Easter Traditions From Around the World
Every nation has its own holiday traditions and Easter is no exception. The world’s diversity is reflected in these customs. I love collecting trivia and legend and lore. Here are some of my favorites to share with you.
United States
Begins with carnival, a celebratory parade in New Orleans the night before Lent. Lent continues for six weeks ending with a sunrise service on Easter morning. Some traditions include dying eggs, hunting for baskets and an egg hunt before enjoying a meal of ham, potatoes, breads and desserts. There is an annual egg hunt hosted by the president in Washington D.C. at the White House, a tradition started in 1978 by Rutherford B. Hayes.
England
In small towns, pancake races are held on Shrove Tuesday to mark the start of Lent. Traditionally, pancakes were made to empty the larders of rich food until Easter Day.
Celebrates the resurrection of our Lord with a festive parade. Churches are decorated with Easter lilies. Dance performances are hosted in which Morris dancers costumed in white shirts and red sashes celebrate. To add to the festivities, they wear bells around their wrists and ankles.
Poland
The Polish love the traditional meal of ham, kielbasa and babka bread. No Easter would be complete without this light yeast bread made with plump raisins, rum and vanilla. But not a bite is eaten until the food is placed in a basket and blessed at an Easter Saturday service.
Mexico
Papier-mache images of the traitor Judas of all sizes are suspended over streets and poles on Easter Sunday. They are filled with fire crackers and lit at the appropriate moment followed by much rejoicing.
Sweden
Young Swedish girls dress as witches on Easter morning and go around the houses with coffee pots to collect sweets and coins while people try to frighten them off by lighting fire crackers.
Spain
Easter is celebrated by beautiful floats of red carnations. In Murcia, a table is set to designate the Last Supper. Twenty-six men carry it through the town before setting it down for the feast. Madrid processions are silent--where village boys in Valencia and Helen play a drum roll from Holy Wednesday to Easter Sunday.
Greece
A priest lights a candle and all his neighbors use this candle to light their candles. After the service, the candles are carried home through a festivity of fireworks.
Hungary
Girls wear as many petticoats as possible to church. When they come out, boys sprinkle them with water for good luck.
Switzerland
Swiss toss eggs down the mountains for good luck. Fathers whistle on the Easter hare in the hope he will lay eggs in the children’s baskets on Easter morning.
France
Bells stop ringing on Holy Thursday to mourn Jesus’s death. On Sunday morning, the Resurrection, bells ring and people rejoice, hug and kiss.
Australia
Is where the Royal Easter Show is hosted in Sydney. This show exhibits the best produce and farm animals. Other festivities include fireworks, parades, joy rides for kids and delicious food. Rather than the rabbit, the Bilby is the symbol most associated with Easter in Australia. This is said to be due to the bunny rabbit destroying the agriculture crops. The hot game is Egg Knocking. The Easter celebration begins Good Friday and ends Easter Monday.
Germany
Begins on Good Friday with the draping of the cross. Fish is eaten on Easter Feast. Kids light huge bon fires on Easter Eve. Easter lunches include cookies, chocolates and cakes in the shape of a lamb along with ccruller, a thick donut. Kids enjoy egg hunts and a game of chocolate kiss where they gobble up as many chocolate covered marshmallows as they can stuff into their mouths. The child who eats the most and has the cleanest face wins a prize.Christmas trees are burned to welcome spring. The passion play, based on the life of Jesus is held in a town where about 1200 villagers take part.
So let’s have some Easter fun. Today is the twelfth day of A TISKET A TASKET PUT ROMANCE IN YOUR BASKET Contest.
Spring is in the air! Bees are buzzing. Children anxiously await the big morning
where they can graze on candy all day. What about Mom? We’ve got a treat for you!
Come join a group of romance authors in celebration of spring. Enter to win a prize
a day as well as enter to win the grand prize. I’m hosting the day’s contest and providing the link to tomorrow’s location.
Don’t forget to enter to win the grand prize! Here’s the dirt…
A TISKET A TASKET, PUT ROMANCE IN YOUR BASKET Grand Prize:
To enter to win prizes from the authors donating treasures to the grand prize (see
each day’s post for what an author is donating to the grand prize), find the four
Easter eggs in the A TISKET A TASKET, PUT ROMANCE IN YOUR BASKET blog event.
You will be searching for the above egg. And no, this isn’t one of them! (But it
might be hidden here so look around, just in case.) Visit all of the authors’ websites,
locate the FOUR eggs hidden somewhere on four different sites, make a list of their
locations by pasting the URLS to the website pages in an e-mail, then send the entry
to happyendings2007@aol.com by midnight CST on May 1st, 2009. The winner will be
randomly drawn and announced May 2nd at
Skhye Moncrief’s Blog
. Tip #1, subscribe to
Skhye Moncrief’s Blog
to learn if you’re the winner! Don’t miss the fun! See you next to the burgundy tulips. ~Skhye
So today, I am giving an eBook of my Easter story Lasting Love. Just leave a comment about a favorite Easter tradition and I will choose a name at midnight. Good luck!
And for the grand prize, I am donating a gift card for this beautiful Lasting Love rose bush. Isn’t it pretty?
So, tomorrow, April 13th, go visit Jennifer Johnson’s blog
http://jennfrancesca.blogspot.com/
Good luck bloggers and Happy Easter!!
21 comments:
Great post! I've often wished I'm Swedish. Go figure with the witch angle!
So, I hid the eggs, left the child a note of how many plastic and real eggs to find. We're just waiting for the wee one to rise and squeal. And, of course, the rain.
Have a wonderful day, Sharon!
Hi Sharon
What an interesting post, so many different customs, many of which I'd never heard before. And such a beautiful, beautiful rose. The winner of your Grand Prize is certainly in for a treat, as is the winner of your lovely Easter Story story 'Lasting Love'.
Have a lovely Easter!
Wow! I really like the tradition of burning the Christmas trees to welcome Spring. I had never heard of that before. I also like silent bells which then ring the joy of the Resurrection. He is risen. He is risen, indeed!
Happy Easter Skhye! Swedish? A witch? You? No, never. LOL! I hope your wee one finds all those wonderful Easter eggs. What fun. My niece and nephew will be over this afternoon for yet another Easter egg hunt. In fact, I'd best be getting to that Irish soda bread and cheesy potatoes. About that ongoing battle of the scones between you and Ashley. Hmmm. I'll take an order of both! Happy Easter!
Happy Easter Lyn! Thank you for your lovely words about my post and your comments on Lasting Love. Yes, I fell in love with the rose while doing research for this Easter story. Such a sucker for legend and lore am I, who do you think was the first to run out and buy one? And do you know the lady at the greenhouse told me they could not keep them in stock during Valentine's Day because of their vintage appeal and old fashioned sweetness. This tea rose has a unique color and glitter. With all the mystical legends of Wales, you must let me know if this hybrid is cultivated there. Have a great Easter!
Happy Easter Jennifer! Hmm. I guess I kind of liked the one about rolling the eggs down the hill. Are they trying to get rid of them--or knock someone out? LOL Have a lovely Easter and see you tomorrow for your turn on the blog!
Happy Easter everyone!! I enjoy the children hiding and looking for the eggs. My grandson is 25 months old and this is really the first time he has the concept of what is going on. He got one of those mobilized John Deere tractors with the trailer behind it, and I wish everyone could have seen his smiling face coming across their propery to mine driving that tractor :)
Sharon that is a great post.I enjoy learning about all the customs of different countries. I knew about ours here in the Us since I live in Louisiana!!
Judy
Hi Judy. Oh, what a lovely photo for your memory. I don't know what it is, but I can never get enough tradition. I love learning new ones and hearing old versions of the old. You must have nice weather. It is freezing here in Pittsburgh, so--so much for spring fashion! Happy Easter and thanks for stopping by.
Loved reading about the traditions. How interesting!
Patsy
P. L. Parker
Happy Easter Patsy! Thanks for dropping by. We all need a little tradition in our lives, right? Hope you have a lovely day.
I really enjoyed your blog. I wanna visit every country and participate. It's a joyous day all over the world!
How wonderful it would be if it lasted all year. Have a great day Sharon, you and your whole family.
Happy Easter Mary! So what do you think we should do about this? Have a country blog party? Wouldn't it be a nice goal indeed for all of us to make enough money on our books to do just that. Now there's a tradition and a goal all wrapped up in one. Have a lovely day!
Happy Easter Sharon. Thanks for the informative post - so many different celebrations! I guess my favorite tradition is dying the eggs with my daughter. I think this was the first year we didn't do any as they were doing the plastic egg hunt with our church. Your gifts are wonderful! Thanks!
Happy Easter Martha. Thanks for dropping by. Too bad about breaking the tradition, but the egg hunt at your church sounds like a blast. Have a fantastic day!
as a child we had easter sunrise services outdoors and had a resurrection scene where there was a boy that was a guard that laid at the head of the tomb where jesus was resurrected and i would be dressed as an angel and people would stop and watch,what an amazing scene, afterwards we would all go in the church and have breakfast.
We always have the adults hide the eggs for the kids first but then after the kids find all the eggs we make the adults go inside and have the kids hide the easter eggs for the adults to find. It's always fun.
lexeetoste@sbcglobal.net
Kids in our family can't wait to hunt for eggs. My bil hides plastic ones all around his yard, some with money, some with candy and some with trinkets. He had a lot out there today, so they were all very happy.
Happy Easter Tabbyn. I love this tradition. What a wonderful memory for you to share. Hope your day was lovely.
Happy Easter tigger9. Now here's a new take on things. I love it! Hope your day was filled with fun and more memories.
Happy Easter Pam. Sounds like a lot of fun. Trinkets and candy and money are all good prizes. Isn't it great to keep these memories alive from year to year? That's what tradition's all about.
Hi everyone. I'd like to thank you all for sharing your Easter traditions with me. I hope you all had a wonderful and blessed Easter. As promised, one of you will win a copy of my eBook Lasting Love. It's always hard to pick a winner, so I picked one name from an Easter basket. And the winner is...Tabbyn. Congratulations Tabbyn! Please email me at
sharonad@comcast.net
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