The Christmas holiday has gathered around it customs and traditions for over two millennia, some of which even pre-date the Christian festival itself. From gift-giving to the sumptuous spread of a Christmas dinner table, this article traces the history of the celebrations from Roman times to the Victorian era when our modern take on the holiday was firmly established in both deed and literature. Although many of the traditions described herein are universal to all Christian countries, particularly up to the end of the Middle Ages, we here present the Christmas traditions largely in terms of the Anglo-Saxon experience.
This is a companion discussion topic for the original content at https://www.worldhistory.org/article/1893/christmas-through-the-ages/.