Tuesday, December 6, 2011

Father Christmas Through the Ages: Christmas to Greet You, c. 1890

The Victoria & Albert Museum



Whether you call him Father Christmas, Santa Claus or Old Saint Nicholas, you have a set idea of what the jolly gift-giver looks like. Kris Kringle takes different forms in each country.

Here, we see a classic representation of Father Christmas, as he is known in the U.K. This greeting card is a charming masterpiece of embossing, chromolithography and block printing. Produced in Britain in the late Nineteenth Century, it bears the atypical message, "Xmas to Greet You."

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