Why do we give each other gifts at Christmas?

Crowded stores, last minute purchases and the pressure to find the present that will please loved ones… The familiar image of this pre-Christmas marathon punctuates each end of the year. In the West, giving gifts on December 25 has now become part of custom, if not almost ritualized.

But do we know why we trade them? Often attributed, in the imagination, to the arrival of the Three Wise Men who came to offer gifts to the Child Jesus, the tradition has its roots, in reality, in a very ancient era.

A very ancient origin: a pagan festival before being a Christian festival

In ancient Rome, already during the Saturnalia, New Year gifts were exchanged at the beginning of January, at the time of the winter solstice, accompanied by important festivities, to celebrate together the lengthening of the days and the return of light.

These ceremonies, linked to Strenia, goddess of health, who probably gave her name to “New Year’s Eve”, already had a spiritual character as well as a social function. Giving each other gifts is “a social phenomenon that has always existed and varies depending on occasions and places,” attests Dominique Desjeux, anthropologist and professor emeritus at Paris Cité University.

In the Middle Ages, the Feast of the Nativity was a pretext for the preparation of a large collective festive meal marking the end of the fasting period which precedes Christmas. There we exchange modest gifts and food, reminiscent of New Years.

It is also at this time that the practice is associated with the gifts given by the Three Wise Men to the Child Jesus. It is difficult to know if it inspired the Christian tradition. But it reminds us that “Christmas is the feast of giving to imitate God, who gave himself to us,” analyzed Pope Benedict XVI in his homily on the night of December 24, 2006.

The birth of the contemporary gift in the 19th century

From the end of the 19th century, Christmas gifts became restricted to a more intimate circle and became secularized. At this time, the family takes an increasingly important place and the child, heir to the booming bourgeoisie, is pampered. Christmas then turns into an annual family reunion.

Custom is a determining factor in the emergence of new commercial practices. Thus were born department stores like Le Bon Marché or Le Printemps, which capitalized on the phenomenon by making many items for children accessible at fixed and displayed prices.

Santa Claus, based on the character of Saint Nicholas, then emerged in the United States and gradually established himself as an essential figure who embodies generosity and spoils the youngest. In the 1950s, Christmas became more popular outside bourgeois circles and the toy industry developed. Gifts are becoming almost inseparable from the end-of-year celebrations, driven by advertising and the rise of the consumer society.

“The fundamental meaning of the gift is to create social bonds”

Emblematic of the holiday season, the Christmas gift is part of a system of gifts and counter-gifts, essential for maintaining and consolidating links between individuals in society.

“The fundamental meaning of the gift is to create social bonds within one’s nuclear family, one’s extended family and possibly one’s colleagues. It changes depending on the proximity we can have with those who offer them,” explains Dominique Desjeux.

Not reciprocating appears to be a “transgress(ion) of the social norm”. Gifts thus send messages: some gifts are a way to please, to show affection to others, while others, more cold and distant, are sometimes resold by their recipients. The gift is a way of recognizing the person to whom it is addressed, of telling them that they have a place. It is therefore not only material.

A study by the Research Center for the Study and Observation of Living Conditions (Crédoc) of December 8, 2025 entitled “Living conditions and aspirations of the French” demonstrates that, under the tree, material objects have been increasingly replaced by “experience” gifts. Meals in restaurants (33%) or cultural visits (18%) feature prominently in gift intentions for the upcoming end-of-year holidays.

Treating yourself to souvenirs rather than objects, or simply spending time together by offering collective activities, this is the trend that more and more French people are following. Beyond today’s consumerist aspect, Christmas gifts are part of a humanist, age-old and universal tradition of exchange.