So What (and a merry Saturnalia to you too, sir!)

^Miles Davis, minus the parenthesized part.

Well, finals are done, and now I can allow my brain to slowly deform into a gelatinous, mushy cheese; I only have yet to decide whether or not I prefer Pepper-jack or Mozzarella. Anyway, since I shall be in my lactose-induced catatonic state, I shall divulge to my reader(s) my last bit of reputable information before my brain is likely to be used for a pizza topping.

As it is that time of year (Christmas/Jewish Movie & Take-out Day), I thought it prudent to recite the story of the first Christmas, minus the guy born in the dead of winter in a small wooden shack.

'Twas around the year 200 B.C., and all 'round Rome, one could hear the shouting and cheering of every Roman citizen singing songs, getting hopelessly inebriated and being generally merry. These jovial comrades were not celebrating a great military victory, or the destruction of Carthage, or even the free Viagra that everyone is offered in their spam boxes. No, they were celebrating Saturnalia, an entire week dedicated to being happy, drunk, and giving gifts to your fellow citizen. You see, this was the week of December 17th-23rd, a very special week indeed; this week, slaves and their respective owners would switch roles and be unassumingly kind to one another (note: the term "slave" to which we are accustomed had a different connotation in Rome; slaves were accorded some rights and were recognized as people; they were more, in contemporary sense, "butlers."). Families came together and feasted heartily while exchanging presents, all in honor of the god Saturn (each major god of the pantheon had their own specific times during the year of celebration). Sound familiar? I hope it does.
Going forward approximately 6 centuries (give or take 100 years), another holiday is celebrated, now on the 25th of December: Sol Invictus. Sol Invictus was somewhat a more minor holiday, as it corresponded with the Roman Winter Solstice. This holiday, while not a fundamental part of Roman culture much as Saturnalia was (and was still being celebrated at the time), was still a marked day on the calendar for the citizens of Rome. It marked a turning point in the vast tundra of winter where the days would grow longer and the farming season would soon begin again (thus, Sol Invictus translates to "Unconquered Sun").
Saturnalia, in its practices, was essentially a way to bolster spirit before a period of long hardship, where food and warmth would be scarce. The coming cold months typically meant the highest mortality rates of the year, both in newborns and those of ill-health, along with the elderly. Saturnalia instilled Roman citizens with a Brobdingnagian sense of pride and joy, something of which there would be a dearth of in the upcoming winter.
Both of these holidays had a dominating impact upon the placement of Christmas on the Julian calendar. As Christianity had an ever-growing following and finally controlled the Roman Empire, it became evident that to placate the worries of the remaining original worshipers (at this time called paganus, meaning "one who dwells in the country"), it would be necessary to place the date of Jesus Christ's birth on the 25th so as to instill the idea that the deity being worshiped was the same that they had previously worshiped.

That, in a nutshell, is the story of the first Christmas. I hope that it left you with warm, fuzzy and jubilant feelings, though that just might be the contact high from reading this blog.

I suppose cheddar cheese is a viable option as well...

Das Flüg