"Old, Dark and Forgotten Christmas"
by John Grossman
The images of Santa Claus we have today are so ingrained and considered so "traditional" that it is hard to imagine that even 100 years ago the image of the Christmas giftbringer hadn't been standardized. This delightful little book is a fun read, watching the development of "old Santeclaus" from an early 1800s poem to the red-clad figure we know today, through a collection of images, mostly from old postcards, some from the United States and many from Europe.
Santa is such a genial figure today that it might seem horrifying to discover that early St. Nicholas characters carried around birch rods to whip naughty children or traveled with a devilish-looking character named the Krampus or Knecht Ruprecht who administered punishment or threatened to take disobedient children away in a sack.
Other photos show Santa conveyed by other means than reindeer, with more benevolent companions like angels, and other Victorian images for Christmas such as fairies, dancing food, animals celebrating Christmas, and...dead birds! Wonderful stuff; a great book for anyone interested in the history of Christmas.
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