The wedding apple - a lovely old tradition revived

Oh yes, the apple! Whether it's the imperial apple, apple butt, apple of discord, an apple a day for the doc, Snow White and Newton, Eve or Adam's apple - he accompanies us through history and we associate mixed feelings with him. At least as long as it is not about the edible apple. It has been a valued food since ancient times because of its nutritional benefits, but above all because of its taste. For thousands of years, stories have been entwined around it and King Solomon had it sung in his Song of Songs in 500 B.C.

Here we would like to introduce you to an old tradition around the apple and thus help to ensure that it will not be forgotten.

It is of course about the unique wedding apple. This tradition even has its own apple variety. The wedding apple, which originated in Franconia, was first described in 1809 by Johann Ludwig Christ "Verzeichnis der vornehmsten Sorten des Kern- und Steinobstes, Schalen- und Beerenobstes der Christ'schen Baumschulen zu Kronberg". The skin of the wedding apple is wax yellow and on the sunny side it is colored in the most beautiful red tones. Due to its very long storage time, it is a perfect match for marriage - it lasts forever.

The wedding apple is the ambivalent symbol of beauty and strife and probably the trigger of the Trojan War, if Greek mythology is to be believed. Homer described it very vividly in his Iliad around 800 BC.

According to this tale, the legendary golden apples of the Hesperides aroused the covetousness of gods and mortals. These very special apples could give immortality and whoever eats from them is freed from hunger, thirst, suffering and disease. Gaia presented one of them to Zeus and Hera at their wedding as probably the first wedding apple. It could end here with the wedding apple, but Eris had not been invited to the wedding. The goddess of discord was so upset about this that she stole the apple and hid it in the wedding feast at the next wedding. But not without first placing the dedication "For the most beautiful" on it.

This dedication caused a tumult in the wedding party, which Paris was to end by designating the most beautiful goddess. The judgment of Paris determined the love goddess Aphrodite as the most beautiful. This, still in the frenzy of her victory, promised him in return the beautiful Helen of Sparta as his wife and thus probably triggered the legendary Trojan War.

In contrast to the well-known wedding almonds, which stand for luck, health, wealth, long life and fertility, the wedding apple is said to have a more romantic power. As a symbol of life, it is said to bless the newly married couple with fertility, but above all with immortal love. Because of its round shape, the apple was also the symbol of the perfection of the earth. As a symbol of seduction and femininity, it is a faithful companion in marriage. The middle classes already knew this in the Middle Ages. Today you can still buy wedding apples from a few producers who know and cultivate this custom. These wedding apples are then available with a kind of sun tattoo or with a laser engraving individualized. This is not quite according to tradition, but it is becoming increasingly popular and may even become a trend. Either way, not much remains of the crisp splendor and wedding apple tradition after two weeks. We at Keramik-Kartell.de have thought that we can do this in a much more sustainable way. This lovely, bourgeois tradition must be preserved and made public.

That is why we produce the traditional and trendy wedding apples from clay and let them continue the old wedding apple tradition as wish apples. Our clay wedding apples are individually handcrafted and, of course, also hand painted.

At the wedding, the apple is presented to the bridal couple as a high-quality, handmade gift and filled with the wishes of the guests on small strips of paper to the newlyweds and their future together.

Marriage is for the vast majority of people still a great good and therefore correspondingly valuable. The clay wedding apple plays beautifully with this traditional promise of values, if only because of the work that was necessary for its production. Unlike the real edible wedding apple, the value of this gift and the associated wishes are visible.

The congratulations of the illustrious guests are hidden inside the wedding apple until the reading. At the end of the ceremony the wishes of the wedding apple are read out and the magic of the everlasting apple takes its course. Especially this wedding apple made of clay is a beautiful memory even years after the wedding, as the handmade apple with its wishes effortlessly lasts for decades.

And if the wishes have been lost along the way during the course of the marriage, the ceramic apple is an ideal growing vessel for the first tree that the man is to plant. Hopefully it will be a wedding apple tree.