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Concept
Egg decorating
Summary
Egg decorating is the art or craft of decorating eggs. It has been a popular art form throughout history because of the attractive, smooth, oval shape of the egg, and the ancient associations with eggs as a religious and cultural symbol. Egg decorating has been associated with Easter in recent times, but was practiced independently by many ancient cultures.
Eggs are an important symbol in folklore and mythology, often representing life and rebirth, healing and protection, and sometimes featuring in creation myths. This means that traditional egg decorating existed throughout the world.
The oldest eggshells, decorated with engraved hatched patterns, are dated for 60,000 years ago and were found at Diepkloof Rock Shelter in South Africa.
In Egypt, it is a tradition to decorate boiled eggs during Sham el-Nessim, a spring-ushering national holiday celebrated by Egyptians regardless of religion, which falls every year on the Monday following the Eastern Christian Easter.
In Australia, emu eggs are carved and the art created by them is known as kalti paarti carving. The art (which dates to the nineteenth century) is practised by people of different cultures, but it is associated most strongly with Aboriginal art.
A Punic ostrich egg was found in Villaricos, Spain.
Orthodox Christians in Mesopotamia used red dyed eggs to symbolise the blood of Christ, which is a possible origin of the Easter egg. Red eggs feature in Greek Easter celebrations, where people play games which involve tapping the red eggs against each other.
Persian culture has a tradition of egg decorating, which takes place during the spring equinox. This time marks Nowruz, the Persian New Year. Family members decorate eggs together and place them in a bowl. It is said that it is from this cultural tradition that the Christian practice on Easter ultimately originates, having been transmitted via the Slavs.
Long ago Slavic and Iranic peoples formed a close continuum sharing many traditions and innovations in religion and language and in the first millennium many formerly Iranic peoples would eventually become Turkic or Slavic in identity.
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