In 2010, Santa Claus celebrated his 1,730th birthday. The original Nicholas was born in 270 in the small country of Lycia, which is now part of modern-day Turkey.

Nicholas became first a priest and then a bishop in the early Christian church.

The very first paintings of him show Nicholas wearing the ceremonial robes of a Christian bishop — red trimmed with white. When we see “Santa’s suit” today, we’re seeing those same colors.

Nicholas became famous for gift-giving, usually to the poor. In the early 4th century a legend began to spread about Nicholas coming at night to the home of three poor girls who did not have dowries and therefore could not marry their fiancés. While the girls slept, Nicholas left gold coins in their stockings, which were drying by the fire. That’s how our tradition of Santa filling stockings got its start.

Santa is known by many names all over the world. He became “Santa Claus” in America because many of the first English colonists did not celebrate Christmas; as Puritans they felt the holiday was disrespectful to Jesus. But their children saw the children of Dutch settlers receiving gifts from someone called “St. Nicholas.” They thought the gift-giver’s name was “Sinter Klass” and anglicized it further to “Santa Claus.”

Many people think Santa’s reindeer were introduced to the holiday in Clement Moore’s wonderful poem “A Visit From St. Nicholas,” which most of us now call “’Twas the Night Before Christmas.” Moore wrote about Santa and the eight reindeer in 1822. But in 1809 another great American author named Washington Irving wrote a book titled “Diedrich Knickerbocker,” and in it he wrote about St. Nicholas delivering presents to children “by flying over the treetops in a wagon.” Clement Moore simply expanded on that previous description.

Our modern-day image of Santa as a stout man is based on Coca-Cola ads from the 1930s. Artist Hans Sundblom used a retired salesman named Les Prentice as his model.

2010年，圣诞老人庆祝了他的一千七百三十岁生日。其原型尼古拉斯在公元270年出生于利西亚小国，这个国家现已并入土耳其。

在早期的基督教会中尼古拉斯由一名牧师晋升为主教。尼古拉斯的第一幅画像是他穿着基督教主教的仪式长袍 — 红色镶有白色的衣服。在如今的圣诞老人装扮中，我们也能看到相同的颜色。

尼古拉斯因经常给穷人送礼而知名。四世纪早期，相传尼古拉斯某晚来到三个穷苦的女孩家，由于没有嫁妆，她们无法和自己的未婚夫结婚。女孩们睡着时，尼古拉斯把金币放进正在炉火边烘烤的袜子里。这正是圣诞老人把礼物放进袜子传统的由来。

圣诞老人在世界各地有很多不同的名

字。在美国，他是Santa Claus，因为第一批到来的英国殖民者大多不庆祝圣诞节；身为清教徒，他们觉得过节是对耶稣的不敬。但是他们的孩子看到荷兰殖民者的孩子收到来自一个名叫St. Nicholas的礼物。他们认为送礼人的名字是Sinter Klass，再将名字英译就是Santa Claus。

很多人认为在克莱门特•穆尔的名诗

《圣古拉斯的来访》中，将圣诞老人的驯鹿和节日联系了起来，这首诗现在也被称为

《圣诞节前夜》。穆尔在1822年写了关于圣诞老人和八只驯鹿的故事。

其实在1809年，另一名伟大的美国作家华盛顿•欧文写了一本书《迪德里奇．尼克巴克》，书中写道圣尼古拉斯坐着马车飞越树梢给孩子送礼物。克莱门特•穆尔只是对故事的描述加以扩展。

现代身材丰满的圣诞老人形象是基于上个世纪三十年代的可口可乐广告。艺术家汉斯•松德布卢姆用一个退休的销售员诺士•普伦蒂斯作他的模特。

    Words to Learn 相关词汇

   【嫁妆】jiàzhuāng dowry money or property brought by a bride to her husband at marriage

    【失敬的】shījìng de disrespectful having or showing disrespect, lacking courtesy