Althouse: "In many parts of Europe it was traditional to supply a newly married couple with enough mead for a month..."

June 28, 2011

"In many parts of Europe it was traditional to supply a newly married couple with enough mead for a month..."

"... ensuring happiness and fertility. From this practice we get honeymoon or, as the French say, lune de miel [lit. 'moon of honey']."

35 comments:

Methadras said...: Honeymead; 6/28/11, 10:09 PM
Chip Ahoy said...: That sounds like a very good idea.; 6/28/11, 10:12 PM
traditionalguy said...: So today do we give them a case of Blue Moon Honey Wheat Ale and take away all of their digital devices in hope that they actually speak to each other?; 6/28/11, 10:13 PM
Beta Rube said...: A month of Meade might be too much for the average woman.; 6/28/11, 10:16 PM
Fred4Pres said...: So does Meade make mead?; 6/28/11, 10:17 PM
Fred4Pres said...: I have made mead and frankly it can be a bit nasty. It requires proper aging to be good. I prefer adding some honey to an ale for balance.; 6/28/11, 10:18 PM
Anonymous said...: If the Meadhouse is rockin', don't come a knockin'.

wv: boosr; 6/28/11, 10:19 PM
Fred4Pres said...: I am sure Meade is a gentleman and does not have bitter after taste.

The drink mead can unfortunately be a bit rough.; 6/28/11, 10:19 PM
KCFleming said...: The cicada cycle seems more promising.; 6/28/11, 10:20 PM
Anonymous said...: Mead(e) is very potent and can satisfy even the deepest thirst.; 6/28/11, 10:21 PM
bagoh20 said...: Never tried any Mead, but I've been looking for it. Nothing local yet (L.A.); 6/28/11, 10:39 PM
Titus said...: Do you know the food and drink you have effect that taste of your cum?

Just be careful!

No one wants to swig bitter cum.; 6/28/11, 10:40 PM
erictrimmer said...: I would much rather buy a couple some booze for a wedding gift than a silver picture frame, plates or some towels.

Also, I think it's perfectly fine for a couple to put consumer electronics -- like video game systems -- on their registries.

WV: moledr

She married a dermatologist, you know, a mole doctor.; 6/28/11, 10:41 PM
Peter V. Bella said...: You were supplied with enough Meade to last a lifetime.; 6/28/11, 10:42 PM
bagoh20 said...: Occasionally, Titus is just impossible to disagree with.

WV: "boyas" I can't f'n believe this WV shit. It's spooky.; 6/28/11, 10:43 PM
Titus said...: Aspragus, spinach and cauliflower should not be eaten if you believe the whore you are with that night will take your load.; 6/28/11, 10:46 PM
WineSlob said...: Allegedly Althouse knees Meade when she needs Mead.

And when Meade meets her need for Mead, she kneads Meade.

So, on many a Mead-soaked night, Meade has been needed, kneed and kneaded, and has most surely suceeded.; 6/28/11, 10:52 PM
Meade said...: Indeed.; 6/28/11, 10:57 PM
Penny said...: "Mead(e) is very potent and can satisfy even the deepest thirst."

Too good to be true.

And you know what they say. If it sounds too good to be true, it isn't.

Right?

What I mean is..."Isn't sounding right."

So it must be left!

Right?; 6/28/11, 10:59 PM
Shouting Thomas said...: Aspragus, spinach and cauliflower should not be eaten if you believe the whore you are with that night will take your load.

This is the sort of pragmatic advice I've been looking for, Tight Ass.; 6/28/11, 11:43 PM
The Crack Emcee said...: One of the spookiest things I learned, from living in Europe, is how much was transplanted over here. And then, when I got sick of being over there and returned, to discover we were actually trying to be MORE like them was shocking. Now, as we're beginning to kick them back to the curb, I'm starting to calm down a bit.

Quaint ideas, built around the drinking of beer, is enough for me, thanks.; 6/29/11, 12:29 AM
Steven said...: Coincidentally, my wedding was a month to the day before you posted this.; 6/29/11, 12:41 AM
edutcher said...: Meade doesn't need mead.

He gets drunk on Ann.

Titus said...

Do you know the food and drink you have effect that taste of your cum?

Just be careful!

No one wants to swig bitter cum.

For a woman, what's the difference between love, true love, or just showing off?

Spit

Swallow

Gargle; 6/29/11, 5:51 AM
Fred4Pres said...: Wisconsin is pretty...pretty grisly.; 6/29/11, 7:35 AM
Fred4Pres said...: Opps wrong thread. My bad.; 6/29/11, 8:14 AM
Toad Trend said...: @edutcher

LOL good one.

Back at 'ya...

What is the square root of 69?

'Eight' something.; 6/29/11, 8:19 AM
dbp said...: I made a couple of 5 gallon batches of mead when I was in college. Most of my motivation was that from hobby beekeeping in high school, I had a lot of honey to get rid of.

Fermentation was very slow--I think at least a couple of months and we put lemons, cardamon, Cinnamon and cloves for flavor. The yeast was a high alcohol tolerant champagne type.

The result was pleasant and very strong. After bottling, we had a large iced tea glass of mead left and no more bottles. So four of us passed it around and easily felt its effect.; 6/29/11, 8:20 AM
erictrimmer said...: Jokes about bodily fluids aren't funny. Period.; 6/29/11, 9:13 AM
Trooper York said...: Hey is it your anniversary or something?; 6/29/11, 11:58 AM
Kirby Olson said...: honeyed moon, is how I'd translate that lune de miel bit.; 6/29/11, 3:21 PM
Methadras said...: Titus said...

Do you know the food and drink you have effect that taste of your cum?

Just be careful!

No one wants to swig bitter cum.

Titus, did you know that there are products to give your cum a specific flavor. Look it up. Have fun, but just make sure you don't give a hot beef injection to your indian husband. It's bad for the hindu in him.; 6/29/11, 3:37 PM
Ann Althouse said...: "Hey is it your anniversary or something?"

No. Our anniversary is August 3. We were just talking about honeymoons because someone we know just got married.; 6/29/11, 3:39 PM
Gabriel Hanna said...: The "honeymoon" etymology presented at the link is bogus.

"Honeymoon" has nothing whatever to do with mead. It refers to the feelings of a newly married couple, which are sweet as honey, but which change quickly like the moon, according to OED which is cites sources for this usage to the fifteenth century.

The bogus etymology doesn't make any sense: if "honeymoon" referred to a month's worth of mead why wasn't it called a "meadmonth"--both words are as ancient as "honey" and "moon". From what I can tell the bogus etymology comes from meadmaking books--note that those are the ONLY cites given in the wikipedia article. There is no evidence that a month's worth of mead was ever traditionally given at marriages anywhere.

Like the bogus Steinbeck quote presented here earlier this month, you can't believe everything you read on the internet.; 6/29/11, 3:43 PM
Gabriel Hanna said...: From TFA:

This, the first known literary reference to the honeymoon, was penned in 1552, in Richard Huloet's Abecedarium Anglico Latinum. Huloet writes: “Hony mone, a term proverbially applied to such as be newly married, which will not fall out at the first, but th'one loveth the other at the beginning exceedingly, the likelihood of their exceadinge love appearing to aswage, ye which time the vulgar people call the hony mone.; 6/29/11, 3:44 PM
Jose_K said...: Luna de miel in spanish.
I read somewhere that among germans abduction was the way to marry a woman. After 40 days, the honeymoon , the relatives were no longer legally able to get back the woman.
In spanish transalation of sagas, Odin, Wotan drinks beer, but in english transaltions mead is the Gods food, hydromiel or water,honey; 6/29/11, 5:48 PM