Easter Traditions & Facts

Easter Facts

Easter is a grand festival of Christians. There are many interesting facts about Easter that we are all unaware of.

Here are some Easter facts:

The name Easter owes its origin to Eastre, the Anglo-Saxon goddess who symbolizes hare and egg.
Easter always falls between March 22 and April 25.
Pysanka is a specific term used for the practice of Easter egg painting.
From the very early times, the egg has been considered to be the most important symbol of rebirth.
The initial Easter baskets were given the appearance of bird's nests.
The maiden chocolate eggs recipes were made in Europe in the nineteenth century.
Each year witnesses the making of nearly 90 million chocolate bunnies.
Next to Halloween, the Easter holiday paves the way for confectionary business to boom.
When it comes to eating of chocolate bunnies, it is the ears that are preferred to be eaten first by as many as 76% of people.
In the catalogue of kids' favourite Easter foodstuff, red jellybeans occupy top most position.

When Is Easter

Easter is the most important festival of Christians as it is observed to honour the Jesus' return to life. Easter is a festivity of colours and joy. It brings a message of hope along. It conveys the message that after the dark clouds, there is a ray of silver lining. Easter has a lot of significance especially for the Roman Catholics. They use the Julian calendar for the purpose of calculating the Easter day date.
Easter always falls on the first Sunday after the full moon night of the spring season. Generally the Gregorian calendar is used for the purpose of computing the Easter date. In many countries, Easter Monday is granted as a legal holiday.

Easter History

The origin of the Easter festival dates back to the Pagan times. It is celebrated to honour Jesus’ return to life. There are many legends associated with Easter history. One Easter story says, that the very name Easter has been derived from Eostre, who was the Anglo Saxon Goddess of spring. Thus, it is also said that the Easter celebration is actually dedicated to the refreshing spring season. This Pagan holiday, Easter is one of the principal religious festivals of Christians. It was earlier addressed as the festivity of Eostre that always occurred during the period of vernal equinox, when the ratio of day to night was exactly the same.
But some of the legends say, that this festival Easter actually owes its origin to the Hebrew tradition, instead of the Christian tradition. According to the Hebrew lunar calendar, it falls in the first month also known as ‘Nisan’. According to Hebrew tradition, the reason behind its celebration is that, it was during this period, that Israel after having suffered for 300 years finally got rescued from the bondage of Egypt. But in all the legends, one thing that is emphasized is that, Easter is a grand holiday that is celebrated to glorify the victory of life over death and light over darkness.

Easter Traditions

Easter Colours

The Easter colours wheel encompasses innumerable colours. Most of the people are unaware of the Easter colour philosophy. In fact, all the colours of Easter have their own unique significance. If one is indicative of brightness, the other represents the darkness of our sins.

1 - RED: this colour is associated with the blood that Jesus Christ shed for mankind. Thus the colour red is a symbol of love and sacrifice for goodness of humanity.
2 - WHITE: this Easter colour signifies purity and grace.
3 - GREEN: the colour green brings rays of hope. Green is the colour of grass.
4 - PURPLE: Easter colour purple is indicative of royalty. It is said that the colour purple brings wealth.
5 - YELLOW: it is the colour that is related to the brightness of sun. It’s a colour that brings joy and happiness.
6 - BLACK: it is the colour that indicates the evil side. To put it other words, we can say black signifies darkness.
7 - ORANGE: it is the colour that represents hope. It is associated with the dawn of day.
8 - PINK: Easter colour pink indicates fresh beginning.

Easter Cards

The trend of exchanging greeting cards for Easter has become very popular. In fact, this tradition of gifting friends and relatives with Easter cards is a back dated practice. But year-by-year, gift galleries are witnessing a boom in the sale of Easter cards and other gifts. People are spending loads of money on these cute gift items. Next to Christmas, Valentine Day and Mothers day, the fourth largest greeting card selling holiday is Easter.
In this hi technology contemporary world, people have begun to send Easter e cards. The best part about these online cards is that, there are multiple websites that provide with the facility of sending free e cards. There are beautiful animated bunny cards and Easter egg cards. Not only can we find animated cards, but also the musical ones. Also there are no hassles of their delivery. There are religious Easter cards with a social message that guide us to lead a truthful life. On the other hand, there are cute colourful bunny cards especially meant to be exchanged among children. One can shop for these cards, but hand made Easter cards have their own significance because they have a personal touch attached. Hopefully, this custom of wishing each other Happy Easter through Easter greeting cards will never fade.