Gingerbread Men - The Golden Glow of Christmas Past® (2024)
When you think about gingerbread at Christmas, probably the first thing that comes to mind is the flat, spicy cookie that is made into men whose heads you bite off! Did you ever wonder why “gingerbread men” are shaped like men in the first place? The answer can be traced back hundreds of years.
Queen Elizabeth I, who reigned from 1558-1603, is credited with the invention of the gingerbread man. (I am not kidding!) She loved throwing lavish royal dinners that included things like marzipan shaped like fruit, castles and birds. But, the Queen’s court also included a royal gingerbread maker. (More about these bakers a little later.) Elizabeth delighted in having her gingerbread maker bake gingerbread men made in the likenesses of visiting dignitaries and people from her court. I wonder if these gingerbread men were placed on a serving platter to allow guests to choose any one they wanted. Just imagine the satisfaction of biting off the head of someone you really did not like!
But, the Queen wasn’t the only person eating gingerbread men. Taking their lead from the Queen, gingerbread men were often handed out by folk medicine practitioners (often known as magicians and witches). These gingerbread men were created as “love tokens” for young women. The idea was to get the man you’d like to marry to eat the gingerbread man! Tadah! A trip down the aisle was in your future! Well that was what the magician/witch told you. A contemporary to Elizabeth was none other than William Shakespeare. In Loves Labor’s Lost, he wrote this, “An I had but one penny in the world, thou shouldst have it to buy gingerbread.” I guess William really liked gingerbread.
So, how did gingerbread cookies become something to eat around the holidays? Through the ages, gingerbread was sacred and only specific bakers, all men, were given the exclusive rights to baking it. These men all belonged to baking guilds. The only time during the year that gingerbread was allowed to be made by the general public was during Christmas and Easter. So, that’s most likely why it’s seen as a Christmas food. It’s all in the timing! Once an association is established, it’s nearly impossible to change it. Eating gingerbread at Christmas might also be associated with the medicinal properties of the ginger root. It was believed that eating spices heated you up in the winter. Another explanation may be related to overeating during the holidays. Ginger is good at taming upset stomachs. Remember when you were a kid and you were given flat ginger ale when you had an upset tummy?
The popularity of gingerbread cookies and houses spread to colonial America. Recipes for the treat varied from region to region, depending upon what immigrants settled there. In 1848, it is said that Queen Victoria and her German-born husband Prince Albert, brought gingerbread cookies into the mainstream when they included them in with other German Christmas traditions they adopted and promoted as family centered traditions, like decorating a Christmas tree and the Yule log. It was during this time that gingerbread cookies became associated primarily with the Christmas holiday.
The development of tin cookie cutters in the mid-1800s also helped to establish gingerbread cookies in many kitchens and breathed new life into the tradition of gingerbread. The new cookie cutters proclaimed the end of the long-established and complicated cookie board used primarily in bakeries. Soon, these shaped cookies began to appear as ornaments on trees and as gifts for family and friends.
Today, gingerbread cookies are as popular as ever, becoming an established Christmas tradition in America. If reading this blog post has made you hungry for gingerbread men, perhaps you are off to make some for yourself. I have the perfect idea for enjoying them after baking them. Why not sit down with your favorite beverage and The Glow magazine? What a great combination!
One theory holds that since the "men" are really more toddler-shaped than adult, they came to represent the baby Jesus at Christmas. And the spices involved are sometimes thought to represent the exotic gifts of the Magi.
Superstitions about gingerbread flourished in the 17th century. Witches supposedly made gingerbread figures, ate them, and thereby caused the death of their enemies. Dutch magistrates went so far as to declare baking or eating molded cookies illegal.
The gingerbread man was very confident that he could run fast and escape from everyone. However, he was proved wrong when the sly fox caught him. Secondly, “we should never trust anyone blindly”. The gingerbread man believed the fox offered him and was not at all tempted to eat him.
The first documented instance of figure-shaped gingerbread biscuits was at the court of Elizabeth I of England. She had the gingerbread figures made and presented in the likeness of some of her important guests which brought the human shape of the gingerbread cookies.
The Gingerbread man is one of England's most frequently used Christmas decorations. Its creation is attributed to Queen Elizabeth !, who is thought to have served the gingerbread figurines to visiting dignitaries. Lebkuchen, the German gingerbread, is likely to be the oldest Christmas gingerbread cookie.
Run, run, run as fast as you can, you can t catch me I m the Gingerbread Man!You re a monster!I m not the monster here, you are.You and the rest of that fairy tale trash poisoning my perfect kingdom.
The infamous legend behind the gingerbread man is a classic fairytale that has been delighting children for more than 200 years. It was first published in 1875 under the title "The Gingerbread Boy.” This story varies depending on where it's being told in the world, but the moral always remains the same.
The moral of the story of the gingerbread man is to be careful of who you trust. The gingerbread man outruns the people and animals chasing him, but then reaches a river where a fox is sitting on the bank. The fox offers a ride on his tail, and the gingerbread man decides he will be safe there.
The tale ends with a fox catching and eating the gingerbread man who cries as he is devoured, "I'm quarter gone... I'm half gone... I'm three-quarters gone... I'm all gone!"
Perhaps most well known in the shape of gingerbread men, thanks to the nursery rhyme, the ginger gives these cookies an unmistakable spice. Santa loves when these cookies are decorated and shaped into a gingerbread family.
A fear that gingerbread men could be the agents of the devil also spread throughout Europe. In 1607, the superstitious magistrates of Delft in the Netherlands made it illegal to either bake or eat any of these molded and spiced cookies. This was also a time of religious upheaval.
Long before it became a holiday treat, gingerbread was a royal favorite, a token of fertility, and a tool for witches to exact their vengeance. The pudgy gingerbread man with his candy eyes and icing smile has a sinister backstory—a link to death and the demonic.
After creating a paste of breadcrumbs, honey, and ginger, and rolling the mixture out, the monks often carved biblical scenes or images of saints before baking it. They then used these gingerbread treats as a way to feed the hungry and offer some religious teaching at the same time.
During the winter months, colonials enjoyed ginger snap cookies dipped in wine. A comforting way to stay warm, their popularity in the colder months led to ginger cookies becoming common Christmas tree decorations.
Today, the ultimate Christmas gingerbread incarnation is of course the gingerbread house. It has been suggested that these edible structures originated in Germany between the 16th and 18th centuries. The trend for gingerbread houses must have spread to Britain at some point during the nineteenth century.
The gingerbread house origin tells us of a fourth wise man
He would be born in Bethlehem, which means “House of Bread” when translated from Hebrew. It was common for young acolytes to make houses of bread to eat in order to symbolically sustain their faith.
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Introduction: My name is Virgilio Hermann JD, I am a fine, gifted, beautiful, encouraging, kind, talented, zealous person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.
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