You all know him, fat guy, comes down chimneys, wears red, gives gifts yea all that jazz. But how much do you really know about Father Christmas and wear the whole idea was dreamt up?

In English speaking countries he is usually known as Santa Claus or Father Christmas. The name Santa Claus came about in 1809 when in his History of New York Washington Irving translated Sinterklaas as Santa Claus. Of course he was also originally known as St Nicholas, because of course, St Nicholas was a real person and he lived in what is now known as Turkey.

Now St Nicholas was a very kind man, especially to children and one tale tells of him restoring life to three children who had been chopped up and preserved in brine. He was venerated throughout Europe and they dedicated the 6th of Decenber to him, thought to be the day he died. After that, on that day Bishops would give gifts to the children who served the church. Amazingly, St Nick is also the patron Saint of bakers, sea travellers, thieves and murderers. The vatican demoted the 6th December to a volentary celebratory day in 1969.

Father Christmas was not completely derived from St Nicholas but is in fact made up of several European legends. One such folk tale reffers to a Holy Man and a demonic creature called Krampus. This creature was said to sneak down chimneys and slaughter children in their beds or carry them away in his sack. The Holy man finally trapped this demon and from then on made him deliver gifts to children instead.

Many of you gove Coca-Cola far too much credit and believe that they created the jolly fat man dressed in red. Ironically though many of you also know the reason that is wrong. Haddon Sundblom's famous Cola Santa images of the 1930's were inspired by that well known and loved poem A Visit from St Nicholas known by many now as The night before Christmas. As you may recall, this poem gave Santa his reindeer their names, a sledge full of toys that landed on rooftops, made it happen on Christmas Eve and most important of all it described St Nicholas as a round, jolly elf dressed in fur trimmed clothing (the seventeenth century put Father Christmas in a green fur lined suit). The poem was written in 1823, well before Coca-Cola gave him that image. As Coca-Cola and America slowly took over the globe, that image of 'Santa' became set as the 'real' one...but they certainly didn't invent it.

As for the North Pole, its not clear where that idea came from, but by 1927 the Finnish claimed that Santa Claus lived in Lapland for there was no lichen in the North Pole for the reindeer to live on.

I hope this has been an interesting read, and these are all facts brought together by various books, for 'true' Christmas stories interest me greatly. Watch this space, for I'll be doing more 'Origins' soon. Now, we have discussed image as an important aspect of Santa here, so lets show some of our beloved jolly elf.