Why is it called Boxing Day? You asked Google – here’s the answer | Stephen Moss

Every day millions of internet users ask Google life’s most difficult questions, big and small. Our writers answer some of the commonest queriesThe first thing to say about Boxing Day is that its origins have nothing to do with boxing, or with putting used wrapping paper into boxes, or with boxing up all your unwanted presents, or indeed with football, horse racing, hunting, shopping, going for icy mass swims in the sea, or any of the other activities that now characterise the day after Ch