Personalized Chocolate Gifts Exceptional Easter Eggs

Posted by dodo

Easter eggs were traditionally carved from wood or gathered from domestic fowl and decorated. Chocolate eggs became popular in the Victorian era.

Eggs have been a symbols of the spring calendar since pagan times. Long before the egg became a sign of the Resurrection, it was the fertility token of birth and growth. Chocolate, now a popular ingredient for the making of Easter eggs, was also associated with fertility and held to be of great value for its curative powers, by the Aztecs of South America. It was the Aztecs who gave the sweet brown substance its name from their word xococatl — xococ meaning bitter and atl meaning water.

The original Easter eggs that were given as gifts were ordinary birds‘ eggs, sometimes boiled in hot water to make them more robust, or blown, to empty out their contents. Modern designs are now applied with felt markers, ink or paint but in the past, natural dyes made from plants and insects — such as gorse flowers for yellow and crushed beetle shells for cochineal red.

Painted eggs are still exchanged between friends and families around the world. In Poland, eggs are painted red, blue and green in accordance with a legend that Mary did so to amuse the baby Jesus. The customary colour for dyed eggs is red. In Romania this is said to represent the blood of Christ; however in China, the colour red, like the egg, is used as a symbol of life.

In eastern Europe, egg decoration is in fact a traditional peasant art. It reached its most refined form with the beautiful and expensive eggs designed by the Russian goldsmith and jeweller, Carl Faberge, in the late nineteenth century. The most famous of these are probably the celebrated imperial Easter eggs, first commissioned way back in 1884 by Alexander III, for his Tsarina.

In Britain in the Middle Ages,ordinary eggs were collected by the parish priest as his Easter tithe: some of these would then be blessed, and given as holy gifts. One of the earliest records of gifts of painted eggs in England dates back to 1290 when King Edward I distributed them to his household. The egg was probably then referred to as a paschal, using the ancient word Pash or Paschal, for Easter. In time, paschal evolved to the word pace, and in parts of the country, pace eggs are given at Easter.

Pace Egging, or knocking on neighbours’ doors and chanting, was a traditional way for children to collect their eggs. Those they received were then either eaten or used in games. One ancient game still carried on today is egg rolling: eggs are tumbled, in a race, down a grassy bank; those that survive the ordeal are said to be blessed with luck. Egg rolling also takes place on the lawns of the White House in Washington DC; a tradition started by the wife of President Madison over one hundred years ago. The Christian custom of egg rolling is said to be symbolic of the moving of the boulder from the mouth of Christ’s tomb on Ascension Day. Another game that has survived to the present day, is the Easter Egg Hunt, where eggs are hidden around the house or garden to be found by children.

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