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we have not yet begun to seriously reserch country wedding trends. Our archive of wedding images is very limited. Here we are interested both in the attendees and the wedding party. Hopefully readers will provide us information about wedding traditions in their countries. We suspect that Victorian England played a major role in establishing modern wedding conventions. Of course a country like the United States people with immigrants from many different countries has a wide variety of wedding trafditions. We notice some countries which use ethnic costumes for weddings. One example is the kilts worn by men and boys at Scottish weddings. One the previous page we see a German wedding (figure 1). We also have someinformation about American weddings. We have collected information on several specific American weddings. We also have some information on French weddings.
We also have some information about American weddings. We have collected information on several specific American weddings. Some images are available at actual weddings from various eras. HBC has just begun to collect information on these weddings. In some cases only the image is available. In other instances some
information is available on the wedding. Some HBC readers have provided infprmation about weddinggs that they or their parents have participated in and we this have more details about these weddings. There are also some famous society weddings which
we also eventually hope to add to this section. Currently we only have information on American weddings, but we hope to eventually add information on foreign weddings as well. We are organizing this section chronlogically.
We do not yet have much information on Canadian weddings. We do have one portrait from what may be a World War I wedding in Toronto.
Colombia is a Latin American country and former Spanish colony. The wedding traditions are thus primarily Catholic and Spanish. We do no know if any Native American traditions survive in Colombian wessings. As far as we know wedding traditions are quite similar throughout Latin America because of the predominately Catholic culture. We have few details at this time. Hopefully our Colombian readers will provide some information on local wedding traditions. We do have an impageof a Colombian wedding from the 1930s.
Many important wedding traditions originated in Europe, especially England, during the Victorian era. They were a major influence on American weddings and have come to be common in many other countries around the world. Infortunately, while photography was invented (1839) about the same time as the Victorian era began (1837), we do not have early images of weddings. Photography was at first largely confined to the studio. So we do not get a lot of image portraits during the early- and mid-Victorian era. Thus as wedding traditiins were being established, we do not at first see images. We finally begin to see wedding portraits, but only in the late-Victorian era. There might be mention in newspapers and magazines, but only witn photography can wedings be repoted in detail. Publications had illustrations, but they had to be based on enravings unil the turn-of-the 20th century when te half-tone process was developed for actually printing photographs.
High scociety through most of history made fashion. People liked to dress like thev society leaders.
And English society were very cosely followed, especially in Ameriv=ca. Photography made this possible for the general public. Thus weddings could make big fashion news, especially high-society wedings. Of course few people could aford high scoety wdings, but they did influence what ordinary people could do on a small scale.
We also have some information on French weddings. We do not have much information about French weddings. France of course is a Catholic country and the wedding traditions ar Catholic. Even so I believe many poor people did not marry formally before the Revolution (1789). A strong anticlerical trend developed with the Revolution which was moving toward a kind secular religion. This of course affected wedding trends. This was stopped by Napoleon, but throughout the 19th century there was a conflict between the Church and liberals. Even so most French people wanted a Church wedding. A lot of American wedding traditiins come from Vctorian Britain. We know much less about French wedding traditions. I am not sure about modern trends in France. Another factor is France's growing Muslim population.
We do not yet have much information on German weddings. We do not know about any specifically German wedding traditions. Hopefully our German readers will provide us some insights. Most of the images we have seen look rather like weddings in other Western European countries. We have a few German wedding traditions, but not yet enough to assess German weddings in any detail. Germany was both Protestant and Catholic thus there were a range of traditions involved. There was by the 20th century a strong socialist movement, thus we suspect that many Germans, especially working-class Germans, were married outdide the church. We see a German wedding in 1932bon the previous page. It looks rather like a modest income, working-class family family. We suspect that it represents a good idea of how many Germans married in the 1930s.
We notice some countries which use ethnic costumes for weddings. One example is the kilts worn by men and boys at Scottish weddings.
Weddings in South Africa like the vrious people which make up the country are highly diverse. They reflect the various cultural traditions, including the mnany African tribes, European (primarily Dutch and English), and Asian (mostly Indian). The wedding ceremonies to a a large degree refkect the various religious traditions of these many people. To a lrge extent, the African peoples have accepted Christianity and their weddings are thus an interesting mix of traditional African and Chridtian belefs. The South Africans of European origins mostly dollow Dutch and English ceremonies. Wuddings often begin with the bridal procession into the church. The actual cremony begins with a dedication prayer. Then the actual ceremony begins. The cenrepoiece of the wedding is the exchange of vows. Then a unity candle will be lit. The couple will then be pronounced man and wife, and blessed by the officicating clergy man. Many have added the twelve symbols of life important in African culture to the tradoitional Christian creemony as well as African traditional religions and Mus\lim weddings. These twelve symbols are wine, wheat, pepper, salt, bitter herbs, water, a pot and spoon, a broom, honey, a spear, a shield, and a copy of Holy Scriptures. This is usually the Bible, but Muslims (mostly of Indian origins) will use the Koran. A wedding is not just a union of two solitary individuals, but actually two families. Each of the 12 sybols stand for an aspect of the love and strength which unites families being joined together. A wedding feast follows the ceremony and is known by the traditional African name Karamu. An aspect of many traditional African weddings is that the bride's and groom's parents carry a flame from their hearths to the home of the newly maried couple and a fire is kindled there.
We do not yet have any information on Spanish wedding traditions which are strongly Catholic. We hope to acquire some information because along with essentially similar Portuguuese traditions, they were transferred to the many countries of the Americasin Spanish and Portuguese empires.
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