December 25 is Christmas in Western countries. Although many countries do not have this holiday, it does not affect people around the world to feel the Christmas atmosphere.

　　We all know Christmas customs such as eating Christmas dinners, decorating Christmas trees, exchanging gifts. However, these are folk Christmas customs. Do you know how the royal family celebrate Christmas? Is there anything different? This will start with Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom.

　　As early as the beginning of the 19th century, there was no custom of celebrating Christmas in Britain. People had never heard of Christmas Card, Christmas Cracker or Christmas holiday.

　　This situation did not change until Queen Victoria ascended the throne. The Christmas we celebrate nowadays largely follows Victorian customs.

　　Christmas tree

　　Queen Victoria's husband, Prince Albert, introduced Christmas customs from Germany. In 1848, The London News published a sketch of British royal family celebrating Christmas. The queen and her husband stood beside the brightly decorated Christmas tree, and the children excitedly enjoyed the decorations on the tree. Soon, this aroused the enthusiasm of all classes in Britain for Christmas. As long as it was an affordable family, a tree decorated with sweets and small gifts would be placed at home to create a strong warmth atmosphere.

　　Christmas Dinner

　　The Queen's Christmas dinner was also very rich. A total of 46 chefs prepare Christmas food for Queen Victoria. In addition to making a Christmas dinner of no less than 12 dishes, they also made a surprising share of snacks gifts.

　　Late 19th Century Queen Victoria's Christmas Dinner Menu

　　Queen Victoria would send over 100 Christmas puddings and more than 200 pie to relatives, and each pudding and pie was decorated with edible gold foil coat of arms. This was a huge project, and the chefs had complained that stirring 300 pounds (about 136 kg) of the Christmas pudding mixture is too tiring!

　　Relatives and friends would return gifts. The Tsar returned a lot of boxes of catfish; the Austria emperor returned the wine made by the royal estate; The Germany emperor returned boar head and ham.

　　The Germany emperor sent wild boar heads. The boar's head was stuffed with fillings, decorated with plants outside, and an apple was in its mouth. It was placed on a gold plate. After the trumpets were played, the male servant held up the dishes. Along with wild the boar head, there was also a super large pie from the Governor of Ireland, made from 100 mandrill birds, and it took 4 people to serve.

　　A few days after the big party, people always eat a lot of leftovers, and Queen Victoria is no exception. She will eat leftovers for a week or so, even if the New Year's Day dinner entertains guests, she will still bring out the leftovers from the Christmas dinner. She insists on the shameful principle of wasting food.

　　Christmas Card

　　Queen Victoria also had a soft spot for Christmas cards, and once made Christmas cards by hand.

　　With the popularity of color printing technology, ordinary people can also afford exquisite Christmas cards. By 1880, giving each other Christmas cards with blessings was very popular, and more than 10 million cards had been sold in just one year.

　　The first Christmas card ever sent was designed by John Callcott Horsley for Henry Cole in 1843. And Henry Cole was the key person who contributed to the first World Expo. He suggested to the Queen's husband, Prince Albert, the possibility of making the London Expo a World Expo.

　　Open the box

　　The wealth brought about by the Industrial Revolution allowed Victorian English and Welsh people to celebrate Christmas Day and Boxing Day. The popularity of trains allows people living in the city to return to their hometown to reunite with their relatives.

　　Boxing Day, as we all know today, means shopping. In the Victorian era, December 26 was the day when servants and workers opened the "box."

　　This box collects the change donated by the rich and was a Christmas gift to the poor."A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens encouraged the upper Victorian class to give money and gifts to the poor and spread the spirit of Christmas sharing to every corner.

　　Cover of the first version of A Christmas Carol, 1843

　　Christmas gift

　　At the beginning of the Victorian era, children's toys were mostly handmade and expensive.

　　With the advancement of the industrial revolution, factories can produce toys on a large scale, and the price of toys has dropped. It has become a tradition to buy toys for children as Christmas gifts.

　　But in poor children's home, Only apples, oranges and dried fruits in the Christmas stockings.

　　Christmas crackers

　　In 1846, a London confectioner named Tom Smith wanted to wrap sweets in beautiful colored paper, but he found that it was better to sell paper hats and small toys in the package. This paper cracker full of surprises has gradually become an important symbol of Christmas.

　　Everyone crossed their hands while pulling the two ends of the paper cracker. With a sudden pop, the paper crown, small toys and riddles in the crackers fell out.

　　The Queen Victoria, who has love and supreme power, created her own Victorian Christmas in order to satisfy her desire for Christmas. She created a 26-letter Christmas opinion, infected the upper class to follow. And then she controlled the merchants and brought the royal supplies into the Christmas market until it swept the country.

　　The Cambridge University Library in the United Kingdom also has a well-preserved picture book "Father Christmas ABC" which published 120 years ago. It vividly described in 26 letters how the British family celebrate a Christmas in the 19th century, each letter represents a traditional Christmas thing.

　　Victorian Christmas set the tone for contemporary Christmas, and generosity, sharing, and gathering are the constant themes.

　　As the most famous Queen of England, Queen Victoria brought and popularized the World Expo and Christmas to mankind, and shared the wonderful things with everyone.

　　If you want to know more about queen, you can come to the World Expo Museum to see her diary."Read the World- Exhibition of Expo Historical Documentations " exhibited the "Queen's Diary", you can fell the charm of the Queen from her words.

　　Read the World- Exhibition of Expo Historical Documentations

　　Exhibition Name: Read the World- Exhibition of Expo Historical Documentations

　　Exhibition time: December 11, 2019-February 9, 2020

　　Address: Temporary exhibition hall 1 at World Expo Museum

　　Cost: Free

　　（Part of the materials come from the Internet）