The 3 Creepiest Facts About the Real Santa Claus

3

St. Nick Was a Rowdy Bastard

Yes, the real Santa was truly a rough-and-tumble son of a bitch. His exploits may have been embellished over the years, but the guy was constantly in and out of jail and tortured. The fact that his face was pretty much a pulverized shank of lamb at his death gives validity to the hardness of his lifestyle, particularly that time he clocked a bishop in the face for saying that Jesus wasn't divine enough.

Soumela Monastery via FrJody.com
Someone in Turkey even made a lovely fresco of this sucker punch.

2

St. Nick, Crime Scene Investigator

St. Nick's done more for the wee ones of the world than to simply command his elven hive to build Tonka trucks. According to one fable, Nicholas met an innkeeper who butchered three kids and pickled them during a famine so he could try to pass them off as ham. After God's cosmic prodding led Nicholas to their corpses, he prayed to divinely stitch their little salty dismembered bodies back together.

Metropolitan Museum of Art
"From this day forth, you will be known as 'The Pickle Triplets' and possess all the powers of sodium."

1

St. Nick's Bones Are Supposedly All Over the Damn Place

Santa Claus doesn't live in the North Pole. No, he lives all across Europe, in many different countries, a little bit here, a little there. You see, in 1087, Italian sailors stole St. Nicholas' remains from Turkey in a harrowing heist that involved hoodwinking some monks and escaping an angry mob of villagers. His holly-jolly bones were laid to rest in Bari, Italy, where they currently reside, much to the chagrin of Turkish Santaphiles.

To make matters more confusing, an abbey in Ireland claims to possess his body, and a bunch of random body parts said to belong to St. Surly are strewn all over the globe as relics. So if Santa doesn't get you what you want for Christmas this year, try writing to his tooth in Germany the next.

Berolinensis
"Dear molar, I want an Xbox."

Reuben Glaser created Little Face Mitt and occasionally writes for the AV Club. He's currently working on a wildly uncelebrated free e-book called "A Chris Christmas Carol." You can find him on Twitter.