Everyone has heard it a million times “something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue” or “the groom can’t see the bride before the wedding!” but do you know WHY these traditions are in place? Where they actually stem from? I’ll give you a hint, they come from outdated practices that honestly, don’t make sense in most of todays weddings! I’m going to go over some of the most popular wedding traditions, where they stemmed from, and leave it up to you to decide if it’s worth including in your wedding day! At the very least, maybe you’ll learn something new!
BURY THE BOURBON
First up, a Southern superstition involving a bottle of bourbon! If you’re not from the South you may never have heard of this one, but in South Carolina we see it all the time. The folklore states that exactly 1 month before the wedding, the bride and groom should bury a bottle of bourbon at their wedding venue to bring good weather on their wedding day! But, there are a couple other points to remember when it comes to this Southern tradition. One, the bottle must be FULL and un-opened. Two, it needs to be buried upside-down. And three, you should try and bury it on a day with the kind of weather you are hoping for on your wedding day. The tradition doesn’t specify a kind of bourbon or the size of the bottle, but on the day of the wedding, it is to be dug up and shared by the bride and groom with their friends and family so be sure you pick something you actually want to drink if you’re going to partake in this one. Also, be sure to remember where you buried it so you don’t spend hours trying to find it on the day-of!
HIDING THE BRIDE
Number two, and one you may not realize, is the origin behind the groom seeing the bride for the first time at the altar on the wedding day. This tradition stems from a time when marriages were arranged by the parents. The families of the bride and groom didn’t want to give them the opportunity to change their mind about the marriage based on how their new spouse looked. Honestly, how sad! The thought that the groom might call it off if he saw his bride before the ceremony and thought she was ugly… This is one reason (among many others) why I think doing away with this tradition and having a first look is a wonderful choice. If you want to know more about why I LOVE first looks, you can read about it in this post, here.
SOMETHING OLD, SOMETHING NEW
Third on our list is the ever popular “Something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue” tradition. This one actually goes back to an old English rhyme from the 19th century which also added “a sixpence in your shoe”. The theory is that the old item is meant to tie a bride to her past. The new item represents hope and optimism for the future. “Something borrowed” should be from a happily-married friend or family member to bring good luck to the couple, and the blue item was meant to ward off evil. The color blue also stands for purity, fidelity and love, which are all good things! The final piece about a putting a sixpence in your shoe was to bring prosperity to the couple, but as this coin is no-longer manufactured it has sort of drifted from the tradition. However, some brides opt to put a “lucky coin” given by their father in their shoe instead.
EXCHANGING VOWS
At number four, is the story of wedding vows. At every wedding, during the ceremony, the couple will recite vows. Sometimes they are personally written and sometimes they are more traditional and repeated after the officiant. While today they are filled with sentiment and emotion, they didn’t always used to be that way. In fact, wedding “vows” were originally the legal terms with which the marriage was agreed upon by the two families. However, as time passed, marriage ceremonies became more of a religious affair than a business transaction and the vows were used to religiously and legally bind the married couple. Much of that same sentiment still remains today, but with the addition of personal vows, weddings have become less formal when it comes to the tradition of exchanging vows.
THE HONEYMOON
Finally, one that I bet you didn’t know! The tradition of the newlywed couple taking a honeymoon. This tradition comes from multiple practices actually. First, the idea of the bride and groom going away somewhere after the wedding first originated from a fairly scary practice of “marriage by capture” where the groom would essentially kidnap the bride and keep her somewhere hidden far away until the family gave up looking for her. Yikes! That eventually morphed into the groom taking the bride away with the family’s knowledge and consent as a “ritual practice” rather than an actual abduction. However, the term “honeymoon” comes from an old Scandinavian practice where the bride and groom would drink fermented mead for the first month of marriage (aka, a full moon cycle) to improve the chances of conception. I bet you didn’t know that was the origin of what is now simply a happy vacation enjoying newlywed life!
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