Where does the name 'Boxing Day' come from?
We have to go back to the early seventeenth century to find the basis for the name. The term Christmas box appeared about then for an earthenware box, something like a piggy bank, which apprentices took around at Christmas to collect money. When it was full, or the round complete, the box was broken and the money distributed among the company.
By the eighteenth century, Christmas box had become a figurative term for any seasonal gift or charity.
Some time after the beginning of the nineteenth century, the word box of Christmas box shifted to refer to the day after Christmas day. The first recorded use of Boxing Day for the 26th December is in 1833.
|