Why Are Red and Green the Colors of Christmas?為什么圣誕節的代表顏色是紅配綠？

As the last Thanksgiving leftover is consumed and the calendar flips to December， the unmistakable red-and-green flood of the Christmas season comes into view. The two colors fill malls and living rooms around the world， and adorn nearly every decoration， strand of lights， and ugly sweaters on store shelves. The Christmas season is inextricably connected to this color combination—but why？

While there may be no definitive consensus on how this color scheme came to be， there are a few interesting candidates for the official answer.

隨著感恩節大餐的最后一點剩菜被掃盡，日歷翻到了12月，圣誕季滿目的紅紅綠綠開始映入眼簾。世界各地的商場和客廳都布滿了這兩種顏色，幾乎每一處裝飾、彩燈甚至連商店貨架上的丑毛衣都是紅配綠。為什么圣誕季和這種配色密不可分呢？

盡管對于紅配綠是如何成為圣誕專屬配色并無公論，但還是有幾種有趣的說法可供參考。

PARADISE PLAY TREE

《天堂》中的樹

Probably the most obscure of the hypotheses suggests red and green may go back to Paradise Play， which was a traditional play performed on Christmas Eve about the Fall of Man and Adam and Eves banishment from the Garden of Eden. The story cant be recreated without a tree， and since it was winter， any good-looking tree was probably an evergreen. You also need a fruit to hang from it—a red apple or a pomegranate.

Its widely thought that as the Paradise Play died out， the tree remained—and turned into the modern Christmas tree. The red of the fruit and the green of the tree linked the two colors in popular imagination with the Christmas season.

這很可能是各種假說中最晦澀的一種，這種說法認為，圣誕節和紅配綠的關聯可能起源于圣誕前夜上演的傳統戲劇《天堂》。該劇講述的是人類的墮落以及亞當、夏娃被逐出伊甸園的故事。這出戲離不開樹，而冬天里只有常青樹還好看點。樹上還需要懸掛水果——紅蘋果或者紅石榴。

人們普遍認為，在戲劇《天堂》淡出舞臺后，戲中的樹卻保留了下來，并演變成現代的圣誕樹。水果的紅色和樹的綠色成為大眾心目中圣誕季的代表顏色。

HOLLY

冬青樹

Religious Studies professor Bruce David Forbes theorizes that medieval Europeans were looking for something to do during the bleakness of winter. So， why not party？

And that party “would feature evergreens， as signs of life when everything else seems to have died， plus other plants that not only stay green but even bear fruit in the middle of winter， like holly or mistletoe.” （Although mistletoe berries are actually white.） These bright reds and greens in the middle of winter may have made them natural candidates for the colors of Christmas.

宗教學教授布魯斯·戴維·福布斯的理論是，中世紀的歐洲人尋找可以在凄冷的冬天做的事。于是他們想，何不開個派對呢？

這個派對“將會有常青樹，在萬物蕭瑟時常青樹象征著生命;還有另外一些能在深冬時常青，甚至是結果的植物，比如冬青樹或槲寄生”。（不過槲寄生的果實是白色的）深冬之中的這抹鮮紅色和綠色很自然地成為圣誕節的代表顏色。

ROOD SCREENS

圣壇屏

In 2011， Cambridge Universitys Spike Bucklow commented， “We recognize holly as being a quintessentially Christmas plant. That red and green is in our psyche because of the Victorians， but it was in their psyche because of the medieval paint that we can still see on 15th-and 16th-century rood screens.”

Rood screens were an integral part of Western churches up until around the time of the Reformation. Their purpose was to separate the nave （where the congregation sits） from the chancel （around the altar， where the clergy would be） and they were intricately designed with local saints， donors， or other figures.

According to Bucklow， popular combinations of colors were red/green and blue/gold， with one pair of colors being watery （blue or green） and one fiery （gold or red）. Bucklow suggests that these colors were part of a representative barrier—separating the more earthly parishioners from the more spiritual altar and sanctuary.

By the time of the Reformation in England， rood screens had largely fallen out of use. In the years afterward， they would be vandalized or ignored as they decayed. Centuries later， according to Bucklow， the Victorians began restoring these rood screens and noticed the red/green color combination. Its possible that they adapted this red and green color scheme for a different boundary： when one year ended and the next began.

2011年，劍橋大學的斯派克·巴克羅評論道：“我們意識到冬青樹是典型的圣誕植物，而紅配綠是因為維多利亞時代的人們而深入人心的。他們對這種配色的情結源于至今我們仍然可以在15世紀和16世紀的圣壇屏上看到的中世紀涂色。”

到宗教改革時期為止，圣壇屏一直是西方教堂中必不可少的一部分。圣壇屏的用途是把教堂的中殿（教眾坐的地方）和高壇（圣壇周圍，神職人員站的地方）分開，屏上畫著當地圣人、捐贈人或其他人物的精美畫像。

巴克羅稱，圣壇屏常見的顏色組合是紅綠色和藍金色，一組顏色是水的顏色（藍色或綠色），一組顏色是火的顏色（金色或紅色）。巴克羅指出，這些顏色代表著一種屏障，將世俗的教區居民與精神的圣壇和圣所分隔開來。

在英格蘭宗教改革之前，大多數圣壇屏已經被棄之不用。此后多年，人們或是對其肆意破壞，或是任其腐壞。巴克羅稱，幾百年后，維多利亞時代的人開始修復這些圣壇屏，并注意到了上面的紅綠配色。他們可能將這種配色代表的界限改換成了另一種：舊歲和新年的界限。

Word Study

adorn /?'d??n/ v. 裝飾;裝扮

The walls were adorned with paintings.

psyche /'sa?ki/ n. 心靈;精神;心態

She knew， at some deep level of her psyche， that what she was doing was wrong.

decay /d?'ke?/ v. & n. 腐爛，腐朽

The smell of death and decay hung over the town.