Popular belief holds that 3 wise men visited Bethlehem from the east bearing gifts. However there is no mention in the bible about the number of wise men who visited. Three gifts were brought - gold, frankincense and myrrh, but names commonly attributed t
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The tradition of putting tangerines in stockings comes from 12th-century French nuns who left socks full of fruit, nuts and tangerines at the houses of the poor.
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The Queen's Christmas speech was first televised in 1957.
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Louis Prang, a Bavarian-born lithographer who came to the USA from Germany in the 19th century, popularized the sending of printed Christmas cards. He invented a way of reproducing color oil paintings
, the "chromolithograph technique", and created a car
, the "chromolithograph technique", and created a car
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Carols began as an old English custom called wassailing, toasting neighbours to a long life.
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The world's tallest Xmas tree at 221ft high was erected in a Washington shopping mall in 1950.
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The word Christmas comes from Cristes maesse, or "Christ's Mass." There is no set date for his birth in scripture and it wasn't celebrated on any particular day. However Christmas was first celebrated on the 25th of December in Rome in 336AD with an aim t
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