Facts About
Easter Bunny History

"Easter bunny history linking rabbits and hares with the springtime holiday
appears in German folklore from the 1500s."

The prolific rabbit, long a potent symbol of fecundity celebrated by pagan tribes in spring fertility festivals, became Osterhase, the Easter hare bearing gifts of colored eggs to children who had been well-behaved.

The hare's arrival was keenly awaited by German children, who set out "nests" the day before Osterhase to receive the eggs, using their bonnets and hats

This tradition was brought to America by German immigrants to Pennsylvania during the 1700s. The celebration spread and became popular, merging with the Christian observance of Easter and making the Easter rabbit the secular symbol of Easter.

Wide appeal to children of the Easter bunny tradition no doubt inspired German confectioners in the early 1800s to introduce edible, long-eared bunny candies, cakes and pastries.

Chocolate, as a beverage, had been a luxury commodity among European upper classes for two hundred years. By the mid 1800s, edible chocolate was introduced by Fry and Sons of England, made possible by the development of chocolate molds.

Soon other European confectioners such as John Cadbury in Birmingham, England, helped to create demand for the chocolate treats at Easter.

Also in the mid 1800s, Stephen Whitman in Philadelphia began making chocolate Easter bunnies for the American market. Whitman's Chocolates helped popularize the giving of chocolate bunnies as Easter gifts.

The most popular non-chocolate treat in recent Easter rabbit history is the marshmallow confection known as Easter Peeps™ which are made in the shape of baby chicks. Yellow is the favorite color, although peeps are also available in pink, white, blue, lavender and green.

Preview or send a free, printable, Easter bunny ecard.
Preview or send an Easter chicks ecard.

Eggs are an exquisite cradle containing new life.

Reverence for the egg as a symbol of birth and renewal appears in the oldest cultures.

• In Hindu mythology there is the cosmic egg of Brahma, the god of creation, in which the universe was born of a golden egg.
• In Chinese creation mythology the first living creature, P'an Ku, evolved inside a huge cosmic egg containing all the elements of the universe.
• The Babylonians believed that a magical egg of enormous size fell from heaven into the Euphrates river. It was rolled onto the riverbank by fishes, incubated and hatched by doves. From the egg was born Venus (also called Astarte), the queen of heaven.

The tradition of egg decorating also dates to pagan times:

• Engraved ostrich eggshell water vessels were found in Dieploof rock cave in South Africa. These eggshells were found to be 60,000 years old.
• Phoenician painted eggs are preserved from the Carthaginian Empire (North Africa and Spain), 1200 B.C.
• The Persians decorated eggs as part of their new year, which is celebrated at the vernal equinox.
• Eastern Europeans, especially Ukrainians, Czecks, Poles, Croats, Sorbs, and Slovaks have a very long tradition of creating intricately decorated eggs.
• Among orthodox Christian groups such as those in Greece, Syria, Bulgaria, and Russia, it became the custom to dye Easter eggs red to represent the blood of Christ.
• The Germans who settled in Pennsylvania (the Pennsylvania Dutch) brought with them to America the art of dyeing and decorating eggs.
• Perhaps the most well-known decorated eggs in history are those created by Russian jeweler Peter Fabergè (1846-1920) for Russian Tsars Alexander III and Nicholas II. He designed a total of 54 exquisitely bejeweled Fabergè eggs.
• In 1880, William Townley of Newark, New Jersey developed a recipe for egg dye tablets. His product launched the PAAS Dye Company, which still makes Easter egg colorings kits.

Today, Easter eggs are just as likely to be made of chocolate or marshmallow as they are to be real eggs. The egg-shaped jelly bean has been another Easter egg tradition since the 1930s.

And, as adults gather to exchange gifts and share prayers and food, children are entertained by games and activities.

The most popular of these is the Easter egg hunt, in which eggs of all kinds: decorated real eggs, chocolate eggs, or candy eggs are hidden for children to seek. Children are delighted to find these beautiful "treasures" which, indeed, eggs have been throughout history.

Another Easter game is the egg roll, in which children push or roll decorated boiled eggs through the grass with a spoon.

Preview or send a free, printable, Easter egg ecard.

What Does Easter Mean?

The Christian meaning of Easter is a celebration of the life and resurrection of Jesus.

• The season begins with Lent, the forty days before Easter Sunday, which represent the forty days Jesus spent alone in preparation for starting his ministry.
• Fat Tuesday is the day before the 40-day Lenten fast begins. It is a day for merriment and eating.
• The week before Easter is Holy Week, when Jesus entered Jerusalem, preached to his followers, presided over the Last Supper, stood trial, was condemned, and was crucified.
• Palm Sunday, the Sunday before Easter, Jesus entered Jerusalem and was hailed as a king.
• Good Friday represents the day of Jesus' crucifixion.
• Easter Sunday represents the day of Jesus' resurrection.

Acceptance by pagan peoples of these new Christian precepts was likely made more agreeable by entwining them with existing spring festivals celebrating renewal and birth.

Eostre/Ostara

The precise origin of this holiday's name, Easter, is not known.

According to modern Wiccan and pagan lore, Easter is named for a Teutonic goddess of fertility and springtime, Eostre (also called Ostara, Oestre, and Eastre).

Drawings of Eostre show her adorned in the flowers of spring, surrounded by birds and hares. Wiccans celebrate Ostara, the vernal equinox, or arrival of spring, each year.

Eostre is first mentioned by Benedictine monk Bede almost 1,300 years ago in his writings De temporum ratione (The Reckoning of Time).

He writes that the month of April, Eustremonth, is named for the Anglo-Saxon goddess of spring, Ostara.

The goddess' next acknowledgement appears among the works of Jacob Grimm in the early 1800s, as a brief mention in the course of the Grimm Brothers' collecting of oral fairy fales from German storytellers.

The Christian belief in resurrection as it relates to Easter has, perhaps, a parallel in a story from the fertile crescent of Mesopotamia, as early as 3000 B.C.

There exist many colorful, mythological accounts of the Sumerian goddess of fertility and love, Inanna (also known as Ishtar), and her consort Dumuzi (also known as Tammuz).

Dumuzi was a fertility god as well as the god of herdsmen. The two enjoyed a lustful, amorous relationship recounted in poems and songs of the time.

For motives not entirely known, Inanna visited her sister Ereshkigal, goddess of the dead and the underworld. Ereshkigal trapped Inanna in the underworld, not allowing her to escape until Inanna sacrificed her lover Dumuzi in exchange for herself.

Out of devotion to Dumuzi, his sister Geshtinana begged to take his place in the underworld. The dilemma was resolved when the goddess of the underworld decreed that brother and sister would share the imprisonment, each spending half of each year in the world of the dead.

During the time Dumuzi is in the underworld, Inanna mourns for him. Her spirit and powers ebb, the earth saddens, and the fruitful seasons end.

When her lover returns (is resurrected from the dead), Inanna the goddess of fertility and love rejoices. The earth warms and greens, bursting forth with buds and flowers. All 'round is the promise of new babies.

Spring has returned!

Happy Easter!

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