that time of year again

You can generally be at rest and assured that when December arrives, the MSM will cover stories and articles related to Christmas and the birth of Christ. Time or Newsweek, and sometimes both, will feature Jesus, Mary, Joseph or some other person involved in the Nativity story on the magazine cover.

This time, Benedicta Cipolla is writing for WaPo about the wisemen. Oh, you thought there were three of them?

The scene ingrained in the public imagination -- a stately procession of three kings in turbans, crowns, elaborate capes and fancy slippers, with an entourage of servants and camels trailing behind -- is a common image in books and films, but it isn't from Scripture.

In fact, there's no evidence in the Gospels that the Magi were kings, or even that there were three, much less that they sidled up to a manger on dromedaries exactly 12 days after Jesus's birth.

"Legends pop up when people begin to look closely at historical events," said Christopher Bellitto, assistant professor of history at New Jersey's Kean University. "They want to fill in the blanks."