- A: No. https://www.jstor.org/stable/3813871 at 182-183: It has been stated in a number of books on English folklore that the image of Father Christmas travelling through the sky in his sledge drawn by reindeer is based on such traditions of the heathen god. But it seems difficult to trace this tradition in England beyond the last century. Peter Opie gives as the earliest reference to hanging up stockings for Father Christmas an allusion in Notes and Queries in 1879, where it is implied that the custom is a new one, and he suggests that it came from Germany by way of America.
- Santa’s reindeer didn’t fly until 1823, in Clement Clarke Moore’s poem A visit from St Nicholas, better known as ‘Twas the night before Christmas’. In that poem they whisk the sleigh (presumably on the ground up until that point) onto the rooftop. Sinterklaas’ horse didn’t ride on rooftops until 1850. Sinterklaas is widely regarded as the main antecedent of Santa Claus, and Jan Schenkman’s classic Sint Nicolaas en zijn knecht has a bit about him riding his horse on the roofs. If it’s earlier than that I’ve found no evidence of it. Schenkman’s book dates to 1850, more than a quarter of a century after ‘Twas the night before Christmas’; Sinterklaas celebrations didn’t start to become mainstream until the 1870s or so. All of the mythology of Santa flying is 19th century in origin. Moreover, the detail about rooftops leads me to suspect influence from Moore’s American poem! Odin’s horse didn’t fly at all. Certainly no pagan source hints at anything of the kind. The only source that can be adduced that has anything to do with the claim is a 12th century Christian writer, Saxo Grammaticus. The purported reference to flying is in this passage, describing Odin giving a man a lift (Gesta Danorum 1.6.9, tr. Peter Fisher).
Is Santa derived from Odin?
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