A Season for Celebrating Peace
And so enters St. Nicks alter ego – Krampus. Birthed in the hills of Austria during a time when religious influence spread via word of mouth and took liberties in translating to the hearts and heads of local residence. Mistral shows and theater became the creative grounds for tales of St. Nicholas exercising evil from the souls of the inflicted. But where St. Nick found himself rewarding honest little ones for a year of good deeds, so too was there a deliverer of penance for those with not-so-good deeds.
The character of Krampus is more accurately an amalgamation of traits from the times depiction of Satan – black skinned, horned and hoofed with gaping jaws and all consuming tongue. He embodied the antithesis of Santa Clause and provide karmic balance to the purpose of the pagan holiday of the winter solstice.