NICHOLAS, ST., bishop of Myra, in Lycia, a saint honoured by the Greeks and the Latins on the 6th of December. His cult is as celebrated as his history is obscure. He was bishop of Myra in the time of the emperor Diocletian, was persecuted, tortured for the faith, and kept in prison until the more tolerant reign of Constantine, and is said to have been present at the council of Nicaea, though Athanasius, who knew all the notable bishops of the period, never mentions Nicholas, bishop of Myra. The oldest known monument of the cult of St. Nicholas seems to be the church of SS. Priscus and Nicholas built at Constantinople by the emperor Justinian. (See Procopius, De aedif. i. 6.) In the West, the name of St. Nicholas appears in the 9th century ma rtyrologies, and churches dedicated to him are to be found at the beginning of the 11th century. It is more especially, however, from the time of the removal of his body to Bari, in Apulia, that his cult became popular. The inhabitants of Bari organized an expedition, seized his remains by means of a ruse, and transported them to Bari, where they were received in triumph on May 9, 1087, and where the foundations were laid of a new bagilica in his honour. This was the origin of a famous and still popular pilgrimage. There are nearly 400 churches in England dedicated to St. Nicholas. He is the patron saint of Russia; the special protector of children, scholars, merchants and sailors; and is in voked by travellers against robbers. In art St. Nicholas is repre
sented with various attributes, being most commonly depicted with three children standing in a tub by his side.
A legend of his surreptitious bestowal of dowries upon the three daughters of an impoverished citizen, who, unable to procure fit marriages for them, was on the point of giving them up to a life of shame, is said to have originated the old custom of giving presents in secret on the Eve of St. Nicholas, subsequently trans ferred to Christmas Day. Hence the association of Christmas with "Santa Claus," an American corruption of the Dutch form "San Nicolaas," the custom being brought to America by the early Dutch colonists. (For the ceremony of the boy-bishop elected on St. Nicholas's Day see BOY-BISHOP.) See N. C. Falconius, Sancti Nicolai acta primigenia (Naples, 1751) ; Bibliotheca hagiographica Graeca (Brussels, 1895), p. 96; Bibl. hagiogr. Latina (Brussels, 5899), n. 6104-6221 ; F. Nitti di Vito, Le Pergamene di S. Nicola di Bari (Bari, 1901) ; Charles Cahier, Caracteristiques des saints (Paris, 1867), p. 354 ; Frances Arnold-Forster, Studies in Church Dedications (London, 5899), t. 495-501 and iii. 21; L'abbe Marin, Saint Nicholas, eveque de Myre (19i7).