Euro Christmas Battle

 

Which nativity* is better?

My mom's brightly colored German style?

Or the Italian faux-wood muted style we bought in adulthood?

I may be of German descent, but I like the Italian nativity better!

*Wise Men to come later.  We celebrate their coming on Epiphany, January 6th, so I put them out around New Years.  We've acquired 7 for our Italian set a nice, sacred number. Since the Bible only numbers the gifts and not the men, we put them all out!

     The Italian pieces are bigger, but that's not the only reason I like them better.  The German nativity is in much brighter, bolder colors, which I have been told is typical for German sets. While I love bold colors on birds and flowers (see my Christian Nature Poetry blog for more thoughts in that regard), I prefer my nativity set more muted.  

     Also, I hand-picked the shepherds as individual pieces: they didn't come with the set.  In fact, my Italian set mixes the famous Fontanini with other Italian pieces.  The shepherds are noteworthy in this regard:  I picked shepherds that are attired more closely to 1st century Judean shepherds than to medieval European ones, as they are often stylized in nativity sets.  One has his sheep slung over is shoulder.  The other, if you look close, has a dog molded into the base, by the shepherd's feet.  I love dogs.  I hope one got to go see the Baby Jesus.

     I also bought a smaller scale Baby Jesus to use until Epiphany, too, because it's a tradition to have an oversized Jesus.  I wanted one more to scale.  Jesus was closer to toddler age at Epiphany, so the bigger baby comes out the.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

FRÖHLICHE WEIHNACHTEN!

BUON NATALE!