A Brief History Of Wedding Favors
Friday, July 16th, 2010Wedding favors are small gifts, trinkets, or tokens that are given to the bride and grooms guests either at the end of a wedding ceremony or during the wedding reception. These are usually tokens of appreciation for attending the bridegroom’s special day.
It is a very ancient tradition when the giving of the wedding favors is tackled. Throughout the history, the first ever practice of giving a wedding favor was done by old European aristocrats, nobles, and members of the richest group of the society. Bonbonnier was the first term for the wedding favor and such is an Italian word.
Back then, bonbonnieres were usually a small box, the size of a trinket or jewel box that was made out of porcelain, crystals, and sometimes with the addition of precious gems and stones. These boxes were usually filled with sugar, sugar cubes, and other delicate confections. This was meant to symbolize royalty and wealth. The reason for this was because back then, sugar was an expensive and hard to find product. And mostly only the wealthy, nobles, and the elites had access and could afford it. But over time, as sugar became more and more common and inexpensive, couples from lower classes were able to afford it. Thus the tradition of giving wedding favors and other such gifts of appreciation reached the masses, and couples of modest income and upbringing.