A Google search: "Birth Night" Celebration turned up many hits: This citation may be relevant to your inquiry: GEORGE WASHINGTON AND THE DANCE ... together. My Grandparents & self went up to Alexandria to attend the celebration of the Birth night. The room was crowded, there were twenty five or thirty ... www.colonialmusic.org/Resource/GW&Dance.htm - 29k - Cached - Similar pages ----- Original Message ----- From: <[log in to unmask]> To: <[log in to unmask]> Sent: Friday, March 29, 2002 6:22 PM Subject: Re: Birth Night Festivities > Hello. > > I will throw in my $.02 here if you don't mind. > > My grandmother continued to refer to Christmas Eve as "Birth Night" until her > death in 1960. She was a lifelong Virginian of very old stock (pre-1620), but > I doubt that the term was local. I do not remember her talking of "Birth > Night Balls", but we also never mentioned cotillions and such either. > > Could anyone look into the pre-1900 Christmas traditions to see if this was a > popular reference to that occasion? It seems strange to us in 2002, but > Christmas was NOT celebrated the same way before 1900, having been affected > many times by the melding of cultures here... and the consequent amelioration > of the terminology, etc. > > I hope this helps in some small way. > > Jon > > To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions > at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html > > To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html