The Advent calendar, which has become an indispensable part of the Advent season today, only came into being at the beginning of the 20th century.

~However, its actual origins can be traced back to the 19th century. The first forms of the Advent calendar originated in a Protestant environment.
For example, in religious families, 24 pictures were gradually hung on the wall in December. Another variation, simple but no less effective, was 24 chalk marks drawn on the wall or door, which the children were allowed to erase one by one each day (so-called "Strichkalender" or tally calendars).
Or, straws were placed in a manger, one for each day until Christmas Eve.

>Other forms include the Christmas clock, or an Advent candle that was allowed to burn down to the next mark each day. The earliest known homemade Advent calendar dates back to 1851. Those who wanted to order an Advent calendar had to wait a little longer: In 1902, the Evangelische Buchhandlung in Hamburg published what was probably the first printed Advent calendar: a Christmas clock for children, which is absolutely comparable in its use to the one that appeared in 1922 at the St. Johannis Druckerei (Dominik Wunderlin, lic.phil Switzerland).

In 1904, a Christmas calendar was included as a gift with the "Neues Tagblatt Stuttgart." However, the Lower Austrian State Museum states 1903 as the year of origin of the printed Advent calendar.