Santa Claus has been associated with commerce from the beginning, says ethnographer

There's the first Advent Sunday.What symbolizes Advent?

It is a period when Christians are preparing to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ.At the time of Advent, the principles of moderation in food and drinks, ban on entertainment, dances or walking for girls and weddings did not take place.Also characteristic are parades of people in masks of fantastic beings, saints or even animals.

With Advent is associated with fasting.When does it start?

After the twenty -five November, when the holiday of holy Catherine has.Since then there has been a limitation of the diet concerning meat and alcohol.The spiritual dimension is associated with the tradition of the morning masses of the rorues to honor the Virgin Mary.They start at four or five in the morning and ignite special rorát candles.Even today, Advent is a preparatory period, although rather in the practical sense.Whether this is the case of pre -Christmas cleaning or trips to shops.

Many people on Advent Sundays lit candles on a wreath.Is this habit very old?

Is quite new.Originated in the Protestant environment of northern Germany in the first half of the nineteenth century.In the Institute for Abandoned Children in Hamburg in 1839, the educator first hung a wooden circle with candles under the ceiling.Every day until the twenty -four December on it one day.The tradition in the form of Chvojový wreath has expanded among Catholics.In Bohemia and Moravia, Advent wreaths appeared only after 1990.New habit people accepted well.For merchants, gardeners and florists, this is an opportunity to earn.

With the beginning of Advent are connected by Nicholas gifts.Why have they maintained to this day as opposed to the beats before the Holiday.Barbara or Lucie?

St. Nicholas tradition is associated with children and with giving.For the smallest it is strange time that Nicholas with his entourage enters the hall and asks if they were good.Even this habit is undergoing modernization.Nicholas, for example, report to parents before visiting by phone.

What did the walks look like before the holiday of St. Barbara?

They are still adhered to somewhere, for example in the Třebíč region.Girls are disguised in white clothes for Barbara and children distribute small gifts, such as gingerbread.And the whisk patting them on their face.

How does it differ from the tradition of Lucie.

Both characters have white clothes, but for Lucky adult women change.Barborka is helpful and is not scary, Lucka, on the other hand, is strict to terrible.Sometimes naughty children stabbed the end of the wooden spoon.She wore a goose wing that wipes people's cheeks and was also sweeping the walls.Therefore, it is associated with pre -Christmas cleaning.On her holiday had previously been banned from spinning.When the sprockets disobeyed the ban, Lucka taps them with a spindle over your fingers.In the Czech Republic in some regions they walked around Advent in addition to Lucy and Perchta or Persychty of the terrible appearance.They wore a knife and threatened it.

When was the Christmas present?

In the time of religious reformation in the sixteenth century, the Protestants refused to worship the saints, including St. Nicholas.The idea that gifts brings to children Christ came from Martin Luther.She gradually took over in our country.In the nineteenth century, it was already in the folk environment next to the Nicholas gifts and the one from Santa Claus.Initially, only children received gifts.Over time they started to find adults under the Christmas tree.

Santa Claus's character appears more and more often in the Czech Republic.How did it come from?

Comes from America.Dutch settlers have transferred the tradition of Nicholas.Santa Claus, as we know it today, created the cartoonist Haddon Sundblom for the advertising of Coca-Coly in the 1930s.Santa Claus is thus associated with commerce from the beginning.It spread very quickly from overseas to Europe and we see it on various advertising objects.The question for the future is whether our children will be given to our children or Santa Claus.

Why did Santa Claus spread so?

Mainly because of advertising.And there is his particular picture.The character in red clothing now knows everyone.With Jesus it is more complicated.The idea of its appearance is quite vague.In the holy pictures he is portrayed as a little boy with a halo or as a newborn in nativity scenes.

There are other Christmas donors in Europe.Why do the characters differ?

It is based on regional traditions.Sometimes children give a female figure.In Italy, for example, gifts wears a good but ugly witch Befana.In Finland, children expect the arrival of Joulupukki, in Russia looking forward to Grandfather Mraj.In Germany gifts deliver Christkindl in the form of an angel.Children usually believe in Christmas donors within four, five years.When they start going to school, they usually learn quickly how it really is.

How did you spend Christmas as a child?

We sang with my brother carols and had a nativity scene.Gifts were slightly less than today and was not Santa Claus.In general, however, Christmas at that time did not differ from today's much.Greater difference was in my parents or grandparents.People then gave the children practical small gifts and often made them themselves.Dad, for example, carved the daughter's cradle for a doll, my mom sewed an apron or knit gloves and a sweater.

Do you remember the best Christmas gift you got as a kid?

I guess it was a puppet theater.My brother and I wished him very much and we really got him.

How do you celebrate Christmas now?

We buy a living tree from Veronica.It's a small fir in a pot.In spring we always plant it in the garden.We put oatmeal for a generous lunch.It is excellent with blueberry yogurt.

Previously people ate different porridge at Christmas.When did the carp spread?

Only in the last century.In regions where they founded ponds in the sixteenth century, people ate the fish much earlier.Also in burgher households it was usual.Fish is Lent food and Christmas Eve is still a fasting day.

What are the other Christmas meals?

Much dishes were prepared a lot, such as black cuba, or boiled dried fruit sauce.She was called music or brother.Christmas was also served.New meals spread through recipes in cookbooks.Girls also learned them in housewife.

What other customs are associated with Advent?

Certainly it is sending Christmas postcards.The first comes from the nineteenth century from England.It was designed in 1843 by the painter John Calcott Horsley.There are people on her who are toasting.

Are there any special Christmas customs in South Moravia?

They concern, for example, St. Stephen's Feast.Previously, a family service has changed to this date.They got a retirement from the farmer for the year -round service and re -joined the New Year.The girls ended the service for the New Year and went again to serve the three kings.In the South Moravian region of Podluží, the family had a retirement cake in the form of a knitted wreath that worn on their wand over the shoulder.In the southeastern part of Moravia, the girls were given a cake in which the skewers were stuck and various shapes from the dough were hung on them.It was a tribute, the girl was always solemnly carrying it across the village or carrying on the car.The youth then gathered in the cesalties in which this bun was the first to cut the girl's boy.

Does St. Stephen's Day accompany other traditions?

People visited a lot and the children walked around the carol.God's feast, on the other hand, was a resting holiday connected with a visit to worship.

Currently many people consider the most important holiday of New Year's Eve after Christmas Eve.Did he celebrate before?

He celebrated first in cities.Various associations, students and intellectuals organized entertainment with songs and joking scenes.At the end of the nineteenth century, these entertainment has spread to the countryside.

What customs were associated with the new year?

Maybe in Humpoleck the boys went to New Year's walks.They had a rod decorated with ribbons and dried fruit and went to carol to the farmers to be well born.Young men with Bukač or Fanfrnoch walked around Western Moravia.It is a keg with a membrane at the top of which the tuft of horsehair passes through the center of which.By heating the horsehair on the membrane they made special sounds.

What Christmas tradition elsewhere in Europe captivated you?

Ceremonial burning of a piece of trunk in a fireplace on Christmas Eve.It was followed in western and southern Europe.On Christmas Eve, people brought a piece of oak or fruit tree to the building and burned it for special rituals.They spoke to him, pouring him with wine and putting food on him.In Portugal or Serbia, the habit has been preserved to this day.

What do you think is the most important moment of Christmas?

Meeting family at Christmas Eve dinner.It's a special moment that has a ceremonial subtext.In some families they also place for deceased members to show them that they have not forgotten them.And then there is mutual gift.So people show that they want to make their loved ones and want to make them happy.But it doesn't matter but the quantity.Although advertising and commerce often determine the character of Christmas.

You are the author of the exhibition The Story of the Christmas Tree, which started last week in the Brno Palace of the Noblewoman.What do people see about her?

The exhibition focuses on everything around the Christmas tree.Visitors will see, for example.People can also see older glass ornaments and ornaments from the second half of the twentieth century and read interesting records of Christmas tree.