document_title: Christmas

question_text: what is the original meaning of ivy at christmas

question_tokens: what is the original meaning of ivy at christmas

text: Christmas

text: Etymology

text: "Christmas" is a shortened form of "Christ's mass". It is derived from the Middle English Cristemasse, which is from Old English Crīstesmæsse, a phrase first recorded in 1038[9] followed by the word Cristes-messe in 1131.[32] Crīst (genitive Crīstes) is from Greek Khrīstos (Χριστός), a translation of Hebrew Māšîaḥ (מָשִׁיחַ), "Messiah", meaning "anointed";[33][34] and mæsse is from Latin missa, the celebration of the Eucharist.

text: The form Christenmas was also historically used, but is now considered archaic and dialectal;[35] it derives from Middle English Cristenmasse, literally "Christian mass".[36] Xmas is an abbreviation of Christmas found particularly in print, based on the initial letter chi (Χ) in Greek Khrīstos (Χριστός), "Christ", though numerous style guides discourage its use;[37] it has precedent in Middle English Χρ̄es masse (where "Χρ̄" is an abbreviation for Χριστός).[36]

text: Other names

text: In addition to "Christmas", the holiday has been known by various other names throughout its history. The Anglo-Saxons referred to the feast as "midwinter",[38][39] or, more rarely, as Nātiuiteð (from Latin nātīvitās below).[38][40] "Nativity", meaning "birth", is from Latin nātīvitās.[41] In Old English, Gēola (Yule) referred to the period corresponding to December and January, which was eventually equated with Christian Christmas.[42] "Noel" (or "Nowel") entered English in the late 14th century and is from the Old French noël or naël, itself ultimately from the Latin nātālis (diēs) meaning "birth (day)".[43]

text: Nativity

text: The canonical gospels of Luke and Matthew both describe Jesus as being born in Bethlehem in Judea, to a virgin mother. In the Gospel of Luke account, Joseph and Mary travel from Nazareth to Bethlehem for the census, and Jesus is born there and laid in a manger.[44] It says that angels proclaimed him a savior for all people, and shepherds came to adore him.

text: In the Matthew account, magi follow a star to Bethlehem to bring gifts to Jesus, born the king of the Jews. King Herod orders the massacre of all the boys less than two years old in Bethlehem, but the family flees to Egypt and later settles in Nazareth.

text: History

text: The Nativity stories of Matthew and Luke are prominent in the gospels and early Christian writers suggested various dates for the anniversary. The first recorded Christmas celebration was in Rome in 336.[45][46] Christmas played a role in the Arian controversy of the fourth century. In the early Middle Ages, it was overshadowed by Epiphany. The feast regained prominence after 800, when Charlemagne was crowned emperor on Christmas Day.

text: Associating it with drunkenness and other misbehavior, the Puritans banned Christmas in the 17th century.[47] It was restored as a legal holiday in 1660, but remained disreputable. In the early 19th century, Christmas was revived with the start of the Oxford Movement in the Anglican Church.[48]

text: Charles Dickens and other writers reinvented the holiday by emphasizing Christmas as a time for family, religion, gift-giving, and social reconciliation as opposed to the revelry that had been common historically.[48]

text: Choice of December 25 date

text: In the 3rd century, the date of birth of Jesus was the subject of both great interest and great uncertainty. Around AD 200, Clement of Alexandria wrote:

text:
“
There are those who have determined not only the year of our Lord's birth, but also the day; and they say that it took place in the 28th year of Augustus, and in the 25th day of [the Egyptian month] Pachon [May 20] … Further, others say that He was born on the 24th or 25th of Pharmuthi [April 20 or 21].[49]
”

text: In other writing of this time, May 20, April 18 or 19, March 25, January 2, November 17, and November 20 are all suggested.[9][50] Various factors contributed to the selection of December 25 as a date of celebration: it was the date of the winter solstice on the Roman calendar; it was about nine months after March 25, the date of the vernal equinox and a date linked to the conception of Jesus.

text: Solstice date

text: December 25 was the date of the winter solstice on the Roman calendar.[51][52] Jesus chose to be born on the shortest day of the year for symbolic reasons, according to an early Christmas sermon by Augustine: "Hence it is that He was born on the day which is the shortest in our earthly reckoning and from which subsequent days begin to increase in length. He, therefore, who bent low and lifted us up chose the shortest day, yet the one whence light begins to increase."[53]

text: Linking Jesus to the Sun was supported by various Biblical passages. Jesus was considered to be the "Sun of righteousness" prophesied by Malachi: "Unto you shall the sun of righteousness arise, and healing is in his wings."[54] John describes Jesus as "the light of the world."[55]

text: Such solar symbolism could support more than one date of birth. An anonymous work known as De Pascha Computus (243) linked the idea that creation began at the spring equinox, on March 25, with the conception or birth (the word nascor can mean either) of Jesus on March 28, the day of the creation of the sun in the Genesis account. One translation reads: "O the splendid and divine providence of the Lord, that on that day, the very day, on which the sun was made, March 28, a Wednesday, Christ should be born.[9][56]

text: In the 17th century, Isaac Newton argued that the date of Christmas was selected to correspond with the solstice.[57]

text: According to Steven Hijmans of the University of Alberta, "It is cosmic symbolism ... which inspired the Church leadership in Rome to elect the southern solstice, December 25, as the birthday of Christ, and the northern solstice as that of John the Baptist, supplemented by the equinoxes as their respective dates of conception."[58]

text: Calculation hypothesis

text: The Calculation hypothesis suggests that an earlier holiday held on March 25 became associated with the Incarnation.[59] Modern scholars refer to this feast as the Quartodecimal. Christmas was then calculated as nine months later. The Calculation hypothesis was proposed by French writer Louis Duchesne in 1889.[60][61] In modern times, March 25 is celebrated as Annunciation. This holiday was created in the seventh century and was assigned to a date that is nine months before Christmas, in addition to being the traditional date of the equinox. It is unrelated to the Quartodecimal, which had been forgotten by this time.[62]

text: Early Christians celebrated the life of Jesus on a date considered equivalent to 14 Nisan (Passover) on the local calendar. Because Passover was held on the 14th of the month, this feast is referred to as the Quartodecimal. All the major events of Christ's life, especially the passion, were celebrated on this date. In his letter to the Corinthians, Paul mentions Passover, presumably celebrated according to the local calendar in Corinth.[63] Tertullian (d. 220), who lived in Latin-speaking North Africa, gives the date of passion celebration as March 25.[64] The date of the passion was moved to Good Friday in 165 when Pope Soter created Easter by reassigning the Resurrection to a Sunday. According to the Calculation hypothesis, celebration of the quartodecimal continued in some areas and the feast became associated with Incarnation.

text: The Calculation hypothesis is considered academically to be "a thoroughly viable hypothesis", though not certain.[65] It was a traditional Jewish belief that great men lived a whole number of years, without fractions, so that Jesus was considered to have been conceived on March 25, as he died on March 25, which was calculated to have coincided with 14 Nisan.[66] A passage in Commentary on the Prophet Daniel (204) by Hippolytus of Rome identifies December 25 as the date of the nativity. This passage is generally considered a late interpellation. But the manuscript includes another passage, one that is more likely to be authentic, that gives the passion as March 25.[67]

text: In 221, Sextus Julius Africanus (c. 160 – c. 240) gave March 25 as the day of creation and of the conception of Jesus in his universal history. This conclusion was based on solar symbolism, with March 25 the date of the equinox. As this implies a birth in December, it is sometimes claimed to be the earliest identification of December 25 as the nativity. However, Africanus was not such an influential writer that it is likely he determined the date of Christmas.[68]

text: The tractate De solstitia et aequinoctia conceptionis et nativitatis Domini nostri Iesu Christi et Iohannis Baptistae, falsely attributed to John Chrysostom, also argued that Jesus was conceived and crucified on the same day of the year and calculated this as March 25.[69][70] This anonymous tract also states: "But Our Lord, too, is born in the month of December ... the eight before the calends of January [25 December] ..., But they call it the 'Birthday of the Unconquered'. Who indeed is so unconquered as Our Lord...? Or, if they say that it is the birthday of the Sun, He is the Sun of Justice."[9]

text: History of religions hypothesis

text: The rival "History of Religions" hypothesis suggests that the Church selected December 25 date to appropriate festivities held by the Romans in honor of the Sun god Sol Invictus.[59] This feast was established by Aurelian in 274. An explicit expression of this theory appears in an annotation of uncertain date added to a manuscript of a work by 12th-century Syrian bishop Jacob Bar-Salibi. The scribe who added it wrote:

text: "It was a custom of the Pagans to celebrate on the same 25 December the birthday of the Sun, at which they kindled lights in token of festivity. In these solemnities and revelries the Christians also took part. Accordingly when the doctors of the Church perceived that the Christians had a leaning to this festival, they took counsel and resolved that the true Nativity should be solemnised on that day." [71]

text: In 1743, German Protestant Paul Ernst Jablonski argued Christmas was placed on December 25 to correspond with the Roman solar holiday Dies Natalis Solis Invicti and was therefore a "paganization" that debased the true church.[72] It has been argued that, on the contrary, the Emperor Aurelian, who in 274 instituted the holiday of the Dies Natalis Solis Invicti, did so partly as an attempt to give a pagan significance to a date already important for Christians in Rome.[73]

text: Hermann Usener[74] and others[32] proposed that the Christians chose this day because it was the Roman feast celebrating the birthday of Sol Invictus. Modern scholar S. E. Hijmans, however, states that "While they were aware that pagans called this day the 'birthday' of Sol Invictus, this did not concern them and it did not play any role in their choice of date for Christmas."[58] Moreover, Thomas J. Talley holds that the Roman Emperor Aurelian placed a festival of Sol Invictus on December 25 in order to compete with the growing rate of the Christian Church, which had already been celebrating Christmas on that date first.[75] In the judgement of the Church of England Liturgical Commission, the History of Religions hypothesis has been challenged[76] by a view based on an old tradition, according to which the date of Christmas was fixed at nine months after March 25, the date of the vernal equinox, on which the Annunciation was celebrated.[69]

text: With regard to a December religious feast of the deified Sun (Sol), as distinct from a solstice feast of the birth (or rebirth) of the astronomical sun, one scholar has commented that, "while the winter solstice on or around December 25 was well established in the Roman imperial calendar, there is no evidence that a religious celebration of Sol on that day antedated the celebration of Christmas".[77] "Thomas Talley has shown that, although the Emperor Aurelian's dedication of a temple to the sun god in the Campus Martius (C.E. 274) probably took place on the 'Birthday of the Invincible Sun' on December 25, the cult of the sun in pagan Rome ironically did not celebrate the winter solstice nor any of the other quarter-tense days, as one might expect."[78] The Oxford Companion to Christian Thought remarks on the uncertainty about the order of precedence between the religious celebrations of the Birthday of the Unconquered Sun and of the birthday of Jesus, stating that the hypothesis that December 25 was chosen for celebrating the birth of Jesus on the basis of the belief that his conception occurred on March 25 "potentially establishes 25 December as a Christian festival before Aurelian's decree, which, when promulgated, might have provided for the Christian feast both opportunity and challenge".[79]

text: Introduction of feast

text: As Christmas was unknown to the early Christian writers, it must have been introduced sometime after 300. Irenaeus and Tertullian omit it from their lists of feasts. In 245, Origen of Alexandria, writing about Leviticus 12:1–8, commented that Scripture mentions only sinners as celebrating their birthdays, namely Pharaoh, who then had his chief baker hanged (Genesis 40:20–22), and Herod, who then had John the Baptist beheaded (Mark 6:21–27), and mentions saints as cursing the day of their birth, namely Jeremiah (Jeremiah 20:14–15) and Job (Job 3:1–16).[80] In 303, Arnobius still ridiculed the idea of celebrating the birthdays of gods, a passage cited as evidence that Arnobius was unaware of any nativity celebration.[81] But since Christmas does not celebrate Christ's birth "as God" but "as man", this does not necessarily show that Christmas was not a feast at this time.[9]

text: The earliest known Christmas celebration is recorded in a fourth-century manuscript compiled in Rome.[45] This manuscript is thought to record a celebration that occurred in 336. It was prepared privately for Furius Dionysius Filocalus, a Roman aristocrat, in 354. The reference in question states, "VIII kal. ian. natus Christus in Betleem Iudeæ"[46] translated as "8 Kalends January[a] Birth of Christ in Bethlehem, Judea."[82] This reference is in a section of the manuscript that was copied from earlier source material.[83] The document also contains the earliest known reference to the feast of Sol Invictus.[84] The fact the Donatists of North Africa celebrated Christmas suggests that the feast was established by the time that church was created in 311.[85][86]

text: In Eastern Christianity the birth of Jesus was celebrated in connection with the Epiphany on January 6,[87][88] which however emphasized celebration of the baptism of Jesus.[89] Christmas was promoted in the Christian East as part of the revival of Nicene Christianity following the death of the pro-Arian Emperor Valens at the Battle of Adrianople in 378. The feast was introduced at Constantinople in 379, in Antioch by John Chrysostom towards the end of the fourth century,[88] probably in 388, and in Alexandria only in the following century.[90] The feast disappeared after Gregory of Nazianzus resigned as bishop in 381, although it was reintroduced by John Chrysostom in about 400.[9] Even in the West, January 6 celebration of the nativity of Jesus seems to have continued until after 380.[91]

text: Relation to concurrent celebrations

text: Many popular customs associated with Christmas developed independently of the commemoration of Jesus' birth, with certain elements having origins in pre-Christian festivals that were celebrated around the winter solstice by pagan populations who were later converted to Christianity. These elements, including the Yule log from Yule and gift giving from Saturnalia,[92] became syncretized into Christmas over the centuries. The prevailing atmosphere of Christmas has also continually evolved since the holiday's inception, ranging from a sometimes raucous, drunken, carnival-like state in the Middle Ages,[93] to a tamer family-oriented and children-centered theme introduced in a 19th-century transformation.[94][95] In fact, the celebration of Christmas was banned on more than one occasion within certain Protestant groups, such as the Puritans, due to concerns that it was too pagan or unbiblical.[47][96] Jehovah's Witnesses also reject the celebration of Christmas.

text: Prior to and through the early Christian centuries, winter festivals—especially those centered on the winter solstice—were the most popular of the year in many European pagan cultures. Reasons included the fact that less agricultural work needed to be done during the winter, as well as an expectation of better weather as spring approached.[98] Many modern Christmas customs have been directly influenced by such festivals, including:

text:
Gift-giving and merrymaking from the Roman Saturnalia,
Greenery, lights, and charity from the Roman New Year, and
Yule logs and various foods from Germanic feasts.[99]

text: The Egyptian deity Horus, son to goddess Isis, was celebrated at the winter solstice. Horus was often depicted being fed by his mother, which also influenced the symbolism of the Virgin Mary with baby Christ.

text: The pre-Christian Germanic peoples—including the Anglo-Saxons and the Norse—celebrated a winter festival called Yule, held in the late December to early January period, yielding modern English yule, today used as a synonym for Christmas.[100] In Germanic language-speaking areas, numerous elements of modern Christmas folk custom and iconography stem from Yule, including the Yule log, Yule boar, and the Yule goat.[100] Often leading a ghostly procession through the sky (the Wild Hunt), the long-bearded god Odin is referred to as "the Yule one" and "Yule father" in Old Norse texts, while other gods are referred to as "Yule beings".[101]

text: In eastern Europe also, old pagan traditions were incorporated into Christmas celebrations, an example being the Koleda,[102] which was incorporated into the Christmas carol.

text: Middle Ages

text: In the Early Middle Ages, Christmas Day was overshadowed by Epiphany, which in western Christianity focused on the visit of the magi. But the medieval calendar was dominated by Christmas-related holidays. The forty days before Christmas became the "forty days of St. Martin" (which began on November 11, the feast of St. Martin of Tours), now known as Advent.[93] In Italy, former Saturnalian traditions were attached to Advent.[93] Around the 12th century, these traditions transferred again to the Twelve Days of Christmas (December 25 – January 5); a time that appears in the liturgical calendars as Christmastide or Twelve Holy Days.[93]

text: The prominence of Christmas Day increased gradually after Charlemagne was crowned Emperor on Christmas Day in 800. King Edmund the Martyr was anointed on Christmas in 855 and King William I of England was crowned on Christmas Day 1066.

text: By the High Middle Ages, the holiday had become so prominent that chroniclers routinely noted where various magnates celebrated Christmas. King Richard II of England hosted a Christmas feast in 1377 at which twenty-eight oxen and three hundred sheep were eaten.[93] The Yule boar was a common feature of medieval Christmas feasts. Caroling also became popular, and was originally a group of dancers who sang. The group was composed of a lead singer and a ring of dancers that provided the chorus. Various writers of the time condemned caroling as lewd, indicating that the unruly traditions of Saturnalia and Yule may have continued in this form.[93] "Misrule"—drunkenness, promiscuity, gambling—was also an important aspect of the festival. In England, gifts were exchanged on New Year's Day, and there was special Christmas ale.[93]

text: Christmas during the Middle Ages was a public festival that incorporated ivy, holly, and other evergreens.[103] Christmas gift-giving during the Middle Ages was usually between people with legal relationships, such as tenant and landlord.[103] The annual indulgence in eating, dancing, singing, sporting, and card playing escalated in England, and by the 17th century the Christmas season featured lavish dinners, elaborate masques, and pageants. In 1607, King James I insisted that a play be acted on Christmas night and that the court indulge in games.[104] It was during the Reformation in 16th–17th-century Europe that many Protestants changed the gift bringer to the Christ Child or Christkindl, and the date of giving gifts changed from December 6 to Christmas Eve.[105]

text: Reformation to the 18th century

text: Following the Protestant Reformation, many of the new denominations, including the Anglican Church and Lutheran Church, continued to celebrate Christmas.[106] In 1629, the Anglican poet John Milton penned On the Morning of Christ's Nativity, a poem that has since been read by many during Christmastide.[107][108] Donald Heinz, a professor at California State University, states that Martin Luther "inaugurated a period in which Germany would produce a unique culture of Christmas, much copied in North America."[109] Among the congregations of the Dutch Reformed Church, Christmas was celebrated as one of the principal evangelical feasts.[110]

text: However, in 17th century England, some groups such as the Puritans, strongly condemned the celebration of Christmas, considering it a Catholic invention and the "trappings of popery" or the "rags of the Beast".[47] In contrast, the established Anglican Church "pressed for a more elaborate observance of feasts, penitential seasons, and saints' days. The calendar reform became a major point of tension between the Anglican party and the Puritan party."[111] The Catholic Church also responded, promoting the festival in a more religiously oriented form. King Charles I of England directed his noblemen and gentry to return to their landed estates in midwinter to keep up their old-style Christmas generosity.[104] Following the Parliamentarian victory over Charles I during the English Civil War, England's Puritan rulers banned Christmas in 1647.[47][112]

text: Protests followed as pro-Christmas rioting broke out in several cities and for weeks Canterbury was controlled by the rioters, who decorated doorways with holly and shouted royalist slogans.[47] The book, The Vindication of Christmas (London, 1652), argued against the Puritans, and makes note of Old English Christmas traditions, dinner, roast apples on the fire, card playing, dances with "plow-boys" and "maidservants", old Father Christmas and carol singing.[113]

text: The Restoration of King Charles II in 1660 ended the ban, but many Calvinist clergymen still disapproved of Christmas celebration. As such, in Scotland, the Presbyterian Church of Scotland discouraged the observance of Christmas, and though James VI commanded its celebration in 1618, attendance at church was scant.[114] The Parliament of Scotland officially abolished the observance of Christmas in 1640, claiming that the church had been "purged of all superstitious observation of days".[115] It was not until 1958 that Christmas again became a Scottish public holiday.[116]

text: Following the Restoration of Charles II, Poor Robin's Almanack contained the lines: "Now thanks to God for Charles return, / Whose absence made old Christmas mourn. / For then we scarcely did it know, / Whether it Christmas were or no."[117] The diary of James Woodforde, from the latter half of the 18th century, details the observance of Christmas and celebrations associated with the season over a number of years.[118]

text: In Colonial America, the Pilgrims of New England shared radical Protestant disapproval of Christmas.[96] The Plymouth Pilgrims put their loathing for the day into practice in 1620 when they spent their first Christmas Day in the New World working – thus demonstrating their complete contempt for the day.[96] Non-Puritans in New England deplored the loss of the holidays enjoyed by the laboring classes in England.[119] Christmas observance was outlawed in Boston in 1659.[96] The ban by the Puritans was revoked in 1681 by English governor Edmund Andros, however it was not until the mid-19th century that celebrating Christmas became fashionable in the Boston region.[120]

text: At the same time, Christian residents of Virginia and New York observed the holiday freely. Pennsylvania German Settlers, pre-eminently the Moravian settlers of Bethlehem, Nazareth and Lititz in Pennsylvania and the Wachovia Settlements in North Carolina, were enthusiastic celebrators of Christmas. The Moravians in Bethlehem had the first Christmas trees in America as well as the first Nativity Scenes.[121] Christmas fell out of favor in the United States after the American Revolution, when it was considered an English custom.[122] George Washington attacked Hessian (German) mercenaries on the day after Christmas during the Battle of Trenton on December 26, 1776, Christmas being much more popular in Germany than in America at this time.

text: With the atheistic Cult of Reason in power during the era of Revolutionary France, Christian Christmas religious services were banned and the three kings cake was renamed the "equality cake" under anticlerical government policies.[123][124]

text: 19th century

text: In the UK, Christmas Day became a bank holiday in 1834, Boxing Day was added in 1871.[125]

text: In the early-19th century, writers imagined Tudor Christmas as a time of heartfelt celebration. In 1843, Charles Dickens wrote the novel A Christmas Carol that helped revive the "spirit" of Christmas and seasonal merriment.[94][95] Its instant popularity played a major role in portraying Christmas as a holiday emphasizing family, goodwill, and compassion.[126]

text: Dickens sought to construct Christmas as a family-centered festival of generosity, linking "worship and feasting, within a context of social reconciliation."[127] Superimposing his humanitarian vision of the holiday, in what has been termed "Carol Philosophy",[128] Dickens influenced many aspects of Christmas that are celebrated today in Western culture, such as family gatherings, seasonal food and drink, dancing, games, and a festive generosity of spirit.[129] A prominent phrase from the tale, "Merry Christmas", was popularized following the appearance of the story.[130] This coincided with the appearance of the Oxford Movement and the growth of Anglo-Catholicism, which led a revival in traditional rituals and religious observances.[131]

text: The term Scrooge became a synonym for miser, with "Bah! Humbug!" dismissive of the festive spirit.[132] In 1843, the first commercial Christmas card was produced by Sir Henry Cole.[133] The revival of the Christmas Carol began with William Sandys's "Christmas Carols Ancient and Modern" (1833), with the first appearance in print of "The First Noel", "I Saw Three Ships", "Hark the Herald Angels Sing" and "God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen", popularized in Dickens' A Christmas Carol.

text: In Britain, the Christmas tree was introduced in the early 19th century following the personal union with the Kingdom of Hanover by Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, wife of King George III. In 1832, the future Queen Victoria wrote about her delight at having a Christmas tree, hung with lights, ornaments, and presents placed round it.[134] After her marriage to her German cousin Prince Albert, by 1841 the custom became more widespread throughout Britain.[135]

text: An image of the British royal family with their Christmas tree at Windsor Castle created a sensation when it was published in the Illustrated London News in 1848. A modified version of this image was published in the United States in 1850.[136][137] By the 1870s, putting up a Christmas tree had become common in America.[136]

text: In America, interest in Christmas had been revived in the 1820s by several short stories by Washington Irving which appear in his The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. and "Old Christmas". Irving's stories depicted harmonious warm-hearted English Christmas festivities he experienced while staying in Aston Hall, Birmingham, England, that had largely been abandoned,[138] and he used the tract Vindication of Christmas (1652) of Old English Christmas traditions, that he had transcribed into his journal as a format for his stories.[104]

text: In 1822, Clement Clarke Moore wrote the poem A Visit From St. Nicholas (popularly known by its first line: Twas the Night Before Christmas).[139] The poem helped popularize the tradition of exchanging gifts, and seasonal Christmas shopping began to assume economic importance.[140] This also started the cultural conflict between the holiday's spiritual significance and its associated commercialism that some see as corrupting the holiday. In her 1850 book The First Christmas in New England, Harriet Beecher Stowe includes a character who complains that the true meaning of Christmas was lost in a shopping spree.[141]

text: While the celebration of Christmas was not yet customary in some regions in the U.S., Henry Wadsworth Longfellow detected "a transition state about Christmas here in New England" in 1856. "The old puritan feeling prevents it from being a cheerful, hearty holiday; though every year makes it more so."[142] In Reading, Pennsylvania, a newspaper remarked in 1861, "Even our presbyterian friends who have hitherto steadfastly ignored Christmas—threw open their church doors and assembled in force to celebrate the anniversary of the Savior's birth."[142]

text: The First Congregational Church of Rockford, Illinois, "although of genuine Puritan stock", was 'preparing for a grand Christmas jubilee', a news correspondent reported in 1864.[142] By 1860, fourteen states including several from New England had adopted Christmas as a legal holiday.[143] In 1875, Louis Prang introduced the Christmas card to Americans. He has been called the "father of the American Christmas card".[144] On June 28, 1870, Christmas was formally declared a United States federal holiday.[145]

text: 20th century

text: Up to the 1950s, in the UK, many Christmas customs were restricted to the upper classes and better-off families. The mass of the population had not adopted many of the Christmas rituals that later became general. The Christmas tree was rare. Christmas dinner might be beef—certainly not turkey. In their stockings children might get an apple, orange and sweets. Full celebration of a family Christmas with all the trimmings only became widespread with increased prosperity from the 1950s.[146] National papers were published on Christmas Day until 1912. Post was still delivered on Christmas Day until 1961. League football matches continued in Scotland until the 1970s while in England they ceased at the end of the 1950s.[147][148]

text: Under the state atheism of the Soviet Union, after its foundation in 1917, Christmas celebrations—along with other Christian holidays—were prohibited in public.[149] During the 1920s, 30s and 40s, the League of Militant Atheists encouraged school pupils to campaign against Christmas traditions, such as the Christmas tree, as well as other Christian holidays, including Easter; the League established an antireligious holiday to be the 31st of each month as a replacement.[150] At the height of this persecution, in 1929, on Christmas Day, children in Moscow were encouraged to spit on crucifixes as a protest against the holiday.[151] It was not until the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 that the persecution ended and Orthodox Christmas became a state holiday again for the first time in Russia after seven decades.[152]

text: European History Professor Joseph Perry wrote that likewise, in Nazi Germany, "because Nazi ideologues saw organized religion as an enemy of the totalitarian state, propagandists sought to deemphasize—or eliminate altogether—the Christian aspects of the holiday" and that "Propagandists tirelessly promoted numerous Nazified Christmas songs, which replaced Christian themes with the regime's racial ideologies."[153]

text: As Christmas celebrations began to be held around the world even outside traditional Christian cultures in the 20th century, some Muslim-majority countries have banned the practice of Christmas, claiming it undermines Islam.[154]

text: Customs and traditions

text: Christmas Day is celebrated as a major festival and public holiday in countries around the world, including many whose populations are mostly non-Christian. In some non-Christian areas, periods of former colonial rule introduced the celebration (e.g. Hong Kong); in others, Christian minorities or foreign cultural influences have led populations to observe the holiday. Countries such as Japan, where Christmas is popular despite there being only a small number of Christians, have adopted many of the secular aspects of Christmas, such as gift-giving, decorations, and Christmas trees.

text: Countries in which Christmas is not a formal public holiday include Afghanistan, Algeria, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Bhutan, Cambodia, China (excepting Hong Kong and Macau), the Comoros, Iran, Israel, Japan, Kuwait, Laos, Libya, the Maldives, Mauritania, Mongolia, Morocco, North Korea, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, the Sahrawi Republic, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Tajikistan, Thailand, Tunisia, Turkey, Turkmenistan, the United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan, Vietnam, and Yemen. Christmas celebrations around the world can vary markedly in form, reflecting differing cultural and national traditions.

text: Among countries with a strong Christian tradition, a variety of Christmas celebrations have developed that incorporate regional and local cultures. For Christians, participating in a religious service plays an important part in the recognition of the season. Christmas, along with Easter, is the period of highest annual church attendance. A 2010 survey by LifeWay Christian Resources found that 47% of American households attend church services during this time.[155] In the United Kingdom, the Church of England reported an estimated attendance of 2.5 million people at Christmas services in 2015.[156]

text: In Catholic countries, people hold religious processions or parades in the days preceding Christmas. In other countries, secular processions or parades featuring Santa Claus and other seasonal figures are often held. Family reunions and the exchange of gifts are a widespread feature of the season. Gift-giving takes place on Christmas Day in most countries. Others practice gift giving on Saint Nicholas Day, and January 6, Epiphany.

text: Decorations

text: The practice of putting up special decorations at Christmas has a long history. In the 15th century, it was recorded that in London it was the custom at Christmas for every house and all the parish churches to be "decked with holm, ivy, bays, and whatsoever the season of the year afforded to be green".[157] The heart-shaped leaves of ivy were said to symbolize the coming to earth of Jesus, while holly was seen as protection against pagans and witches, its thorns and red berries held to represent the Crown of Thorns worn by Jesus at the crucifixion and the blood he shed.[158][159]

text: Nativity scenes are known from 10th-century Rome. They were popularised by Saint Francis of Assisi from 1223, quickly spreading across Europe.[160] Different types of decorations developed across the Christian world, dependent on local tradition and available resources, and can vary from simple representations of the crib to far more elaborate sets – renowned manger scene traditions include the colourful Kraków szopka in Poland,[161] which imitate Kraków's historical buildings as settings, the elaborate Italian presepi (Neapolitan, Genoese and Bolognese),[162][163][164][165] or the Provençal crèches in southern France, using hand-painted terracotta figurines called santons.[166] In certain parts of the world, notably Sicily, living nativity scenes following the tradition of Saint Francis are a popular alternative to static crèches.[167][168][169] The first commercially produced decorations appeared in Germany in the 1860s, inspired by paper chains made by children.[170] In countries where a representation of the Nativity scene is very popular, people are encouraged to compete and create the most original or realistic ones. Within some families, the pieces used to make the representation are considered a valuable family heirloom.

text: The traditional colors of Christmas decorations are red, green, and gold. Red symbolizes the blood of Jesus, which was shed in his crucifixion, while green symbolizes eternal life, and in particular the evergreen tree, which does not lose its leaves in the winter, and gold is the first color associated with Christmas, as one of the three gifts of the Magi, symbolizing royalty.[159]

text: The Christmas tree is considered by some as Christianisation of pagan tradition and ritual surrounding the Winter Solstice, which included the use of evergreen boughs, and an adaptation of pagan tree worship;[171] according to eighth-century biographer Æddi Stephanus, Saint Boniface (634–709), who was a missionary in Germany, took an axe to an oak tree dedicated to Thor and pointed out a fir tree, which he stated was a more fitting object of reverence because it pointed to heaven and it had a triangular shape, which he said was symbolic of the Trinity.[172] The English language phrase "Christmas tree" is first recorded in 1835[173] and represents an importation from the German language. The modern Christmas tree tradition is believed to have begun in Germany in the 18th century[171] though many argue that Martin Luther began the tradition in the 16th century.[174][175]

text: From Germany the custom was introduced to Britain, first via Queen Charlotte, wife of George III, and then more successfully by Prince Albert during the reign of Queen Victoria. By 1841 the Christmas tree had become even more widespread throughout Britain.[135] By the 1870s, people in the United States had adopted the custom of putting up a Christmas tree.[136] Christmas trees may be decorated with lights and ornaments.

text: Since the 16th century, the poinsettia, a native plant from Mexico, has been associated with Christmas.[176] Other popular holiday plants include holly, mistletoe, red amaryllis, and Christmas cactus. Along with a Christmas tree, the interior of a home may be decorated with these plants, along with garlands and evergreen foliage. The display of Christmas villages has also become a tradition in many homes during this season. The outside of houses may be decorated with lights and sometimes with illuminated sleighs, snowmen, and other Christmas figures. Mistletoe features prominently in European myth and folklore (for example the legend of Baldr), it is an evergreen parasitic plant which grows on trees, especially apple and poplar, and turns golden when it is dried. It is customary to hang a sprig of mistletoe in the house at Christmas, and anyone standing underneath it may be kissed. Mistletoe has sticky white berries, one of which was traditionally removed whenever someone was kissed under it. This is probably a fertility ritual. The mistletoe berry juice resembles semen.[177]

text: Other traditional decorations include bells, candles, candy canes, stockings, wreaths, and angels. Both the displaying of wreaths and candles in each window are a more traditional Christmas display. The concentric assortment of leaves, usually from an evergreen, make up Christmas wreaths and are designed to prepare Christians for the Advent season. Candles in each window are meant to demonstrate the fact that Christians believe that Jesus Christ is the ultimate light of the world.[178]

text: Christmas lights and banners may be hung along streets, music played from speakers, and Christmas trees placed in prominent places.[179] It is common in many parts of the world for town squares and consumer shopping areas to sponsor and display decorations. Rolls of brightly colored paper with secular or religious Christmas motifs are manufactured for the purpose of wrapping gifts. In some countries, Christmas decorations are traditionally taken down on Twelfth Night, the evening of January 5.

text: Music and carols

text: The earliest extant specifically Christmas hymns appear in fourth-century Rome. Latin hymns such as "Veni redemptor gentium", written by Ambrose, Archbishop of Milan, were austere statements of the theological doctrine of the Incarnation in opposition to Arianism. "Corde natus ex Parentis" ("Of the Father's love begotten") by the Spanish poet Prudentius (d. 413) is still sung in some churches today.[180] In the 9th and 10th centuries, the Christmas "Sequence" or "Prose" was introduced in North European monasteries, developing under Bernard of Clairvaux into a sequence of rhymed stanzas. In the 12th century the Parisian monk Adam of St. Victor began to derive music from popular songs, introducing something closer to the traditional Christmas carol.

text: By the 13th century, in France, Germany, and particularly, Italy, under the influence of Francis of Assisi, a strong tradition of popular Christmas songs in the native language developed.[181] Christmas carols in English first appear in a 1426 work of John Awdlay, a Shropshire chaplain, who lists twenty-five "caroles of Cristemas", probably sung by groups of wassailers, who went from house to house.[182]

text: The songs we know specifically as carols were originally communal folk songs sung during celebrations such as "harvest tide" as well as Christmas. It was only later that carols began to be sung in church. Traditionally, carols have often been based on medieval chord patterns, and it is this that gives them their uniquely characteristic musical sound. Some carols like "Personent hodie", "Good King Wenceslas", and "The Holly and the Ivy" can be traced directly back to the Middle Ages. They are among the oldest musical compositions still regularly sung. "Adeste Fideles" (O Come all ye faithful) appears in its current form in the mid-18th century, although the words may have originated in the 13th century.

text: Singing of carols initially suffered a decline in popularity after the Protestant Reformation in northern Europe, although some Reformers, like Martin Luther, wrote carols and encouraged their use in worship. Carols largely survived in rural communities until the revival of interest in popular songs in the 19th century. The 18th-century English reformer Charles Wesley understood the importance of music to worship. In addition to setting many psalms to melodies, which were influential in the Great Awakening in the United States, he wrote texts for at least three Christmas carols. The best known was originally entitled "Hark! How All the Welkin Rings", later renamed "Hark! the Herald Angels Sing".[183]

text:
Hark! The Herald Angels Sing

Performed by the U.S. Army Band Chorus

Problems playing this file? See media help.

text: Felix Mendelssohn wrote a melody adapted to fit Wesley's words. In Austria in 1818 Mohr and Gruber made a major addition to the genre when they composed "Silent Night" for the St. Nicholas Church, Oberndorf. William Sandys' Christmas Carols Ancient and Modern (1833) contained the first appearance in print of many now-classic English carols, and contributed to the mid-Victorian revival of the festival.[184]

text: Completely secular Christmas seasonal songs emerged in the late 18th century. "Deck the Halls" dates from 1784, and the American "Jingle Bells" was copyrighted in 1857. In the 19th and 20th century, African American spirituals and songs about Christmas, based in their tradition of spirituals, became more widely known. An increasing number of seasonal holidays songs were commercially produced in the 20th century, including jazz and blues variations. In addition, there was a revival of interest in early music, from groups singing folk music, such as The Revels, to performers of early medieval and classical music. John Rutter has composed many carols including "All Bells in Paradise", "Angels' Carol", "Candlelight Carol", "Donkey Carol", "Jesus Child", "Shepherds' Pipe Carol" and "Star Carol".

text: Traditional cuisine

text: A special Christmas family meal is traditionally an important part of the holiday's celebration, and the food that is served varies greatly from country to country. Some regions, such as Sicily, have special meals for Christmas Eve, when 12 kinds of fish are served. In the United Kingdom and countries influenced by its traditions, a standard Christmas meal includes turkey, goose or other large bird, gravy, potatoes, vegetables, sometimes bread and cider. Special desserts are also prepared, such as Christmas pudding, mince pies, fruit cake and Yule log cake.[185][186]

text: In Poland and other parts of eastern Europe and Scandinavia, fish often is used for the traditional main course, but richer meat such as lamb is increasingly served. In Sweden it is common with a special variety of smörgåsbord, where ham, meatballs and herring play a prominent role. In Germany, France, and Austria, goose and pork are favored. Beef, ham, and chicken in various recipes are popular throughout the world. The Maltese traditionally serve Imbuljuta tal-Qastan,[187] a chocolate and chestnuts beverage, after Midnight Mass and throughout the Christmas season. Slovaks prepare the traditional Christmas bread potica, bûche de Noël in France, panettone in Italy, and elaborate tarts and cakes. The eating of sweets and chocolates has become popular worldwide, and sweeter Christmas delicacies include the German stollen, marzipan cake or candy, and Jamaican rum fruit cake. As one of the few fruits traditionally available to northern countries in winter, oranges have been long associated with special Christmas foods. Eggnog is a sweetened dairy-based beverage traditionally made with milk, cream, sugar, and whipped eggs (which gives it a frothy texture). Spirits such as brandy, rum or bourbon are often added. The finished serving is often garnished with a sprinkling of ground cinnamon or nutmeg.

text: Cards

text: Christmas cards are illustrated messages of greeting exchanged between friends and family members during the weeks preceding Christmas Day. The traditional greeting reads "wishing you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year", much like that of the first commercial Christmas card, produced by Sir Henry Cole in London in 1843.[188] The custom of sending them has become popular among a wide cross-section of people with the emergence of the modern trend towards exchanging E-cards.

text: Christmas cards are purchased in considerable quantities, and feature artwork, commercially designed and relevant to the season. The content of the design might relate directly to the Christmas narrative, with depictions of the Nativity of Jesus, or Christian symbols such as the Star of Bethlehem, or a white dove, which can represent both the Holy Spirit and Peace on Earth. Other Christmas cards are more secular and can depict Christmas traditions, mythical figures such as Santa Claus, objects directly associated with Christmas such as candles, holly and baubles, or a variety of images associated with the season, such as Christmastide activities, snow scenes and the wildlife of the northern winter. There are even humorous cards and genres depicting nostalgic scenes of the past such as crinolined shoppers in idealized 19th-century streetscapes.

text: Some prefer cards with a poem, prayer, or Biblical verse; while others distance themselves from religion with an all-inclusive "Season's greetings".

text: Commemorative stamps

text: A number of nations have issued commemorative stamps at Christmastide. Postal customers will often use these stamps to mail Christmas cards, and they are popular with philatelists. These stamps are regular postage stamps, unlike Christmas seals, and are valid for postage year-round. They usually go on sale some time between early October and early December, and are printed in considerable quantities.

text: Gift giving

text: The exchanging of gifts is one of the core aspects of the modern Christmas celebration, making it the most profitable time of year for retailers and businesses throughout the world. On Christmas, people exchange gifts based on the Christian tradition associated with Saint Nicholas,[189] and the gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh which were given to the baby Jesus by the Magi.[190][191] The practice of gift giving in the Roman celebration of Saturnalia may have influenced Christian Christian customs, but on the other hand the Christian "core dogma of the Incarnation, however, solidly established the giving and receiving of gifts as the structural principle of that recurrent yet unique event", because it was the Biblical Magi, "together with all their fellow men, who received the gift of God through man's renewed participation in the divine life."[192]

text: Gift-bearing figures

text: A number of figures are associated with Christmas and the seasonal giving of gifts. Among these are Father Christmas, also known as Santa Claus (derived from the Dutch for Saint Nicholas), Père Noël, and the Weihnachtsmann; Saint Nicholas or Sinterklaas; the Christkind; Kris Kringle; Joulupukki; tomte/nisse; Babbo Natale; Saint Basil; and Ded Moroz. The Scandinavian tomte (also called nisse) is sometimes depicted as a gnome instead of Santa Claus.

text: The best known of these figures today is red-dressed Santa Claus, of diverse origins. The name Santa Claus can be traced back to the Dutch Sinterklaas, which means simply Saint Nicholas. Nicholas was a 4th-century Greek bishop of Myra, a city in the Roman province of Lycia, whose ruins are 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) from modern Demre in southwest Turkey.[194][195] Among other saintly attributes, he was noted for the care of children, generosity, and the giving of gifts. His feast day, December 6, came to be celebrated in many countries with the giving of gifts.[105]

text: Saint Nicholas traditionally appeared in bishop's attire, accompanied by helpers, inquiring about the behaviour of children during the past year before deciding whether they deserved a gift or not. By the 13th century, Saint Nicholas was well known in the Netherlands, and the practice of gift-giving in his name spread to other parts of central and southern Europe. At the Reformation in 16th–17th-century Europe, many Protestants changed the gift bringer to the Christ Child or Christkindl, corrupted in English to Kris Kringle, and the date of giving gifts changed from December 6 to Christmas Eve.[105]

text: The modern popular image of Santa Claus, however, was created in the United States, and in particular in New York. The transformation was accomplished with the aid of notable contributors including Washington Irving and the German-American cartoonist Thomas Nast (1840–1902). Following the American Revolutionary War, some of the inhabitants of New York City sought out symbols of the city's non-English past. New York had originally been established as the Dutch colonial town of New Amsterdam and the Dutch Sinterklaas tradition was reinvented as Saint Nicholas.[196]

text: In 1809, the New-York Historical Society convened and retroactively named Sancte Claus the patron saint of Nieuw Amsterdam, the Dutch name for New York City.[197] At his first American appearance in 1810, Santa Claus was drawn in bishops' robes. However, as new artists took over, Santa Claus developed more secular attire.[198] Nast drew a new image of "Santa Claus" annually, beginning in 1863. By the 1880s, Nast's Santa had evolved into the modern vision of the figure, perhaps based on the English figure of Father Christmas. The image was standardized by advertisers in the 1920s[199] and continues through the present day.[200][201]

text: Father Christmas, a jolly, stout, bearded man who typified the spirit of good cheer at Christmas, predates the Santa Claus character. He is first recorded in early 17th century England, but was associated with holiday merrymaking and drunkenness rather than the bringing of gifts.[173] In Victorian Britain, his image was remade to match that of Santa. The French Père Noël evolved along similar lines, eventually adopting the Santa image. In Italy, Babbo Natale acts as Santa Claus, while La Befana is the bringer of gifts and arrives on the eve of the Epiphany. It is said that La Befana set out to bring the baby Jesus gifts, but got lost along the way. Now, she brings gifts to all children. In some cultures Santa Claus is accompanied by Knecht Ruprecht, or Black Peter. In other versions, elves make the toys. His wife is referred to as Mrs. Claus.

text: There has been some opposition to the narrative of the American evolution of Saint Nicholas into the modern Santa. It has been claimed that the Saint Nicholas Society was not founded until 1835, almost half a century after the end of the American War of Independence.[202] Moreover, a study of the "children's books, periodicals and journals" of New Amsterdam by Charles Jones revealed no references to Saint Nicholas or Sinterklaas.[203] However, not all scholars agree with Jones's findings, which he reiterated in a book-length study in 1978;[204] Howard G. Hageman, of New Brunswick Theological Seminary, maintains that the tradition of celebrating Sinterklaas in New York was alive and well from the early settlement of the Hudson Valley on.[205]

text: Current tradition in several Latin American countries (such as Venezuela and Colombia) holds that while Santa makes the toys, he then gives them to the Baby Jesus, who is the one who actually delivers them to the children's homes, a reconciliation between traditional religious beliefs and the iconography of Santa Claus imported from the United States.

text: In South Tyrol (Italy), Austria, Czech Republic, Southern Germany, Hungary, Liechtenstein, Slovakia, and Switzerland, the Christkind (Ježíšek in Czech, Jézuska in Hungarian and Ježiško in Slovak) brings the presents. Greek children get their presents from Saint Basil on New Year's Eve, the eve of that saint's liturgical feast.[206] The German St. Nikolaus is not identical with the Weihnachtsmann (who is the German version of Santa Claus / Father Christmas). St. Nikolaus wears a bishop's dress and still brings small gifts (usually candies, nuts, and fruits) on December 6 and is accompanied by Knecht Ruprecht. Although many parents around the world routinely teach their children about Santa Claus and other gift bringers, some have come to reject this practice, considering it deceptive.[207]

text: Multiple gift-giver figures exist in Poland, varying between regions and individual families. St Nicholas (Święty Mikołaj) dominates Central and North-East areas, the Starman (Gwiazdor) is most common in Greater Poland, Baby Jesus (Dzieciątko) is unique to Upper Silesia, with the Little Star (Gwiazdka) and the Little Angel (Aniołek) being common in the South and the South-East. Grandfather Frost (Dziadek Mróz) is less commonly accepted in some areas of Eastern Poland.[208][209] It is worth noting that across all of Poland, St Nicholas is the gift giver on the Saint Nicholas Day on December 6.

text: Date according to Julian calendar

text: Some jurisdictions of the Eastern Orthodox Church, including those of Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, and Jerusalem, mark feasts using the older Julian calendar. As of 2018, there is a difference of 13 days between the Julian calendar and the modern Gregorian calendar, which is used internationally for most secular purposes. As a result, December 25 on the Julian calendar currently corresponds to January 7 on the calendar used by most governments and people in everyday life. Therefore, the aforementioned Orthodox Christians mark December 25 (and thus Christmas) on the day that is internationally considered to be January 7.[4]

text: However, other Orthodox Christians, such as those belonging to the jurisdictions of Bulgaria, Greece, Romania, Constantinople, Antioch, Alexandria, Albania, Cyprus, Finland, and the Orthodox Church in America, among others, began using the Revised Julian calendar in the early 20th century, which at present corresponds exactly to the Gregorian calendar.[11] Therefore, these Orthodox Christians mark December 25 (and thus Christmas) on the same day that is internationally considered to be December 25, and which is also the date of Christmas among Western Christians.

text: A further complication is added by the fact that the Armenian Apostolic Church continues the original ancient Eastern Christian practice of celebrating the birth of Christ not as a separate holiday, but on the same day as the celebration of his baptism (Theophany), which is on January 6. This is a public holiday in Armenia, and it is held on the same day that is internationally considered to be January 6, because the Armenian Church in Armenia uses the Gregorian calendar.

text: However, there is also a small Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem, which maintains the traditional Armenian custom of celebrating the birth of Christ on the same day as Theophany (January 6), but uses the Julian calendar for the determination of that date. As a result, this church celebrates "Christmas" (more properly called Theophany) on the day that is considered January 19 on the Gregorian calendar in use by the majority of the world.

text: In summary, there are four different dates used by different Christian groups to mark the birth of Christ, given in the table below.

text: Listing

text:
Church or section
Date
Calendar
Gregorian date
Note

Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem
January 6
Julian calendar
January 19
Correspondence between Julian January 6 and Gregorian January 19 holds until 2100; in the following century the difference will be one day more.

Armenian Apostolic Church, Armenian Catholic Church
January 6
Gregorian calendar
January 6

Eastern Orthodox Church jurisdictions, including those of Bulgaria, Greece, Romania, Constantinople, Antioch, Alexandria, Albania, Cyprus, and the Orthodox Church in America
December 25
Revised Julian calendar
December 25
Revised Julian calendar usage started in the early 20th century

Other Eastern Orthodox: Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, Macedonia, Belarus, Moldova, Montenegro, Serbia and Jerusalem.
Also, some Byzantine Rite Catholics.

December 25
Julian calendar
January 7
Correspondence between Julian December 25 and Gregorian January 7 of the following year holds until 2100; from 2101 to 2199 the difference will be one day more.

Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria
Koiak 29 (corresponding to Julian December 25 or 26)
Coptic calendar
January 7 or 8
Since the Coptic calendar's leap day is inserted in what the Julian calendar considers September, the following Koiak 29 falls one day later than usual in the Julian and Gregorian calendars

Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church
Tahsas 29 or 28 (corresponding to Julian December 25)
Ethiopian Calendar
January 7
After the Ethiopian insertion of a leap day in what for the Julian calendar is September, Christmas is celebrated on Tahsas 28 in order to maintain the exact interval of 9 30-day months and 5 days of the child's gestation.[210] The Eritrean Orthodox Tewahedo Church uses the same calendar but, like the Coptic Church, does not make this adjustment.

Western Christian churches, Finnish Orthodox Church, secular world
December 25
Gregorian calendar
December 25

text: Economy

text: Christmas is typically a peak selling season for retailers in many nations around the world. Sales increase dramatically as people purchase gifts, decorations, and supplies to celebrate. In the U.S., the "Christmas shopping season" starts as early as October.[211][212] In Canada, merchants begin advertising campaigns just before Halloween (October 31), and step up their marketing following Remembrance Day on November 11. In the UK and Ireland, the Christmas shopping season starts from mid-November, around the time when high street Christmas lights are turned on.[213][214] In the United States, it has been calculated that a quarter of all personal spending takes place during the Christmas/holiday shopping season.[215] Figures from the U.S. Census Bureau reveal that expenditure in department stores nationwide rose from $20.8 billion in November 2004 to $31.9 billion in December 2004, an increase of 54 percent. In other sectors, the pre-Christmas increase in spending was even greater, there being a November–December buying surge of 100 percent in bookstores and 170 percent in jewelry stores. In the same year employment in American retail stores rose from 1.6 million to 1.8 million in the two months leading up to Christmas.[216] Industries completely dependent on Christmas include Christmas cards, of which 1.9 billion are sent in the United States each year, and live Christmas Trees, of which 20.8 million were cut in the U.S. in 2002.[217] In the UK in 2010, up to £8 billion was expected to be spent online at Christmas, approximately a quarter of total retail festive sales.[214]

text: In most Western nations, Christmas Day is the least active day of the year for business and commerce; almost all retail, commercial and institutional businesses are closed, and almost all industries cease activity (more than any other day of the year), whether laws require such or not. In England and Wales, the Christmas Day (Trading) Act 2004 prevents all large shops from trading on Christmas Day. Scotland is currently planning similar legislation. Film studios release many high-budget movies during the holiday season, including Christmas films, fantasy movies or high-tone dramas with high production values to hopes of maximizing the chance of nominations for the Academy Awards.

text: One economist's analysis calculates that, despite increased overall spending, Christmas is a deadweight loss under orthodox microeconomic theory, because of the effect of gift-giving. This loss is calculated as the difference between what the gift giver spent on the item and what the gift receiver would have paid for the item. It is estimated that in 2001, Christmas resulted in a $4 billion deadweight loss in the U.S. alone.[218][219] Because of complicating factors, this analysis is sometimes used to discuss possible flaws in current microeconomic theory. Other deadweight losses include the effects of Christmas on the environment and the fact that material gifts are often perceived as white elephants, imposing cost for upkeep and storage and contributing to clutter.[220]

text: Controversies

text: Christmas has at times been the subject of controversy and attacks from various sources. Historically it was prohibited by Puritans when they briefly held power in England during the English Interregnum (1649–1660), and in Colonial America where the Puritans outlawed the celebration of Christmas in 1659.[221][222] The Parliament of Scotland, which was dominated by Presbyterians, passed a series of acts outlawing the observance of Christmas between 1637 and 1690; Christmas Day did not become a public holiday in Scotland until 1958.[223] Christmas celebrations have also been prohibited by atheist states such as the Soviet Union[224] and more recently majority Muslim states such as Somalia, Tajikistan and Brunei.[225]

text: Modern scholars such as E. P. Sanders, Geza Vermes and Marcus Borg consider both Gospel narratives of the birth of Jesus to be non-historical, arguing that there are contradictions between them.[226][227][228] Many biblical scholars view the discussion of historicity as secondary, given that gospels were primarily written as theological documents rather than historical accounts.[229][230][231][232]

text: Secularization controversies

text: Some Christians and organizations such as Pat Robertson's American Center for Law and Justice cite alleged attacks on Christmas (dubbing them a "war on Christmas").[233][234][235] Such groups claim that any specific mention of the term "Christmas" or its religious aspects is being increasingly censored, avoided, or discouraged by a number of advertisers, retailers, government (prominently schools), and other public and private organizations. One controversy is the occurrence of Christmas trees being renamed Holiday trees.[234] In the U.S. there has been a tendency to replace the greeting Merry Christmas with Happy Holidays, which is considered inclusive at the time of the Jewish celebration of Hanukkah.[236] In the U.S. and Canada, where the use of the term "Holidays" is most prevalent, opponents have denounced its usage and avoidance of using the term "Christmas" as being politically correct.[237][238][239] Groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union have initiated court cases to bar the display of images and other material referring to Christmas from public property, including schools.[240] Such groups argue that government-funded displays of Christmas imagery and traditions violate the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, which prohibits the establishment by Congress of a national religion.[241] In 1984, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Lynch v. Donnelly that a Christmas display (which included a Nativity scene) owned and displayed by the city of Pawtucket, Rhode Island, did not violate the First Amendment.[242] In November 2009, the federal appeals court in Philadelphia upheld a school district's ban on the singing of Christmas carols.[243] The Supreme Court of the United States declined to hear an appeal.[244]

text: American Muslim scholar Abdul Malik Mujahid has said that Muslims must treat Christmas with respect, even if they disagree with it.[245]


document_title: M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story

question_text: ms dhoni the untold story meaning in hindi

root

text: M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story

text: Plot

text: In the pre-credits sequence there is a scene of the 2011 Cricket World Cup Final. MS Dhoni, India's captain, walks out to bat after Kohli's wicket.

tag: p

text: The film begins in Ranchi, 7 July 1981. At the hospital maternity unit, Pan Singh is confused whether he has got a girl or boy. He later names his baby boy Dhoni. Fourteen years later, Dhoni is spotted by a cricket coach while goalkeeping in a football game. He invites him to try out for the school cricket team as a wicketkeeper and selects him after being impressed. Dhoni's father is a pump operator who waters the practice ground. Dhoni improves his batting and becomes a regular member of the team.

text: Three years later, Dhoni helps win an inter-school cricket match. After achieving much fame, Dhoni is selected for the Ranji Trophy but his draft notice is late due to which he is late in reaching Kolkata despite his friend's help. But Dhoni does not give up and to please his father, he joins the Kharagpur Station as a ticket collector. Years later, Dhoni's sister Jayanti is married.

text: After sometime, Dhoni is depressed with his job. After the insistence of his manager, Dhoni decides to play cricket alongside his job. He attends his day-shift then goes to practice cricket. He participates in different tournaments and as a result he gets selected for the Railways team. After a good performance, he tries-out for the U-19 team selections. Bihar loses to Punjab where Yuvraj Singh scores 301 and Dhoni does not succeed though he is selected for the Duleep Trophy.

text: Dhoni leaves his job and admits to his father that cricket is his only ambition and he wants to become a professional cricketer. He works hard and is selected in the national team and makes his debut. He meets and befriends Priyanka Jha, an office consultant. He scores a century after meeting her. She buys a watch for him as a Valentines' Day present but dies in a truck accident on her way. Dhoni again goes into depression and has bad form in the 2007 World Cup. He later wins the 2007 T-20 World Cup as a captain. He succeeds as a captain and India reaches the ranking of no.1 in test matches.

text: In 2010, Dhoni arrives at a hotel. Sakshi Rawat, a hotel official fails to recognize him and later apologizes to him. They soon start dating and Dhoni eventually proposes marriage to her after she mentions buying him a Valentines' Day's gift which he refuses. They marry and Dhoni begins training for the 2011 World Cup. He eventually develops the team with new players.

text: The film returns back to the 2011 World Cup final where Dhoni eases the pressure with a crucial innings. With 4 runs required, Dhoni hits a six and India wins the final. His family, friends and coaches watching the match cry happy tears.

text: After the credits, the real Dhoni walks by the boundaries.

text: Cast

text:
Sushant Singh Rajput as Mahendra Singh Dhoni
Kiara Advani as Sakshi Dhoni née Rawat, Dhoni's wife
Disha Patani as Priyanka Jha, Dhoni's girlfriend
Anupam Kher as Pan Singh, Dhoni's father
Bhumika Chawla as Jayanti Gupta, Dhoni's sister
Rajesh Sharma as Dhoni's coach Baneerji[5]
Mithu Chakrabarty as Coach Banerjee's wife
Kumud Mishra as Mr. Deval Sahay
Kali Prasad Mukherjee as Animesh Kumar Ganguly
Kranti Prakash Jha as Santosh Lal[6]
Deepak Dutta as Dilip Vengsarkar
Ravindra Mankani as Jagmohan Dalmiya
Kiran More as himself (Chief national selector)
Herry Tangri as Yuvraj Singh (During 1999/00 Cooch Behar Trophy final)[7]
Rajendra Chawla as Dhoni's first sponsor
Sanjay Dadhich as SatyaPrakash Krishna (Dhoni's friend at railways)
Sandeep Nahar as Param Bhaiya (Dhoni's Sikh friend)
Sarvadaman D. Banerjee as Chanchal

tag: ul

text: Production

text: Development

text:
Since 2003, Dhoni’s life has been chronicled in the media. Nobody knows what happened to him before that; before he made it to the Indian cricket team. So, it was relatively easy to revisit that life. That’s where the story for the film came from.

— Director Neeraj Pandey[8]

tag: div

text: Development of a Dhoni biopic began after the 2011 Cricket World Cup Final and the discussion about the idea went on over the following years but remained dormant. Then, after a few years, Dhoni was at an airport when a child approached him and asked him a question on motivation. Dhoni sat down with the young boy and spent 5 minutes answering the question. His manager, Arun Pandey, asked why he spent that much time and Dhoni replied how his answer was pivotal in benefiting and motivating the boy. This incident then prompted Pandey to make a film about him saying [to Dhoni] that his story has the power to motivate millions of children like him.[9] After the idea coalesced, Pandey began to convince Dhoni himself in order to adapt his life into a full-length feature film.[9] When he was first approached on the idea of the adaptation, he became a little worried and questioned the need for it. But after being convinced by his peers, all he said was, "Don't misrepresent me. Show me as I am."[9][10] It took Dhoni two years to finally agree.[9] According to International Business Times, the film carries a production budget of around ₹1.04 billion (US$15.6 million).[11]

text: Writing

text: Pandey was attracted to Dhoni's story not because of his successful cricket career, saying that "it's foolish to chase MS Dhoni's life story only because it's about cricket," but rather to instances and factors that made him the person he is today.[12] Dhoni wasn't involved in writing the script. Pandey recruited a team of researchers who collated data and background information while the director was busy directing Baby (2015).[12] The filmmakers decided that they would only green-light the film once they had a convincing story to tell after the research.[13] Pandey met with Dhoni numerous times over a span of eight months and by the eighth month of their meetings, in 2014, the main arc of the story began to form. Their first meeting took place in Delhi during a cricket match. During their sporadic meetings, Pandey chose not to record and tape their conversations which prompted Dhoni to open up more.[12][13]

text: Arun Pandey says 98% of the content in the film is reality. The team undertook two years of research on the various incidents and how they took place. Pandey says "such authenticity would be hard to find even in Hollywood."[9] Pandey revealed several prominent aspects of Dhoni's life that were hidden before including the fact that Dhoni initially disdained cricket and had a predilection for football instead, his signature "helicopter shot" was taught to him by his friend Santosh Lal, he likes women who don't recognise him, he and Yuvraj Singh had close ties even before their respective stardom and it was Dhoni who ousted Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid from the team since he wanted to build a young team for the 2011 World Cup with better fielders and he wasn't too happy with the 'fitness' levels of the aforementioned cricketers.[14]

text: Pandey decided to end the film with the 2011 Cricket World Cup Final since he felt "the arc of the story had a natural high at the 2011 World Cup win." He knew that they were chronicling almost 30 years of a sportsman's life "in a highly compressed manner" and said that had he extended the script to his sudden retirement during an ongoing series, the run time of the film would shoot up to six hours.[12]

text: Pre-production

text: Neeraj Pandey was in the midst of shooting Baby (2015) when Arun Pandey, the manager of Dhoni, offered him an opportunity of making a biopic based on Mahendra Singh Dhoni. However, Pandey was sceptical and didn't wish to tackle such a subject until he met Dhoni himself. It was only after meeting Dhoni personally – during the second schedule of Baby – that he was convinced to helm the film. Although, to him, he treated the project not as a biopic, but more as an inspiring story.[12][15] Pandey admits that he is not a fan of Dhoni and doesn't feel guilty about it. But he does have a predilection for cricket and other renowned cricketers like AB de Villiers and Sachin Tendulkar. He explained how not being a fan helped him direct the movie impartially, "I think if you are fan, as a director it would be difficult to be objective and impartial. A fan would only see positives. Even negatives will look like positives for him. So not being a fan helped me direct the movie impartially."[15] It is the director's first biopic film.[12]

text: Every question that came from the director or any member of the team working on the script was directly answered by Dhoni. He would clear any doubts of the director and Rajput.[9] However, he did not want the film to serve as a whitewash of his life, "One thing I told (Neeraj) Pandey is that this movie should not be to glorify me. It's about the journey of a professional sportsperson and that's what it should depict."[10]

text: Casting

text: Director Pandey, who has not seen any of Sushant Singh Rajput's films, followed his intuition when it came to casting him. Rajput was always his first choice given how both Dhoni and Rajput hail from the same part of India, which made it easy for him to get the dialect right and the fact he has a predilection for sports like Dhoni.[15] When he met Rajput and chatted with him for 15 minutes, he knew that the accent, the setting and the milieu they needed to capture would not be a problem.[8][12] Rajput admits that he is a fan of Dhoni, and describes himself as an "ardent" cricket fan.[16] Rajput's sister is a professional cricketer who once made it to the women's national team, while he himself wasn't very good at the sport no matter how hard he tried, even failing to get selected for the school team.[8][17]

text: He found it difficult to get Dhoni's mannerisms right. He said that he did not pretend to be Dhoni, but actually felt like the cricketer while essaying the title role. In order to prepare for his role, he had to go through an exhaustive prolonged training for a period of 18 months before shooting began and watched his videos for hours, to a point that he subconsciously started picking up some of his traits.[8][9][18] For instance, in order to grasp Dhoni's trademark "Helicopter shot," the team would carefully analyse it and fix the bowling machine into one spot and then play the same shot at least 200 to 300 times a day for a week to a point that it came naturally to him.[16] He also met Dhoni thrice before filming commenced.[19] Former wicketkeeper Kiran More personally coached Rajput for thirteen months, including wicket-keeping and batting before he started learning Dhoni's body language.[19][20] He practiced for four hours, starting at 6:00 every morning.[9] Rajput described More as a "tough taskmaster," who treated him like a professional cricketer rather than an actor.[21] Dhoni's batting style was scientifically analysed, learnt and practised and an analyst was called on board for this. Training sessions were recorded and compared with the cricketer's real game. It took a further six months for Rajput to feel confident that he looked and played like Dhoni.[17][19]

text: Principal photography

text: The film was shot mainly in authentic and real-life locations where Dhoni spent much of his childhood and teenage years,[9][11][22] with Pandey saying that 95% of the locations in the film were authentic.[23] In an effort to stay true to the crux of the biopic, Neeraj also shot scenes from the film in Dhoni's real home in Ranchi, Jharkhand where his parents and brother Narendra currently live. Shooting also took place at Kharagpur railway station where Dhoni once worked as a Travelling Ticket Examiner (TTE), his old school, Jawahar Vidya Mandir and at the quarter number 142 of Mecon Limited he shared with his four roommates while studying engineering. The filmmakers were also shown his former social hangout as well as introduced to the food he liked eating whilst growing up.[5][22] Dhoni's real school teacher was cast in the film.[24]

text: Filming also took place in Aurangabad.[25]

text: Rajput learned Dhoni's signature 'helicopter' shot by the end of the first day, but suffered a hairline fracture and had to leave for two weeks.[18]

text: Release

text: M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story received the widest release for a Bollywood film receiving a day-and-date release both in India and internationally in a total of 61 countries across approximately 4,500 screens worldwide on the week ending October 2, 2016.[10][26]

text: However, the film was not released in Pakistan due to problems following the 2016 Uri attack.[27][28] Sabina Islam, media and marketing manager of the distributor IMGC Global Entertainment in Pakistan told The Express Tribune, "We wouldn't want to release anything that can aggravate the current situation of the two countries. Dhoni is India's hero so it's risky."[27][29] The film was also not released in Punjabi and Marathi languages. This was because Fox had wanted to release the film on the same day-and-date but a dubbed version in the two aforementioned languages could not be produced at that time.[26]

text: Even though attempts were made later to dub and release the film in the Marathi language in the state of Maharashtra,[30] this was however not possible. This was because Amey Khopkar, chief of Chitrapat Karmachari Sena, the film affairs wing of regional political party Maharashtra Navnirman Sena told the filmmakers that releasing the film in the language would cause unfair competition for regional movies by giving rise to a scenario where more filmmakers will release Hindi films dubbed in Marathi, prompting Pandey to scrap the plan.[31][32]

text: The film was declared tax-free in Uttar Pradesh by Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav a day after its release,[33][34] and in Dhoni's home state, Jharkhand, a few days later.[35] Maharashtra was also declared tax-free on October 5 by chief minister Devendra Fadnavis.[36]

text: Marketing

text: The filmmakers organised large promotions, which later helped the movie register good advance booking.[37] A teaser trailer was released on March 15, 2016, in conjunction with the commencement of the 2016 ICC World Twenty20.[38] The first official poster was released on July 7, 2016, on Dhoni's 35th birthday.[39] A second poster was unveiled on August 6.[40] On September 12, Fox Star Studios released a promotional video entitled "Captain Curious", which shows Dhoni and Sushant Rajput engaging in a conversation. The short clip was written by What Works, shot by Shiraz Bhattacharya and released by Fox.[41] In late September 2016, the cast flew to Chennai to promote the film where Dhoni and Rajput met veteran actor Rajinikanth at his residence and discussed the film.[42]

text: Maruti Suzuki released two MS Dhoni inspired special edition of Alto cars – the Alto 800 and Alto K10 – as part of the company’s association with the film. The two cars were unveiled by Dhoni and R S Kalsi, Maruti Suzuki India Executive Director of Marketing and Sales in Hyderabad on September 24.[43] As a part of the association, Maruti Suzuki ran a series of customer engagement activities on social media.

text: The film recouped around ₹900 million (US$13.5 million) before its release via multiple platforms and ancillary; ₹550 million (US$8.2 million) from satellite rights; ₹200 million (US$3 million) from endorsement brands; ₹100 million (US$1.5 million) for overseas distribution rights; and ₹50 million (US$750,920) for music rights.[44]

text: Internationally, the film was released in 60 countries across 1,000 screens in conjunction with its Indian premiere. According to Vijay Singh, that marks the biggest-ever release for a Hindi film in Tamil and Telugu and one of the widest for any Indian film internationally.[10] It was released in key markets including the United States and Canada and the U.K. and in the other regular Bollywood diaspora markets in South East Asia, Africa and Europe. Through a chain of distributors the film also went out in non-regular Bollywood territories such as Japan, Spain, France, Hungary, Poland, the Philippines and the West Indies.[10]

text: Box office

text: India

text: The film was released on Friday, September 30, across approximately 3,500 screens and delivered an opening of ₹213 million (US$3.3 million) on its first day,[45] occupying 45–50% of the total marketplace which is the biggest opener of Sushant's career.[27] Buoyed by positive reviews, the film earned a total of ₹660 million (US$10 million) net[45] the second biggest opening for a Hindi release in 2016 behind Sultan.[28][46][47] The Tamil version of the film collected ₹70 million (US$1.1 million) in its opening weekend in Tamil Nadu, which is the highest for a film dubbed from Hindi in the state.[48]

text: Following its weekend debut, the film witnessed a sharp fall on Monday earning ₹85.1 million (US$1.3 million) and ₹₹75.2 million (US$1.2 million) on Tuesday.[49] By October 11, the film had grossed a total of ₹1.16 billion (US$18 million) in India[50] and is currently the fifth highest-grossing Hindi film of 2016 in India.[51]

text: International

text: Internationally, the film made an estimated ₹219.2 million (US$3.4 million) in its opening weekend from 60 countries.[52] It had successful debuts in many markets, including $1.1 million in the U.S., $995,000 in the Middle East, $263,000 in the U.K. where it ranked at No. 9, and $194,000 in Australia for tenth spot.[46] The film received a limited release in the U.S. and Canada across 256 theaters and earned $1,108,650 at an average of $4,331 per theater, debuting at number 14 at the box office,[53][54] becoming the third Bollywood film of 2016 to debut above $1 million, following Sultan and Fan.[28]

text: Reception

text: Critical reception

text: The film received mainly positive reviews from critics.[5][27][46][55][56]

text: The film was noted for omitting certain aspects of Dhoni's life and in the realm of cricket that were deemed noteworthy such as the 2009 ICC World Twenty20 press conference, where Dhoni brought the entire team and read out a statement of unity, the 2013 Indian Premier League spot-fixing and betting case and the alleged rift with Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir. The film also does not include Dhoni's take on the two-year ban imposed on Chennai Super Kings from playing in the Twenty20 which he captained at that time, which ultimately led to the Supreme Court asking N. Srinivasan to step aside as BCCI  President The film also does not provide any explanation to Dhoni's purchase (and eventual sale) of the 15% stake in the player management firm Rhiti Sports, or why he was named the vice-president of India Cements.[5][57] While the film featured his sister Jayanti, there was no mention about his real life elder brother, Narendra Singh Dhoni, who is a politician.[58] Chanchal Bhattacharya, a specialised cricket coach who used to train young cricketers in Dhoni's school campus pinpointed at a pivotal incident during Dhoni's days which was absent in the movie: Dhoni once scored a century for East Zone in a Deodhar Trophy against Central Zone. Karsan Ghavri, who was the coach of East Zone at that time, praised Dhoni's century saying that "this lad will represent the country one day."[59]

text: The Hindu said, "of course such sanitisation makes the film lose out on interesting layers and complexity, but, curiously, the focused, unwavering eulogising of Dhoni also helps it get an unmistakeable emotional acuity."[5] In a more positive take, Andy Bull of The Guardian said that not every aspect of Dhoni’s life could be included in the three-hour-and-10-minute-long biopic. He quoted John Briley's famous line from the script he wrote for Richard Attenborough's Gandhi: "No man's life can be encompassed in one telling. There is no way to give each year its allotted weight, to include each event, each person who helped to shape a lifetime."[60]

text: Veteran actor Rishi Kapoor gave a positive review of the film, praising the performance of Rajput in particular.[35] Several professional Indian sportsmen and sportswomen such as cricketer Mohammad Kaif,[61] and badminton player Saina Nehwal[62] had high regards for the film.

text: Rachel Saltz of The New York Times gave a negative review of the film saying that "you don't have to understand cricket to enjoy a good cricket movie", e.g. Lagaan (2001), but one does "have to be a cricket fan, and an indulgent one at that" for M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story. She found the term "hagiographic" unfit for the film and labelled the film as "long and languid." She concluded saying "I learned more about Mr. Dhoni — his enigmatic character and what marked him as a great captain — by reading about him after watching this movie than I did during three long hours."[63]

text: Music

text:
M.S. Dhoni – The Untold Story

Soundtrack album by Amaal Mallik & Rochak Kohli

Released
6 September 2016

Genre
Film Soundtrack

Length
38:00

Language
Hindi, Marathi, Tamil, Telugu

Label
T-Series

tag: table

text: Amaal Mallik composed the soundtrack for M.S. Dhoni.[64] Rochak Kohli composed one song as a guest composer. T-Series acquired the music rights for the film. The 10 song album features the voices of singers Armaan Malik, Arijit Singh, Siddharth Basrur, Rochak Kohli and Palak Muchhal; it was released in three different language versions: Tamil, Telugu & Marathi. Tamil lyrics were penned by P. Vijay, Telugu by Chaitanya Prasad & Marathi by Guru Thakur.[65] The background music was composed by Sanjoy Chowdhury.

text: All lyrics written by Manoj Muntashir.

text:
M.S. Dhoni – The Untold Story (Original Motion Picture Hindi Soundtracks)[66]

No.
Title
Music
Singer(s)
Length

1.
"Besabriyaan"
Amaal Mallik
Armaan Malik
4:15

2.
"Kaun Tujhe"
Amaal Mallik
Palak Muchhal
4:01

3.
"Jab Tak"
Amaal Mallik
Armaan Malik
2:54

4.
"Phir Kabhi"
Amaal Mallik
Arijit Singh
4:47

5.
"Parwah Nahin"
Amaal Mallik
Siddharth Basrur
4:02

6.
"Jab Tak (Redux)"
Amaal Mallik
Armaan Malik
3:38

7.
"Padhoge Likhoge"
Amaal Mallik
Ananya Nanda & Adithyan A Prithviraj
3:07

8.
"Har Gully Mein Dhoni Hai"
Rochak Kohli
Rochak Kohli
4:04

9.
"Phir Kabhi (Reprise)"
Amaal Mallik
Arijit Singh
4:33

10.
"Kaun Tujhe (Armaan Malik Version)"
Amaal Mallik
Armaan Malik
2:39

Total length:
38:00

text:
M.S. Dhoni – The Untold Story (Original Motion Picture Tamil Soundtracks)[67]

No.
Title
Music
Singer(s)
Length

1.
"Pouraadalaam"
Amaal Mallik
Armaan Malik
4:16

2.
"Unnal Unnal Un Ninaival"
Amaal Mallik
Palak Muchhal
4:03

3.
"Konjam (Version 1)"
Amaal Mallik
Armaan Malik
2:53

4.
"Pougalaam"
Amaal Mallik
Sreerama Chandra
4:44

5.
"Bayama Enna"
Amaal Mallik
Siddharth Basrur
4:02

6.
"Konjam (Version 2)"
Amaal Mallik
Armaan Malik
3:38

7.
"Padichu Kizhichu"
Amaal Mallik
Aparnaa Bhaagwat & Adithyan A Prithviraj
3:07

8.
"Ulagam Engum Dhoni Yee"
Rochak Kohli
S. P. B. Charan
4:04

Total length:
30:50

text:
M.S. Dhoni – The Untold Story (Original Motion Picture Marathi Soundtracks)[68]

No.
Title
Music
Singer(s)
Length

1.
"Ghe Dhyas Ha"
Amaal Mallik
Sangeet Haldipur
4:15

2.
"Shravasatun Tu Darvalta"
Amaal Mallik
Palak Muchhal
4:03

3.
"Ashich Thaamb Na Jara-1"
Amaal Mallik
Sangeet Haldipur
2:54

4.
"Dhundicha Kshan Ha Ola"
Amaal Mallik
Sreerama Chandra
4:47

5.
"Parwah Nahi"
Amaal Mallik
Siddharth Basrur
4:02

6.
"Ashich Thaamb Na Jara-2"
Amaal Mallik
Sangeet Haldipur
3:40

7.
"Hoshil Nawab"
Amaal Mallik
Aparnaa Bhaagwat, Adhityaan A Prithviraj
3:08

Total length:
26:47

text:
M.S. Dhoni – The Untold Story (Original Motion Picture Telugu Soundtracks)[69]

No.
Title
Music
Singer(s)
Length

1.
"Le Padha Padhaa"
Amaal Mallik
Armaan Mallik
4:15

2.
"Ninnevarinka Premisthaaru"
Amaal Mallik
Palak Muchhal
4:03

3.
"Nuvve Pranayaagni Lo"
Amaal Mallik
Armaan Mallik
2:54

4.
"Mari Maree"
Amaal Mallik
Sreerama Chandra
4:47

5.
"Pharwaaledhu"
Amaal Mallik
Siddharth Basrur
4:02

6.
"Ninne Tholi Prema Lo 2"
Amaal Mallik
Armaan Mallik
3:40

7.
"Chadhivithe Jagathike"
Amaal Mallik
Aparnaa Bhaagwat, Adhityaan A Prithviraj
3:08

Total length:
26:47


document_title: Down by the Water

question_text: pj harvey down by the water lyrics meaning

text: Down by the Water

text: Composition[edit]

text: "Down by the Water" was written by Harvey and self-produced with Flood and John Parish. The song opens with vocals and a heavy organ played by Harvey. As the song progresses, it incorporates several elements including percussion instruments, drums, and an orchestral ensemble. Pete Thomas conducted the string arrangements for the song. The musicians in the ensemble include Sonia Slany on violin, Jocelyn Pook and Jules Singleton on viola, and Sian Bell on cello.[1] The song derives elements from blues and electronica, the latter due to notable use of a synthesized organ.

text: The song's lyrics tell the story of a woman committing filicide. The woman drowns her daughter "down by the water" and "won't see her again." The final coda features Harvey whispering the lines: "little fish, big fish swimming in the water / come back here, man, gimme my daughter." The refrain was based on Lead Belly's rendition of the traditional American folk song "Salty Dog Blues." In 2005, Harvey used the song's lyrics in a Spin interview as an example to demonstrate that her songs were not autobiographical: "Some critics have taken my writing so literally to the point that they'll listen to 'Down by the Water' and believe I have actually given birth to a child and drowned her."[2]

text: Release and reception[edit]

text:
"Down By The Water"

The song features extensive use of a synthesized organ and features an orchestral ensemble.

Problems playing this file? See media help.

text: "Down by the Water" was released in the United Kingdom and Australia in February 1995 on Island Records. It was the lead single from To Bring You My Love and pressed on CD and 7" vinyl. The CD single featured one b-side, "Somebody's Down, Somebody's Name", and the 7" and Australian CD single included a second b-side "Lying in the Sun." The song charted in four countries upon its release; peaking at number 78 in Canada,[3] number 28 in Ireland,[4] and number 38 in the United Kingdom.[5] The song charted in two charts in the United States; peaking at number 48 on Billboard' Hot 100 Airplay,[6] and reaching number 2 on the Modern Rock Tracks[7] "Down by the Water" became a modern rock radio hit due to extensive rotation on MTV and college radio stations.

text: Critical reception to "Down by the Water" was positive. Allmusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine retrospectively noted the song was an Allmusic pick and called Harvey's song-writing "tighter and more melodic than before," adding that "the menacing 'Down by the Water' has genuine hooks."[8] Robert Hilburn of the Los Angeles Times noted in 1995 that was one of To Bring You My Love' "most gripping moments" adding "she speaks with the captivating clarity and force of someone reaching for a final, life-saving anchor."[9] "Down by the Water" was later nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance at the 38th Grammy Awards.[10]

text: In 2005, Diplo sampled "Down By The Water" for a remix of the Mike Jones single "Still Tippin"[11] and then again the following year on Plastic Little's indie rap track "Now I Hollar."[12]

text: Music video[edit]

text: Maria Mochnacz directed the music video for "Down by the Water".[13] Due to To Bring You My Love's large promotional push by Island Records, the video received a higher budget than Harvey's two previous music videos for Island. The video was recorded over the course of two days in London with a large crew, by contrast to the "anti-pop" video for "Man-Size," and was shot on 35mm film. Two camera assistants, Seamus McGarvey and Mike Valentine, recorded the separate scenes of the video. McGarvey recorded the dancing scenes and Valentine recorded the underwater scenes.[14] A body double replaced Harvey for some of the underwater sections.[13]

text: The video features Harvey dancing in a red satin dress with a large wig and excessive make-up. Harvey dubbed her appearance as "Joan Crawford on acid" in an interview with Spin in 1996.[15] Describing the video in an interview with JBTV, she said: "it was a hard video to make actually that one. It was two days worth of jumping in and out of a swimming pool. Well, one day was just in the swimming pool and the other day was just dancing on a rotating platform but it was quite hard-going after all," adding "it was quite scary as well because I was jumping in with a wig which was really, really heavy so it was quite difficult to get to the surface again. And wearing high-heel silver shoes, not the best thing for swimming in."[16]

text: The video was nominated for Best Female Video at the 1995 MTV Video Music Awards[17] and has been featured on an episode of Beavis and Butt-head, Ash vs. Evil Dead and Gotham.

text: Track listings[edit]

text:
"Down by the Water" – 3:15
"Somebody's Down, Somebody's Name" – 3:42

tag: ol

text:
"Down by the Water" – 3:15
"Lying in the Sun" – 4:32
"Somebody's Down, Somebody's Name" – 3:42

text: "Down by the Water" – 3:15

text: Personnel[edit]

text: All personnel credits adapted from To Bring You My Love's liner notes.[1]

text:
PJ Harvey – vocals, organ, producer, engineer
Joe Gore – guitar
John Parish – drums, percussion

text:
Pete Thomas – string arrangements
Sonia Slany – violin
Jocelyn Pook – viola
Jules Singleton – viola
Sian Bell – cello

text: Flood – producer, engineer, mixing

text: Chart positions[edit]

text:
Chart (1995)
Peak
position

Australian Singles Chart[18][19]
84

Canadian RPM Top 100[3]
78

Irish Singles Chart[4]
28

UK Singles Chart[5]
38

US Billboard Hot 100 Airplay[7]
48

US Billboard Modern Rock Tracks[7]
2