BRIDAL TRADITIONS.

Te Aroha News, Volume XLI, Issue 6572, 5 February 1925, Page 7

BRIDAL TRADITIONS.

Bridal robes carry us back to the very beginnings of our civilisation. At first the Anglo-Saxon maiden went to the altar with her long tresses of flaxen hair flowing gracefully over her shoulders; and when fashion later decreed that her hair should be put up, the bridal veil was introduced to take the place of the silken locks.

The bride’s gown, too, has been of white material from time immemorial. Colour innovations, it is true, have recently been essayed, but the old tradition will die hard which reserved white as the most fitting symbol of youth and innocence. Most interesting of all to trace is the origin and history of the bridal wreath’. Saxon brides were cro\Vned by their married friends with a garand made from the ears of corn and wheat, this garland being a symbol also.

At a later date it was composed of myrtle and roses, the time-honoured emblems of true love. Later still it consisted of the leaves and blossoms of rosemary fitted on a metal crown, the special virtue of rosemary being, of course, its power of strengthening the wearer’s memory. For a still later brief period the gilt chaplet was all the vogue, flowers and foliage being entirely dispensed with. In Victorian days the bride was led into the church wearing her coronal of syringa, an ancient symbol remodelled to suit the taste of her generation. And close upon her heels, the same old tradition, comes our own modern bride with her pretty wreath of orange blossom.