How does Know Christmas check its facts?
Every fact in this book has a source you can check.
Every fact has a source
Everything this book teaches as history or fact comes from a source we can name, such as a library or museum record, a church’s own words, a scholar’s book or article, a dictionary or an old printed page. Before a fact is written down, the source is opened and the exact place where it says so is noted: the page, the section, the paragraph.
At the end of every article, under Where our facts come from, are its sources, each with the place to look, so you can check them yourself.
Saying only what the sources say
When the sources are sure, the page is sure. When they say “probably” or “perhaps”, so does the page. When historians disagree, the page tells you so. And when a well-loved story has no record behind it, the page says that too, gently, and tells the story as the tale it is.
How to read this book
Every chapter and article wears one of these marks, and so does any passage that is a different kind from the rest of its page. Look for the gold star. It means this part is history, checked against our sources.
True story- History, checked against our sources.
A tale people tell- A legend, told as a legend.
Christmas magic- Santa and the world’s gift-bringers, as families know them.
As the Bible tells it- The Christian story, in its own words.
A second look at every page
Research and drafting are assisted by software; every fact is checked against the sources listed and reviewed before it is published.
Before a page goes into the book, it gets a check of its own, apart from the writing: every fact is compared with the source it names, and every mark with what the sources say. If a page changes after that, it is checked again.
In our own words
Facts belong to everyone, but sentences belong to whoever wrote them. Apart from the old texts and short quotations we print and credit, everything here is written in our own words, and before it goes in, it is compared with the text of a large Christmas website to make sure no sentence has been borrowed.
When we get something wrong
If we find a mistake, we correct the page, and an article that has been corrected shows the date it was updated. If you find one, write to us at hello@knowchristmas.com.