~+~+~ Victorian Christmas Trees ~+~+~ Queen Victoria and Prince Albert did not invent the custom of a decorated tree,  but thanks to them, it became one of the best traditions of the season.  Actually the evergreen tree symbol is a lot older than the Victorian era.  It was actually made a symbol in Europe during the Middle Ages.   Whoever was the first to bring a tree indoors and decorate it, by the middle of the 17th century, the custom of cutting small trees and adorning them with homemade trinkets, apples and cookies was prominent in Germany.  As early as 1605, a visitor remembered seeing a tree decorated with apples, gilded candies, paper roses and thin wafers. By the early 19th century, German-style Christmas trees were decorated with apples, cookies and the gold & silver strands known as "angel's hair", which were found in many homes in New York and Philadelphia.  Gradually, the Christmas Trees got larger through the years and could no longer fit on a table.  Later the traditional Christmas Tree in America would be decorated with strings of popcorn, or slices of dried apples, paper chains, cotton batting Santas and paper doilies.  Ornaments became commercialized after the Civil War.





NEXT