Who is Santa Claus ?
Santa Claus, the gift giver as we know him today was in actual a true
person – St. Nicholas who lived in Myra (now, Turkey), way back in 300AD. Born to be
the only child of a wealthy family, he was orphaned at a very young age when his parents
died of plague. He later grew up to be one of the youngest priests ever at a monastery.
Ever since then was he known for his generosity
as he gave away his wealth in gifts to the poor and the needy, especially children.
Legends also have him throwing bags of gold into their houses through the chimneys and
windows that occasionally fell in the stockings hung at the fire place to dry. At a later
stage he took to become a bishop and thus came into existence the current attire of long
flowing gown, white beard and the red cap. After his death, he was elevated to Sainthood
and made part of the Christmas Eve celebrations.
Ever since then was Santa represented on the Eve in various attires of
all hues in contradiction to the traditional red and so also was given different names. It
was the ‘Sinter klaas’ of Dutch that was over the time changed to today’s
‘Santa Claus’. However, Santa’s today’s appeal has more to do with
Clement Moore’s "A Visit from Saint Nicholas" (1823) where he described St.
Nicholas as "chubby and plump, a right jolly elf" and was given a visual form by
Thomas Nast for the first time. And from then on came a number of illustrations of Santa
every year that has all lead to today’s ‘Santa Claus’ with a red suit
trimmed with white fur, leather boots and belt, long white beard and a pack of toys hung
on to his back.
