St. Nicolas

Sinterklaas - December 05, 2006

St. Nicolas and the tradition of celebrating his birthday :

Placing shoes in front of the fireplace, his horse, eating and offering speculaas (spiced cookies), the chimney, his knights and servants. A lot can be traced back into time, christianity and in Celtic mythology.

This feast has several sources and I will try to connect them all to get a picture on who Saint Nicolas is by sharing all I know about facts, myths, legends and stories.

Sint Nicolaas

Where did he come from and where did he live :
Some remains of this Saint are buried and kept in Bari. Parts (bones, pieces of his skeleton - reliques) are kept safe in the Nicolaas-basilique where this saint was named and known as : Sanda Necola Njore. In Italian this means : San Nicola Nero, or Black Holy Nicolas in English and Sint Nicolaas de Zwarte in Dutch.

In the basilique in Bari, you will find Nicolas with a mocca coloured skin like a Barik sailor after a very long journey at sea. Some think he was a Moor, or an Arab, because of his tainted skin colour as if this saint got a lot of sunshine during his journey. The images and statues in old churches often get very dark and dusty during their stay inside those churches and as a result of that long stay the skin of all statues become very dark, brown sometimes even black.

The truth is we don't really how he must have looked like, but there is of course the catholic robe and clothing. Originally the Saint was Spanish - Italy was part of Spain a long time ago, and people in northern Europe thought that everyone that lived that far south was rich which explained why and how Nicolas was able to help so many poor people.
Saint Nicolas used to be known in Russia where he was as popular as Mother Mary - Maria mother of Jesus - his reliques are transported from Myra where he spent most of his life - to Bari in the south of Italy that used to be Spanish ground a long time ago.

Nicolas of Myra was born in 270.
Long after Nicolas of Myra (a place in what we now know as Turkye) died - during the second concile in Nicea 787, Theodoor - Myra's bisshop had an important announcement to make. The image as we can see it in the byzantine church was made while Nicolas was still alive and the image shows us an old man, with red cheeks and curly long white hair as a result of very old age. The text that offered some inside information about Saint Nicolas was translated from Greek and to honour him, Theodoor decided to share the information with the public.

Saints are part of catholism, its culture and history.
They have done good, they have given their lives for humanity, they have done miracles and most of the stories were past on in oral teachings and eventually written down in books and scrolls. Some saints are legendary and their lives became legends. These stories were passed on to all who were interested and told to children and adults to set a good example, to bring hope, to entertain people and they were considered to be good advertisement for the church.

Sinterklaas, Saint Nicolas was a special little baby child.
The story goes that he could stand up in his baby bathtub when he was 2 days old and shortly after that refused mothers milk twice a week. A sign of a desire to fast and of course very unique even for a saint. When he was older some saw this special saint flying through the skies with great speed to save the ones who needed rescue and later some had visions of Saint Nicolas to the rescue on a fierce white horse with enormous powers and elegance. He went out to rescue sailors in a storm at sea and whenever the men at sea were in trouble and needed help they would call upon Saint Nicolas as a protector to help them get to land safe and as soon as possible.

How children were involved.
The oldest proof that people and especially children were involved in the celebration of this saints birthday can be traced back to 1360 - financial notes in a town called Dordrecht show us that there was a child-bishop assigned when the winter started with 26 helpers to serve him. These young boys had to do the job for Saint Nicolas and help the poor by buying them shoes, cloths, candy, and gifts and grain or flour.. Others were given a little money and the day after his birthday they all had a day off.

This tradition made it possible for young men to step into adult life for a few weeks. During these weeks a young boy was assigned to do the task of an adult bishop but with the help of his friends, most of them living in religious homes and monasteries. The boys were challenged to behave like grown-ups, knowing what to do, judging what was best and to practice responsibility towards the community and to bring compassion into action.

Sinterklaas is a symbol of the historic religious figure and the teutonic hero who saved a lot of lives during winter, especially of children.

Nicolas the bishop of Myra.
Nicolas was born in 270 and died on December 6, 340. He was declared a Saint because of his great and good deeds but was scratched off the catholic calendar for an unknown reason. The catholic saint was dressed in red, with a golden wand with a curl at the top to bring in there all the energy needed to do his work : protect the innocent, the poor and the ones that were in trouble and do healings for those who suffered during a hard and cold winter.

Soon a lot of legends were built and created around this man. He would throw money and food and candy and gifts into the houses of those who had to live in poverty and he offered opportunities to get a education for boys and young men who were doomed to spent their lives without any prosperity. He would offer young people a chance to find love and luck by paying the dowry for the girls born in poor families so they would have a chance of marrying a good man in stead of becoming a easy pray for men with bad intentions and/or to prevent them becoming prostitutes in an attempt to escape from hunger and eventually death.

He represents generosity, humility, faithfulness, compassion.

The other figure is Wodan or Odin.
A great deity with a robe, a cap and a big white beard. Riding the skies on a strong white horse. Sometimes the horse is black. The horse had 8 legs and was named Sleipnir. In one hand Wodan held a spear or wand with a snakes head at the end. Two big black birds were there with him to inform him about what had to be done and what was going on below. His son Balder accompanied his father when ever he could and he too could sneak up on you to see if you were behaving in a good way.

There are also other minor gods as Balder that can be considered to be helpers and servants of Wodan. Before and during the middle ages, people offered Wodan food and beer at the fire place so he could enter their homes to the fire place when all were asleep. And before food, beer and bread were introduced people of the old tradition were used to offer blood, animals and slaves. These items were sacrificed to call Wodan and the luck he would bring. Good thing of course these sacrifices were changed in time into food, water, beer, and sometimes fruits and grains for the black birds.

Past Lives and Fireplaces : Before the Middle Ages the fire place was already the centre in every house where people in their homes would sleep and get together to tell stories and find warmth and comfort. The chimney was also and always the channel where ancestors and entities good travel from one plane to another. In the very early ages passed relatives were buried under the floor in homes and shelters, so they would be around with the living.
Offering sacrifices such as grain, berries and straw was a remaining ritual to serve Lugh. After the last harvest of the year there was darkness and there was not much else to do then to keep warm and to survive the cold winter. Children were most vulnerable and therefore lots of Love and Luck and Light was needed to get them through the hard time healthy enough to make it till spring.

Saint Nicolas and Wodan are important keepers of children, sailors and ships, commerce and crafts, harvests, justice and relationships.

Additive historic facts and stories :
The catholic church couldn't banish this powerful and popular deity Wodan so they dressed him up with a red robe, and the appropriate clothing to make some adjustments to the old religion. The ravens were replaced by little black boys to show how a saint had to be served and all that did not really work out of course because these boys were riots, clowns, extremely naughty and made everyone smile.

Black More Slaves : The people saw young black Mores as slaves serving the rich when they were out there in the open with their masters and there were a lot of stories going around those young men, good and bad, but they were poor and never to allowed to talk to rich and noted people not even to their servants so the stories began that these boys from an unknown and far away place came through the chimneys and to the fireplace at night to find a substitute for the warmth of the sun they were used to before they were brought to the northern countries.
Similar stories also existed about Wodans son and servants and about the little local boys that were responsible for cleaning up the chimneys. All this completed the mix of historic facts, cultural believes and catholicism.

Living Brooms : Little boys living during the middle ages without a warm home to live in had to clean up the fire places and the chimneys and when they did their job they became so black and filthy you couldn't possibly rub it off or clean it with water and soap. These little boys - living brooms - were Nicolas' helpers when it was his birthday. Normally they were held responsible when the cities would burn or something caught fire, so they were very busy, very careful.
Fire was a great danger in the middle ages especially in larger towns and cities so the boys tried to be as invisible as possible just in case and always climbed on top of the roofs to keep an eye out, to stay off the ground not to be seen, to be heard and never to be found.
As long as they did their job, the towns and cities were safe from fires and in return they were allowed to steal some food out of the houses they had cleaned up the chimneys and fire places. These boys lived off the ground and on top of the roofs their entire youth.
These ''Living Brooms'' became a living symbol and proof the big black ravens of Odin did exist and at night on December 5, the boys were allowed to roam the streets and give those who had given them a hard time a little scare. Only once and only on that special day. Maybe you could compare this to America's Halloween where children go around in the neighborhood to bounce on front doors and ''scare'' adults and then leave people alone as they harvest their treats.

The Devil : There are drawings that show the devil with a bag on his back dragging little children away through the fire place. This was all to warn the children to behave and be nice or else the devil would come to take them away. If they were good, they could expect candy, gifts and something nice like sugar and sweets, maybe a little money. Knowing the living brooms were always out there, but almost never to be seen let alone get a chance to talk to, made them available for educational purposes, like Wodans ravens and also the More slaves owned by the rich.
Good children who had done their tasks, chores and behaved nicely and polite were treated with the rewards of sweets and gifts. Those who had been naughty deserved punishment - they would be taken away from their parents by the devil - later the ravens, Balder, the black knights, or the young Mores who would take them with them to their homeland far far away. Or worse : The devil would take them to hell.

Pite - Piet : Another story tells us that Saint Nicolas bought the freedom of a young black slave called Pite - Pete in English - and that this boy decided to stay with Nicolas to help him with good deeds and later on other young children became servants also to make the Saints life a little easier when he grew older and older. Servants of noted people had special clothing that is why the boys were dressed up in colourful fancy clothes.

4 groups of helpers : The Living Brooms. The Black More slaves. The Black Ravens of Wodan. The Child-bishop and the 26 boys. This mix resulted in the figure of : Zwarte Piet. The Zwarte Pieten travel with Saint Nicolas when he comes with his ship to the Netherlands - remember he was a sailor and helped the sailors and fishermen out there at sea - and when he gets on shore, he travels with a white horse able to fly through the skies, followed by dark men running and climbing the roofs and chimneys. Stealing food and drinks and offering candy, gifts and Good Luck in return.

Dear Sinterklaas : Happy Birthday and I am thrilled to congratulate you with your 1737th birthday.

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