That reminds me, I recently saw the results of a study on the birth dates of people in their 90s and 100s and so, and they noticed a pattern. Many of those birth dates were apparently just estimated, as they were almost all listed as being born either on the 1st of the month or on the 15th.
Birth records that far back hadn’t exactly been standardized or made official quite yet.
So it only makes sense that they don’t know for sure when St. Nicholas was born.
The Wikipedia article I got the info from basically says that mid-month was considered a good time for religious celebrations. With St. Nick being a literal religious entity, that’s probably why his “birthday” was put there.
The mid-month habit goes a lot further back than St. Nick too. For similar reasons to St. Nick’s birthday, Julius Caesar’s assassination is/was said to have been on that date (aka the ides of March). It might even have been. There’s no way to be sure.
Interesting.
That reminds me, I recently saw the results of a study on the birth dates of people in their 90s and 100s and so, and they noticed a pattern. Many of those birth dates were apparently just estimated, as they were almost all listed as being born either on the 1st of the month or on the 15th.
Birth records that far back hadn’t exactly been standardized or made official quite yet.
So it only makes sense that they don’t know for sure when St. Nicholas was born.
The Wikipedia article I got the info from basically says that mid-month was considered a good time for religious celebrations. With St. Nick being a literal religious entity, that’s probably why his “birthday” was put there.
The mid-month habit goes a lot further back than St. Nick too. For similar reasons to St. Nick’s birthday, Julius Caesar’s assassination is/was said to have been on that date (aka the ides of March). It might even have been. There’s no way to be sure.