95 Fun Facts About Holiday Traditions

The modern custom of decorating an evergreen tree for Christmas began in the 16th century in which country?

Germany is where the fir 'paradise tree' of medieval plays became the decorated Christmas tree; an 1848 engraving of Queen Victoria and her German husband Albert around theirs spread the fashion in Britain.

What do the Yule Lads leave in the shoe of a child who has misbehaved?

A rotten potato awaits naughty children and small gifts the good; the lads were once so frightening that a 1746 decree banned parents from using such tales to scare their children.

Eating twelve grapes at midnight on New Year's Eve, one per chime of the clock, is a tradition from which country?

Spain's grapes are swallowed to the chimes of the clock in Madrid's Puerta del Sol, broadcast nationwide, and the custom has spread across Latin America.

The egg-laying 'Oschter Haws', forerunner of the Easter Bunny, is said to have reached America with German settlers in which colony?

Pennsylvania's German settlers told their children that the hare laid coloured eggs for the well-behaved, so before Easter the children set out their caps and bonnets as nests for it.

Diwali, often called the Festival of Lights, primarily symbolizes the triumph of what?

Good over evil is Diwali's theme: in northern India the lights recall the people of Ayodhya welcoming Rama home after he defeated the demon king Ravana.

Kwanzaa is a celebration based on seven core principles, collectively known by what Swahili term?

Nguzo Saba, 'seven principles', runs from Umoja, unity, on the first night to Imani, faith, on the last; one more candle is lit for each principle as the week goes on.

Which Jewish holiday features a Seder meal retelling the Exodus from Egypt?

Passover's Seder retells the escape from slavery; matzah is unleavened because the Israelites left too fast for bread to rise, and the bitter herbs recall the bitterness of bondage.

Which traditional English Christmas punch of hot spiced ale or cider takes its name from a toast meaning 'be in good health'?

Wassail began as a toast that was answered with 'drinkhail'; in England's cider counties wassailers still go from orchard to orchard and sing to the apple trees to bless the next crop.

Kissing under the mistletoe is first noted as popular among which group in late-18th-century England?

Servants in late-18th-century England were the first noted for it; in one version of the custom each kiss cost the sprig a berry, and the kissing had to stop once the berries ran out.

What is traditionally placed at the very top of a Christmas tree?

A star, recalling the Star of Bethlehem that the Wise Men followed, is the classic topper; its usual rival is an angel from the Nativity story.

Which country sends London a Christmas tree for Trafalgar Square each year in thanks for wartime support?

Norway's gift thanks Britain for its help during the Second World War; the spruce is felled each November at a ceremony with the mayors of Oslo and Westminster, then shipped across the North Sea.

How many numbered doors or windows do most standard Advent calendars feature?

Standard Advent calendars have 24 doors, one for each day from 1 to 24 December; because Advent's first Sunday moves between 27 November and 3 December, reusable calendars simply start on 1 December.

The thirteen Yule Lads, with names like Spoon-Licker and Door-Slammer, visit children before Christmas in which country?

Iceland's thirteen Yule Lads are the sons of the child-eating ogress Grýla; they come down from the mountains one a night from 12 December, each named for his favourite prank.

What sweet treat do children in the United States commonly leave out for Santa Claus on Christmas Eve?

Cookies and a glass of milk are the classic Christmas Eve offering for Santa in the United States; the half-eaten plate found the next morning serves as 'evidence' of his visit.

What nine-branched candelabrum is lit during the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah?

The Hanukkah menorah, or hanukkiah, has nine branches: eight for the nights plus the shamash, the helper candle that lights the rest. The ancient Temple's menorah had seven.

Kwanzaa was created in 1966 by activist Maulana Karenga in the aftermath of which event?

The Watts riots of 1965 shook Los Angeles, and Maulana Karenga created Kwanzaa the following year as a way to bring African Americans together around a shared heritage.

What traditional game is played with a four-sided spinning top during Hanukkah?

The dreidel is the Hanukkah spinning top; each of its four Hebrew letters fixes the outcome of a spin—nothing, all, half, or put in—in a game played for coins or chocolate gelt.

In what season does Diwali, the Festival of Lights, typically occur?

Diwali falls in autumn, between mid-October and mid-November, because its date shifts with the Hindu lunisolar calendar; the celebrations run for five days.

What type of lamp is commonly lit as part of Diwali celebrations?

Diyas, small clay lamps filled with oil, are set out in rows on the new-moon night of Diwali to invite Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth, into the home.

New Year's resolutions are usually traced to which ancient people, who made promises to their gods each new year?

The Babylonians pledged at Akitu, their spring new-year festival, to repay debts and return borrowed objects; the Romans later made similar vows to Janus, the god January is named for.

Green bean casserole, a Thanksgiving staple, was created in 1955 in the test kitchen of which soup company?

Campbell's home economist Dorcas Reilly devised it for a newspaper feature that wanted a quick dish from ingredients most households kept on hand, among them the firm's cream of mushroom soup.

Which Easter activity did Florida's Cypress Gardens stage with a record 501,000 eggs in 2007?

An Easter egg hunt: Cypress Gardens in Winter Haven, Florida, hid 501,000 eggs for 9,753 children on 1 April 2007, the Guinness record for the largest hunt.

In Scottish Hogmanay first-footing, which visitor is preferred as the first across the threshold after midnight?

A tall, dark-haired man brings the best luck, arriving with gifts such as coal, shortbread, salt or whisky; one theory dates the preference to Viking times, when a blond stranger at the door meant trouble.

Traditionally, what does finishing a bowl of tteokguk on Korea's Lunar New Year do?

It makes the eater a year older, which is why Koreans ask 'how many bowls of tteokguk have you eaten?' to ask someone's age; the white rice cakes stand for a clean start.

At Japan's Setsubun festival each February, families shout 'Demons out, fortune in' while throwing what at a relative in an ogre mask?

Roasted soybeans are hurled in a rite called mamemaki; afterwards you eat one bean for every year of your age, and in some homes one more for luck.

In Mexico, whoever finds the figurine in the Rosca de Reyes must host a party on which feast day?

Candlemas, 2 February, known as Día de la Candelaria, is when whoever found the figurine gathers everyone again for tamales; the day closes Mexico's long Christmas season.

Colombia's Día de las Velitas on 7 December falls on the eve of which feast?

8 December is the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, a public holiday in Colombia; the candle custom dates from 1854, when Pope Pius IX defined the doctrine as dogma and Colombians lit candles to celebrate.

What event does Ethiopia's Timkat festival, held at pools and rivers each January, celebrate?

The baptism of Jesus in the Jordan is marked by carrying each church's tabot, a replica of the Ark of the Covenant, to a pool or river, where the water is blessed and sprinkled on the crowd.

The girl leading Scandinavia's Saint Lucy's Day procession wears a white robe and what else?

A crown of lit candles tops the Lucia's white robe; legend says Lucy wore candles on her head to keep both hands free while carrying food to Christians hiding in Rome's catacombs. Stockholm crowned its first newspaper Lucia in 1927.

Much of Latin America plays April Fools-style pranks on 28 December, the feast of whom?

The Holy Innocents are the children killed on King Herod's orders; in Spanish, whoever falls for a prank on their feast is teased as an 'inocente'.

The Mari Lwyd, a midwinter custom of south Wales, involves parading what from house to house?

A horse's skull on a pole, draped in a white sheet, goes door to door; the party sings for entry, the household answers in verse, and the rhyming contest runs until the Mari is let in for food and drink.

Tom Smith developed the Christmas cracker from which of his existing products?

Bon-bon sweets sold in a twist of paper were the start: Smith slipped love mottoes inside, added a strip that banged when the wrapper was pulled, and in time swapped the sweet for a small gift.

In 1839 Hamburg pastor Johann Wichern fixed candles to an old cartwheel to count down to Christmas, creating which decoration?

The Advent wreath began as Wichern's cartwheel ring, with small candles for weekdays and large ones for Sundays, because the children at his mission school asked every day whether Christmas had come.

On the Kwanzaa kinara, what colour is the one candle that stands in the middle and represents unity?

Black is the colour of the centre candle, lit first for Umoja, unity; one more candle is then lit on each of the six days that follow.

The Times Square ball drop began after New York City banned which New Year's Eve spectacle?

Fireworks had drawn crowds to the New York Times tower since 1904; when the city banned them, publisher Adolph Ochs had a 700-pound ball of iron and wood lowered down the flagpole instead.

On which date in 1865 were enslaved people in Galveston, Texas told they were free?

June 19, 1865 was when Union General Gordon Granger issued the order in Galveston, two and a half years after the Emancipation Proclamation; the day is kept as Juneteenth, a US federal holiday since 2021.

Which flower, believed to guide souls home, decorates ofrenda altars on Mexico's Day of the Dead?

Marigolds, called cempasúchil in Mexico, are heaped on altars and strewn in petal paths because their vivid colour and strong scent are believed to lead the dead back to their families.

Thailand's Songkran new year festival is famous for what public activity each April?

Mass water fights grew out of a gentler rite: water is poured over Buddha images and the hands of elders as a blessing and a symbol of cleansing; UNESCO inscribed Songkran in 2023.

Which Hindu spring festival has people drenching each other in coloured powder and water?

Holi falls on the last full moon of the month of Phalguna, usually in March; bonfires called Holika Dahan burn the night before, and the next day everyone is drenched in coloured powder and water.

Which instrument, made from a ram's horn, is blown during Rosh Hashanah services?

The shofar, a ram's horn, is blown in a set pattern of blasts that many hear as a crying voice, a call to look inward and repent; it opens the Ten Days of Repentance that end with Yom Kippur.

Chicago's green St. Patrick's Day river grew from dye first used to trace what?

Illegal sewage: in the early 1960s crews were dyeing the water to find polluters when the vivid green was seen to suit St. Patrick's Day, and a clean-up tool became a yearly ritual.

Bonfire Night marks the 1605 arrest of which man caught guarding explosives under the House of Lords?

Guy Fawkes was caught in the cellar beneath the Lords on the night of 4–5 November 1605; the Gunpowder Plot aimed to blow up James I at the opening of Parliament, and children later begged a 'penny for the Guy' to burn.

Punxsutawney Phil's Groundhog Day ceremony takes place at which spot in Punxsutawney?

Gobbler's Knob, a wooded hill outside town, is where the top-hatted Inner Circle presents Phil each 2 February; its president claims to understand the forecast, which Phil delivers in 'Groundhogese'.

Saint Patrick is said to have used the shamrock to explain which Christian doctrine?

The Holy Trinity: Patrick is said to have used the shamrock's three leaves on one stem to illustrate Father, Son and Holy Spirit; the story first appears in writing in 1726, though shamrocks were worn by the 1680s.

'Mardi Gras' is French for what?

Mardi Gras means 'Fat Tuesday': it is the final day of Carnival, named for the last chance to eat rich, fatty foods before the fasting season of Lent begins on Ash Wednesday.

Along with purple and green, what is the third traditional Mardi Gras colour?

Gold stands for power, purple for justice and green for faith, meanings assigned by New Orleans' Rex parade organisation in 1892.

Cinco de Mayo commemorates Mexico's 1862 victory at the Battle of Puebla over the forces of which empire?

France: the Second French Empire's army was beaten at Puebla on 5 May 1862 by General Ignacio Zaragoza, who died of typhoid months later; a larger French force took Mexico City in 1863.

The very first Oktoberfest, held in Munich in October 1810, celebrated what event?

A royal wedding: Crown Prince Ludwig of Bavaria married Princess Therese of Saxe-Hildburghausen on 12 October 1810, and the festival grounds were named Theresienwiese, 'Therese's Meadow', after the bride.

Magazine editor Sarah Josepha Hale's years of lobbying finally persuaded which president to proclaim a national Thanksgiving?

Abraham Lincoln proclaimed the holiday in 1863, days after a letter from Hale, the author of 'Mary Had a Little Lamb'; he hoped a shared day of thanks would help heal a nation at war.

What is the star-shaped Christmas lantern hung in windows across the Philippines called?

Parol lanterns of bamboo and coloured paper recall the light that guided the Wise Men to Bethlehem; in San Fernando, Pampanga, makers compete with giant versions at a festival each December.

In the Scottish custom, what do people do while singing 'Auld Lang Syne' at New Year?

Join hands in a circle: the Scots also cross arms at the final verse; in North America the song became a New Year's Eve fixture largely through bandleader Guy Lombardo's midnight broadcasts, begun on radio in 1929.

Which vegetable were 19th-century Irish and British jack-o'-lanterns most commonly carved from?

Turnips (and mangelwurzels) were the carved lanterns of Ireland and Britain before emigrants found the larger American pumpkin; Irish legend tells of Stingy Jack, doomed to roam with only a hollowed turnip to light his way.

Roller-skating to early-morning Christmas Mass is a tradition in the capital of which country?

Venezuela: in Caracas, streets are closed before dawn in the days before Christmas so residents can skate to the Misa de Aguinaldo, the early-morning carol Mass.

What is burned in the streets of Valencia on the final night of Las Fallas?

Papier-mâché effigies: the satirical fallas monuments built over the year are set alight in the cremà on 19 March, Saint Joseph's night, with one figure spared by public vote.

The Hindu spring festival of colours recalls the playful love between Radha and which deity?

Krishna's play with Radha and the cowherd girls, daubing faces with colour, is what the festival's paint-throwing is said to re-enact; in one telling it began when he fretted that she was fairer than he was.

During which Jewish festival do families eat meals in a temporary hut roofed with branches?

Sukkot: for seven days families eat, and some sleep, in a sukkah whose roof of cut branches recalls the shelters of the Israelites' forty years in the wilderness.

Which US president started the White House Easter Egg Roll in 1878 after Congress banned it from the Capitol grounds?

Rutherford B. Hayes opened the South Lawn to the children in 1878 after Congress's 1876 Turf Protection Act banned the egg rolling that was wrecking the Capitol's lawns.

Which number is avoided in Chinese New Year red envelope money because it sounds like 'death'?

4 is avoided because 'sì', four, sounds like 'sǐ', death; amounts with an 8 are favoured instead, since 'bā' sounds like 'fā', to prosper.

Whose famous diary for 19 December 1663 records an early Christmas box, a tip left for his shoemaker's boys?

Samuel Pepys wrote on 19 December 1663 of paying his shoemaker and giving 'something to the boys' box against Christmas'; such seasonal tips to tradesmen's lads are one explanation for the name Boxing Day.

Japan's hatsumōde, in the first days of January, is the year's first visit to what?

A Shinto shrine (or Buddhist temple): millions queue at Tokyo's Meiji Shrine in the first three days of January to pray for the year, buy amulets and draw omikuji fortunes.

John Adams expected July 2 to be America's great holiday because Congress did what?

Voted for independence: the Lee Resolution passed on July 2, and Adams wrote to Abigail that the day would be kept with 'Pomp and Parade'; the Declaration, approved two days later, took the glory instead.

Under what title was the song now known as "Jingle Bells" first published in 1857?

'The One Horse Open Sleigh' was James Lord Pierpont's 1857 title; in December 1965 the Gemini 6 astronauts reported a strange object in polar orbit, then played the tune on a harmonica and bells.

Swedish lussekatter, the buns baked for Saint Lucy's Day, are coloured with which spice?

Saffron gives lussekatter their golden colour; the S-shaped buns, dotted with raisins, are served with coffee and glögg on 13 December, Saint Lucy's Day.

The film It's a Wonderful Life became a television Christmas staple in the 1970s largely because of what?

A lapsed copyright: a clerical error left it unrenewed in 1974, so stations could air the film without fees, and years of repeats turned a box-office disappointment into a classic.

Which Swedish town has raised a giant straw Yule Goat each Advent since 1966?

Gävle's 13-metre straw goat has been a target from the start: the first, raised on 1 December 1966, was burned down on New Year's Eve, and arsonists have destroyed many of its successors.

Which horned figure of Alpine folklore accompanies Saint Nicholas to punish naughty children?

Krampus, half-goat and half-demon, roams Austrian and Bavarian towns on 5 December, Krampusnacht, rattling chains and threatening to carry bad children off in his basket.

In which 1942 film did Bing Crosby first sing "White Christmas"?

Holiday Inn (1942) introduced Irving Berlin's 'White Christmas', which won the Oscar for Best Original Song; twelve years later the song gave its name to a second Crosby film built around it.

What is the traditional flavour of a red-and-white striped candy cane?

Peppermint is the classic flavour; canes were finished by hand until Gregory Harding Keller, a Catholic priest whose brother-in-law ran a Georgia candy firm, patented a machine for the job.

What does the oil used to fry Hanukkah latkes and doughnuts commemorate?

The Temple's oil lasting eight days: after the Maccabees rededicated the Second Temple, a single day's supply of pure oil is said to have burned for eight, which is why latkes and sufganiyot are fried in oil.

The four Hebrew letters on a Hanukkah spinning top stand for what phrase?

Nun, gimel, hei, shin stand for Nes Gadol Haya Sham, 'a great miracle happened there'; most tops sold in Israel swap the last letter to pe so the phrase reads 'happened here'.

'Silent Night' was first sung on Christmas Eve 1818 in Oberndorf, a village near which Austrian city?

Salzburg: in nearby Oberndorf, priest Joseph Mohr and teacher Franz Xaver Gruber first sang it to a guitar; within a few years singing families from the Zillertal valley carried it abroad.

Why did President Franklin D. Roosevelt move Thanksgiving a week earlier in 1939?

To lengthen the Christmas shopping season: the last Thursday of 1939's November fell on the 30th, and Roosevelt feared a short season would hurt the recovery; many states refused, so the country kept two Thanksgivings.

The customs of Halloween are usually traced back to which ancient Gaelic festival?

Samhain marked the end of the harvest in Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man, a night when the boundary to the otherworld was thought to thin.

Which two Declaration signers, both later presidents, died on July 4, 1826?

John Adams and Thomas Jefferson both died on 4 July 1826, the Declaration's 50th anniversary; Adams's last words included 'Thomas Jefferson survives', but Jefferson had died a few hours earlier.

On which day, a month after Valentine's Day, do Japanese men repay the women who gave them chocolate?

White Day, 14 March, began with a marshmallow maker urging men to repay their Valentine chocolates, at first as 'Marshmallow Day'; chocolatiers soon joined in with white chocolate.

Which English poet's 'Parliament of Fowls' is usually credited with first linking Saint Valentine's Day to romantic love?

Geoffrey Chaucer's dream vision, written in the early 1380s, has the birds assemble on 'Seynt Valentynes day' to choose their mates, echoing a medieval belief that birds paired off in mid-February.

Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker score famously introduced which bell-like keyboard instrument to ballet audiences?

Celesta: patented in Paris in 1886, it gives the Sugar Plum Fairy's dance its chime; Tchaikovsky had tried the instrument a year before the ballet in his little-known symphonic ballad The Voyevoda.

What do Swedish families traditionally watch on television at 3 pm on Christmas Eve?

Donald Duck cartoons: 'Kalle Anka och hans vänner önskar God Jul', a Disney compilation, has gone out on Swedish public television at 3 pm every Christmas Eve since about 1960, and much of the country stops to watch.

The name Kwanzaa comes from a Swahili phrase meaning what?

'First fruits': the name comes from the Swahili matunda ya kwanza, and an extra 'a' was added to make seven letters, in one account so each of seven children at an early celebration could have one.

What is baked into a Greek vasilopita, the cake cut at New Year?

A coin: the vasilopita, named for Saint Basil whose feast is 1 January, is cut at midnight, and whoever finds the coin in their slice is promised luck for the year.

At which American institution did the drunken 1826 "Eggnog Riot" take place?

West Point Military Academy cadets sneaked in liquor for a Christmas eggnog party in 1826; the drunken riot that followed ended in arrests, courts-martial and expulsions.

Which two of Santa's reindeer take their names from Dutch words for thunder and lightning?

Donner and Blitzen were 'Dunder and Blixem' in the poem's first printing of 1823; an 1844 edition respelt them 'Donder and Blitzen', and the German-looking 'Donner' came later still.

Which Mexican plant with red bracts became the classic Christmas pot plant?

Poinsettia: named for Joel Roberts Poinsett, the first US minister to Mexico, who sent cuttings home in the 1820s; the red 'petals' are bracts, modified leaves around tiny yellow flowers.

Which tall, dome-shaped sweet bread from Milan is an Italian Christmas staple?

Panettone, from Milan, is raised with a fermented starter and studded with candied fruit and raisins; after baking it is hung upside down to cool, which keeps its tall dome from collapsing.

In Dickens's A Christmas Carol, whose chained ghost visits Scrooge before the three spirits arrive?

Jacob Marley, Scrooge's business partner, has been dead seven years to the night; he drags a chain forged by his own greed in life and warns Scrooge that three spirits will follow.

Which author is widely credited with the 1823 poem known as 'The Night Before Christmas', which named most of Santa's reindeer?

Clement C. Moore's poem first appeared anonymously in a Troy, New York newspaper in 1823; he claimed it only years later, and the family of Henry Livingston Jr. has long disputed the credit.

Which Jewish festival features costumes, noisemakers and a public reading of the Book of Esther?

Purim: the Megillah of Esther is read aloud and the crowd drowns out Haman's name with graggers (rattles); costumes, hamantaschen pastries and gifts of food mark the day.

Who created Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer for Montgomery Ward in 1939?

Robert L. May wrote Rudolph as a giveaway booklet for Montgomery Ward in 1939; a decade later his brother-in-law, songwriter Johnny Marks, turned the story into the song that Gene Autry made a hit.

What is the traditional German spiced Christmas cookie often compared to gingerbread?

Lebkuchen are sweetened with honey and heavy with spice; Nuremberg, baking them since at least 1395, grew so protective of the trade that it ruled on who could sell them and what went in.

In Italian folklore, on which night does the witch-like Befana deliver gifts to children?

Epiphany Eve, 5 January: the Befana flies on her broomstick to fill stockings at the end of the Twelve Days of Christmas; legend says she declined to join the Magi and has searched for the Christ Child ever since.

By what means does Sinterklaas traditionally arrive in the Netherlands each year?

By steamboat from Spain: each November a different Dutch port stages his arrival, after which he parades through the streets on a white horse.

In Catalonia, how do children make the Tió de Nadal log 'deliver' its Christmas presents?

Beat it with sticks: children sing as they hit the log so that it 'drops' sweets and small gifts; from 8 December it has been 'fed' every night and kept warm under a blanket.

Which fast-food chain's meals became a Christmas tradition in Japan after a 1970s campaign?

KFC took 'Kentucky for Christmas' nationwide in 1974; by the company's account, Takeshi Okawara, manager of its first Japanese outlet, thought up a Christmas 'party barrel' after hearing foreigners say they missed turkey.

The Scandinavian Yule goat is often linked to which Norse god, whose chariot was pulled by two goats?

Thor's chariot was drawn by the goats Tanngrisnir and Tanngnjóstr, which he could eat and resurrect; modern Scandinavian Yule goats are made of straw.

The French word 'réveillon', for a long Christmas or New Year's Eve dinner, derives from a word meaning what?

Waking: réveillon comes from réveiller, 'to wake', because diners stay up through the night; New Orleans keeps the custom through its French-Creole heritage.