FOLIO
For more than 4,000 years, beer has played a major role in wedding celebrations. While November may seem a bit out of season to talk about nuptial traditions, I have a very good reason to have matrimony on my mind: My only daughter is marrying her fiancé this weekend.
So, for that reason — and the fact that some of the traditions are interesting — a wedding theme is perfect for this week’s column.
Let’s put one bit of misinformation to bed. There are many articles about the origins of the word “bridal.” Many believe it’s a combination of two Anglo-Saxon words: brýd and ealo. The words do translate to “bride-ale,” but in this case, “ale” doesn’t mean beer, according to British beer historian and journalist Martyn Cornell. It means “a festival or merry-meeting at which much ale was drunk.”
Now let’s look at some truly interesting wedding beer traditions.
About 400 miles east of Moscow lies the Chuvash Republic, or Chuvashia, a federal subject of Russia. In the 18th century, the Chuvash people practiced a wedding tradition in which the bride, covered in a veil, hid behind a screen. After a short period of time, the bride would solemnly emerge into view as young girls brought her beer, bread and honey. After she’d circled the room three times, the groom would enter, snatch the bride’s veil, kiss her and exchange rings. From that moment, the bride would be called schourasnegher, or betrothed girl, and be expected to distribute beer, bread and honey to the wedding guests.
In Germany, there’s a tradition of the Nuernberg Wedding Cup. Legend has it that the daughter of a wealthy nobleman fell in love with a lowly goldsmith. The father had the young man thrown in the dungeon to keep him from marrying his daughter.
Still in love with the goldsmith, the young fräulein began to waste away. The nobleman set forth a challenge to the dashing metalworker: Craft a chalice from which two people could drink beer without spilling a drop. The prize? Miss Thing in matrimony.
The goldsmith sculpted a smiling girl with upraised arms holding a bucket set on a swivel. As the primary vessel, the skirt she wore was hollowed out. Held with the skirt opening up, both the skirt and the bucket were filled. As the first drinker sipped from the skirt, the second could drink from the small bucket on the swivel, with nary a splash.
The challenge met, the lovers were married. Today, many German weddings feature a Nuernberg Wedding Cup as a romantic nod to the power of true love, and love of beer.
In medieval times, Irish custom was for the newlyweds to drink mead for an entire month after their wedding. Mead, brewed from fermented honey, was thought to endow powers of virility and fertility. The word “honeymoon” comes from this practice; obviously, honey for the mead and moon for the month-long — or one lunar cycle — celebration.
These are only two of the many global wedding traditions that feature beer. This weekend, there’ll be beer at my daughter’s wedding, but the only tradition I expect to follow is to raise a cold glass of it to toast her and and my new son-in-law.
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