Jacob Marley

Jacob Marley is a fictional character from Charles Dickens’s 1843 novella A Christmas Carol. He was the business partner of the story’s protagonist, Ebenezer Scrooge, and has been deceased for seven years when the narrative begins. On Christmas Eve, Marley appears to Scrooge as a ghost, forced to wander the Earth bound by heavy chains and money boxes as a consequence of his own lifetime of greed and selfishness.

During this visitation, Marley warns Scrooge that he has one final opportunity for redemption. He informs Scrooge that he will be visited by three spirits in the hope that he will change his ways. Marley cautions that if Scrooge fails to do so, he will be cursed to carry chains similar to his own.