许多人认为感恩节是北美的节日，但在更早之前的西欧社会，人们就已经举办丰收庆典，感谢富饶大自然给予的恩赐。当欧洲人移民到新大陆后，也带来了这一传统习俗。
hello, i’m matt cail and on behalf of expert village i’m here today to tell you all about the history of thanksgiving.
while people think of thanksgiving as a north american holiday, one that goes back to the time of the earlier european settlers in north america. the fact is that thanksgiving’s roots actually go back much further. thanksgiving’s roots go actually across the atlantic back into europe which is where a lot of the harvest celebrations originated at least in terms of european western society. you can find a lot of these harvest celebrations actually worldwide.
but, particularly around in europe and just where you had like the cycles. and europe definitely oscillates between warm and cold. there are very strong definite seasons and you have the harvest period when you brought in all the crops that you had planted throughout the season, toiled over and you are getting ready to ride out the winter and then you have the harvest. often times people would celebrate by having a feast during this time.
and, places like northern france and england were no exception to this. and, many of these groups would get together and there would be, i mean these feasts would last over a period of days not just one meal. and as we start actually entering into a period of european migration to the new world a lot of these folks brought their customs with them."
almost every culture in the world has held celebrations of thanks for a plentiful harvest. the american thanksgiving holiday began as a feast of thanksgiving in the early days of the american colonies almost four hundred years ago.
in 1620, a boat filled with more than one hundred people sailed across the atlantic ocean to settle in the new world(新大陆). this religious group had begun to question the beliefs of the church of england and they wanted to separate from it. the pilgrims settled in what is now the state of massachusetts. their first winter in the new world was difficult. they had arrived too late to grow many crops, and without fresh food, half the colony died from disease. the following spring the iroquois indians(美国纽约州东北部易洛魁族印第安人)taught them how to grow corn, a new food for the colonists. they showed them other crops to grow in the unfamiliar soil and how to hunt and fish.
in the autumn of 1621, bountiful crops of corn, barley(大麦), beans and pumpkins were harvested. the colonists had much to be thankful for, so a feast was planned. they invited the local indian chief and 90 indians. the indians brought deer to roast with the turkeys and other wild game offered by the colonists. the colonists had learned how to cook cranberries and different kinds of corn and squash dishes from the indians. to this first thanksgiving, the indians had even brought popcorn.
in following years, many of the original colonists celebrated the autumn harvest with a feast of thanks.
after the united states became an independent country, congress recommended one yearly day of thanksgiving for the whole nation to celebrate. george washington suggested the date november 26 as thanksgiving day. then in 1863, at the end of a long and bloody civil war, abraham lincoln asked all americans to set aside the last thursday in november as a day of thanksgiving.
thanksgiving falls on the fourth thursday of november, a different date every year. the president must proclaim that date as the official celebration.共2页，当前第1页 1 2
thanksgiving is a time for tradition and sharing. even if they live far away, family members gather for a reunion at the house of an older relative. all give thanks together for the good things that they have.
in this spirit of sharing, civic groups and charitable organizations offer a traditional meal to those in need, particularly the homeless. on most tables throughout the united states, foods eaten at the first thanksgiving have become traditional.
symbols of thanksgiving
turkey, corn, pumpkins and cranberry sauce(酸果曼沙司)are symbols which represent the first thanksgiving. now all of these symbols are drawn on holiday decorations and greeting cards. the use of corn meant the survival of the colonies. "indian corn" as a table or door decoration represents the harvest and the fall season.
sweet-sour cranberry sauce, or cranberry jelly, was on the first thanksgiving table and is still served today. the cranberry is a small, sour berry. it grows in bogs(沼泽), or muddy areas, in massachusetts and other new england states. the indians used the fruit to treat infections. they used the juice to dye their rugs and blankets. they taught the colonists how to cook the berries with sweetener(甜味佐料)and water to make a sauce. the indians called it "ibimi" which means "bitter berry." when the colonists saw it, they named it "crane-berry" because the flowers of the berry bent the stalk over, and it resembled the long-necked bird called a crane. the berries are still grown in new england.
in 1988, a thanksgiving ceremony of a different kind took place at the cathedral of st. john the divine. more than four thousand people gathered on thanksgiving night. among them were native americans representing tribes from all over the country and descendants of people whose ancestors had migrated to the new world.
the ceremony was a public acknowledgment of the indians’ role in the first thanksgiving 350 years ago. until recently most schoolchildren believed that the pilgrims cooked the entire thanksgiving feast, and offered it to the indians. in fact, the feast was planned to thank the indians for teaching them how to cook those foods. without the indians, the first settlers would not have survived.