Everyone in the world certainly has some special birthday tradition that they hold dear and that they've practiced in their family for as long as they can remember. In the United States, birthdays are certainly a special occasion and are made so even more by the family and friends that we celebrate them with. Youngsters always have special birthday blowout parties, while older adults find themselves doing something special on their birthday as well.
However, have you ever wondered about some of the birthday traditions and how they got started? Why do people get "spanked" on their birthday, for example? What's the significance of the birthday cake and how did it get started? There are actually many things that we do on our birthdays, especially in America, which we may be totally clueless as to how the tradition started. Well, if you are wondering why we get "spanked" and how the birthday cake became popular then keep reading as we will debunk these mysteries as well as tell you about some of the other interesting facts about birthdays.
Why do we get "Spanked" on our Birthday?
Children are the ones that typically get spanked on their birthdays as adults are much too old for this kind of ritual. However, if you have ever wondered why children get the number of spanks as they are for each year they've turned, you may be interested to know that this tradition started a long time ago with some early folklore. Children would typically get spanked on their birthdays because people were actually afraid of death. People believed that spanking would toughen your body up so that you wouldn't die. Now how's that for an interesting story?
How did the Birthday Cake originate?
The birthday cake did not originate in America as most people would have thought. In fact, most people don't even give a second thought to the people who actually started this tradition. As it turns out, in the early times Greeks made round cakes (which later became called "Birthday Cakes") to symbolize the moon and the candles on the cake would symbolize the moon's brightness. Even more interesting, though, is that they were actually praying to the goddess of the moon when they did all of this on their birthdays. So Americans can thank the early Greeks for contributing to the tradition of the Birthday Cake.
Another interesting Birthday Tradition
Religious traditions are always interesting to read about, but one of the most interesting of all traditions comes from the Pagans. Paganistic individuals actually celebrated people's birthdays but not for the sole purpose of having a good time. These people thought that parties full of celebration and laughter kept evil spirits away, which is why they celebrated birthdays!
All of these little known facts are pretty interesting stories about birthday traditions and folklore. So the next time you celebrate your birthday just think about all the small traditions that you continue to do and how they actually got started.
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