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Easter eggs are specially decorated eggs given out
to celebrate the Easter holiday. The oldest tradition
is to use dyed and painted chickens eggs, but the
general modern custom is to substitute eggs made from
chocolate.
Easter eggs can be any form of confectionery such as
hollow chocolate eggs wrapped in brightly-colored foil.
Some are delicately constructed of spun sugar and pastry
decoration techniques. The ubiquitous jelly egg (or
jelly bean) is made from sugar-coated pectin candy.
These are often hidden, supposedly by the Easter Bunny,
for children to find on Easter morning.
Decorated eggs are much older than Easter, and both
eggs and rabbits are age-old fertility symbols. The
Passover Seder service uses a hard-cooked egg flavored
with salt water as a symbol both of new life and the
Temple service in Jerusalem. The Jewish tradition
may have come from earlier Roman Spring feasts.
Easter egg origin stories abound -- one has an emperor
claiming that the Resurrection was as likely as eggs
turning red (see Mary Magdalene); more prosaically
the Easter egg tradition may have celebrated the end
of the privations of Lent.
Easter eggs are a widely popular symbol of new life
in Poland and other Slavic countries folk traditions.
A batik-like decorating process known as Pisanki produces
intricate, brilliantly-colored eggs. The celebrated
Fabergé workshops created exquisite jewelled Easter
eggs for the Russian Imperial Court.
There are many other decoration techniques and numerous
traditions of giving them as a token of friendship,
love or good wishes. When boiling hard-cooked eggs
for easter a nice colour can be achieved by boiling
the eggs with onion skin.
Easter Eggs 2008 Decorating
Egg decorating is the art or craft of decorating
eggs. Any bird egg can be used, but generally the
larger and stronger the eggshell is, the more favoured
it will be by decorators.
Goose, duck or hens' eggs are usually blown, i.e.
the content of the egg is removed. The egg is sometimes
sculpted, otherwise decorated in a number of different
techniques.
Some eggs, eg. emu eggs are so large and strong that
the shells may be carved without breaking. Decorations
on emu eggs take advantage of the contrast in colours
between the dark green mottled outside of the shell,
and the contrasting shell-underlay.
The renowned Russian artist and jeweller Faberge
made exquisitely decorated precious metal and gemstone
eggs for the Russian Court. These eggs resembled standard
decorated eggs, but they were made from gold and precious
stones.
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