Images

A fresco of the early Orthodox Saint Ignatius of Antioch who died in the 2nd century CE.

A picture of a 19th-century coach caught in the snow. From a tin produced by Excelvit. (Private Collection)

Volumes of Christmas Literature. (Private Collection)

An 1880 coloured lithograph titled Christmas Eve by J. Hoover. (Library of Congress)

An 1848 illustration of the royal Chirstmas tree of Queen Victoria (r. 1837-1901) and Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, the Prince Consort (l. 1819-61).

A painting depicting the tradition of attending a morning church service on Christmas Day. Print by Hoover & Son. (Library of Congress)

A c. 1862 oil painting, Santa Claus, by William Holbrook Beard (1825-1900). (Rhode Island School of Design Museum)

Washington Irving and his Literary Friends at Sunnyside, oil on canvas by Christian Schussele, 1864. National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution.

Title page of The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., by Washington Irving, New York, 1864.

Portrait of William Henry Harrison (future ninth president of the United States) as a major general in the War of 1812. Oil on canvas by Rembrandt Peale, c. 1813. National Portrait Gallery, Washington, D.C.