Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun The first weekday after Christmas, celebrated as a holiday in parts of the British Commonwealth, when Christmas gifts are traditionally given to service workers.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun In England, the first week-day after Christmas, when Christmas boxes or presents are given to one's employees, to postmen, etc.
- noun In the Scottish law-courts, same as
box-day .
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- engraving The first week day after Christmas, a legal holiday on which Christmas boxes are given to postmen, errand boys, employees, etc. The night of this day is
boxing night .
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun The day after
Christmas ; the 26th ofDecember .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun first weekday after Christmas
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
Perhaps because of boxes that were placed outside churches to collect special offerings tied to the Feast of St Stephen, or because of the old British custom of tradesmen collecting "Christmas boxes" of money or presents on the first weekday after Christmas as thanks for good service (mentioned by diarist Samuel Pepys).
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Examples
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