Wedding Anniversary

We explain what a wedding anniversary is, how it originated and what types are celebrated. Also, the monthly anniversaries of the first year.

What is wedding anniversary?

a wedding anniversary It is the annual celebration of the day of formalization of marriage which a couple decides to remember in order to renew the feelings that unite them. On this date, spouses usually give each other gifts, organize celebrations or commemorative activities, often in relation to the shared love story. It is also common for celebrants to receive congratulations (and even gifts) from their family and friends.

Wedding anniversaries are among the most common and popular personal celebration dates, similar to birthdays and name days. However, the way it is celebrated can vary according to the culture and also the number of years of marriage, so The more time together, the greater the celebration.

See also: Love

Origin of wedding anniversaries

Wedding anniversaries were not always celebrated: in the Western Middle Ages It was not even common for commoners to marry, but rather they simply gathered together under the same roof. Marriage was reserved for the nobility as a way to formalize and cement the common political and economic project of two aristocratic families, especially when they came from two different and often enemy nations.

This way, Wedding anniversaries were usually celebrated because they constituted a founding event of governments or even of nations, that is, a date on which two noble houses came together to become more powerful, or two rival nations joined their thrones to overcome their differences. More than an emotional and family procedure, marriage was a political procedure.

But since the Renaissance the world of the nobility was slowly replaced by that of the bourgeoisie, and many commoner but wealthy families could become part of the nobility through marriage. Thus, this institution became popular, especially among the nascent middle class, and the custom of celebrating their anniversary was transmitted to the masses.

Types of anniversary according to the years of marriage

Numerous traditions and different symbols have been woven over time around marriage and the celebration of its anniversary. One of the most popular has to do with the association of certain particular anniversaries with a certain material so that the longer the time together, the more noble and valuable the material with which the bond between the spouses is represented.

This custom responds to medieval European traditions in which nobles gave each other gifts of valuable materials as the marriage lengthened, as a gesture of celebration and a reminder of the power and abundance that the union had brought them. For example, after 50 years together, the couple gave each other gold objects and ornaments, meaning that their union had acquired immense value over time. Thus, the couple celebrated their “golden wedding.”

Traditionally, the years of marriage are associated with the following materials:

Monthly anniversaries of the first year of marriage

Just as the years of marriage are celebrated, many people like to celebrate the months of the first year of marriage, which is why each monthly “anniversary” has been given names:

Continue with: Blended Family

References

• “Wedding anniversary” on Wikipedia.
• “Anniversary” on Wikipedia.
• “How did the tradition of relating wedding anniversaries to a specific material come about?” in Culturizing.