Re: Fw: Christmas things

Torsen, I did some checking an although I had always thought that
Clement Clark Moore was the author of "Twas The Night Before
Christmas" that might not be correct:

<<Until recently it was believed that this ballad was written in 1822
for Clement Clarke Moore's two daughters, Margaret and Charity, and
later anonymously published in the Troy [New York] Sentinel on
December 23, 1823. But, according to University of Toronto English
Library, in 2000, Don Foster, in his book Author Unknown: On the
Trail of Anonymous (New York: Henry Holt, 2000) was able to
demonstrate that Moore could not have been the author. Foster
concluded that it was probably written by Major Henry Livingston Jr.
For another analysis of the authorship see Christmas (Moore or Less?).

Visit A Mouse in Henry Livingston's House for a biography and an
account of the quest to correct the authorship of this poem.>>

I do hope this was the poem you were referring to. Interesting that
Americans needed to create reindeer to pull Santa's sleigh. This
same fantasy drove Walt Disney to create his marvelous celluloid
characters. Is America the only country historically that utilized
fantasy in creating its cherished myths?

Gerry


--snip--

> > Can anyone help out? The question is: What, I wonder,

would "Happy

> Christmas", "Santa Claus" and "reindeer" be in Nostratic?
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Gerry
> >
> >
> The reindeer are an American invention, introduced in a supposedly
> famous poem in the early 19th century, the title of which escapes

me,

> but you would probably know it. "Santa Claus" is Dutch Sinter

Klaas,

> as you probably know, borrowed from the Dutch of Nieuw Amsterdam.

The

> Dutch still have him; he wears a bishop's outfit. The admixture of
> Northern stuff (North Pole, reindeer) to the Catholic Saint St.
> Nicolaus was done because someone at some time (in America)
> identified him with the Scandinavian "old man of the house", the
> spirit of the old or ancestral owner of the house, Sw. tomte, Da
> nisse (but cf. Sw. tomtenisse, small "tomte"). He was to be

pacified

> at yuletide by receiving a bowl of porridge, or he would take

revenge

> on the cattle by making it sick. He is the ancestor of Santa's

little

> helpers (in America mythology) in Santa's workshop (another

American

> addition to the tradition). The tomte or nisse may have been known

to

> Americans through some of Andersen's fairy tales. Nisse is the
> hypochoristic of Niels (< Nicolaus), as Bill from William.
>
> Note the pointy gray or red hat, derived from both St. Nicolaus'
> bishop's mitre and the traditional hat of the not-so-Christian
> country folk (also known as the Phrygian cap of the French
> revolution).
>
> 'Tomte' is usually derived from 'tomt' Sw. "plot of land",
> Da. "abandonned building", from PIE *dom-peda, (cf. 'toft' "piece

of

> land"), but perhaps it's from *dom-pot- "master of the house"?
>
> I was wondering if the English tom- of tom-foolery, tom-boy fits in
> here?
>
> The Scandinavian for Christmas is 'jul' (as in "yuletide"), of
> disputed origin. It has been borrowed into Finnish at two different
> times, as 'juhla' "feast" and (later) 'joulo' "Christmas".
>
> The oldest mention of 'jól' mentions that they drank 'jól', thus
> celebrated it with drink. It was the time of slaughtering a pig and
> feasting, winter solstice.
>
> Torsten