The Christmas Orange
It’s Christmas morning and there is a rare, exotic treat nestled snugly in your stocking. You reach inside and withdraw a sweet-smelling golden orb brought to your county at great cost from the distant land of . . . Florida. Yes, St. Nicholas has delivered the Christmas orange.
For centuries, oranges have been gifted at Christmas. These days, most people aren't overly thrilled receiving an orange for Christmas. They’re commonplace fruits. You can even find pyramids of them at the local grocery store, for Nick’s sake! But there are two very good reasons why oranges continually find their way into stockings.
First, oranges at Christmas have a religious significance. They symbolize the bags of gold the real St. Nicholas once threw into a house to help its impoverished occupants. This legend of generous giving is also the reason stockings are hung. The bags of gold St. Nick delivered were pitched through a window in the dead of night, supposedly landing in stockings hung by the fire to dry.
Secondly, oranges might not seem special today, but in times past they were rare and costly. In fact, oranges have a long, romantic history. Originating in the Southern China, they were once so bitter as to be barely edible. They were spread around the known world by traders from the Persian Empire. Sultans and kings grew them in their palaces in silver pots and built luxurious orangeries (heated glass houses) to cultivate them year round. They sailed over the ocean on Spanish and Portuguese ships, where they served as a remedy for scurvy. In the new world, orange trees sprung up in Spanish missions and thrived in Brazil, Florida and California, where by the late 1800s, they were a sweet snack for haggard gold-miners.
During the Great Depression in America and later in European countries ravaged by WWII and later still Soviet occupation, oranges were often the only gifts poor families could give their children. Their citrus scent reminded weary families of far-off lands, adventure and decadence.
So if you are gifted an orange this Christmas try and appreciate your good fortune. It’s not just a cheap piece of fruit from the local market, it’s the taste of generosity and ingenuity. It’s a portable, aromatic testament to humanity’s love for sweetness, adventure and comfort. Following the Christmas theme, its a something small and seemingly insignificant that means more than meets the eye.
Brian Rutter, PhD, is the cofounder of Thing in a Pot Productions and a postdoctoral researcher in plant biology at Indiana University. Subscribe to our newsletter to receive our “Things About Things – Odd Facts About Plants” and video production tips in your inbox every month!
Works Cited:
Mansky, Jackie. “Why we should bring back the tradition of the Christmas orange.” smithsonianmag.org, 21 December 2018. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/why-we-should-bring-back-tradition-christmas-orange-180971101/
Musica, Nick. “A Brief History of Oranges.” fruit stand.com, 10 August 2020. https://fruitstand.com/blogs/stories/a-brief-history-of-oranges