30 Santa Claus Coloring Pages - Free!

Santa Claus, also known as Father Christmas, is a bearded gentleman, fair-skinned and wearing a very bright red suit who, according to Western culture, brings gifts to children every Christmas.

You have surely heard of him already! We all have, because we all eagerly look forward to Christmas for the gifts he brings, between the night of December 24 and the early morning of the 25.

Santa Claus is actually inspired by the figure of the Christian bishop Nicholas of Bari, who lived in Anatolia. He is said to have been a very important person for Christians of the Middle Ages. So much so that his image stays alive in Santa.

Would you like to learn more? Then come along with us. Here at Coloring Together we have gathered very interesting information about Santa Claus, so that while coloring the Santa Claus drawings to print and color you will learn a whole lot. Do not waste time! It is time to color.

1. Santa Claus is inspired by a famous bishop who lived around the 4th century, in what is now Turkey. He was called Saint Nicholas of Bari, a very important symbol for Christianity at that time.
2. In Holland, a celebration is held with Christmas gifts, but unlike other places, it is not held on December 24 or 25, but on the 6th, for the feast day of Saint Nicholas.
3. In ancient Rome, festivals were also celebrated where gifts were given in mid-December, but instead of receiving gifts from a god or from Santa, children received presents from their elders.
4. Before the story of Santa Claus became popular, in Italy children received gifts from a fairy named Befana. Incredible!
5. Saint Nicholas is the patron saint of Turkey, Russia and Greece. A whole lot of miracles are attributed to Saint Nicholas. He was so important that by the year 550 he already had a temple.
6. A whole lot of miracles are attributed to Santa Claus, among them bringing back to life three children who had been murdered by a butcher. Another was reviving a drowned sailor with prayers.
7. It is said that Saint Nicholas dropped some gold coins down the chimney of a very poor house. These coins landed in some socks that were drying near the fire. That is where the tradition of decorating with stockings comes from.
8. Santa Claus's current outfit is actually credited to Coca-Cola, in 1931 after an advertising campaign. Who would have thought they were the ones who gave rise to his current image!
9. In the earliest depictions of Santa, he was a gentleman more like a wizard, dressed in green. Spooky!
10. The first person to be the "Santa Claus of the Year" was Nelson Mandela, thanks to the appointment by the prime minister in Greenland, in 2013, according to Express.
11. The illustrator hired by Coca-Cola to design Santa's suit was Haddon Sundblom.
12. It is said that the god Odin was a deity who contributed to creating the image of Santa Claus: a man with a white beard and on horseback, the latter serving as inspiration for the reindeer.
13. The pastor Clement C. Moore published, on December 23, 1823, a story titled "An Account of a Visit from St. Nicholas" in which he describes the character as a little old man with a white beard and a home at the North Pole.
14. In America no one knew Santa Claus. He did not originate on this continent! However, this tradition arrived thanks to Dutch immigrants, who brought him to New York in 1621.
15. In the first stories told about Santa he rode on horseback. This changed when the poet Clement Moore wrote "A Visit from St. Nicholas" and described him in a sleigh pulled by reindeer.