Santa Claus is coming to town

Every year millions of children (and adults, too) are waiting impatiently for the arrival of  a short, fat guy in a red suit that brings them presents: Santa Claus. Where did the original Santa Claus come from and why did he devote his apparently immortal life to bringing children presents on Christmas?

Usually, a saint called St Nicholas is acknowledged as the original Santa Claus. We know little about this man for certain. He probably lived in Myra, in the south-west of modern Turkey, in the fourth century. St Nicholas, who was a bishop in his home town of Myra, is likely to have died on 6 December. This day was celebrated as his feast day in the medieval church, and still is his feast day in some countries today. 

One of the earliest legends about St Nicholas tells how he heard of a man who could not afford the dowries for his three daughters. The man therefore intended to make his daughters work in a brothel. St Nicholas saved them from their fate by throwing three bags of gold through their window at night.

This tale is often seen as the root of St Nicholas as a gift giver. He also appears to have taken on some of the qualities that originally belonged to pagan gods such as Poseidon or Wodan.

Throughout the Middle Ages, the legend of St Nicholas spread enormously. In addition to being the patron of sailors and unmarried women, he also became the patron of children. The most significant change, however, was brought about by the introduction of the Dutch Sinterklaas. Sinterklaas clearly derives from St Nicholas and his feast-day on 6 December, but he differs from earlier portraits of the Christian saint. Sinterklaas, for example, has got a flying white horse. This may derive from the fusion of St Nicholas with pagan gods (Wodan did possess a flying horse).

It seems likely that St Nicholas became an American tradition in a period following the Revolutionary War, when Americans became interested in Dutch customs. However, it was probably Clement Moore who fixed the image of Santa Claus so firmly in the American mind. He wrote a poem called "A Visit from St Nicholas" in 1822. Moore added some elements from German and Norse legends to the Dutch Sinterklaas. In his poem, St Nicholas is a tiny man with a sleigh drawn by eight miniature reindeer. He stops at every house and comes down the chimney to fill stockings with gifts. The poem was published anonymously and became very popular under the name "The Night before Christmas".

As time went by, more and more details were added to the legend of St Nicholas. Thomas Nast, a cartoonist, did a series of drawings of St Nicholas. His version of Santa lives at the North Pole, has a workshop for building toys and a large book filled with the names of all the naughty and nice children. In the 19th century Santa was often shown wearing outfits of different colours including purple, green and blue. The Coca-Cola company is often said to have made popular the image of Santa dressed in the colours red and white because those are the company's colours. However, the other colours had already faded out by the beginning of the 20th century and most of the time Santa was associated with the colours red and white.