Make the season bright with Reindeer Knoll - a joyful guide to Christmas traditions, history, activities, and songs. Discover the origins of beloved Christmas customs like decorating trees, Santa Claus, and gift-giving. Learn fun holiday activities like baking cookies, building snowmen, and Christmas crafts. Sing along to classic Christmas carols and songs the whole family will love.
Christmas stockings were mentioned as an established American tradition as early as 1823 in the poem A Visit from St. Nicholas. The origin of the Christmas stocking is thought to originate in the life of Saint Nicholas. While there are no written records of the origin of the Christmas stocking, there are popular legends that attempt to tell the history of the Christmas tradition.
One such legend has several variations, but the following is a good example: St. Nicholas was staying with a poor family and heard that the father was planning to sell his three daughters into prostitution to save them all from starvation. St. Nicholas wanted to help but knew that the old man would not accept charity, so he decided to help in secret. When he left the house after dark, he threw three bags of gold through an open window; one landed in a stocking. When the girls and their father woke up the next morning, they found the bags of gold and were, of course, overjoyed. The girls were saved from their sad fate. Other versions of the story say that Saint Nicholas threw the three bags of gold directly into the stockings, which were hung by the fireplace to dry.
This led to the custom of children hanging stockings or putting out shoes, eagerly awaiting gifts from St Nicholas. Sometimes the story is told with gold balls instead of bags of gold; this variation is why three gold balls, sometimes represented as oranges, are one of the symbols for St. Nicholas. This is also the origin of three gold balls being used as a symbol for pawnbrokers.
A tradition that began in a European country originally, children simply used one of their everyday socks, but eventually special Christmas stockings were created for this purpose. These stockings are traditionally used on Saint Nicholas Day although in the early 1800s, they also came to be used on Christmas Eve.
Another explanation for the origin of Christmas stockings involves Odin. Odin had a flying horse named Sleipnir, and children would place carrots, straw, and more in their boots and near the chimney for Sleipnir to eat. Odin would then gratefully repay the children with treats, candy, gifts, or more in the boots! This tradition supposedly survived the Christianization of Europe and was instrumental in beautiful Christmas stockings still being hung in homes across the world today.