If you are going to marry a Russian woman you have to keep in mind about the Russian wedding traditions! All Russian girls dream about the classical wedding from their early childhood, so you have to know a few things about it!
So if a Russian wedding has no traditions and customs, it could be boring and not interesting. Many modern wedding traditions have come to us from antiquity. Today, most of the wedding traditions are used just for fun and guests entertainment, although they all have deep meaning.
Perhaps the most common tradition is the Wedding Bread or as it is called “bread and salt”. In the old days, the parents of the bride and groom greet the newly married couple with the loaf of bread and some salt on the top of it.
By giving the bread, the parents hope that their children will never be hungry or be in need, and with the salt, they remind the couple that their life may be difficult at times.
Nowadays just married couples bite the bread, and get the hypothetical answer of who will be on the top of their family: the one who bites off the bigger piece of bread, becomes the leader of the family.
Also in the old days the newlyweds were sprinkled with corn and hops to wish the family to live a wealthy life.
Nowadays relatives strew the couple with coins or fresh rose petals.
Sometime people throw different things like small chocolates or wheat and every kind of it has its own meaning on the wedding.
For example: when people \ relatives throw small chocolates they want and wish the young couple to live a sweet life; rose petals – life will be full of romance, tenderness and beauty; coins – for prosperity.
As for the “wedding bouquet” tradition, it cannot be called Russian, although it is very popular nowadays at Russian weddings. The sense is the same like at western weddings: the bride throws her bouquet back over her shoulder to the unmarried female guests. Who catches the bouquet will be the next one of those present to marry or get married faster than other girlfriends.
There is also one more wedding tradition as wedding cake. Usually people do not bake it by themselves but order \ buy it in the pastry shop. Tradition of a wedding cake is also not Russian, it is French. But nowadays it is very popular and a couple should cut the wedding cake together. When the newlyweds cut the cake it symbolizes that they share their happiness with them.
