By Paco D. Taylor
Tuesday, December 5, 2006
http://www.nigrasum.com/
Oh, Santy Claus, we hardly knew ye. But for more than a century of American Christmas tradition, we certainly thought we had you all figured out: a chubby old elf of a man with a porcelain complexion, blue eyes, rose red cheeks and a snow-colored beard. That appearance was set in stone.
Or so we believed.
Sinter Klaas
Santa Claus owes much of his existence to customs brought to the New World by immigrants from Europe. Interwoven in the American tradition of Santa are the customs of England, Germany, Bavaria, Italy and -- above all -- the Netherlands, where the clearest connection to the Santa Claus tradition can be found.
Before becoming known in America as Santa Claus, this mythical gift bearer was known in the Netherlands as “Sint Claes” or “Sinter Klaas,” a Dutch distortion rooted in the name of Saint Nicholas, a bishop in the Eastern Orthodox Church during 4th century.
According to the Dutch, Sinter Klaas leaves his home in Spain around mid-November, traveling by steamboat to the Netherlands to deliver gifts on December 5th, the eve of St. Nicholas' Feast Day (Dec 6). Garbed in a red Episcopal robe with the pointed miter headdress of a bishop on his head, and carrying a gold shepherd’s staff, Sinter Klaas’ status as a high priest of the Church is on full display.
To date it is unclear why the Dutch consider Spain the homeland of Sinter Klaas -- not that the North Pole makes any better a locale for the toy making racket. The actual St. Nicholas lived in an ancient city called Myra, two miles from the Mediterranean Sea. But there are a few theories on the matter, the best of which has to do with the Moors, the Northwest African peoples who were the scourge of Europe for several hundred years.
Strange as Africa having any connection to Sinter Klaas may at first sound, it makes perfect sense when it is learned that in the centuries-old traditions of the Netherlands, Sinter Klaas isn’t assisted by elves, like in the stories told in America. In the legends of the Dutch the helpers of Sinter Klaas are dark-skinned blackamoors.
Zwarte Piet(s)
Making a list and checking it twice to keep accurate records of who has been naughty, and who has been nice throughout the year is a monumental task -- even for a magical old man like Sinter Klaas. So assisting him with his gift giving tasks is Zwarte Piet (Black Peter), a Moorish youth with large gold earrings in his ears.
According to tradition, Black Peter holds the book in which the names of all the children are kept, as well as the records of their behavior. He also carries Sinter Klaas’ bulging sack of toys.
Though the origin of Sinter Klaas is generally agreed upon, the origin of Black Peter -- while considerably more recent -- is a matter of debate. Moreover, as Europe’s relationship with black peoples has varied throughout the years so too has the origin of Black Peter, whose relationship to Sinter Klaas has ranged from devilish bogeyman (who tosses naughty children in his sack and carries them off to a hell somewhere in Spain), to noble companion, to civil servant, to clownish slave.
Whatever his exact origin, Black Peter has clearly come to represent an Islamic tide which once swept out of Africa and threatened to overtake medieval Europe. The fact that he is most often described as a Moor (making him a Muslim) fits Black Peter firmly into the historical time line when an army of Africans made a fearsome advance into southern Europe, securing a foothold that would allow the spread of the Islamic faith into previously Christian and/or pagan lands.
The Blackamoor
It was in 711 AD when the Moors crossed the Mediterranean into what is modern day Portugal and Spain. Within ten years they would control virtually the entire region. Eventually they would also cross the Pyrenees Mountains that separate France from Spain, taking several towns in the south of France (then known as Gaul). It would take more than thirty years for France to drive the Moors back through the Pyrenees Mountains. Their occupation of the neighboring Spain, however, would last more than seven-hundred years.
Around 827 AD the Moors also took the Mediterranean Islands of Corsica and Sicily -- both of which they occupied for more than two-hundred years. Several cities along the southern coast of Italy were also taken, including Taranto, Brindisi and Bari, the city where the bones of St. Nicholas lie enshrined. In a letter written in 871 AD to the king of the Eastern Roman Empire, King Ludwig II of Italy wrote that Naples, under Moorish occupation, had virtually become “a second Africa.”
It is this lesser known history of the Moors -- as well as Dutch involvement in the Transatlantic Slave Trade -- which contribute to the figure of Black Peter. Once, as one writer describes him, the “ultimate bogeyman of nightmares and parental threats,” this Moor now serves in a more neutered capacity as comic relief: A black fool set against a white, godly St. Nicholas with clownish pranks and mumbling mouthfuls of pseudo Afro-Dutch Creole.
Nicholas of Myra
“Saint Nicholas, on whom the character Santa Claus is based, was of Northern European descent,”
But, truth is, he wasn’t.
Like countless religious figures revered throughout Christian Europe, the birthplace of Saint Nicholas was in Asia. Asia Minor to be exact (part of the area questionably referred to now as the “Middle East”). Nicholas was born to wealthy parents in Patara, a city on the coast of what is modern day Turkey. Orphaned when his parents died from a plague that swept the region, he was raised under the care of an uncle and the Orthodox Church.
Believing that he had been called to devote his life to religious service, Nicholas donated much of his inheritance to the poor and joined the monastery. Following in the footsteps of Christ, he followed the pilgrimage routes to Egypt and Palestine. Soon after his return home to Patara, Nicholas was appointed to serve as bishop of an Orthodox church in the nearby city of Myra.
In Nicholas’ day, Myra was a major port for the Eastern Roman Empire situated directly opposite Egypt, on the far side of the Mediterranean. In the Bible Myra is mentioned as a stopping point where Paul, under arrest for inciting a riot in Jerusalem, was transferred to a ship bound for Rome (Acts 27:5-6).
The Legend
The best known legend associated with St. Nicholas would lay the ancient foundation upon which the Santa Claus legend is based. It tells of a poor man who had three beautiful teenage daughters. This man had once been a noble, but, through a series of misfortunes, was nearly destitute. So much so that he considered selling his daughters into prostitution, as he could not provide the necessary dowries for his girls to become acceptable brides.
Soon Nicholas came to hear whispers of the poor man’s plight, and took it upon himself to devise a more saintly solution.
At the dead of night Nicholas went to the man’s house, climbed up on the roof and dropped three small bags of gold down the chimney. Now, earlier that evening, the man’s daughters had washed the laundry, and their stockings were hung at the fireplace to dry. Miraculously, each bag of gold fell into one of the stockings belonging to each daughter.
The next morning the family awoke to find the gold that an anonymous benefactor had left for them. Due to the generosity of Nicholas (whose identity would eventually be discovered), the man and his daughters would go on to live the proverbial “happily ever after” life.
Black Saint
For centuries after the death of Bishop Nicholas, frequently given as December 6th, 343 AD, legends of his miraculous acts and charitable deeds continued to spread. By the 9th century in the East, and the 11th century in the West, Nicholas was one of the most revered figures in all of Christendom. His tomb at Myra became a popular place of pilgrimage, and visitors often reported of being healed from sickness there.
For the Church of Europe religious relics from the East, including the remains of its holy men, were of immense value -- in both religious and economic terms. And in those days churches were all about the business of acquiring relics. So much so that on May 9, 1087 AD, a group of men from the Italian port city of Bari, raided the tomb of Nicholas at Myra, and stole the bishop’s remains. Back in Bari, a basilica named for Nicholas was built to shelter the coveted relics. They lie beneath the altar in the crypt to this day.
In the right transept, a side chapel at the Basilica of St. Nicholas, on a wall above a priceless silver altar hangs a nearly life-sized painting of the bishop of Myra. It is called “San Nicola Nero,” which translates from the Italian as “St. Nicholas the Black” or “Black St. Nicholas.” And positioned at the center of this surprising painting is Nicholas of Myra, rendered as a bushy-bearded black man.
The identity of the artist who created the piece, dated to between the 17th and 18th century, seems to have been lost to history. But for centuries now his beautiful work has been a spiritual focal point for parishioners and pilgrims of the Bari Basilica.
Out of the painting, the eyes of St. Nicholas stare forward, firmly fixed upon the viewer. Nicholas’ right hand is raised in the gesture of benediction, while his left hand holds up the Book of the Gospels. Atop the Gospels rests three gold balls (or coins), symbolizing the legendary act that redeemed the lives of a poor man and his daughters.
Hidden Tradition
To say the least, the “San Nicola Nero” painting is a surprising image, one full of meaning and reverence. Not so surprising, however, is the lack of documentation anywhere which tells how -- in addition to the now commonplace images of St. Nicholas as white skinned -- for centuries, images like this one at the Bari Basilica, have depicted the patron saint of Christmas with the features of African or Asiatic black populations.
Also in Bari, in an 11th century chapel inside the Norman Castle of Sannicandro, a weathered statue of a Black St. Nicholas endures. And elsewhere in Southern Italy, at the churches of Aradeo, Maglie, Mileto and Picerno, centuries-old statues and/or paintings of San Nicola Nero prevail.
Outside Italy, in Spain and Russia, where St. Nicholas is one of the most revered of all the saints, images that depict him as a dark skinned man are preserved. As far away as South America, at the Cathedral of San Nicolas de Bari in La Rioja, Argentina, a life-sized statue of “San Nicolas Negro” or “Black St. Nicholas” has been a celebrated icon of the church since 1640, when it was brought to the region by the Spanish.
“His representations in art are as various as his alleged miracles,” is the very most the Catholic Encyclopedia will offer a curious researcher on the image of St. Nicholas. And met with an old-time secret so guardedly kept, one cannot help but wonder if there are still other places left in the world where the old image of St. Nicholas with a blackamoor’s complexion lingers.
.
Free BS generalizations. 'White' and 'black' (where do YOU draw the line), you're playing your own game. Please tell me what those classifications mean to you. That's like me saying why do black people keep on depicting non-black people of importance as black? It's as if anywhere in your head where you see a person seems to be leaning a slightly bit more towards your own racist views (divisions of skin color and whatnot) of people, you 'claim' a person? What kind of thinking is that?
Damn, crazy as to what limits a racist'll BELIEVE (your words) and you then take part in the RELIGION (Beliefs) threads..