Georgian Christmas

The Georgian Christmas was a mixed bag. Beloved by the middle classes as a great tradition of ye olde Englande, yet simultaneously looked upon by some members of the aristocracy as a bit old-fashioned and (whispered) plebeian, there’s a definite ambivalence in contemporary descriptions. Mentions of the word Christmas in print declined, and, more pertinently, so did the opportunity to celebrate it. In 1761 the Bank of England closed on forty-seven days of the year – by 1834 it was down to four. Shops which had fought to stay shut on Christmas Day in the 1640s now opened, at least on Christmas morning, so that people could buy provisions for their Christmas dinners.