Today we celebrate a birthday with cake because, for thousands of years, blowing out candles has been a gesture that combines ritual and symbol: from the ancient Greeks, who offered honey sweets to Artemis, to the Germans in Medieval Germany with the first Kinderfests, the cake has become the symbol par excellence of the celebration. However, if we go back a few millennia, we discover that the first celebratory cakes had nothing to do with the sweet and soft ones we know today.
According to historians, the first recognizable form of “birthday” cake dates back toancient Greece: the Greeks used to offer round honey sweets in honor of Artemis, goddess of hunting and the moon, decorating them with small candles to imitate their light. Even then, the gesture of blowing on candles had a ritual and symbolic value as it was believed that smoke could transport desires to the gods.
A few centuries later ancient Romans they also borrowed this tradition adapting it to more use daily: they celebrated the birthdays of the most illustrious citizens with cakes made from flour, cheese and honey, which were offered to the guests as a sign of prosperity and good omen. Thus some fundamental aspects began to emerge that we still find today, both relating to sweet character (honey was one of the most excellent sweeteners in ancient times) both to function, as the cake began to be representative of a moment to celebrate or commemorate.
We have to wait for the period to pass from the beginning of the 15th to the end of the 17th century to have another major development. During these centuries in Germany bakeries began producing the first cakes specifically intended for children’s birthdays, the Kinderfest. Here the candles took on a more personal meaning: one for each year of life, plus one “for luck”, a detail that still survives today. The Geburtstagstorten (birthday cake) were initially reserved for the wealthiest families, but with the industrial revolution and the large-scale production of sugar, the cakes became increasingly sweeter, accessible to the less wealthy population, and decidedly more imaginative. From that moment they spread throughout Europe as holiday symbol, best wishes and of companyfully entering popular culture.
A delight that began thousands of years ago, the cake is not limited to birthdays or even to being a simple dish to eat: it is a symbol that cannot be missing during a celebration and as such cannot escape the excesses of the modern era. An example of this are the famous multi-layer wedding cakes with two miniatures of the bride and groom at the top, or the Disney themed cakes or Marvel from children’s birthdays, to spectacular ones 3D creations Of cake design sported by celebrities, the production of this dessert has become an art. Thanks to technology and confectionery innovation, complex structures and exaggerated decorations can be created, which celebrities often compete with to leave their guests amazed.
