1.
Nativity scene
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A nativity scene (also known as a manger scene, crib, crèche is the special exhibition, particularly during the Christmas season, of art objects representing the birth of Jesus. Nativity scenes exhibit figures representing the infant Jesus, his mother, Mary, other characters from the nativity story, such as shepherds, sheep, and angels may be displayed near the manger in a barn intended to accommodate farm animals, as described in the Gospel of Luke. A donkey and an ox are typically depicted in the scene, several cultures add other characters and objects that may or may not be Biblical. Saint Francis of Assisi is credited with creating the first live nativity scene in 1223 in order to cultivate the worship of Christ and he himself had recently been inspired by his visit to the Holy Land, where hed been shown Jesuss traditional birthplace. The scenes popularity inspired communities throughout Catholic countries to stage similar pantomimes, Nativity scenes have not escaped controversy, and in the United States their inclusion on public lands or in public buildings has provoked court challenges. A nativity scene takes its from the accounts of the birth of Jesus in the Gospels of Matthew, Lukes narrative describes an angel announcing the birth of Jesus to shepherds who then visit the humble site where Jesus is found lying in a manger, a trough for cattle feed. Matthews account does not mention the angels and shepherds, while Lukes narrative is silent on the Magi, the Magi and the angels are often displayed in a nativity scene with the Holy Family and the shepherds although there is no scriptural basis for their presence. The nativity scene created by Francis is described by Saint Bonaventure in his Life of Saint Francis of Assisi written around 1260, staged in a cave near Greccio, Saint Francis nativity scene was a living one with humans and animals cast in the Biblical roles. Pope Honorius III gave his blessing to the exhibit, such reenactment pantomimes became hugely popular and spread throughout Christendom. Within a hundred years every church in Italy was expected to have a nativity scene at Christmastime, eventually, statues replaced human and animal participants, and static scenes grew to elaborate affairs with richly robed figurines placed in intricate landscape settings. Charles III, King of the Two Sicilies, collected such elaborate scenes, the scenes popularity inspired much imitation in Catholic countries, and in the Early modern period sculpted cribs, often exported from Italy, were set up in Catholic churches and homes. These elaborate scenes reached their apogee in the Papal state, in Emilia, in the Kingdom of Naples. Different traditions of nativity scenes emerged in different countries, hand-painted santons are popular in Provence. In southern Germany, Austria and Trentino-Alto Adige the wood figurines are handcut, colorful szopka are typical in Poland. A tradition in England involved baking a pie in the shape of a manger which would hold the Christ child until dinnertime. When the Puritans banned Christmas celebrations in the 17th century, they also passed legislation to outlaw such pies. In the United States, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City annually displays a Neapolitan Baroque nativity scene before a 20 feet blue spruce, Nativity scenes have not escaped controversy. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals indicates that animals in living displays lack proper care, static nativity scenes may be erected indoors or outdoors during the Christmas season, and are composed of figurines depicting the infant Jesus resting in a manger, Mary, and Joseph
2.
Christmas in Poland
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Christmas in Poland is a major annual celebration, as in most countries of the Christian world. Later influences include mutual permeating of local traditions and various folk cultures, Christmas trees are decorated and lit in family rooms on the day of Christmas Eve. Other trees are placed in most public areas and outside churches, Christmas is called Boże Narodzenie in Polish. Among the special tasks carried out in private homes during Advent is the baking of the Christmas piernik, pierniki are made in a variety of shapes, including hearts, animals, and St. Nicholas figures. St. Nicholas does not play a role on Christmas Day. He visits good children in secret and leaves presents for them and they are lit on Christmas Eve before Wigilia. At the top of each there is a star or a glittering tree topper. In many homes, sparklers are hung on the branches of the trees for wintery ambiance, sometimes the trees are left standing until February 2, the feast day of St. Mary of the Candle of Lighting. During Advent and all the way until Epiphany, or the baptism of Jesus, some of them sing carols, others recite verses or put on szopki, or herody. The last two customs are inspired by the traditional manger scenes or Jaselka, one tradition unique to Poland is the sharing of the opłatek, a thin wafer into which a holy picture is pressed. In the old days people carried these wafers from house to house wishing their neighbors a Merry Christmas, nowadays, opłatek is mostly shared with members of the family and immediate neighbors before the Christmas Eve supper. As each person shares pieces of the wafer with another, they are supposed to forgive each other any hurts that have occurred over the past year, in Poland, Christmas Eve is a day first of fasting, then of feasting. The Wigilia feast begins at the appearance of the first star, there is no red meat served but fish, usually carp. The supper, which includes many dishes and desserts, can sometimes last for over two hours. It is followed by the exchange of gifts, the next day, the Christmas Day, is often spent visiting friends. In Polish tradition, people combine religion and family closeness at Christmas, although gift-giving plays a major role in the rituals, emphasis is placed more on the making of special foods and decorations. On the night of Christmas Eve, so important is the appearance of the first star in remembrance of the Star of Bethlehem, on that evening, children watch the sky anxiously hoping to be the first to cry out, The star has come. Only after it appears, the members sit down to a dinner table
3.
Christmas carol
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A Christmas carol is a carol whose lyrics are on the theme of Christmas, and which is traditionally sung on Christmas itself or during the surrounding holiday season. Christmas carols may be regarded as a subset of the category of Christmas music. The first known Christmas hymns may be traced to 4th century Rome, Latin hymns such as Veni redemptor gentium, written by Ambrose, Archbishop of Milan, were austere statements of the theological doctrine of the Incarnation in opposition to Arianism. Corde natus ex Parentis by the Spanish poet Prudentius is still sung in churches today. In the 9th and 10th centuries, the Christmas Sequence or Prose was introduced in Northern European monasteries, in the 12th century the Parisian monk Adam of St. Victor began to derive music from popular songs, introducing something closer to the traditional Christmas carol. In the 13th century, in France, Germany, and particularly, Italy, the songs we know specifically as carols were originally communal songs sung during celebrations like harvest tide as well as Christmas. It was only later that carols begun to be sung in church, many carols which have gained popularity today were printed in Piae Cantiones, a collection of late medieval Latin songs which was first published in 1582. Early, Latin forms of such as Christ was born on Christmas Day, Good Christian Men, Rejoice. Adeste Fideles appears in its current form in the mid-18th century, the origin of the tune is disputed. Carols gained in popularity after the Reformation in the countries where Protestant churches gained prominence and this was a consequence of the fact that the Lutheran reformation warmly welcomed music. The publication of Christmas music books in the 19th century helped to widen the appeal of carols. The first appearance in print of God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen, The First Noel, I Saw Three Ships, the Herald Angels Sing was in Christmas Carols Ancient and Modern by William Sandys. The publication in 1871 of Christmas Carols, New and Old by Henry Ramsden Bramley, in 1916, Charles Lewis Hutchins published Carols Old and Carols New, a scholarly collection which suffered from a short print run and is consequently rarely available today. The singing of carols was further popularised in the 20th century when OUP published one of the most popular books in the English-speaking world. First published in 1961 and edited by David Willcocks and Reginald Jacques, today carols are regularly sung at Christian religious services. Some compositions have words that are not of a religious theme. For example, the 16th century song A Bone, God Wot. appears to be a wassailing song, as recently as 1865, Christmas-related lyrics were adopted for the traditional English folk song Greensleeves, becoming the internationally popular Christmas carol “What Child is This. ”. It is not clear whether the word derives from the French carole or the Latin carula meaning a circular dance
4.
Poland
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Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe, situated between the Baltic Sea in the north and two mountain ranges in the south. Bordered by Germany to the west, the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south, Ukraine and Belarus to the east, the total area of Poland is 312,679 square kilometres, making it the 69th largest country in the world and the 9th largest in Europe. With a population of over 38.5 million people, Poland is the 34th most populous country in the world, the 8th most populous country in Europe, Poland is a unitary state divided into 16 administrative subdivisions, and its capital and largest city is Warsaw. Other metropolises include Kraków, Wrocław, Poznań, Gdańsk and Szczecin, the establishment of a Polish state can be traced back to 966, when Mieszko I, ruler of a territory roughly coextensive with that of present-day Poland, converted to Christianity. The Kingdom of Poland was founded in 1025, and in 1569 it cemented a political association with the Grand Duchy of Lithuania by signing the Union of Lublin. This union formed the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, one of the largest and most populous countries of 16th and 17th century Europe, Poland regained its independence in 1918 at the end of World War I, reconstituting much of its historical territory as the Second Polish Republic. In September 1939, World War II started with the invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany, followed thereafter by invasion by the Soviet Union. More than six million Polish citizens died in the war, after the war, Polands borders were shifted westwards under the terms of the Potsdam Conference. With the backing of the Soviet Union, a communist puppet government was formed, and after a referendum in 1946. During the Revolutions of 1989 Polands Communist government was overthrown and Poland adopted a new constitution establishing itself as a democracy, informally called the Third Polish Republic. Since the early 1990s, when the transition to a primarily market-based economy began, Poland has achieved a high ranking on the Human Development Index. Poland is a country, which was categorised by the World Bank as having a high-income economy. Furthermore, it is visited by approximately 16 million tourists every year, Poland is the eighth largest economy in the European Union and was the 6th fastest growing economy on the continent between 2010 and 2015. According to the Global Peace Index for 2014, Poland is ranked 19th in the list of the safest countries in the world to live in. The origin of the name Poland derives from a West Slavic tribe of Polans that inhabited the Warta River basin of the historic Greater Poland region in the 8th century, the origin of the name Polanie itself derives from the western Slavic word pole. In some foreign languages such as Hungarian, Lithuanian, Persian and Turkish the exonym for Poland is Lechites, historians have postulated that throughout Late Antiquity, many distinct ethnic groups populated the regions of what is now Poland. The most famous archaeological find from the prehistory and protohistory of Poland is the Biskupin fortified settlement, dating from the Lusatian culture of the early Iron Age, the Slavic groups who would form Poland migrated to these areas in the second half of the 5th century AD. With the Baptism of Poland the Polish rulers accepted Christianity and the authority of the Roman Church
5.
National anthem
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The majority of national anthems are either marches or hymns in style. The countries of Latin America tend towards more operatic pieces, while a handful of countries use a simple fanfare, a national anthem is usually in the national or most common language of the country, whether de facto or official, there are notable exceptions. Amhrán na bhFiann, the anthem of the Republic of Ireland, was written in English, the current national anthem of South Africa is unique in that five of the countrys eleven official languages are used in the same anthem. One of the two national anthems of New Zealand, God Defend New Zealand, is commonly now sung with the first verse in Māori. The tune is the same but the words are not a translation of each other. God Bless Fiji has lyrics in English and Fijian which are not translations of each other, although official, the Fijian version is rarely sung, and it is usually the English version that is performed at international sporting events. There are several countries that do not have official lyrics to their anthems, one of these is the Marcha Real, the anthem of Spain. In 2007 a national competition to write words was held, other anthems with no words include Inno Nazionale della Repubblica, the anthem of San Marino, and that of Kosovo, entitled Europe. National anthems rose to prominence in Europe during the 19th century, the oldest national anthem belongs to the Netherlands and is called the Wilhelmus. It was written between 1568 and 1572 during the Dutch Revolt, but did not become the anthem until 1932. The Japanese anthem, Kimigayo, has the oldest lyrics, which were taken from a Heian period poem, in contrast, the music of Qaumi Taranah, Pakistans national anthem was composed in 1949, preceding its lyrics, which were written in 1952. The Philippine anthem Lupang Hinirang was composed in 1898 as wordless incidental music for the ceremony declaring independence from the Spanish Empire, the Spanish poem Filipinas was written the following year to serve as the anthems lyrics, the current Tagalog version dates to 1962. Spains national anthem, the Marcha Real, written in 1761, was among the first to be adopted as such, in 1770. Denmark adopted the older of its two national anthems, Kong Christian stod ved højen mast, in 1780, and La Marseillaise, Serbia became the first Eastern European nation to have a national anthem – Rise up, Serbia. – in 1804. Ee Mungu Nguvu Yetu, the anthem of Kenya, is one of the first national anthems to be specifically commissioned. It was written by the Kenyan Anthem Commission in 1963 to serve as the anthem after independence from the United Kingdom, National anthems are used in a wide array of contexts. Certain etiquette may be involved in the playing of a countrys anthem and these usually involve military honours, standing up/rising, removing headwear etc. In diplomatic situations the rules may be very formal, there may also be royal anthems, presidential anthems, state anthems etc. for special occasions
