Father Christmas and Santa Claus
In the sixteenth century after the reformation,
Saints went out of favour in Europe. Someone had to
take the place of Saint Nicholas and distribute
presents at Christmas. In England a jolly character
known as Father Christmas took over. In France it is
Pere Noel and in Germany the Christkind or Christ
Child who gives out gifts. In the USA his name
became Kris Kringle. Dutch settlers in America
shorted St Nicholas’s name to Class and called him
Sinta Class this soon became Santa Clause. No one
knows how St Nicholas’s white horse turned into a
reindeers. In the nineteenth century a book showed
him with one reindeer. In 1882 DR Clement Clarke
Moore wrote a poem for children about Santa
Clause, in the poem he named and described eight
reindeers.The original English Father Christmas has
come to look more and more like his American
counterpart and now Father Christmas and Santa
Clause have become the same person.