Egg art is a spring thing

Egg Art—It’s a Spring Thing!

Based on the “Every Day’s a Holiday” monthly column (March 1997) for AOL’s The electronic Gourmet Guide (eGG) by Ian Makay.

 

It’s Not Just About Easter!

Egg art is a spring thing! And it’s not just about Easter!

While there’s controversy over which came first—the chicken or the egg—there’s no doubt the egg preceded its adornment.

Moreover, it’s far from the kid stuff many associate with it today.

Glancing across the broad landscape of culinary history and lore, it soon becomes apparent, even to the casual observer, that so many things once so clear and simple to us as children, quickly blur when adding time, geography, and culture to the mix.

Child’s Play

Ask a child to associate Easter with a particular food. An image most likely conjured is that of pastel-colored eggs peeking from behind tulips in bloom.

In pre-Christian European cultures, the egg was the symbol of rebirth. In the same vein, spring was the reawakening of the earth itself. Consequently, the egg and spring became intertwined.

Subsequently, as Christianity spread throughout the continent, the egg symbolized a different kind of rebirth—the Resurrection of Christ. As a result, the egg became the scaled-down version of the boulder which sealed the tomb of Jesus. It also came to represent the Holy Trinity. The shell, yolk, and albumen came to symbolize God the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit.

Let the Games Begin!

Egg rolling is a centuries-old Easter tradition in the United Kingdom. The White House’s annual Easter Egg Roll dating back to 1814 was begun by United States First Lady, Dolley Madison. Similar traditions can be found throughout Northern Europe.

Among Orthodox Christian nations, egg tapping has been popular for hundreds of years. People pair up and tap each other’s hard-boiled, crimson eggs point-to-point. Whosever egg cracks is the loser. After that the winners of each game continue pairing and tapping until only one remains with an uncracked egg.

Meanwhile, we can thank Protestant Christian Reformer, Martin Luther, for introducing the Easter Egg Hunt as a holiday tradition. Originally, men hid eggs (representing the aforementioned boulder) for women and children to find. But by the 1600s, the eggs were hidden by that other vernal (and fertility) symbol, the Easter Bunny.

More Than Child’s Play

Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “There is always a best way of doing everything, if it be to boil an egg.”*

As Emerson implied, this may be so when boiling is the case, but egg ornamentation is another story.

With variations in technique, purpose, and pigment extending to every corner of the world, egg décor is steeped in history.

Judeo-Christian culture was not the first and it is far from the only society to have found the egg’s alabaster shell an ideal canvas. Egg coloring preceded Christianity itself by almost a millennium. Evidence indicates that the Chinese were adorning eggs at least as early as 900 BC.

Common threads join virtually all forms of egg art. Anthropological studies almost universally find the egg to be a symbol of fertility and rebirth, with its artistic manifestations at the core of many religious belief systems. As such, ritualistic ornamentation of eggs most often revolved around specific holidays or general celebrations associated with spring.

Easter and Lenten egg painting found their roots, in part, in the pre-Christian traditions of the people of northern Europe. Colored eggs of migratory birds returning from warmer climates marked the return of spring to many in the north. It’s speculated that artistic renderings on eggshells occurred as domestication of fowl created a larger supply of eggs. Dyes using local vegetation then came to furnish a reasonable substitute for colored eggs once provided by the travelling harbingers of the earth’s annual rebirth.

Creating Converts

Roman and Orthodox Christian missionaries moved the metaphor a step further. They sought to blend these ancient traditions with the message of spiritual renewal represented in the resurrection. Consequently, egg art evolved to include intricate ornamentation replete with Christian symbols, iconography, and portraits.

Egg painting became such a potent religious symbol and an enjoyable celebratory ritual, that the practice spread to other faiths.

Taking a Cue from the Neighbors

Judaism employed the practice of colored eggs for Passover borrowing from Christian Pascal celebrations. Historic belief in its Christian origins is derived from the observation that only in those communities where Jews and Christians lived together, primarily in Eastern Europe, did Jews color eggs for their Passover festivities.

Similarly, Lag B’Omer, which usually falls chronologically between the Jewish holiday of Passover and the Christian holy day of Pentecost, is often celebrated with a family picnic. In addition to bonfires and barbecues symbolizing the light that Shimon Bar Yochai brought into the world, colored eggs that represent the rainbow and God’s promise to Noah and the Jews are featured.

Reacting to the popularity of Easter and Passover celebrations in the Middle East, Saladin created the holiday of Khamis al-Amwat adding it to the Muslim calendar in the twelfth century. In English, the holiday is called Dead Remembrance Thursday or Thursday of the Eggs. Observed on the first Thursday after Easter it features two Pascal traditions. First, the distribution of colored gift eggs to children. Second, the solemn reflection of the contribution of one’s departed ancestors.

A Darker Shade of Faith

Artistic evolution in central and eastern Europe brought with it a change in hue. Many Christian societies replaced the Easter egg’s original pastel colors with shades of deep red. Crimson symbolized the blood, passion, suffering, purification embodied in the crucifixion of Christ.

Other Christian enclaves went further. In some cases, they emblazoned eggs with elaborate colors and patterns or etchings, then preserving them with coats of resin. Many of these eggs became family and personal heirlooms. These true works of art were designed for display not consumption and made to last for generations.

Perhaps the most famous and elaborate of these are the Fabergé eggs. Designed and created under the supervision of Peter Carl Fabergé from 1895 and 1917 for emperors of Russia as Easter gifts for their wives and mothers. Several were also manufactured for a Russian industrialist. Bejeweled and made of precious metals, the 57 remaining eggs are considered works of art, each worth millions of dollars.

Let’s Eat!

Hard boiled and simply dipped in pastel dyes, most Easter eggs were meant and are meant to be eaten. For a time in both the Eastern- and Western-rite Christian churches, eggs were among the foods forbidden during the forty-day Lenten fast beginning with Ash Wednesday and extending through Easter. As a result, both Fat and Shrove Tuesday (the day preceding Ash Wednesday, marked in many places with Mardi Gras celebrations) and Easter Sunday became days to relish the taste of eggs.

Eschewed along with meat and eggs during Lent were cream, milk, and butter. Fat Tuesday provided the obligation to rid the house of all these tempting ingredients. And thereby also provided a plausible excuse to devour copious amounts of whatever native variation on the pancake existed. Presence of the pancake became so prevalent on Fat Tuesday that the English even went as far as to dub it Pancake Day. Meanwhile, the Scots (giving ode to their own national adaptation on the cakes) named it Bannock Day.

Lamb or turkey roasts may be the culinary apex of your Pascal celebration. However, for many cultures throughout Europe, northern Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia, Easter breakfast is the meal that makes the day. Eggs in every form appear at the table following religious services, along with various breakfast meats, breads, and confections.

Other such meals are simple and somber reflections on the season. These consist of little more than hard boiled eggs and special Easter breads blessed by the priest during religious ceremonies.

In addition, some traditional recipes, like Torta Pasqualina or Easter Pie, reflect both the holiday and the season. Thereby taking us full circle in this brief exploration of egg art and its culinary expressions.

A Disappearing Art

Many of the traditional symbols and lore at the heart of egg art and Easter have been obscured with time. They’ve also been replaced by more commercialized imitations. As a result, the craftmanship so central to its creation has also become increasingly scarce.

Fewer artisans, professional or amateur, have invested the time to learn and master the crafts of painting and etching eggs. Passed down by local virtuosi over generations, these are now predominantly elderly and too often themselves limited by age. This is no less true of European Easter egg art, than it is of African ostrich egg etching, Middle Eastern and central European egg beading, or Asian styles of egg lacquering, painting, and sculpture.

Our global view of nature, the seasons, our holy days, and holidays have undergone a sea change. All have been replaced by a new set of personal and societal priorities and concerns. In the process, existence of egg art and the history and meaning behind its varied forms seem, much like the egg itself—resilient, beautiful, strong, yet uniquely fragile.

Culinary art has, in many ways, gone through a similar transformation and come out better for it. Like the phoenix, so often associated with it, perhaps the art of egg crafting too will rise from its own ashes and be reborn a wonderful and welcoming centerpiece to life’s daily and seasonal celebrations.

 

*There is always a best way of doing everything, if it be to boil an egg.

RALPH WALDO EMERSON
American essayist, lecturer, philosopher, abolitionist, and poet
1803—1882
The Conduct of Life

Excerpted from Ian Makay’s Food for Thought: The Pleasures of the Table: Primi Piatti.

 

 

                                                            

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2 Responses

  1. Growing up in Europe, I remember colouring our eggs using things found in nature. Fond memories.

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