Traditional Bulgarian Easter Eggs

2024 Author: Jasmine Walkman | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 08:29

Painted eggs are the brightest symbol of Easter. Since ancient times, eggs are painted on Thursdays and Saturdays, and Good Friday is strictly forbidden to work. On Saturday, this ban was raised for those brides who had to do some other work, such as painting eggs.

The first egg is always red and is painted by the oldest woman in the house. While freshly painted, she painted a cross on the children's foreheads and then on everyone else's. After this ritual, the painting is taken over by the young women in the house.

Knocking with Easter eggs is a ritual for health, and whoever stays with a healthy egg will enjoy health and happiness throughout the year.

Whenever eggs were painted, a basket of eggs was left for the godparents. Every guest who crossed the threshold of the house also received a painted egg.

One of the most common ways that is still used today to decorate eggs is with leaves. They were attached to the egg with threads or wrapped in a rag. Then the egg was released into the paint. After removing the leaves, the pattern stands out. This is a traditional way of painting eggs.

Writing eggs with wax is an old Bulgarian custom. It is typical to paint with a homemade candle made of pure beeswax. Using the candle, draw on the half-cooled egg.

Thus, when immersed in the paint, what is drawn is reflected. Nowadays, a homemade candle made of pure wax is not found, but you can use an ordinary thin candle.

In the days when there were no artificial colors, various decoctions of herbs and nuts were used. With a decoction of oregano was obtained red paint, with sumac - orange, green with nettle, yellow with a decoction of old onions.

A lot of diligence and love has been put into painting the eggs. Drawings, geometric figures, etc. were made. The painted eggs are still called perashki. They are not used for fucking, but only as a gift.