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Cheap Wedding Favors
Planning a wedding of any size or budget can have numerous items that may be quite costly. In addition to planning for the dress and cake, a bride will want to spend thought considering the wedding favors for her guests. These small tokens of...
Destination Weddings
No matter where you and your future groom are wed, your wedding will have the same meaning and give you the same new start to a beautiful beginning together, however destination weddings can add a little extra touch to the wedding of your dreams. ...
Gay Wedding Ring: Symbol of Love and Equality
A wedding is a once-in-a-lifetime occasion for many people, although for an increasing number of persons, it has become a several-in-a-lifetime event. In any case, it is still a very special ceremony that binds not only a man and a woman together;...
Loose Moissanite Stones, A Great Way to Buy Your Moissanite Wedding Jewelry.
Moissanite is fast becoming the new diamonds. The newest jewelry stone on the market, moissanite is fashionable. Moissanite stones are manufactured to exacting standards, and so produce fine quality jewelry. And loose moissanite stones, being ...
Planning Your Outdoor Wedding Reception
An outdoor wedding reception can be host to an almost unlimited number of guests and has the aura of nature that can never be duplicated in an indoor ballroom. Some of the following outdoor wedding reception ideas should help to get you started with...
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Symbolism Of Wedding Rings
"The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of
two chemical substances; if there is any reaction,
both are transformed."
-C.G. Jung
Rings have been exchanged as a symbol of the bond of marriage for so long, and in so many different cultures, that the origin of the practice is obscure. Certainly, the circle of a ring represents undying love and the continually renewed vows of the married couple. Circles have long been archetypes for not only timelessness, but also wholeness and homecoming. The circle also speaks to the constant round of the heavens, as well as the eternal return of the seasons, marked by cyclical ritual and celebration.
In addition, the circle in rock art, sacred stone arrays, and astrology represents both the Sun and the Moon, themselves astrological and alchemical symbols for the masculine and feminine aspects of the cosmos. This correspondence with the Sun and Moon is emphasized by the frequent practice of choosing gold for one betrothed and silver for the other, as gold and silver are the metals long associated with the Sun and Moon respectively.
Rings in general have a deeply rooted magical significance. Enchanted rings figure in many ancient folk tales. Incantations and spells for the protection of the wearer of rings are common motifs. Today, in traditional religious ceremonies, Christian and otherwise, the wedding rings are blessed by a minister or priest, thus continuing the symbolic practice of imbuing rings with protective powers.
The widespread tradition of embellishing the plain gold or silver wedding band with various designs and patterns has been known since at least 700 AD, in both Pan-Hellenic and Celtic cultures. The quite ancient symbol of the ouroboros, the serpent which consumes its own tail, was a theme used for wedding rings made of iron in Rome. The ouroboros itself is a symbol of the oneness of creation and destruction in renewal, and the life principle which timelessly feeds on its own inspiration. It also represents the hope for a lifelong marriage union that’s continually renewed.
Celtic wedding rings are often gorgeously decorated with geometrically knot work patterns that have a long history and central place in Celtic
art. These patterns are strongly vegetative, suggesting tendrils and vines. In fact, in much of Celtic art, including the famous illuminated Bible, The Book of Kells, these Celtic Knots emerge from or transform into vegetative foliage. The beautiful symmetry of these woven patterns is often not square, rigid, or overly formal, but organic, flowing, and a stylized reflection of the curves and spirals found in nature. Indeed, the Celtic Knots that embellish wedding rings herald the ideas of spring, fertility, and the eternal reawakening of the life force- all of which bode well for a fruitful life partnership.
Wedding rings have most commonly been worn on the third finger of the left hand. Speculation has it that this is because the Romans believed that a vein ran directly from this finger to the heart. An alternate suggestion for this tradition is that each finger on the hand is associated with a planet in the ancient systems of astrology, and the ring finger of the left hand was associated with the Sun. In this way, the wearing of a wedding ring on that finger signifies the public proclamation of the union in the daylight, in other words, the conscious and clearly visible world of human community. This correspondence is perhaps even more strongly emphasized by the general tendency to craft wedding rings out of gold, which is symbolically the metal of the Sun throughout folk history and across cultures.
Wedding rings capture the full range of the ceremonial, symbolic, and communal aspects of marriage, and preserve these many levels of significance as a durable and constant reminder. Ancient yet contemporary, steeped in lore and mystery yet almost universally exchanged, wedding rings combine the art of the jeweler, the reverence of the betrothed, and the beauty of love and partnership in a single, resonant symbol.
About the Author
Peter Breslin is a musician, astrologer, Tarot reader, teacher and freelance writer for Artisanweddingrings.com and Celticjewelry.com living in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He has a teacher for over twenty years in Pennsylvania, New York, New Mexico, and California. He is currently at work on a novel.
http://www.artisanweddingrings.com
Please send email inquiries to: marek@celticjewelry.com
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