The bulletin (Augusta, Ga.) 1920-1957, December 21, 1957, Image 17
THE BULLETIN OF THE CATHOLIC LAYMEN’S ASSOCIATION OF GEORGIA
ONE-B
DECEMBER 21. 1957.
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IDe’re heading your way
with a sleighful
of good wishes for
this festive season! May
you and all your
loved ones enjoy a
happy holiday!
P. O. BOX 1039
COLUMBUS, GA.
cA special delight of the holiday season is the opportunity It
beings to exchange greetings and good wishes with all our friends. We thoroughly enjoy the
friendly relationship we have with you, our customers, and we’d like to express our grati
tude for your valued patronage. A very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all. j
WILLIAMS CONSTRUCTION
COMPANY
Owned and Managed in the Chattahoochee Valley
Since 1876
THE CHRISTMAS
CRIB'S HISTORY
worship of the Infant. They were
said to receive the gift of speech
at midnight on Christmas Eve.
Christmas cribs were first con
fined to churches and people
brought gifts to the Infant Child,
with the wealthy contributing
jewels and robes for the cos
tumes. Later hand-carved wood
en figures came into use, many
of them life size, and, as the
popularity of the custom grew,
there was great competition to
pi-oduce the most elaborate and
lavish manger scenes.
Many of the great castles of
Europe had their own chapels,
and to provide a suitable manger
scene nobles and kings hired the
leading artists of the time to
produce lavish creations.
In this competitive spirit the
artists of the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries rose to the
challenge and the settings took
a great variety of forms. Many
figures were added to the Na
tivity scene, including represen
tations of the nobleman who was
financing the project, members
of his household, and his serv
ants. There were figures repre
senting the various social class
es, as well, all clad in the dress
of the day, so that crib art be
came a kind of contemporary so
cial history as well as a new art
medium.
Movement was added to the
figures' by some ingenious crafts
men, and today some of the most
famous examples of these Christ
mas cribs may be seen in mu
seums throughout Europe.
One of the best known of these
early cribs is now Rome in the
Basilica of Saints Cosmas and
Damain. Forty-five feet long,
twenty feet wide, and twenty-
seven feet high, it includes sev
eral hundred figures, all hand
carved of wood; its sky has
stars and a moon; there are the
traditional angels and shepherds;
the surrounding countryside in
cludes trees, farm animals, and
people performing their daily
tasks; there ai’e buildings rang
ing from an inn to a castle, and
a thousand other details.
Many families also made their
own Christmas cribs and, in
southern Italy particularly, the
Christmas festivities centered
around these home creations.
In Italy it is called the “Pre-
sepe” from the Latin praesepio,
which means stable. In France it
is the Creche: in Germany the
Krippe; ,in Spain the Nacimiento.
Wherever Christmas is celebrated
today, there is a Christmas crib.
The Chirstmas crib was brought
to America by the various immi
grants who came to settle here.
But there is one city in America
which has become famous for its
distinctive Christmas crib tradi
tion — Bethlehem, Pennsylvania,
appropriately named and now
known as the Christmas City of
America.
It was Christmas Eve, in 1741,
that Nicholas Louis, the Count of
Zingerdorf, and a group of Mora
vian pioneers, seeking the reli
gious freedom of the New World,
named their settlement after the
birthplace of Christ.
With them they brought their
“Putz” tradition — the elaborate
manger scenes carved of wood
which have been handed down
from generation to generation
now, and- which are still being
improved as each family makes
its contribution.
The most inspiring of these is
the Community Putz which tells
the Christmas story in seven
(Contiued on Page 14-B)
Following is a chapter from a
new book of authentic Christmas
customs and decorations called,
“A New Look at Christmas Dec
orations” —- Bruce Publishing
Company.
It was the absence of books and
the illiteracy of the times which
prompted St. Francis of Assisi in
1224 to dramatize the birthday of
Jesus with the first manger scene.
In his desire to bring home to
the people of the little village of
Gi-eccio a realization of the hum
ble beginnings of Christ and the
significance of Christmas, he re
constructed the Bethlehem scene
in a cave, using live animals and
people to illustrate the Nativity.
The vividness of this experi
ence, bringing the first Christ
mas to life, was so appealing that
the idea spread throughout Italy,
and then to Spain, France, Ger
many, and the entire Christian
world.
At first those annual manger
scenes continued to use live do
mestic animals and, as a result,
began the legend that at Christ
mas time all animals joined in the