"Merry Christmas or Happy
Christmas"
We wish people a 'Happy
Birthday', and if you're in the USA in November and December you might say
'Happy Holidays', so why do we say 'Merry Christmas' more often than 'Happy
Christmas'?! Saying 'Merry Christmas' rather than 'Happy Christmas' seems to go
back several hundred years. It's first recorded in 1534 when John Fisher (an
English Catholic Bishop in the 1500s) wrote it in a Christmas letter to Thomas
Cromwell: "And this our Lord God send you a mery Christmas, and a
comfortable, to your heart’s desire." There's also the carol "God
Rest You Merry, Gentlemen" which dates back to the 16th century in
England. It comes from the West Country in England and it was first published
in the form we know it today in 1760. In the English language of the time, the
phrase 'Rest You Merry' didn't mean simply to be happy; 'rest' meant "to
keep, cause to continue to remain" and 'merry' could mean "pleasant,
bountiful, prosperous". So you could write the first line as "[May]
God keep you and continue to make you successful and prosperous,
Gentlemen" but that would be hard to sing! The comma in the phrase should
be AFTER the 'merry' not BEFORE it! But it's often put after the merry which
changes the meaning to make 'merry Gentleman' and so a 'Merry Christmas'! The term 'Merry Christmas' might well have
been made very popular in 1843 from two different sources. The first Christmas
Card, sent in 1843 by Sir Henry Cole, had this wording on it: "A Merry
Christmas and a Happy New Year to You" A Christmas Carol by Charles
Dickens was also published in 1843 and the phrase 'Merry Christmas' appears 21
times in the book! Charles Dickens also quoted "God Rest You Merry,
Gentlemen" in A Christmas Carol, but changed it to: "God bless you,
merry gentleman! May nothing you dismay!" moving the comma to before the
merry! The Carol "We Wish You a Merry Christmas [and a Happy New
Year]" is another old carol from the 'West Country' (South West England)
but was only first published in 1935 and this probably confirmed the use of
'Merry Christmas' over 'Happy Christmas'.
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