Middle East is the cradle of several ancient civilizations on Earth, and even though the region had a very troubled history, it is quite interesting that a number of wedding traditions have managed to preserve unspoiled in time.

Middle East is a region with many peoples with different customs and traditions, but despite this fact, many of them have a lot in common. In many parts of the Middle East, the customary wedding ceremony includes five distinctive parties.

The engagement party is the first party in this chain of parties. During this party, the bride and the groom invite family members and close friends to celebrate with them. During the feast, cooked meals are served and singing and dancing is something normal; the party ends up at night. At this party, the bride used to change her clothes five times. Brides from Middle East are very unusual to Europeans; they also have odd wedding dresses, you’ll see that later.
Signing the marriage contract is the second big party from the series.

On this day, the bride and the groom, accompanied by their parents, go to court in order to sign their marriage contract. After that, the bride and the groom invite family members and friends again to their party, where they eat, dance and sing; the bride changes her clothes again five times, during this party.

Hena party is the third party and it helps the new couple avoid all evil and have a happy life. It is the party that they organize a day before the actual wedding. Hena term might seem familiar. Is the paint with that they tattoo the hands and feet of the bride, so she might be protected of evil spirits and gins. This party is also exhausting. In many countries from Middle East the bride and the groom are seated, surrounded by unmarried girls who keep in their hands white blades; two of them break in the couple’s heads sugar snowballs, invoking their God (Allah) to remove all evil from their life. Usually, tradition requires for the bride to wear green clothes and for the party to last till morning.

The next party is the wedding itself, where the bride and groom exchange rings (you must remember that the custom of wearing wedding rings originated in the Middle East). It is the largest of the five parties and her development is similar to previous ones: to keep toasts, dancing and singing, especially songs specific to each country. The bride wears traditional wedding clothes which are nowadays considered odd wedding dresses. It’s unusual for us to see brides wearing something else than white.

Even traditions are common for many peoples or communities from the Middle East, they aren’t universal. Instead, we can say that there is a universal feature common for the whole Middle East and that is the joy of founding a new home, a new family, a new road in life.