Ahh, June... the month most typically associated with weddings. Last year, because my baby brother got hitched, I did a series of posts on wedding traditions. This year, slacker that I am, I didn't even remember the fact that they had reached their first anniversary (love you guys, congrats! sorry I'm such a bad sister!)
Personally, as far as weddings go this year, the only one that caught my eye was the royal wedding. Loved it! Loved it!! LOVED IT!!! It took me back to 1981 when I was a wee little tyke watching Diana go down the aisle in that absolutely gorgeous (yet completely impractical) fairy tale dress. For the first time, I realized that princesses were real. One thing that has always stuck with me about that wedding- and now with the next generation's- was the fact that Diana's engagement ring had a sapphire in it. Heaven forbid (imagine me fanning myself here in a ladylike Southern belle kind of way)... aren't wedding rings supposed to have diamonds in them!?!
Not necessarily. And to be honest with you, the idea of the engagement ring is a fairly modern one. Traditionally, when the bridegroom-to-be or his family negotiated the engagement or betrothal with the bride-to-be's family, there was an exchange of gifts. Girls had some sort of dowry, a bride price if you will, that showed the value of the bride. Depending on how wealthy or important the families were, the dowry might include goods, animals, gold or lands and property. Wonder how many goats I would be worth?
Notice that this was very impersonal. For the most part, betrothals were. The couple was put together for the betterment of both families, not for love. However, over time, it became common for the prospective bridegroom to give his future wife some sort of token of affection (again, I would probably would have gotten a goat, ugh!) Men of wealthy means would give gifts of jewelry. With rings symbolizing eternity, no beginning, no end, voila! The engagement ring was a no brainer. It marked your future bride as yours and the more elaborate it was, the bigger of a catch you looked like as a husband.
Engagement rings tended to be simple bands of gold, maybe some sort of design hammered into them. But in 1477, Archduke Maximilian of Austria stepped up the engagement ring game. Maximilian presented Princess Mary of Burgundy, his future bride, with an engagement ring with a huge diamond flashing right in the middle of it. Oh yeah, Max was the man! Whether he realized it or not, this action started a trend. From that point forward, for those with means, an engagement/betrothal ring had to be bigger and better, with the diamond becoming the traditional stone. Diana's ring and others notwithstanding, diamond engagement rings constitute 80% of the engagement rings given today.
I think that given the chance, I'd pull a Diana when it came to engagement rings. I don't want a typical diamond solitare. Give me an emerald surrounded by smaller diamonds. And guys, let me speak for all the ladies here, when it comes to engagement rings, size does matter :)
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