Victorian Christmas Research

Victorian Christmas Research

Victorian Christmas

• 19th century: Christmas was barely celebrated
• End of century: it became biggest annual celebration
• change is attributed to Queen Victoria and her marriage to Prince Albert
• 1843: Henry Cole commissioned an artist to design a card for Christmas
• By the 1880s the sending of cards had become enormously popular
• 1848: Illustrated London News published a drawing of the royal family celebrating around a decorated Christmas tree
• 1848: Tom Smith came up with the idea of the Christmas cracker

By: Megan Haas and Lydia Simburger

Victorian Life

• Queen Victoria queen from 1837 to 1901
• Education was not equal between sexes and classes
• when a women married she had no independent legal status, no right to money, or claim to her children
• homosexuality was punishable by death
• last execution on the grounds of "homosexuality" took place in 1830
• Social Class
• Working class
• men and women who performed physical labor, paid daily or weekly wages
• Middle class
• men performed mental of "clean" work, paid monthly or annually wages
• Upper class
• did not work, income came from inherited land and investments

Christmas traditions

The Origin of Christmas

Charles Dickens

• in the Christian faith it marks the day Jesus Christ was born
• the winter solstice was celebrated in Rome, even before the birth of Christ, celebrated the Unconquered Son
• in ancient Babylon the Feast of the Son of Isis was celebrated on December 25
• pagans of northern Europe celebrated Yule (symbolic of the pagan Sun God being born)

• greatest writer of his age
• born February 7, 1812
• he was removed from school to work at a boot-blacking factory at 12
• wrote 15 major novels and countless short stories and articles
• marrie Catherine Hogarth in April 1836 and had 10 children
• died June 9, 1870 of stroke

• Christmas trees:
• ancient peoples hung evergreen boughs over doors/windows
• believed evergreens would keep away bad things
• Germany started the Christmas tree tradition
• Christmas stockings
• St. Nicholas of Myra started
• Christmas candles
• medieval Europe: a very large candle was burned in remembrance of the arrival of the Wise Men to Bethlehem
• Victorian times: represented good will for those less fortunate and indicated welcome to a passerby needing shelter and food
• Legends say that candles in windows guide the Christ Child as he wanders from house to house on Christmas Eve looking for a place to stay
• Custom of lighting candles on trees started in Germany