Christmas

25 Interesting facts

Made by Pukhova L.V. ( school 204, Moscow)

Fact 1

The Romans celebrated Saturnalia in honour of the god Saturn. Saturnalia was adopted by the Roman Christians and became Christmas.

Fact 2

In A.D. 320, Pope Julius I, bishop of Rome, proclaimed December 25 the official celebration date for the birthday of Christ

Fact 3In 1399, King

Richard II of England had a rather large Christmas dinner in London – the meal included 28 oxen, 300 sheep

and deer, and thousands of chicken.

Fact 4

King Henry VIII of England loved eating. He once sat down to a Christmas dinner that lasted 12 hours.

Fact 5The first person to

decorate a Christmas tree was reportedly the Protestant reformer Martin Luther (1483-1546). According to legend, he was so moved by the beauty of the stars shining between the branches of a fir tree, he brought home an evergreen tree and decorated it with candles to share the image with his children

Fact 6Oliver Cornwell, the

leader, stopped the celebration of Christmas

during 1647- 1660. According to him it was

immoral to celebrate the holiest day of the

year. It was a criminal offence. He or she could find him or her behind the bars if he/she was found guilty of celebrating Christmas.

Fact 7• There are two

competing claims as to which president was the first to place a Christmas tree in the White House. Some scholars say President Franklin Pierce did in 1856; others say President Benjamin Harrison brought in the first tree in 1889. President Coolidge started the White House lighting ceremony in 1923.

Fact 8

President Teddy Roosevelt, an environmentalist, banned Christmas trees from the White House in 1912

Fact 9

Christmas is a contraction of “Christ’s Mass,” which is derived from the Old English Cristes mæsse (first recorded in 1038). The letter “X” in Greek is the first letter of Christ, and “Xmas” has been used as an abbreviation for Christmas since the mid 1500s

Fact 10The traditional

three colors of Christmas are green, red, and gold. Green has long been a symbol of life and rebirth; red symbolizes the blood of Christ, and gold represents light as well as wealth and royalty

Fact 11

Most of Santa’s reindeer have male-sounding names, such as Blitzer, Comet, and Cupid.

Fact 12Christmas day lasts

172,800 seconds. Santa Claus would need to travel at 2,058 km per second to reach all the places in the world during that time.

Fact 13

Each year more than 3 billion Christmas cards are sent in the U.S. alone

Fact 14

Commissioned by Sir Henry Cole (1808-1883), British illustrator John Callcott Horsley (1817-1903) invented the first Christmas card in 1843.

Fact 15

The world’s largest Christmas stocking measured 32.56 m long and 14.97 m wide. It weighed as much as five reindeer and held almost 1,000 presents. It was made by the Children’s Society in London on December 14, 2007

Fact 16

Scientists say that Christmas trees are edible. The needles are a good source of vitamin C.

Fact 17

A traditional

Christmas

dinner in early

England was the

head of a pig

prepared with

mustard. It was

usually followed

by roast

peacock.

Fact 18According to an old

wives’ tale if you bake bread on the Christmas Eve then it will be fresh forever. It’s yet to be known that how many people actually believe in this story and how many of them have ever tried it.

Fact 19

The British wear paper crowns while they eat Christmas dinner. The crowns are stored in a tube called a “Christmas cracker.”

Fact 20

The poinsettia is a traditional Christmas flower. In Mexico (its original birthplace), the poinsettia is known as the "Flower of the Holy Night".

Fact 21At Christmas, it is

traditional to exchange kisses beneath the mistletoe tree. In ancient Scandinavia, mistletoe was associated with peace and friendship. That may account for the custom of "kissing beneath the mistletoe"

Fact 22 In the Ukraine, if you find a

spider web in the house on

Christmas morning, it is

believed to be a harbinger

of good luck! There once

lived a woman so poor,

says a Ukrainian folk tale, that she could not

afford Christmas decorations for her family.

One Christmas morning, she awoke to find that

spiders had trimmed her children’s tree with

their webs.

Fact 23

The first state to recognize Christmas as an official holiday was Alabama in 1836.

Fact 24

Oklahoma was the last U.S. state to declare Christmas a legal holiday, in 1907

Fact 25 During the auspicious Christmas

time many of the pet owners think their pet as human beings. It is noticed that almost 56 percent of Americans sing to their pets.