Wedding traditions - where they came from and why

Birdie85

I don't know how true this is, but it was part of an e-mail someone sent me about C15th England.

'Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May, and still smelled pretty good by June. However, they were starting to smell, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the body odour. Hence the custom today of carrying a bouquet when getting married.'

RainbowDrops

Birdie85 wrote: »

'Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May, and still smelled pretty good by June. However, they were starting to smell, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the body odour. Hence the custom today of carrying a bouquet when getting married.'

Haha! I'll be a June bride next year - I best remember to have my annual bath in May! :rotfl:

CashSavingGirl

Hi everyone,

I just love this kind of stuff. I once found a book from 1910 that was stuffed with old folklore and copied most of it.

This was the entry for weddings:

WEDDING LORE.
Let a girl hang a wish-bone over the door on New Year's Day and the first man who enters will be her husband.
Three candles burning in one room signify that there will soon be a wedding in the house.
There will be no wedding while peacock's feathers decorate any part of the home.
A girl who builds up a bright fire quickly will make a good wife. A man who achieves this, makes an extremely good husband too.
The bride ought not to see herself in her wedding dress by candle-light, for this is unlucky.
If the bride eats a cube of sugar on her wedding eve, her husband shall be as loving after as he was before the happy day.
The bridegroom should not see his bride fully dressed in her bridal robes until she sails towards him at the altar. If a rehearsal is thought to be necessary, some important item of dress ought to be omitted.
The bride ought to wear something round with her going-away dress, so that her happiness may last. An old, old rhyme says that the bride ought to wear:
"Something old and something new,
Something borrowed and something blue;
And see that the church is full to the chin
Ere ever you let the bride come in."
The dress is, as a rule, the new thing; the rest of the injunction is carried out by the bride wearing an old blue garter, which she has borrowed.
In some parts of the country it is thought unlucky for a man to see his bride on the wedding day until he sees her in the church.
"Happy is the bride the sun shines on."
Good luck for the marriage if the cat sneezes on the wedding day.
Never mark the wedding linen with the first name of the man before marriage, or you will not bear his name for long.
The bride who finds a spider on her wedding gown shall be rich as well as happy.
No girl should sew a stitch in her own wedding dress; nor should she make her own wedding cake, or she will find her married life a life of work. (But there are worse things than work, when the luck of Love is with it all the time.)
If the bride and bridegroom turn away from the altar after the ceremony, in different directions, they will soon be separated.
Whichever of the two answers in the louder voice to the questions in the wedding ceremony, that one will have small say in the government of the household.
A bald headed man at the altar, whether he be the minister or the father of the bride, means "ructions" in the married life of the young couple.
Let the bride and bridegroom when they are married go out from the church by the door at which they entered in; or they will be unlucky in their new life together.
Each should try to catch sight of a dark man when they turn from the altar; for to see a woman or a fair man is not lucky.
Always have an old chair in the house when you start housekeeping, for this brings luck to the new home.

Haven't things changed?

Hope you find this as interesting as I do.

CSG

mshelsbels

I had 52 wedding traditions / trivia in my favour bags and they went down very well! If anyone would like a copy of them just pm me (they're in a word document)

Here are some of them....

Proposal

During Medieval times in Brittany the man proposed by leaving a hawthorn branch at the door of his beloved on the first of May. By leaving the branch at the door she accepted his proposal. She made known her refusal by replacing the hawthorn branch with a cauliflower.

On the way to the wedding

Bad weather on the way to the wedding is thought to be an omen of an unhappy marriage, although in some cultures rain is considered a good omen. Cloudy skies and wind are believed to cause stormy marriages. Snow on the other hand is associated with fertility and wealth. (please let the sun shine!)

Bridesmaids

Bridesmaids were dressed in a similar way to the bride for the same reason as the origin of veil. The bridesmaids were thought to act as decoys to confuse evil spirits and thus protect the bride. (a bit like a modern day Buffy the Vampire Slayer then?)

The wedding

Early marriages were by capture - the groom would kidnap the woman, and take her away from her tribe with the aid of his best man, a warrior friend, who would help him fight off other men who wanted his woman, and also help him prevent her family from finding them.

Wedding Cake

In the past, the custom was to throw many small cakes over the bride in a similar way in which we throw confetti today. A modification of this custom was to crumble cake over the brides head and in some versions to break the cake over the Bride's head (bet she loved that!) In Scotland, Oat Cakes were used for this purpose. This was done to promote fertility.

The wedding night

The first person to fall asleep on the wedding night will also be the first to die. This is a superstition that obviously has no basis in fact, but it is still remarked upon . . . usually by the person who fell asleep last!

bubbles0169

CashSavingGirl wrote: »

Hi everyone,

I just love this kind of stuff. I once found a book from 1910 that was stuffed with old folklore and copied most of it.

This was the entry for weddings:

WEDDING LORE.
Let a girl hang a wish-bone over the door on New Year's Day and the first man who enters will be her husband.
Three candles burning in one room signify that there will soon be a wedding in the house.
There will be no wedding while peacock's feathers decorate any part of the home.
A girl who builds up a bright fire quickly will make a good wife. A man who achieves this, makes an extremely good husband too.
The bride ought not to see herself in her wedding dress by candle-light, for this is unlucky.
If the bride eats a cube of sugar on her wedding eve, her husband shall be as loving after as he was before the happy day.
The bridegroom should not see his bride fully dressed in her bridal robes until she sails towards him at the altar. If a rehearsal is thought to be necessary, some important item of dress ought to be omitted.
The bride ought to wear something round with her going-away dress, so that her happiness may last. An old, old rhyme says that the bride ought to wear:
"Something old and something new,
Something borrowed and something blue;
And see that the church is full to the chin
Ere ever you let the bride come in."
The dress is, as a rule, the new thing; the rest of the injunction is carried out by the bride wearing an old blue garter, which she has borrowed.
In some parts of the country it is thought unlucky for a man to see his bride on the wedding day until he sees her in the church.
"Happy is the bride the sun shines on."
Good luck for the marriage if the cat sneezes on the wedding day.
Never mark the wedding linen with the first name of the man before marriage, or you will not bear his name for long.
The bride who finds a spider on her wedding gown shall be rich as well as happy.
No girl should sew a stitch in her own wedding dress; nor should she make her own wedding cake, or she will find her married life a life of work. (But there are worse things than work, when the luck of Love is with it all the time.)
If the bride and bridegroom turn away from the altar after the ceremony, in different directions, they will soon be separated.
Whichever of the two answers in the louder voice to the questions in the wedding ceremony, that one will have small say in the government of the household.
A bald headed man at the altar, whether he be the minister or the father of the bride, means "ructions" in the married life of the young couple.
Let the bride and bridegroom when they are married go out from the church by the door at which they entered in; or they will be unlucky in their new life together.
Each should try to catch sight of a dark man when they turn from the altar; for to see a woman or a fair man is not lucky.
Always have an old chair in the house when you start housekeeping, for this brings luck to the new home.

Haven't things changed?

Hope you find this as interesting as I do.

CSG

ah carp!! my h2b is a young bald!!!!!

angel13

bubbles0169 wrote: »

ah carp!! my h2b is a young bald!!!!!

hopefully it means a second male in the area and not the groom:D:rotfl:

Lexxi

I've just read that the tradition of keeping the bride and groom apart was because the groom sometimes did a runner, after seeing her on the morning of the wedding, leaving the bride at the alter