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| A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z |
The word for Christmas in late Old English isCristes Maesse, the Mass ofChrist, first found in 1038, andCristes-messe, in 1131. InDutch it isKerstmis, in LatinDies Natalis, whence comes the FrenchNoël, andItalianIl natale; in GermanWeihnachtsfest, from the preceeding sacred vigil. The termYule is of disputed origin. It is unconnected with any word meaning "wheel". The name in Anglo-Saxon wasgeol, feast:geola, the name of a month (cf.Icelandiciol a feast in December).
Christmas was not among the earliestfestivals of theChurch.Irenaeus andTertullian omit it from their lists offeasts;Origen, glancing perhaps at the discreditable imperialNatalitia, asserts (in Lev. Hom. viii inMigne, P.G., XII, 495) that in theScriptures sinners alone, notsaints, celebrate their birthday;Arnobius (VII, 32 in P.L., V, 1264) can still ridicule the "birthdays" of the gods.
The first evidence of the feast is fromEgypt. About A.D. 200,Clement of Alexandria (Stromata I.21) says that certainEgyptiantheologians "over curiously" assign, not the year alone, but the day ofChrist's birth, placing it on 25 Pachon (20 May) in the twenty-eighth year ofAugustus. [Ideler (Chron., II, 397, n.) thought they did thisbelieving that the ninth month, in which Christ was born, was the ninth of their own calendar.] Others reached thedate of 24 or 25 Pharmuthi (19 or 20 April). WithClement's evidence may be mentioned the "De paschæ computus", written in 243 and falsely ascribed toCyprian (P.L., IV, 963 sqq.), which placesChrist's 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,Faenza, 1785, p. 219) that there is no month in the year to which respectable authorities have not assignedChrist's birth.Clement, however, also tells us that theBasilidians celebrated theEpiphany, 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 ofChrist's glory, and was added to the greater manifestations celebrated on 6 January; partly because at thebaptism-manifestation manycodices (e.g.Codex Bezæ) wrongly give the Divine words assou ei ho houios mou ho agapetos, ego semeron gegenneka se (Thou art my beloved Son, this day have I begotten thee) in lieu ofen soi eudokesa (in thee I am well pleased), read inLuke 3:22.Abraham Ecchelensis (Labbe, II, 402) quotes the Constitutions of the Alexandrian Church for adies Nativitatis et Epiphaniæ in Nicæan times; Epiphanius (Hær., li, ed. Dindorf, 1860, II, 483) quotes an extraordinarysemi-Gnosticceremony at Alexandria in which, on the night of 5-6 January, a cross-stamped Korê was carried inprocession round acrypt, to the chant, "Today at this hour Korê gave birth to the Eternal";John Cassian records in his "Collations" (X, 2 in P.L., XLIX, 820), written 418-427, that theEgyptianmonasteries still observe the "ancient custom"; but on 29 Choiak (25 December) and 1 January, 433, Paul ofEmesa preached beforeCyril of Alexandria, and hissermons (seeMansi, IV, 293; appendix to Act. Conc. Eph.) show that the December celebration was then firmly established there, andcalendars prove its permanence. The December feast therefore reachedEgypt between 427 and 433.
InCyprus, at the end of the fourth century, Epiphanius asserts against theAlogi (Hær., li, 16, 24 in P.G., XLI, 919, 931) thatChrist was born on 6 January andbaptized on 8 November.Ephraem Syrus (whosehymns belong toEpiphany, not to Christmas) proves that Mesopotamia still put the birth feast thirteen days after the winter solstice; i.e. 6 January;Armenia 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,Catholicos ofArmenia in eleventh or twelfth century, "Adv. Armenos", I, xii, 5 in P.G., CXXII, 1193; Neale, "Holy Eastern Church", Introd., p. 796). In Cappadocia,Gregory of Nyssa's sermons onSt. Basil (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,Asterius of Amaseia (fifth century) andAmphilochius of Iconium (contemporary of Basil andGregory) show that in theirdioceses both the feasts ofEpiphany and Nativity were separate (P.G., XL, 337 XXXIX, 36).
In 385, Silvia of Bordeaux (or Etheria, as it seems clear she should be called) was profoundly impressed by the splendid Childhood feasts atJerusalem. They had a definitely "Nativity" colouring; thebishop proceeded nightly toBethlehem, returning to Jerusalem for the day celebrations. ThePresentation was celebrated forty days after. But this calculation starts from 6 January, and the feast lasted during the octave of thatdate. (Peregr. Sylv., ed. Geyer, pp. 75 sq.) Again (p. 101) she mentions as high festivalsEaster andEpiphany alone. In 385, therefore, 25 December was not observed atJerusalem. This checks the so-called correspondence betweenCyril of Jerusalem (348-386) andPope Julius I (337-352), quoted byJohn of Nikiû (c. 900) to convertArmenia to 25 December (see P.L., VIII, 964 sqq.). Cyril declares that hisclergy 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 thetrue date of the nativity "from census documents brought by Titus toRome"; Julius assigns 25 December. Another document (Cotelier, Patr. Apost., I, 316, ed. 1724) makes Julius write thus to Juvenal ofJerusalem (c. 425-458), adding thatGregory Nazianzen at Constantinople was being criticized for "halving" the festival. But Julius died in 352, and by 385 Cyril had made no change; indeed,Jerome, writing about 411 (in Ezech., P.L., XXV, 18), reproves Palestine for keepingChrist's birthday (when He hid Himself) on the Manifestation feast.Cosmas Indicopleustes suggests (P.G., LXXXVIII, 197) that even in the middle of the sixth centuryJerusalem was peculiar in combining the two commemorations, arguing fromLuke 3:23 thatChrist'sbaptism day was the anniversary of His birthday. The commemoration, however, ofDavid and James the Apostle on 25 December atJerusalem accounts for the deferred feast. Usener, arguing from the "Laudatio S. Stephani" ofBasil of Seleucia (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.
In Antioch, on the feast of St. Philogonius,Chrysostom preached an important sermon. The year was almost certainly 386, though Clinton gives 387, and Usener, by a long rearrangement of thesaint's sermons, 388 (Religionsgeschichtl. Untersuch., pp. 227-240). But between February, 386, when Flavianordained Chrysostompriest, 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 celebratingChrist's 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,anothen; 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 toCadiz thisfeast was observed — rightly, since itsmiraculously rapid diffusionproved its genuineness. Besides, Zachary, who, ashigh-priest, entered the Temple on theDay of Atonement, received therefore announcement of John's conception in September; six months later Christ was conceived, i.e. in March, and born accordingly in December.
Finally, though never atRome, on authority he knows that the census papers of the Holy Family are still there. [This appeal to Roman archives is as old asJustin Martyr (First Apology 34-35) andTertullian (Adv. Marc., IV, 7, 19). Julius, in theCyriline forgeries, is said to have calculated the date fromJosephus, on the same unwarranted assumptions about Zachary as didChrysostom.]Rome, therefore, has observed 25 December long enough to allow of Chrysostom speaking at least in 388 as above (P.G., XLVIII, 752, XLIX, 351).
In 379 or 380Gregory Nazianzen made himselfexarchos of the new feast, i.e. its initiator, in Constantinople, where, since the death ofValens,orthodoxy was reviving. His three Homilies (see Hom. xxxviii in P.G., XXXVI) were preached on successive days (Usener, op. cit., p. 253) in the privatechapel called Anastasia. On his exile in 381, the feast disappeared.
According, however, toJohn of Nikiû, 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 ofJacob of Edessa quoted by George of Beeltân, asserting that Christmas was brought to Constantinople by Arcadius and Chrysostom fromItaly, 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 Chrysostombishop, as at Antioch by Chrysostompriest. 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.
AtRome 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 universallyveneratedmartyrs, under 25 December is found "VIII kal. ian. natus Christus in Betleem Iudeæ". On "VIII kal. mart." (22 February) is also mentionedSt. Peter's Chair. In the list of consuls are four anomalousecclesiastical entries: the birth and death days ofChrist, the entry intoRome, andmartyrdom 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(Augustus) Cæsar and PaulusOur Lord Jesus Christ 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. Theepact, 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 placingChrist's birth on Wednesday. Moreover the date given forChrist's death (duobus Geminis coss., 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 ofChrist's birth in the flesh alone there found, it might stand as heading the year ofmartyrs' spiritualnatales; but 22 February is there wholly out of place. Here, as in the consularfasti, popular feasts were later inserted for convenience' sake. The civil calendar alone was not added to, as it was useless after the abandonment ofpagan 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 Chalkimanuscript ofHippolytus genuine, evidence for the December feast would exist as early as c. 205. The relevant passage [which exists in the Chigimanuscript Without the bracketed words and is always so quoted beforeGeorge Syncellus (c. 1000)] runs:
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. — (Comm. In Dan., iv, 23; Brotke; 19)
"For thefirst coming of Our Lord in the flesh [in which He has been begotten], inBethlehem, took place [25 December, the fourth day] in the reign ofAugustus [the forty-second year, and] in the year 5500 [from Adam]. And He suffered in His thirty-third year [25 March, theparasceve, in the eighteenth year ofTiberius Cæsar, during the consulate of Rufus and Rubellio]."
Interpolation iscertain, 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 genuineHippolytus, thirty-one; minute data are irrelevant in this discussion with Severianmillenniarists; it is incredible thatHippolytus should have known these details when his contemporaries (Clement,Tertullian, etc.) are, when dealing with the matter,ignorant or silent; or should, having published them, have remained unquoted (Kellner, op. cit., p. 104, has an excursus on this passage.)
St. Ambrose (de virg., iii, 1 in P.L., XVI, 219) preserves the sermon preached byPope Liberius I at St. Peter's, when, onNatalis Christi,Ambrose' sister, Marcellina, took the veil. Thispope reigned from May, 352 until 366, except during his years of exile, 355-357. If Marcellina became anun 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 theEpiphany (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 inRome till much later. Usener, indeed, argues (p. 272) thatLiberius 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 (Bull. 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).Pope Siricius, writing in 385 (P.L., XII, 1134) to Himerius inSpain, 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) andZonaras (Ann., XIII, 11) date a visit ofJulian the Apostate to a church at Vienne in Gaul onEpiphany and Nativity respectively. Unless there were two visits, Vienne in A.D. 361 combined the feasts, though on what day is stilldoubtful. By the time ofJerome andAugustine, 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. AtRome, then, the Nativity was celebrated on 25 December before 354; in the East, at Constantinople, not before 379, unless with Erbes, and againstGregory, we recognize it there in 330. Hence, almost universally has it been concluded that the new date reached the East fromRome by way of the Bosphorus during the great anti-Arian revival, and by means of theorthodox champions. De Santi (L'Orig. delle Fest. Nat., in Civiltæ Cattolica, 1907), following Erbes, argues thatRome took over the EasternEpiphany, now with a definite Nativity colouring, and, with as increasing number ofEastern Churches, 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 andEpiphany on 6 January. The earlier hypothesis still seems preferable.
Concerning the date ofChrist's birth theGospels 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. ButRome was not thus considerate. Authorities moreover differ as to whether shepherds could or would keep flocks exposed during the nights of the rainy season.
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 Jewishpriests, 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 thatChrist 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, whenceChrist's conception 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.
It seems impossible, on analogy of the relation ofPassover and Pentecost toEaster andWhitsuntide, to connect the Nativity with the feast of Tabernacles, as did, e.g., Lightfoot (Horæ Hebr, et Talm., II, 32), arguing fromOld Testament prophecy, e.g. Zacharias 14:16 sqq.; combining, too, the fact ofChrist's 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).
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, andsyncretism withMithraism, see Cumont's epoch-making "Textes et Monuments" etc., I, ii, 4, 6, p. 355. Mommsen (Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum, 12, p. 338) has collected the evidence for the feast, which reached its climax of popularity underAurelian 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 toGod, theMessiah, andChrist 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).
The earliestrapprochement 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 . . .Christ should be born."
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." — "ButOur Lord, 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 asOur Lord . . .? Or, if they say that it is the birthday of the Sun, He is the Sun of Justice."
AlreadyTertullian (Apol., 16; cf. Ad. Nat., I, 13; Orig. c. Cels., VIII, 67, etc) had to assert that Sol was not the Christians' God;Augustine (Tract xxxiv, in Joan. In P.L., XXXV, 1652) denounces theheretical identification ofChrist with Sol.
Pope Leo I (Serm. xxxvii in nat. dom., VII, 4; xxii, II, 6 in P.L., LIV, 218 and 198) bitterly reproves solar survivals —Christians, on the very doorstep of the Apostles' basilica, turn to adore the rising sun. Sun-worship has bequeathed features to modern popular worship inArmenia, where Christians had once temporarily and externally conformed to the cult of the material sun (Cumont, op. cit., p. 356).
But even should a deliberate and legitimate "baptism" of apagan feast be seen here no more than the transference of the date need be supposed. The "mountain-birth" ofMithra andChrist's in the "grotto" have nothing in common:Mithra's adoring shepherds (Cumont, op. cit., I, ii, 4, p. 304 sqq.) are rather borrowed fromChristian sources than vice versa.
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 Naaseneheretics, or even with the Alexandrianceremony 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.).
Duchesne (Les origines du culte chrétien, Paris, 1902, 262 sqq.) advances the "astronomical" theory that, given 25 March asChrist's death-day [historically impossible, but a tradition old asTertullian (Adv. Jud., 8)], the popularinstinct, demanding an exact number of years in a Divine life, would place His conception on the samedate, His birth 25 December. This theory is best supported by the fact that certainMontanists (Sozomen,Church History VII.18) keptEaster 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 andastronomy and "convenience", then so popular. Unfortunately, there is no contemporary evidence for the celebration in the fourth century ofChrist's conception on 25 March.
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 sameinstinct which set Natalis Invicti at the winter solstice will have sufficed, apart from deliberate adaptation or curious calculation, to set theChristian feast there too.
The fixing of this date fixed those too ofCircumcision andPresentation; ofExpectation and, perhaps,Annunciation B.V.M.; and of Nativity and Conception of theBaptist (cf. Thurston in Amer. Eccl. Rev., December, 1898). Till the tenth century Christmas counted, inpapal reckoning, as the beginning of theecclesiastical year, as it still does inBulls;Boniface VIII (1294-1303) restored temporarily this usage, to whichGermany held longest.
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 ofTours (can. xi, xvii) proclaims, in 566 or 567, thesanctity of the "twelve days" from Christmas toEpiphany, and theduty ofAdvent fast; that ofAgde (506), in canons 63-64, orders a universal communion, and that ofBraga (563) forbidsfasting on Christmas Day. Popular merry-making, however, so increased that the "Laws of King Cnut", fabricated c. 1110, order a fast from Christmas toEpiphany.
The Gelasian and Gregorian Sacramentaries give three Masses to this feast, and these, with a special and sublimemartyrology, anddispensation, ifnecessary, from abstinence, still mark our usage. ThoughRome gives three Masses to the Nativity only, Ildefonsus, aSpanishbishop, in 845, alludes to a triple mass on Nativity,Easter, Whitsun, andTransfiguration (P.L., CVI, 888). These Masses, at midnight, dawn, andin die, were mystically connected with aboriginal, Judaic, andChristiandispensations, or (as bySt. Thomas,Summa Theologica III:83:2) to the triple "birth" of Christ: inEternity, in Time, and in the Soul.Liturgical colours varied: black, white, red, or (e.g. at Narbonne) red, white, violet were used (Durand, Rat. Div. Off., VI, 13). TheGloria was at first sung only in the first Mass of this day.
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 theOratorium Præsepis in St. Mary Major — a church probably immediately assimilated to the Bethlehem basilica — and the third, at St. Peter's, reproduced inRome the double Christmas Office mentioned by Etheria (see above) at Bethlehem andJerusalem. The secondMass was celebrated by thepope 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 theJerusalem Anastasis basilica — and like it, finally, in abandoning the name "Anastasis" for that of themartyrSt. Anastasia. The second Mass would therefore be apapal 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) thepope abandoned distant St. Peter's, and said the third Mass at thehigh altar of St. Mary Major. At this third MassLeo III inaugurated, in 800, by thecoronation ofCharlemagne, the Holy Roman Empire. The day became a favourite for court ceremonies, and on it, e.g.,William of Normandy wascrowned atWestminster.
The history of the dedication of theOratorium Præsepis in the Liberian basilica, of therelics there kept and their imitations, does not belong to this discussion [cf.C;R. 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 lessliturgical mysteries. Theordinaria ofRouen and ofReims, for instance, place theofficium pastorum immediately after theTe Deum and before Mass (cf.Ducange, Gloss. med. et inf. Lat., s.v.Pastores); the latter Church celebrated a second "prophetical" mystery afterTierce, in which Virgil and the Sibyl join withOld Testamentprophets 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 fromHerod'sviolence in these plays.
St. Francis of Assisi in 1223 originated the crib of today by laicizing a hithertoecclesiastical custom, henceforward extra-liturgical and popular. The presence of ox and ass is due to a misinterpretation ofIsaiah 1:3 andHabakkuk 3:2 ("Itala" version), though they appear in the unique fourth-century "Nativity" discovered in the St. Sebastiancatacombs in 1877. The ass on whichBalaam rode in theReims mystery won for the feast the titleFestum Asinorum (Ducange, op. cit., s.v.Festum).
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) tohymn the Nativity, for the "Vox clara" (hymn forLauds inAdvent) and "Christe Redemptor" (Vespers andMatins of Christmas) cannot be assigned toAmbrose. "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 toJacopone da Todi (1230-1306);"Adeste Fideles" 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.
Pagan customs centering round the January calends gravitated to Christmas. Tiele (Yule and Christmas, London, 1899) has collected many interesting examples. Thestrenæ (eacute;trennes) of the Roman 1 January (bitterly condemned byTertullian, de Idol., xiv and x, and byMaximus of Turin, Hom. ciii, de Kal. gentil., in P.L., LVII, 492, etc.) survive as Christmas presents, cards, boxes.
The calend fires were ascandal even toRome, andSt. Boniface obtained fromPope Zachary 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 publicceremony inEngland; its popularity, however, grew immense, especially in Provence; inTuscany, Christmas is simply calledceppo (block, log — Bonaccorsi, op. cit., p. 145, n. 2). Besides, it became connected with other usages; inEngland, a tenant had theright 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;Kindsfuss was a present given to children on the birth of a brother or sister, and even to the farm animals on that ofChrist, the universal little brother (Tiele, op. cit., p. 95 sqq.).
Gervase of Tilbury (thirteen century) says that inEngland 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 anArab geographer of the tenth century, and extended toEngland. In a thirteenth-century French epic, candles are seen on the flowering tree. InEngland it wasJoseph of Arimathea's rod which flowered atGlastonbury and elsewhere; when 3 September became 14 September, in 1752, 2000 people watched to see if the Quainton thorn (cratagus præcox) would blow on Christmas New Style; and as it did not, they refused to keep the New Style festival. From thisbelief of the calends practice of greenery decorations (forbidden by ArchbishopMartin of Braga, c. 575, P.L., LXXIII — mistletoe was bequeathed by the Druids) developed the Christmas tree, first definitely mentioned in 1605 atStrasburg, and introduced intoFrance andEngland in 1840 only, by Princess Helena of Mecklenburg and the Prince Consort respectively.
Only with great caution should the mysterious benefactor of Christmas night — Knecht Ruprecht, Pelzmärtel on a wooden horse, St. Martin on a white charger,St. Nicholas and his"reformed" 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 tobless 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 amystery of 1668 and condemned in 1680 as a devil) was only a servant of theHoly Child.
But no doubt aboriginalChristiannuclei attractedpagan accretions. For the calend mumming; the extraordinary and obsceneModranicht; the cake inhonour ofMary's "afterbirth", condemned (692) at theTrullan Council, 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 — andDucange (op. cit., s. vv. Cervula and Kalendæ).
InEngland, 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 asheathen. The conservatives resisted; atCanterbury blood was shed; but after the Restoration Dissenters continued to call Yuletide "Fooltide".
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.
APA citation.Martindale, C.C.(1908).Christmas. InThe Catholic Encyclopedia.New York: Robert Appleton Company.http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03724b.htm
MLA citation.Martindale, Cyril Charles."Christmas."The Catholic Encyclopedia.Vol. 3.New York: Robert Appleton Company,1908.<http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03724b.htm>.
Transcription.This article was transcribed for New Advent by Susanti A. Suastika.
Ecclesiastical approbation.Nihil Obstat. November 1, 1908. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor.Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York.
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