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Most
Secular Humanists have discarded wedding traditions as superstitious
nonsense. To help couples determine which traditions they want to
keep in their ceremony, Celebrations
offers the following information for your consideration: Cake Dress Procession Ring Days Veil
The wedding cake is a very ancient feature of the marriage feast, symbolizing fertility and good fortune. By tradition, it should be made of fine wheaten flour and of as rich a mixture as possible, to indicate abundance. The first slice must always be cut by the bride; otherwise the marriage will be childless. Normally, the husband helps by laying his hand over hers while she is cutting, and sometimes by lending his own knife or his sword if he is a soldier. When the rest of the cake has been cut up, all present must eat a little. To refuse is very unlucky, both for the bridal pair and for the person concerned. If a young girl keeps part of her share and sleeps with it under her pillow that night, she will dream of her future husband. This is still done by many, but without the more elaborate ritual of the past, which involved passing a fragment of the cake three times, or in some districts, nine times, through a wedding right before sleeping on it. The bride also should keep a portion, though for a different reason. If she does so, her husband will be faithful to her. At one time, such portions were kept until the first child was baptized and then eaten at the christening feast. In parts of England, a plate of cake was flung over the new wife's head as she returned from the church, and omens were read from the way the plate broke. The more pieces there were, the happier would the marriage be. In some places, the number of broken bits indicated the number of children. If the plate remained intact, it was a bad sign, and usually some quick-witted person stamped on it with all possible speed to avert the evil omen. The cake itself was scrambled for by the guests and torn into luck-bringing fragments. On both sides of the Scottish Border, a somewhat similar custom was observed, but with shortbread instead of bride-cake. Here the scramble and the omen-reading took place when the married pair reached their new home which, before honeymoons were the rule, was on the evening of the wedding-day. The modern custom of sending pieces of wedding cake to friends not present at the marriage, though now mainly a conventional compliment, has its roots in a desire that they too should share in its luck-bringing properties.
The choice and making of the wedding dress is surrounded by traditional beliefs and strict rules, many of which are still very much alive today. Because she is entering a new state of life, every item of the bride's clothing should be entirely new. The only exception to this rule is the customary inclusion of 'something borrowed' and 'something old'. Nowadays, a borrowed veil often
provides both these necessities in one; formerly, the 'old' item
was frequently the shoes. Girls from the Shropshire region of England
used to undress completely on the wedding morning and start afresh,
with new, unlaundered garments from head to foot. Even pins that
had been used before were sometimes rejected. Nothing black should ever be worn by a bride, for obvious reasons. Green is always an unlucky color, connected with fairies, and believed by many people still to foretell a change into mourning clothes whenever it is worn. It is therefore very clearly unsuitable for weddings, and even today, few girls would choose it deliberately. In Lowland Scotland once, it was thought so ill-omened that not only the bride but the wedding guests also were forbidden to wear it. Nothing green was permitted in the decorations, and no green vegetables were served at the feast. "Those dressed in blue have lovers true," says a north-country rhyme, "but green and white, forsaken quit.' Brown is to be avoided because those who are married in it "will never live in a town." This appears to mean that their husbands will not rise in life or acquire riches. Yellow is widely disliked, since in country tradition it signifies "forsworn," and so is purple because it is a mourning color.
Superstitions of many kinds surround the bride's journey to and from the wedding, and to a lesser extent, that of the bridegroom and the guests. It is now generally considered extremely unlucky for the bride and groom to see each other on the wedding morning before they meet in the church. At one time, however, this rule was by no means universal, and was usually disregarded by simple folk who favored a 'walking wedding'. Sixty or seventy years ago, it was still a common practice for the two people most concerned to walk to the church, the bride going first with the best man and the groom following with the bridesmaid. On the return journey, the married pair walked together in front, followed by the bridesmaid and the best man. No ill-luck was expected from this pre-marital meeting, though some superstitious customs which have now died out, such as the absence of parents from the procession or the ceremony, were then carefully observed. The bride must leave her home by the front door, stepping over the threshold with her right foot foremost. It is lucky if the sun shines on her, or if she sees a rainbow on the way. It is most fortunate if she, or any member of the party, meets a black cat, or a chimney-sweep 'in his blacks', especially if the latter offers good wishes, or walks a little way beside the bridal carriage. It is also a good omen for either the bride or groom to meet an elephant, a rare occurrence, perhaps, at British weddings, but not unknown when there is a circus in the town. On the other hand, a pig running across the road is a sign of evil. The worst of all omens is for the bride to meet a funeral, or even to catch sight of one from a distance. Before the advent of motor-cars, the bridal carriage was always drawn by grey horses, if these could possibly be obtained. It is still thought to be lucky for the bride or groom to encounter a grey horse on the way to church. It was, of course, a bad sign if the horses refused to start, either on the outward or the return journey. By an easily understood transition, the modern car has inherited this superstition, so that a breakdown, or difficulty in starting, is now an unlucky omen. When the bride had been set down at the church door, the coachman was expected to drive on for some way before turning, since to turn the horses' heads immediately outside the building would bring bad luck to one or both of the married pair. In some districts, it was thought unlucky, until fairly recently, for a bridal procession to pass through a lychgate, or through the north door of the church. In many parishes, the latter was reserved for funerals, wedding and baptismal parties always entering by the south or west doors. A superstition peculiar to Suffolk is recorded in The Suffolk Garland, published in 1818, as one of the beliefs still flourishing at that date:
The wedding ring, which in some non-European marriage ceremonies is absent altogether, has in Britain and most parts of Europe so deep a significance that its loss or breaking foreshadows the destruction of the marriage, through death of the husband, or the loss of his affection, or some other disaster. It is usually considered unlucky to remove it once it has been put on in church. If it falls off, or is accidentally removed, then the husband must replace it in order to avert the threatened evil. In some districts, it is thought safe to take it off after the birth of the first child, but not before. The rule against removing the ring, though well known and still quite commonly observed, does not seem to have prevailed everywhere in the past. The fact that wedding rings were used in divination and love-charms, and sometimes in cures, shows that they must often have been taken off, presumably without ill-effects. Moreover, extreme poverty occasionally forced a girl to be married in a borrowed ring which she could not keep. If her husband could not afford to buy one, a neighbor might lend hers for the ceremony. During the nineteenth century when times were hard, it was not unknown for a parish priest to keep one in readiness, to be hired out for a small fee and afterwards returned. To drop the ring before or during the wedding service was very unlucky. If either the groom or the bride dropped it, it was a sign that he or she would be the first to die. If it rolled away from the altar steps, the omen was extremely bad, and if it came to rest on a gravestone in the floor, it foretold an early death for one of the pair, the bride if the person buried beneath the stone was a woman, the groom if it was a man.
Certain days and seasons were thought to be unlucky for marriages. One of these is the month of May. It is still quite often avoided by modern brides, as it was nearly two thousand years ago, when Plutarch inquired why the men of Rome did not take wives in May. He answered his own question by pointing out that May was the month when offerings were made to the dead and mourning was worn. "Marry in May, rue for aye," is a common saying in Scotland and northern England, and it is matched by other similar sayings with the same meaning elsewhere. Another, found all over Great Britain, is "Marry in Lent, you'll live to repent." Many people, of course, dislike Lent weddings for purely religious reasons, but they are also said to be unlucky for others who are not conspicuously devout. The same applies, though less now than formerly, to Advent and in some cases, to Easter Week. All these periods, except the month of May, were included in the Church's prohibited marriage-seasons, as laid down in the Sarum Missal, and probably this fact is enough to explain the lingering tradition of bad luck attaching to them. Before the Reformation, the rule forbidding marriages then was strictly enforced, and one celebrated without special permission during such seasons might well be thought to be a tempting of Providence, and unlikely to bring happiness to those most nearly concerned. Some holy days were also considered ill-omened. Christmas was an unfortunate day for any enterprise, including marriage. Maundy Thursday was unlucky in itself as well as being part of Holy Week. Opinions varied about December 21st: in Yorkshire, it was said that if a girl married then, she would soon be a widow, but in Lincolnshire, it was considered an auspicious date because, being the shortest day in the year, it "left less time for repentance." The bride and groom would be less likely than others to repent of their marriage later on. Ordinary weekdays had their significance also. An old and well-known rhyme says, "Monday for wealth, Tuesday for health, Wednesday the best day of all. Thursday for losses, Friday for crosses, And Saturday no luck at all." These prophecies, however, like those concerning birth on particular days, were not universal. Monday and Tuesday were disliked in some parts because those who were married then would come to poverty. Thursday was often unfortunate, but not in all counties. Friday is still considered ill-omened for wedding by many people, as it is for most other enterprises, but in a few districts, but in a few districts, it is, or was, lucky. The reason given for this belief was that the day is holy because its association with Good Friday, and consequently a marriage begun then is likely to be happy. It is, however, possible that this notion is derived less from Christian thought than from the fact in Norse mythology, Friday was sacred to the goddess Freya, and hence it was fortunate to lovers. Saturday is now a favorite day for the purely practical reason that it is usually a holiday or half-holiday and therefore convenient, but formerly, it was greatly disliked because of a belief that marriage then would be followed by the early death of one of the partners. In addition to all this, a now almost forgotten superstition once demanded that the day of the week on which the previous Christmas had fallen should be carefully avoided. The sinister influence of that ill-starred anniversary affected the corresponding weekday throughout the year that followed.
An old bridal veil is often thought luckier than a new one, particularly if it is borrowed from a woman who is known to be happily married, or if it is an heirloom in the bride's family. The good fortune and fertility of the earlier marriage passes with the veil to its new wearer. The belief that it is unlucky to wear, or see oneself in, bridal clothes too soon applies with double force to the veil. This should never be put on before the wedding morning except during necessary looks at herself during fittings, and then it must be tried on separately, not with the dress. If a girl looks at herself in the mirror while wearing it on any other occasion, the marriage will be unhappy, or the young man may desert her or die before the wedding day. When she is dressing for the ceremony, the veil should not be donned until she is otherwise completely ready, nor should she see herself in it until she takes her last look in the mirror just before starting for the church.
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