Mrs. Claus

Two hundred years ago, “Santa Claus” was a woman. At least, that’s the assumption we find being made in a group of writings published in the New-York Evening Post near the close of December 1815, back at a time when the Santa Claus mythos as we know it today was still largely unfixed and unformed. I don’t mean to claim that the average New Yorker of the period necessarily thought Santa Claus was female, but the idea seems at least to have been plausible enough not to get rejected out of hand. In this post, I’ll share the texts themselves and then speculate about how they might fit into a broader history of the Santa Claus tradition. But what’s that you say? “Santa Claus” is just another name for St. Nicholas, who’s obviously male? Well, according to the sources we’ll be examining from 1815, that’s not the case—St. Nicholas was actually Santa Claus’s husband! The string of documents began with a brief notice in the New-York Evening Post of December 27, 1815. Like the later installments, it appeared on the second of four pages, which was the most prominent place the editor could have put it—the front page was reserved for paid advertisements. NOW THEREFORE, I Santa Clause, Queen and Empress of handsome girls, women married and unmarried, not excepting ugly girls, and old maids of all sorts, phizzes, sizes and descriptions, have thought it proper to issue this my proclamation, commanding, and enjoining all males of all sorts, sizes and descriptions, to desist from this unlawful, indecent, rude, vulgar and ungentleman like [sic] practice from the date of these presents until the fourth of January, 1816; and I hereby further command, that if any male of any sort, size and description be found kissing or attempting to kiss, or making the least advances towards kissing, that he shall be considered hereafter as vulgar, rude, indecent and ungentlemanlike, by all my subjects.—And it is hereby further ordered and commanded, that all my female subjects, of whatever sort, size or description, do give the person so attempting, &c. a hearty box on the left ear, being next to the right hand; and if any of you my subjects submit to any person of the above sort, size or description, the said persons may have it in their power to consider you as deficient in your duty, and to kiss you until your cheeks are filed away by their human files, and not a particle of skin remains. I ran across this “proclamation” on my own, but it has also received a little recent attention elsewhere (in isolation from the other three pieces of the series). John Baker discovered it and brought it up for discussion on Linguistlist on September 7, 2014, in a post with the subject line “Mysterious Early Santa Claus,” writing: “We’ve all heard of Mrs. Claus, but this is the first time I’ve seen Santa Claus referred to as a woman. The item is also quite unusual for its lack of reference to Christmas, though of course its timing was at that time of year.” In fact, Santa Claus (or St. Nicholas, for that matter) wasn’t yet associated closely with Christmas as of 1815, so the lack of reference to that holiday shouldn’t really come as a surprise. Apart from a suggestion that “Santa Claus” might have been a misprint for “Santa Muerte,” there wasn’t any substantive follow-up to the Linguistlist post. But let’s summarize the main points of the “proclamation.” Santa Claus (here written “Santa-Claus” or “Santa Clause”) is identified as “Queen and Empress” both of the “Court of Fashions” and of women of all descriptions, who are represented as her “subjects.” 1815 is supposedly the 1717th year of her reign, which would have begun circa 98 AD, but she has signed the decree in New York City, suggesting that she’s at home there. She commands men not to kiss her subjects during the following week, which overlaps New Year’s Day, and commands her own subjects in turn to scorn them and strike them on their ears if they try, stipulating that if they don’t, the men are welcome to scour the