When the early church began to celebrate the Nativity of Christ, it did so on what is now the Feast of the Epiphany (6 January). At some point the celebration was transferred to 25 December. The earliest evidence for the commemoration (and possibly celebration) of what we now call Christmas on 25 December is provided by one of the documents incorporated in the Calendar-Codex prepared for 1 January 354, namely, a list of festivals celebrated by the Church of Rome at the end of the reign of Constantine, which contains the entry kal(endis) Ian(uariis) natus Christus in Betleem Iudeae (Chr. Min. 1.71).
The fundamental discussion of this notice remains that by Hermann Usener in Das Weihnachtsfest2. Religionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen 1 (Bonn, 1911). But Usener failed to connect the entry with Constantine’s residence in Rome during the months of November and December 312, when he remained in the city until at least 6 January 313 (CTh 15.4.3Seeck). It was the recently converted Constantine, I wish to suggest, who on 25 December 312 first equated the natalis Invicti, the birthday of the Unconquered Sun, his old pagan divine protector, with the Incarnation of his new Christian God and thereby fixed the date of Christmas.
I shall also present apparently overlooked evidence for the introduction of the celebration of Christmas on 25 December into the eastern Roman Empire.
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