Throwing rice at newlyweds: from Roman walnuts to petals

As they leave the church or the town hall, newlyweds are greeted by a shower of rice, petals or confetti. The gesture is festive and seems spontaneous, but it belongs to a family of very old customs, all tied to the same wish: that the new couple may be fruitful and prosperous. Over the centuries what changed was above all the thing being thrown, while the meaning remained remarkably stable.

The walnuts of Roman weddings

In the Roman wedding, during the procession that took the bride to her husband's house, the groom threw walnuts to the boys following the cortege. Catullus, in poem 61, written for the wedding of Manlius Torquatus, urges: «da nuces pueris», give the boys the nuts. Virgil, in the eighth Eclogue, writes «sparge, marite, nuces», scatter the nuts, husband. The two quotations show how familiar the gesture was to ancient readers.

Ancient commentators proposed various explanations. Nuts were children's toys, and throwing them might mean that the groom was abandoning youthful pastimes to enter adulthood. Others saw in it a wish for abundance or a way of covering the bride's voice with noise. Whatever its origin, the throwing made the passage to a new condition visible and collective.

Wheat, spelt and grain

Alongside nuts, cereals played a central role. The most solemn form of Roman marriage, confarreatio, took its name from spelt, far, because it included the offering of a cake of this grain to Jupiter. Shared bread symbolically united the spouses, and grain, a seed that multiplies, was the natural sign of fertility. In many European countrysides the custom of throwing grains of wheat over the couple long survived.

Rice, the cereal par excellence of Asia, had for centuries signified prosperity and abundance in India, China and Japan. In Europe it became prominent above all in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, when it had become a common and cheap food. In Victorian England, alongside rice, people also threw old shoes after the newlyweds' carriage for good luck.

Confetti, petals and a modern rumour

In Italy, besides rice, people sometimes throw rose petals or sugared almonds, and in the past it was common to throw coins as well, an explicit wish for wealth. In some parts of southern Italy the throwing also took place from balconies as the procession passed through the village. Every variant keeps the same logic: to offer the couple, in symbolic form, the abundance that is hoped will accompany the new family.

In recent decades many churches and town halls have banned rice for reasons of cleanliness and safety, preferring petals or soap bubbles. A rumour has also spread that uncooked rice makes the stomachs of birds that eat it burst: it is a modern legend, refuted by ornithologists, but it has helped to change the custom.

From Catullus's walnuts to contemporary petals, throwing things over newlyweds expresses the desire to share in their joy through a concrete gesture. The guests do not merely watch: they hand the couple a physical wish, a shower of seeds or flowers that, for a moment, turns the street into a fertile field.