It’s almost Christmas, one of the most well-known holidays in the world. Christmas is well known by many, but actually, there are more people who don’t know about the history of Christmas than people who do know. Today, I will talk about the history of Christmas and other interesting winter festivals related to Christmas.

Even before Christmas, there were holidays during December. Especially, on December 25th, the Romans celebrated Juvenalia, and it is known that most nobles of Rome celebrated the birthday of an infant god called Mithra, who was born from a rock. Also, it is known that there was a festival known as Saturnalia, worshipping the god of agriculture. Except for Saturnalia, the two festivals were enjoyed by the children of ancient Rome. Actually, the Birth of Jesus originally wasn’t celebrated, and what we now call Christmas wasn’t so popular at first; Easter was a larger festival. Actually, there isn’t any evidence that Jesus’s birth was on December 25th. 1. Christmas is a festival Church officials created in order to celebrate Jesus’ birth, and the date was almost randomly chosen. 2. Why would there be shepherds in the middle of December? These 2 ideas are among the most well-stated evidence by people who reject the date of Christmas. Plus, medieval Christmas was completely different with modern Christmas. There weren’t Christmas cards, no Santa, and only Germans had Christmas trees. Actually, Christmas trees were found strange by most people. Christmas cards were first given during the colonial era. The term Santa Claus was founded by an author, Clement Clark Moore. The character “Santa Claus” came from St. Nicholas, who used all of his money to help poor kids who would have starved during harsh winter weather. In addition, there are many figures like Santa in many countries. In Scandinavia, it is known that an elf called Jultomen delivers presents to good kids with a sleigh of goats. While in Germany and Switzerland a person called Kris Kringle was known to give presents to well-behaved children. In Italian tales, a witch called Le Befana put presents in well-behaved kids’ stockings. In South Korea, Christmas first started in 1945 when the Japanese forces retreated and the US came to Korea. In 1870, Christmas became an official holiday in the US.

Christmas has been one of the best-known holidays ever since the early days of Christianity. However, it is interesting to learn that there were other winter holidays long before Christmas was set in December. Regardless, it is great to know about the history of Christmas. Merry Christmas!