St. Nicholas

 Saint Nicholas, whose day is celebrated in many countries today, came from a very wealthy family. He was a pious child and eventually became bishop of the city of Myra in Asia Minor in the fourth century and tradition says he gave away all the wealth he was left but preferred to do it  secretly - legends say once throwing some money through a window and another time dropping a bag of gold down a chimney where it landed in a stocking (or a shoe). 

He died around AD 326.

A Byzantine enamel of St Nicholas from a museum in Madrid.

In the C6 the Emperor Justinian built a church in his honour in Constantinople and his shrine in Myra (now in modern day Turkey) was a centre for pilgrimage until 1087 when Italian sailors(or pirates) stole his remains and took them to Bari in Southern Italy where another church for St Nicholas was built. He had become the patron saint of sailors due to legends of him saving  seamen in a violent storm.

All through Europe in the Middle Ages December 6th was the day that churches elected a boy-bishop a custom that has carried on in many places. The boy would reign until the feast of the Holy Innocents on December 28th and Nicholas soon became the patron saint of children as well as sailors.

This story of Saint Nicholas was taken to the USA by Dutch Protestant settlers in the 19th Century and  his name - Sinterklaas - became Santa Claus. His traditional appearance is because a man called Thomas Nast whose drawing of him - with white beard, fur trimmed robe and toys appeared in Harpers Magazine in the 1860s, illustrating the poem 'A Visit From St Nicholas' by Clement C Moore published several years earlier.

Before this time, here in the UK a yuletide figure of fun and feasting had been called the' Lord of Misrule', 'Spirit of Christmas' or 'Sir Christmas', 'Prince Christmas' or 'The Christmas Lord' since the mid 17th Century. A character created by playwright Ben Johnson in the early C17 for a play performed for royalty was called Old Christmas and had a white beard and many children. Christmas was then banned in 1647 by the Puritans, brought back after the end of the Civil War.

Eventually all these different stories and legends came together to give us the Father Christmas we know now.

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I got the bread-machine on yesterday and made a large loaf of 50/50 wholemeal /white. A couple of weeks ago I thought the machine had gone wrong. A medium loaf came out about 3 inches tall - maybe I'd got side-tracked and measured the flour wrong? So next time I double checked all the weighing and same problem. Try again with a new packet of yeast and it was a bit better.(All loaves were edible so not wasted, just needed two slices instead of one). Yesterday I started a new bag of flour and set it to large and a proper sized loaf turned out at the end, although slightly lop-sided.

I used to leave the lid open after taking the loaf out so any moisture wouldn't make it go rusty inside but realised that gradually the lid wasn't shutting tight. Now I balance a chopping board and a couple of tins on the lid to shut it properly, but sometimes the loaves don't come out as level as they should. They taste good though. 

I was beginning to think that was my fifth thing going wrong after the heating boiler glitch, the tins of tomatoes over the floor, a tooth needing a filling and the car suspension repairs! 

Yesterday, day 5 of the coffee advent, was Columbian again - I'm beginning to wonder....... where are the mocha, Irish cream, hazelnut and special Christmas blend that are mentioned on the box?.... Patience - is a virtue Susan!