Honeymoon
Origin of the Honeymoon Tradition
Today, the tradition of a honeymoon following nuptials has, long way from its original meaning. Today’s “happy ending” to the wedding event is a far cry from its much different beginnings. The word honeymoon has its roots in the Norse word “hjunottsmanathr” which was anything but blissful.
Honeymoon
Northern European history describes the abduction of a bride from neighboring village. It was imperative, that the abductor, the husband to be, take his bride to be into hiding for period of time. His friends assured his and her safe keeping and kept their whereabouts unknown. Once the bride’s family gave up their search, the bride groom returned to his people. This folkloric explanation presumably is the origin of today’s honeymoon, for its original meaning meant hiding.
The Scandinavian word for honeymoon is derived, in part, from an ancient Northern European custom in which newlyweds, for the first month of their married life, drank a daily cup of honeyed wine called mead. The ancient practices of kidnaping of bride and drinking the honeyed wine date back to the history of Atilla, king of the Asiatic Huns from A.D. 433 to A.D. 453.
So that leaves us with the question of where the “moon” in the word “honeymoon” originates. One piece of folklore relates that the origin of the word moon comes from a cynical inference. To the Northern Europeans the terms referred to the body’s monthly cycle and, its combination with honey, suggested that not all moon’s of married life were as sweet as the first. British prose writers and poets, in the 16th and 17th centuries, often made use of the Nordic interpretation of honeymoon as a waxing and waning of marital affection.
As it is with many of our wedding customs, this one also has an alternative explanation of its origin. The term “honeymoon,” we are told, comes from an old northern European custom in which newlyweds would, for a month, consume a daily cup of mead, a brew that is made from honey.
Certainly we have, long way and there is a vast difference between the original meaning of honeymoon and its present-day connotation. The newer version is, of course, the more pleasant one!
Source: http://www.hudsonvalleyweddings.com/guide/honey.htm
Origin of the word ( Honeymoon )
The Oxford English Dictionary offers no etymology, but gives examples dating back to the 16th century. The Merriam-Webster dictionary reports the etymology as from “the idea that the first month of marriage is the sweetest” (1546).
A honeymoon can also be the first moments a newly-wed couple spend together, or the first holiday they spend together to celebrate their marriage.“ The first month after marriage, when there is nothing but tenderness and pleasure” (Samuel Johnson); originally having no reference to the period of a month, but comparing the mutual affection of newly-married persons to the changing moon which is no sooner full than it begins to wane; now, usually, the holiday spent together by a newly-married couple, before settling down at home. ”
One of the more recent citations in the Oxford English Dictionary indicates that, while today honeymoon has a positive meaning, the word was originally a reference to the inevitable waning of love like a phase of the moon. This, the first known literary reference to the honeymoon, was penned in 1552, in Richard Huloet’s Abecedarium Anglico Latinum. Huloet writes:“ Hony mone, a term proverbially applied to such as be newly married, which will not fall out at the first, but th’one loveth the other at the beginning excedingly, the likelyhood of their exceadinge love appearing to aswage, ye which time the vulgar people call the hony mone. ”
In many parts of Europe it was traditional to supply a newly married couple with enough mead for a month, ensuring happiness and fertility. From this practice we get honeymoon or, as the French say, lune de mie
There are many calques of the word honeymoon from English into other languages. The Welsh word for honeymoon is mis mêl (honey month). In Hebrew it is ‘Yerach D’vash translated to honey month (interestingly the word ‘Yerach’-Month is very close to the word ‘Yare’ach’-Moon. The two words are spelled alike: ???). In Arabic it is shahr el ‘assal also translated to honey month. The Spanish word for honeymoon is la luna de miel (the moon of honey), and the Italian luna di miele (same translation). The Persian word for it is mah e asal which has both the translations honeymoon and honey month (mah in Persian meaning both moon and month).
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honeymoon
