Snowman

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search

This article is about the sculptures made of snow. For other uses, see Snowman (disambiguation).

An example of a generic snowman

A snowman is an anthropomorphic snow sculpture of a human.

Contents [hide] 1 History 2 Construction 3 In fiction 4 World's largest snowman 5 Unicode 6 Gallery 7 See also 8 References 9 Further reading 10 External links

[edit] History

In occidental cultures and the northern hemisphere, snowmen are considered a symbol of the winter holiday season for many, and they often appear on Christmas cards and in front gardens.

According to old diaries and chronicles, this activity dates back to at least the Middle Ages, when in Europe every new snowfall would find townsfolk making snowmen in the streets.

[edit] Construction

Snowmen at Sapporo, Japan Snow Festival

Packing snow is formed when regular powder snow comes near its melting point and becomes moist and compactible. This allows for the construction of large balls of snow by simply rolling a ball of snow until it grows the desired size. Attempting to make a snowman out of powdered snow is extremely difficult since it will not stick to itself. And if packing snow is not rolled into snowballs before it freezes, it will form an unusable denser form of powdered snow called crust. In Europe and North America, most snowmen are usually built with 3 spheres which contain the head,torso, and lower body. Thus the best time to build a snowman is usually in the next warmest afternoon directly following a snowfall with a sufficient amount of snow.

The common trend is to then dress the snowman, usually with rocks, coal, wood sticks, and vegetables. Carrots or cherries are often used for the nose, as are sticks for arms and stones for eyes (traditionally lumps of coal). Some like to dress their snowmen in clothing (scarves, jackets, hats). However, some may prefer not to risk leaving supplies out doors where they could easily be stolen if someone were so maliciously inclined. Also, snowmen usually melt quite quickly on a hot day, which could cause clothing to become stuck under melting ice if not removed promptly. There are variations to these standard forms. These other types range from snow columns to elaborate snow sculptures (similar to ice sculptures).

Snowmen are usually built with two spheres in East Asia. In Japan, they are called Yuki daruma (雪だるま, Yuki daruma^?) lit. snow-daruma.