Facts About Strange Marriage Customs From Around The World
“Mawwaige….. is wot bwings us togeddah…” The clergyman in The Princess Bride may have said it best, but cultures all over the world have been celebrating marriage for thousands of years. Each culture has its own traditions and ceremonies to celebrate the joining of two people in love and matrimony, be they funny or carefree, serious or solemn. From eating chocolate and champagne from a toilet in France to dancing with a camel in Niger, here are 42 ways that people around the world celebrate marriage!
Marriage Customs Facts
42. Noisy Celebration
Traditional Norwegian couples are married while dressed in red and blue tunics covered with gold and silver bangles, which clink together making sounds that keep evil spirits away during their nuptials.
They also don reindeer skin boots and wear crowns covered with charms shaped like spoons. To follow the tradition, the bride must dance until her crown falls off.
41. A Colorful Shower
Italian couples can expect to be showered with brightly-coloured bits of paper called coriandoli at their wedding celebrations.
The word confetti comes from this practice—confetti refers to sugared almonds or candies that were once thrown at these celebrations.
This was an expensive and somewhat wasteful practice however, and in 1875 a clever merchant in Milan began selling tiny colored paper discs for this purpose—the discs were byproducts of the holed sheets of paper used as bedding for silkworms in silk production.
The paper discs caught on as they were cheaper and more fun, and presumably it was less annoying to be showered with coloured paper than hit by sugared almonds.
40. Two Bouquets
Brides in Mexico sometimes carry two bouquets down the aisle at their weddings: one for themselves, and one as an offering to the Virgin Mary, so that she may bless the marriage.
