What do you think of when you hear the word “bridesmaid?” A beloved friend? A source of encouragement and help during wedding planning? Someone who shares one of the most important days of your life with you?
In many cases, the answer today is “all of the above,” but there were times in history when bridesmaids weren’t necessarily friends or loved ones. They had duties to perform, and those tasks weren’t necessarily pleasant—or even safe.
Here’s a look at what being a bridesmaid involved during some key periods in history.
Handmaids Before Bridesmaids
Some historians say two of our earliest records of women serving as bridesmaids, or at least looking after a bride, can be found in the Bible. In the Book of Genesis, when Jacob marries Leah, and then her sister Rachel, each young woman is assigned a “handmaid,” from her father.
The handmaid was a servant, though, and the handmaids who went to work for Leah and Rachel were expected to stay on the job long after the women married Jacob. In fact, it’s not clear if the handmaids were participants in the weddings.
Preparations for a wedding: ancient Greek ceramic painting. Unknown author, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
It Was a Living
There were servants—or paid service providers—responsible for preparing well-to-do brides for their nuptials in ancient Greece. The Women in Antiquity website refers to these women in an article about Greek weddings (these long-ago affairs weren’t big or fat, but there was some pageantry involved).
“After the ritual bath, the bride was dressed for the wedding with the help of the wedding attendant known as a nymphokomos, because it was not easy to dress the bride,” the article says. “This was an opportunity for wealthy families to show off, due to the fact that the bride was dressed as ornately as possible.”
Once she was fully decked out, the bride would walk from her childhood home to the home of the groom and his family in a wedding procession or chariot procession. Some historic images of those events even include a female attendant, most likely the nymphokomos, behind the bride.
Earliest Matching Outfits
If we somehow could watch a bride and groom exchange vows in ancient Rome, we’d probably notice some resemblance to modern weddings, at least in terms of large wedding parties. But the bridesmaids and groomsmen at ancient Roman wedding ceremonies weren’t there to share the joy of the day; they were more about preventing disaster.
According to the magazine, Mental Floss, ancient Roman law said there had to be 10 witnesses at a wedding.
“Bridesmaids and groomsmen had to dress just like the bride and groom to confuse vengeful spirit presences (or real-life jealous suitors) who might try to harm the newlyweds,” Jen Doll wrote for Mental Floss.
Roman weddings also had a matron of honor, someone who’d only been married once and had a living husband, to serve as a positive example of “fidelity and obedience,” Doll wrote. The matron of honor joined the right hands of the bride and groom during the ceremony.
By the way, the practice of dressing like the bride to keep her safe wasn’t limited to ancient Rome; bridesmaids did the same in feudal China (1122 BC to 256 BC). There, it was not uncommon for brides to make long, perilous journeys to the groom’s home, where they were to be married.
“With a host of bridesmaids all dressed alike, it became that much harder to target the bride on the road or at her ceremony,” Brandon Specktor wrote for Reader’s Digest. “(Think about it like traveling with a body double—except everybody looks fabulous.)”
The Long-Lost Art of Shoe Throwing
Bridesmaids were part of English weddings during the early middle ages (about 410-1066 AD), and just like their modern counterparts do today, they sometimes lined up to catch a special something from the bride. Her shoe.
Apparently, shoes were a big part of the wedding tradition. Grooms even hit their bride with a shoe, symbolically, of course, to “establish his authority” as head of the household, Doll wrote in her article for Mental Floss.
The footwear throwing with the bridesmaids was a two-part process. The woman who caught the bride’s shoe would be the next to marry. She then threw the shoe at the men at the wedding, and the guy she hit would be the next man to wed.
More Pathways to Marriage
As the Middle Ages progressed, people started to believe that the act of being a bridesmaid, whether you caught a shoe, flowers, or anything else, was a pathway to marriage. This belief was so strong that by the 1500s, if a woman wasn’t married by the time she’d been a bridesmaid three times, she was considered cursed. The cure? More bridesmaid duty: for four more brides.
Personal Space? Forget It!
Bridesmaid duty in the Middle Ages didn’t stop after the wedding ceremony and feast; they were supposed to accompany the bride to her bed chamber and help her get out of her dress and get ready for bed…and in some cases, ready to consummate their marriage.
In his book, “Marriage Customs of the World From Henna to Honeymoons,” George Monger quoted an 1872 historian who had written about medieval weddings.
“’As the bride entered the bridal chamber, she would be made to drink and eat by her bridesmaids a concoction of plum buns swimming in spiced ale. This was supposed to restore the energies of a delicate young lady.’”
Bridesmaid’s duties during this era also included:
· Leading the groom to the ceremony
· Helping the bride remove her gloves and holding the gloves during the ceremony
· Being responsible for the “dow purse” or dowry money going to the groom’s family
· Watching their step (tripping on the way to the altar supposedly cursed the bridesmaid to an unmarried future)
More Wardrobe Requirements
In Victorian England, bridesmaids’ duties shifted away from the bed chamber, but they still spent time helping the bride dress and prepare her bouquet before the wedding. After the ceremony, they helped the bride change dresses for the feast that followed.
By now, brides were following in the footsteps of Queen Victoria, who wore white at her wedding to Prince Albert. Bridesmaids followed suit by wearing white dresses with short veils.
The tradition of warding off evil spirits was still in place. By now, instead of serving as decoys to confuse dangerous spirits, bridesmaids relied on aromatic bunches of herbs, garlic, and grains to do the trick.
Thankfully, the role of bridesmaids is much safer and less awkward these days. The focus is where it should be: on friendship, support, and making special memories.