Unraveling the Origin of Santa Claus
Drawing by Thomas Nast, 1881
Magic mushrooms may have played a central role
For the last 100 years or so, we have all come to recognize and love that universal symbol of Christmas, Santa Claus. His origins have been traced to St. Nicholas, who lived around 300 AD and was regarded as the patron saint of children. The modern version of “Sinter Klaas” (as the Dutch referred to him) evolved from several sources: the publication of the poem “The Night Before Christmas,” in which the jolly figure was described in detail with flying reindeer and descents down the chimney added to Santa lore; cartoons drawn in the 1870s by Thomas Nast, a political cartoonist who practically invented the editorial cartoon, and marketing efforts by the Coca-Cola company, who commissioned illustrations in the 1930s that laid the final groundwork for the cherubic fellow we know today (and conveniently for Coca-Cola, reinforced their red-and-white branding).
Coca-Cola ad from the 1930s
But in recent years, another origin story has been making the rounds that suggests that Santa’s beginnings lay with shamanic figures from the Nordic countries who would bestow the gift of magic mushrooms on the local populations. Shamans (the term originates in Russia) were the medicine men of their time, and harbored much knowledge concerning the healing and transformative powers of plants. The mushroom in question, Amanita Muscaria, features a bright red top dotted with white. They were commonly found underneath the local conifers, and eventually this gave birth to the idea of “goodies” under the Christmas tree. It’s not a coincidence that Santa’s outfit is red and white.
“Why do people bring pine trees into their houses at the winter solstice, placing brightly colored (red-and-white) packages under their boughs, as gifts to show their love for each other?
It is because, underneath the pine bough is the exact location where one would find this ‘Most Sacred’ substance, the Amanita muscaria, in the wild.”
– James Arthur, author of “Mushrooms and Mankind”
Around the Winter Solstice (December 21) it was traditional for the shamans to deliver gifts of dried mushrooms by entering houses through openings in the roof, as the door to the house was likely to have snow piled up against it. This became the chimney through which Santa descended every Christmas Eve. And in another fun parallel, the mushrooms were dried by arranging them on an evergreen tree. These were the first “Christmas trees.”
Vintage Scandinavian Christmas cards from the 1930s
The local reindeer were also fond of the mushroom (some biologists theorize that they relieved the boredom of a long winter) and could be observed in animated states after consuming them. Shamans considered reindeer to be “spirit animals,” and since an oft-reported effect from ingesting mushrooms is a sensation of flying, it’s not much of a stretch to conceive of “flying reindeer.”
Weave all these strands together, and you have something remarkably like the story we’ve all heard this time of year since we were small children. It’s a story of love for your fellow humans, the desire to make them happy with gifts, and the power of the natural world to make magic happen.
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