After King Henry VIII broke away from the Roman Catholic church and created the Protestant Church of England, Puritans sought to further reform his newly-founded church. Sundays were set aside for worship, but all other church services, festivals and religious revelries—including Christmas—were banned.

In 1659, the Massachusetts Bay Colony officially outlawed the celebration of Christmas, imposing a fine of five shillings on anyone found celebrating the holiday.

Theodore Roosevelt

They saw Christmas as a wasteful festival that threatened Christian beliefs and encouraged immoral activities, to (in Stubbs’ words) the ‘great dishonour of God’. The discontent felt within the Puritan community towards festivals led to the enactment of forceful legislation even before Cromwell’s protectorate.

It all came abut during the Protestant reformation in 1640, during which time a law was passed that made celebrating ‘Yule vacations’ illegal. According to the National Trust for Scotland, the kirk “frowned upon anything related to Roman Catholicism”, therefore sparking the ban.

Just plain Santa Although just over half the British population call him Father Christmas, the bearer of children’s presents in Scotland goes under another alias. He isn’t known as Saint Nicholas as he is throughout much of Northern Europe or as the more American Santa Claus. In Scotland, he’s just plain Santa.

Long before the arrival of Christianity, the inhabitants of Scotland were celebrating the arrival of the New Year around the time of the winter solstice (the shortest day)…. This meant that the biggest celebration of the year in Scotland was New Year, or Hogmanay! Customs…. in the order you should perform them!

Yule