It is tradition to adorn your home with decorations of green and red during the Christmas season, but just why we've settled on those two colours is difficult to know.
Bob Hope sang about strings of streetlights and stoplights blinking a bright red and green in The Lemon Drop Kid, but it seems the use of those colours predates even Bob Hope.
Many Christians believe red was chosen to remind revelers of the blood shed by Jesus Christ when he was crucified. The colour green is meant to symbolize the everlasting life of believers in Christ, embodied by the Evergreen tree found in so many living rooms, according to some Christians. However, it is at this point that some Romans, Persians and pagans politely differ.
For Romans, Dec. 25 marked the birth of the unconquered sun. The sun dipped to its lowest point on Dec. 21, causing the shortest day of the year. On Dec. 25, the days begin to grow appreciably longer, the sun was back, and that was reason enough for celebration. Still other scholars maintain the Dec. 25 celebration dates back to a pagan ritual. Many pagans nurtured a belief in the strength of trees, particularly fir trees and holly.
Because trees and holly endured in the midst of the cold of winter, they became a symbol of life, and of something indomitable, according to author Ace Collins.
In his book, Stories Behind the Great Traditions of Christmas, Collins attempts to delve into the reason red and green became the Christmas colours of choice.
While many pagan rituals were swept away in the passage of time, Collins suggests that associating life with the colour green found its way into Roman celebrations. The use of the colour red likely sprouted from holly, according to Collins.
In North America, the use of the colour red may be at least in part due to poinsettias.
