History of birthday traditions

_Elsa_

Elsa goes back to her googling for a short story idea. She types in birthday short story ideas.

“Hmmmm,” Elsa thinks to herself. “Not sure if any of these will help but I’ll try a couple of them.”

Nothing is working in the way of short story ideas so she decides to see if there is a history about birthday parties. Oh Yes! She finds a great article - How Did The Tradition of Birthdays Begin? 

‘Have you ever wondered where the celebration of birthdays started? In the simplest of terms, it’s a time for friends and family to come together and celebrate you, the anniversary of your birth, and another year of your life under your belt. But there’s so much more to it than that.

It’s been constantly evolving throughout, turning into what we know it to be today. This widely used tradition started somewhere and that’s what we are looking to uncover here today. We’ve pieced together the hypotheses of several historians, making this one huge piece of our culture a little bit more comprehensible.

Here’s what we know:

Birthdays didn’t begin until calendars were created - Early civilizations had no way to keep track of time other than by using the moon, sun, or some other important event. This made it difficult for them to pay attention to the anniversary of a person’s birth. As time went on, everyone realized that they all experienced the effects of aging, they just didn’t have a means to mark a special milestone for it.

It wasn’t until ancient people began taking note of the moon’s cycles that they began paying attention to the change in seasons as well. They also noticed this pattern repeated itself over and over again. They began marking these changes in time. This is what bore the first calendars, which marked time changes and other special days. From this type of tracking system came the ability to celebrate birthdays and other significant events and anniversaries each year.

It all started with the Egyptians - Scholars who study the Bible say that the earliest mention of a birthday was around 3,000 B.C.E. and was in reference to a Pharaoh’s birthday. But further study implies that this was not their birth into the world, but their “birth” as a god. When Egyptian pharaohs were crowned in ancient Egypt, they were considered to have transformed into gods. This was a moment in their lives that became more important than even their physical birth.

You can thank Greeks for all those birthday candles - Gods and goddesses were a huge part of Greek culture. Greeks offered many tributes and sacrifices to appease these gods. The lunar goddess, Artemis, was no different. As a tribute to her, the Greeks would offer up moon-shaped cakes adorned with lit candles to recreate the glowing radiance of the moon and Artemis’ perceived beauty. The candles also symbolized the sending of a signal or prayer. Blowing out the candles with a wish is another way of sending that message to the gods.’ (Source)

Elsa is enjoying all this history about birthdays. Just then her phone rings and it’s Tiffi calling her.

“Hi Tiffi, what’s up?”

Elsa tells her friend that she found some very interesting information about the history of birthdays. Tiffi gets all excited and she tells her friend that she’ll go do some googling to see what trivia she can find to help her with the story.

Hugs and kisses goodbye.

Let’s continue - More history

Start at the beginning - The surprise birthday party