Christmas and Advent: the history of the Christmas market

The most important things in brief

• The Christmas market is a popular meeting point for young and old during Advent, for meeting up with family and friends.
• Whether gingerbread, mulled wine or chocolate fruit: the culinary offer offers something for everyone.
• But where does the tradition of the Christmas markets actually come from?
• The tradition probably dates back more than 700 years.

A walk through the Christmas market often becomes a gauntlet - if you don't want to stop at every stall and buy something nice to eat. At each stand, a different scent fills your nose: bratwurst here, candied apple there, marzipan and gingerbread a few meters away and crêpes, churros and roasted almonds on the corner.

The first Christmas market was probably in Vienna

To quench your thirst, there's children's punch and mulled wine, Feuerzangenbowle and eggnog, Jagertee and Glögg everywhere. Grog, lumumba and hot caipirinha are now also widespread. So there is something for every culinary taste - otherwise the markets impress with the stands selling handicrafts, Christmas decorations, candles, candle arches, incense smokers and the like.

But where did this custom come from? There are sources that indicate that Vienna is probably the place of origin of an Advent market. In 1296, Duke Albrecht I of Austria gave the Viennese traders permission to organize a “December market”. This should provide the population of the city with goods for the winter.

First commodities, then stands with food

In general, it was primarily everyday items that dominated the Christmas market. This is how mostly basket weavers, toy makers and other craftsmen sold their products. Butchers sold meat for the winter. In the early days of these markets, however, snacks, as we would say today, did not exist.

But that was to change very soon, at the beginning of the 14th century. The Christmas and Advent markets were popular with the people, and in 1310 the Munich Nikolausmarkt opened its doors for the first time. With the increasing interest of visitors, the first snack vendors also came, soon it was quite normal that you could buy and nibble delicacies such as roasted almonds, nuts with chestnuts at the pre-Christmas market.

Rapid distribution in German-speaking countries

Because people liked this mixture - the range of diverse products and foods - the concept of the Advent markets spread quickly in the German-speaking area. The first of these transhipment points that was allowed to bear the name "Christmas market" was the one in Bautzen (Saxony), which was permitted by the king in 1384 and was therefore mentioned in documents for the first time.

Now the way to the Christmas market as it is known today wasn't that far at all. In the 17th century the clergy came up with the idea of ​​holding the markets in the immediate vicinity of the town church. The intention was to increase the number of churchgoers. The Christmas markets as we know them today in Switzerland, Austria and Germany have been around for about 100 years, the larger ones last several weeks and usually start as early as November. Christmas markets in smaller towns and rural areas are often only open for a few days, with traders moving from place to place on a daily basis.