<P> Father Christmas is the traditional English name for the personification of Christmas . Although now known as a Christmas gift - bringer, and normally considered to be synonymous with American culture's Santa Claus which is now known worldwide, he was originally part of an unrelated and much older English folkloric tradition . The recognisably modern figure of the English Father Christmas developed in the late Victorian period, but Christmas had been personified for centuries before then . </P> <P> English personifications of Christmas were first recorded in the 15th century, with Father Christmas himself first appearing in the mid 17th century in the aftermath of the English Civil War . The Puritan - controlled English government had legislated to abolish Christmas, considering it papist, and had outlawed its traditional customs . Royalist political pamphleteers, linking the old traditions with their cause, adopted Old Father Christmas as the symbol of' the good old days' of feasting and good cheer . Following the Restoration in 1660, Father Christmas's profile declined . His character was maintained during the late 18th and into the 19th century by the Christmas folk plays later known as mummers plays . </P>

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