regrettably, I can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback — especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.</p></div> </div> <div id="ogdenville"><table summary="Bottom bar" width="100%" cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0><tr><td class="bar_white_on_color"><center><strong>Copyright © 2023 by <a href="../utility/contactus.htm">New Advent LLC</a>. 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