From: utzoo!decvax!harpo!duke!bcw
Newsgroups: net.followup
Title: Re: One more thing on Christmas
Article-I.D.: duke.2933
Posted: Fri Jan 21 18:46:00 1983
Received: Sat Jan 22 05:28:27 1983
References: tektronix.924

From:	Bruce C. Wright @ Duke University
Re:	Lambing season

It's probably somewhat variable exactly when the lambing season is, depending
on specific flocks, climates, etc.  At least in northwestern Pennslyvania, if
you let nature take its course and don't separate the rams from the ewes when
they come into heat, the lambs will typically be born in January and February.
It is also not clear that this has much bearing on the exact date of the
original Christmas - I have heard that in the early church it was celebrated
later, around May, but that it was moved at the time of Constantine to fill
the traditional Roman holiday season.  I don't think there was anything about
it being less risky to celebrate the holiday earlier in the early church -
you have to remember that the persecution was rather intermittant, and that
Christmas wasn't quite the wild celebration that it is today (or in fact as
it has been since Constantine).

			Bruce C. Wright @ Duke University