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Early Christians took over the Pagan Solstice celebrations for Christmas and gave Christian songs to sing instead of pagan ones.
The earliest carols that were written were mostly in Latin, a language that the normal people couldn't understand, and was only sung by the priest and choir in the church.In 1223 St. Francis of Assisi started Nativity plays in Italy. The people in the plays sang songs telling the story during the plays. These choruses were in common language and people watching could merrily enjoy and understand them. The new carols spread to France, Spain, Germany and other European countries.
Traveling singers (known as Troubadours, Jongleurs or Ministrels) started singing these type of songs or carols and the words were changed for the local people wherever they were traveling. One carol that has changed like this 'I saw Three Ships.' By the end of Middle Ages, carols even started to be sung in Churches.
During Victorian times, two men called William Sandys and Davis Gilbert collected lots of old Christmas music from villages in England and by their and other carol books, carols became popular again.
Before public carol singing became popular, there were sometimes official carol singers called 'waits'. They were named such because they only sang on Christmas Eve (this was sometimes known as 'watchnight' or 'waitnight' because the shepherds were watching their sheep when the angels appeared to them.) when the Christmas celebrations began.
New carols services were created and became popular, as did the custom of singing carols round the streets. Both of these customs are quite prevalent till today. One of the most popular types of Carols services are Carols by Candlelight services. These services are held all over the world.
The most famous and evergreen book on Christmas Carols is 'A Christmas Carol' by Charles Dickens.
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