Birthday Candles: Sending Wishes Through the Ages
These days, there’s a whole world of birthday candles to choose from. You can don your cake with the traditional thin wax candles, or add some excitement with birthday candle sparklers. You can also find keepsake candles for babies and toddlers, as well as personalized candles to serve as a gift. But why do we use them and how did they originate?
The origins are sketchy, but it is believed that they were originally placed on cakes during birthdays to bring wishes up to God. This may be because in ancient times, people believed that smoke carried their thoughts up to heaven.
While the belief in smoke carrying our thoughts and wishes up has prevailed over the years, it hasn’t played a role in the average person’s birthday for ages. As a matter of fact, birthdays have not always been celebrated by everyone; historians think that early birthdays were celebrated mainly by nobility, then later by the populace.
These days, people still hold true to that belief that the candles will grant wishes, one way or another, and that if we blow them all out, our wishes will come true.
Birthday Candles Light Up A Special Day
Birthday parties lit by birthday candles mark a yearly milestone for each person. A birthday party without a cake lit by birthday candles would be a disappointment. Some cakes have a single birthday candle for a very special first birthday celebration. Usually the guest of honor has no idea that a special milestone has been noted, but most of the guests are very pleased with the small tike. For those who have marked many milestones, there is not enough room on the cake for all of the birthday candles so a few are used to represent the many years of life.
Birthday cakes lit by birthday candles that represent the number of years of the guest of honor have been around for many years. These cakes with birthday candles are used in many parts of the world by people of many different cultures. There is not much information on the origins of the birthday cake and birthday candles, but everyone seems to expect these will be a part of any birthday celebration. These traditions seem to be a part of the Western European culture, and they seem to have started in the nineteenth century. Western European immigrants brought these traditions to America when they arrived. The traditions were special so people from other cultures soon adopted these as their own.
Birthday Candles Signify Future Hopes And Dreams
Birthday candles are usually bright and colorful, and the guest of honor blows them out and makes a wish. The birthday party usually marks another year of achievement, but the guest of honor gets to make a wish for the future when they blow out the birthday candles. The cakes are usually decorated with special colors and special frostings. There is great hope for the future as the candles are blown out during the course of the party. Tradition holds that the person should blow out all of the candles with one blow in order to have the wish come true. There is no research that proves this to be true.
Birthday candles are sometimes trick candles. There are some special candles that are put onto cakes that are made so they cannot be blown out easily. Once the guest of honor blows on them, they relight in front of their eyes. Most of the guests enjoy these trick candles but some might worry that they will lose their chance to have a wish come true. Birthdays are special times for friends and family, and all seem to thoroughly enjoy eating special cake after the candles are blown out.
Candles
|
