You may have heard of the song, "The Twelve Days of Christmas," and William Shakespeare's play, "Twelfth Night."

Today is that 12th day, Jan. 5. It's been a tradition since Victorian England to celebrate the end of Christmas on Twelfth Night, taking down the evergreens of Christmas season and lighting a bonfire.

Another holiday even older on the Christian calendar, the Epiphany, is celebrated on Jan. 6.

Before Christmas was set on Dec. 25 in the Fourth Century, Epiphany included the celebration of the birth of Jesus of Nazareth, but now primarily celebrates the visit of the magi to the baby Jesus, and the baptism of Jesus in some traditions.

According to the traditional Christian calendar, tonight marks ''Twelfth Night,'' or the Eve of Epiphany, the end of the 12 days of Christmas.

''That's the completion of the 12 days of Christmas,'' the Rev. Alexander Fecanin, pastor of St. Symeon Orthodox Church, one of several Alabama priests who has helped explain the church tradition to AL.com. ''Traditionally, the 12 days of Christmas is not the 12 days before Christmas, it's the 12 days following. We're still singing carols.''

Not many people still celebrate with 12 days of gift-giving from Dec. 25 to Jan. 5, as in the famous Christmas carol. But many churches do observe the ancient feast of Epiphany on Jan. 6, a holiday associated in western churches with the coming of the magi to honor the infant Jesus.

The traditional folk song, "The Twelve Days of Christmas," was published in England in 1790. The modern version we sing includes the line, "On the twelfth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me: 12 drummers drumming."

Very few Americans celebrate 12 days of Christmas starting Dec. 25. The earliest Americans, the Puritans, didn't celebrate Christmas and considered it to be pagan in origin and also too associated with the Roman Catholic Church. At one time, Christmas was banned in New England.

But the tradition was beloved in old England.

''Twelfth Night was the burning of the greens; you took the Christmas wreaths

down and burned them,'' said the Rev. Bill King, rector of Trinity Episcopal Church in Clanton. ''In the old English tradition you'd have a bonfire on Twelfth Night.''

While Roman Catholic, Episcopal, Lutheran, Methodist and other Western churches celebrate the coming of the Magi to adore Jesus, the Eastern Orthodox church commemorates the baptism of Jesus on Epiphany. Icons representing the baptism of Jesus are on display.

But many Catholic churches will leave up their Nativity displays until this coming Sunday, which is celebrated as the Feast of the Baptism of Our Lord on the Sunday after Epiphany.

"All the churches take down their creches and decorations after the the feast of the Baptism of the Lord; that's the end of the Christmas season," said the Rev. Richard Donohoe, director of Catholic Charities for the Diocese of Birmingham.

"The Christmas season only begins on Christmas Eve," Donohoe said. "When I was a boy, we didn't put the tree up until Christmas Eve."

In Italy, including at the Vatican, churches will leave up creches through this coming Sunday.



Now, it's a heavily commercialized season that begins with a marketing blitz immediately after Thanksgiving. By Dec. 26, many people feel anxious to end all the celebration.

According to an English newspaper, the Daily Mirror, it was a folk belief that spirits lived in the holly and greenery used to decorate for Christmas. The festive season provided shelter for the spirits, but they needed to be released when the season was over. If the custom wasn't followed, it was believed to cause agricultural problems in the spring.





