The magical history of Christmas tree
Every year at the end of the year, when we bid farewell to the old year and welcome the new year, the earth is wrapped in silver, which is quite different from the white cold snow. Red ornaments and golden bells flying in shops and streets, as well as laughter and laughter in the bustle … A song “Jingle Bells” runs through almost all the childhood after 1990-Christmas, and every year comes as scheduled.pass palm trees for sale It can be seen from the present situation that the market prospect is relatively broad, which is conducive to our reference and investment. https://vitalismoartificialplants.com/
Christmas Day
No matter where it is, Christmas tree is indispensable. Such a green plant full of exquisite gifts is not only a symbol of Christmas, but also the most sincere yearning and expectation for the new year.
Unfortunately, with the spread of Christmas customs, people’s understanding of the Christmas tree has become more and more one-sided and superficial. Let’s walk into the history and origin behind the Christmas tree.
Christmas tree
Before talking about these two questions, we must first understand one thing-what is the essence of the Christmas tree?
In fact, it’s not hard to guess, just from the names of “Christmas” and “Christmas tree”, after all, the meaning of the word “Christmas” means “the birth of saints”, so both “Christmas” and “Christmas tree” can be understood as “a festival celebrating the birth of saints” and “a tree symbolizing the birth of saints”.
In this way, the essence of the “Christmas tree” is not difficult to understand. There is no doubt that the so-called Christmas tree is essentially a companion of religious activities. Simply put, it is a plant used for religious activities.
This must be very strange to many young people in China who simply regard it as a happy holiday, but abroad, for Christians and Orthodox believers, the existence of Christmas trees is indeed extremely serious!
When did the Christmas tree originate? Where? There is no way to test the details. The earliest use of plants for religious activities in human history can be traced back to the ancient Egyptian period more than 7,000 years ago. At that time, the ancient Egyptian people would put green palms in their homes at the summer solstice to celebrate the sun god Ra’s letting the dark winter pass. For people at that time, the recovery of winter symbolized the victory of life over death, which was the most memorable moment.
Centuries later, in ancient Rome, there was a feast called Saturnalia every summer solstice, which was the Saturnalia Festival of the ancient Roman people. At this time, the ancient Roman people would decorate their homes with green plants and celebrate to commemorate Saturn, their god of agriculture, and thank him for making crops in the fields harvest.
Saturnalia
Similarly, in the 8th century AD, German missionary Nicholas also used fir trees to worship the infant … This series of customs may be regarded as the origin of the Christmas tree.
Of course, it is not rigorous. After all, although the religious ceremonies in ancient Greece and Rome have long since disappeared, until more than a thousand years ago, although there was Christmas in northern Europe, there was no Christmas tree. They just used to hang a fir tree upside down from the ceiling. This behavior has not been explained by scholars so far.
Of course, in essence, considering that the Nordic people were also celebrating Christmas with trees at that time, perhaps those fir trees could also be called Christmas trees. By comparison, the well-known Christmas tree now should be more accurately called modern Christmas tree, which is a new Christmas tree redefined and stipulated by various sects.
However, the emergence of this modern Christmas tree is also controversial.
Tallinn, Estonia, and Riga, Latvia have always claimed that they used the world’s first Christmas tree. The former said that they used the first modern Christmas tree in the town square in 1441, while the latter claimed that they did the same thing in 1510. Why the specific truth has long been unknown, but obviously most historians scoff at it.
Today’s historians generally believe that the modern Christmas tree should have originated in Germany in the 16th century, because the English Christmas tree Tannenbaum means fir tree in German, and once the fir tree is associated with the Christmas tree, it is naturally associated with the religious reformer named Martin Luther.
It is said that in the winter of 1536, at night, Martin Luther, a religious reformer, was walking in a pine forest near his home in Vittenburg. When he looked up, he saw thousands of stars shining among the branches, making them look very beautiful like gems. This wonderful sight immediately inspired Martin Luther’s imagination, so he set up a fir tree in his house and lit candles on it to represent the starlight and Jesus.
Because of this, many Catholics hate Christmas trees very much. At the end of the 19th century, many people even called Christianity fir tree religion.
However, this indirectly proves that the Christmas tree really originated in Germany. In 1605, in southern Germany, an unknown writer recorded the process of Strasbourg residents decorating the Christmas tree with apples, gold foil, candy and so on, but this behavior was not uniform. For example, residents in southern Germany used to use fir as the main body of the Christmas tree, while residents in other places used to.
Some people are used to using box trees, while others are used to using purple shirts. It’s hard to say which one is traditional. For example, in Andersen’s fairy tale, there is a fairy tale called Fir Tree, which tells the story that fir trees are dressed as Christmas trees. However, for the mecklenburg-Strelitz Principality where Queen Charlotte of England was located at that time, they are more used to decorating their rooms with a purple shirt.
Then in the 18th century, Queen Charlotte married in England and became the wife of George III. The habit of decorating rooms with purple shirts was brought to England by the Queen. She put branches with purple shirts in the largest room in Kew Garden or Windsor Castle, and decorated them carefully. When all the candles on the branches were lit, the whole court gathered to sing carols, and gifts were distributed after the holidays. The pattern was quite close to that of Christmas and Christmas trees now.
However, Queen Charlotte was obviously not satisfied with just the “little fun” of the upper class. In 1800, she displayed a whole yew tree decorated with exquisite gifts and fruits in Windsor Castle, which made the first lesson of the Christmas tree in Britain!
Later, the inheritance of the Christmas tree was even faster. In the 1840s, Queen Victoria and Prince Albert took a photo at Windsor Castle, which established the tradition that the British royal family inherited the Christmas tree. With the influence of Queen Victoria, the United States began to pay more and more attention to the changes of the British royal family and upper class.
In addition, a large number of German immigrants came to North America in the 17th century, which brought the tradition of Christmas tree early, so the Christmas tree became popular in the United States.
In China and Japan, Christmas trees were mostly introduced by American missionaries with Christmas and religion in the 19th and 20th centuries. Although the development time is still short, due to the convenience of the Internet and the integration of eastern and western cultures, this festival has gradually grown its own characteristics in the East.