We wish individuals a ‘Happy Birthday’, and on the off chance that you’re within the USA in November and December you might say ‘Happy Holidays’, so why do we say ‘Merry Christmas’ more regularly than ‘Happy Christmas’?
Saying ‘Merry Christmas’ instead of ‘Happy Christmas’ appears to go back a few hundred a long time. It’s, to begin with, recorded in 1534 when (an English Catholic Religious Bishop in the 1500s) composed it in a Christmas letter to Thomas Cromwell: “And this our Lord God send you a merry Christmas, and a comfortable, to your heart’s desire.”
There’s too the carol “God Rest You Merry, Gentlemen” which dates back to the 16th century in Britain. It comes from the West Nation in England and it was, to begin with, distributed within the frame we know it nowadays in 1760.
In the English dialect of the time, the phrase ‘Rest You Merry’ didn’t basically mean to be cheerful; ‘rest’ implied “to keep, cause to proceed to stay” and ‘merry’ seem “pleasant, bountiful, affluent”. So we can say starting line as ” [May] God keep you and proceed to create you fruitful and affluent, Men of their word” but that would be difficult to sing!
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The comma within the phrase ought to be AFTER the ‘merry’ not Sometime recently it! But it’s regularly put after the joyful which changes the meaning to form ‘merry Gentleman’ and so a ‘Merry Christmas’!
The term ‘Merry Christmas’ might well have been made exceptionally prevalent in 1843 from two distinctive sources.
The to begin with Christmas Card, sent in 1843 by Sir Henry Cole, had this wording on it: “A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to You”.
“Firstchristmascard”. Licensed under Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens was also published in 1843 and the state ‘Merry Christmas’ shows up 21 times within the book! Charles Dickens too cited “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 ancient carol from the ‘West Country’ (South West Britain) but was as it were, to begin with, distributed in 1935 and this likely affirmed the utilize of ‘Merry Christmas’ over ‘Happy Christmas’.
source: Christmas.com
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