Modern & Traditional Anniversary Gift List

The vexing question of whether to use the traditional anniversary gift list or go modern comes around as regular as clockwork, or to be more precise once a calender year. Traditional anniversary presents by their very nature harken back to our rural past when most of our ancestors eked out a living on the land.

As you cast your eye down the wedding anniversary symbols calendar – the anniversary year list of gifts, you could be excused in thinking that people in the nineteenth century had a wry sense of humour. You could just imagine some guy giving his wife a lump of aluminium or tin for their tenth anniversary - and then running for his life, but the truth is aluminium was a precious metal back then because of the difficulty and expense of extracting it from it's raw state. A set of aluminium cutlery in Napoleon's day would have been a gift to boast about in the village.

Wedding anniversary traditions have certainly changed a bit since the Industrial Revolution and that change is an ongoing process. To some degree, a glance down any list of wedding anniversaries is looking through a time capsule. Would you rather look down a traditional anniversary gift list and look at where we came from, or do you find your choice from a contemporary anniversary list of years gifts and build your own time capsule?

Anniversary Symbols Guide - Anniversary Gifts By Year List

Lists of wedding anniversary gifts – wedding anniversary gemstones and flowers may vary by country. Meanwhile, let the wedding anniversary gifts by year list below be a guide.

YEARS 1-70 TRADTIONAL GIFTS MODERN GIFTS JEWELS & GEMSTONES FLOWERS & BOUQUETS 1st Paper Clocks, Watches Gold Pansies or Carnation 2nd Cotton China Garnet Cosmos or Lily of the valley 3rd Leather Crystal, Glass Pearls Fuchsia or Sunflower 4th Flowers, Fruits Linen, Appliances Blue Topaz Daisy or Hydrangea 5th Wood Silverware Sapphire Calla Lillies or Daisy 6th Iron, Candy Wood Amethyst Jack in the Pulpit or Calla Lily 7th Wool, Copper, Brass Table Sets Onyx Clematis or Freesia 8th Bronze Linen, Lace Tourmaline Poppies or Lilac 9th Pottery, Willow Leather Lapis Daffodils or Bird of Paradise 10th Tin, Aluminium, Pewter Diamonds Diamond Morning Glory or Daffodil 11th Steel Fashion Jewelry Turquoise Peony or Tulip 12th Silk Pearls, Gems Jade Hollyhock or Peony 13th Lace Fur, Fabrics Citrine, Moonstone Dahlia or Chrysanthemum 14th Ivory Gold Jewelry Opal, Agate Rose or Dahlia 15th Crystal Watches Ruby, Crystal Rose 16th Topaz Hollowware Peridot, Aquamarine Bouquet of Flowers 17th Amethyst, Citrine Furniture Amethyst, Citrine Bouquet of Flowers 18th Garnet Porcelain Cat's Eye Bouquet of Flowers 19th Aquamarine Bronze Almandine Garnet Bouquet of Flowers 20th China, Porcelain Platinum Emerald Day Lilies or Aster 25th Silver Silver Jewelry Silver Jubilee Iris 30th Pearl Diamond Pearl Jubilee Sweet Pea or Lily 35th Coral Jade Emerald Bouquet of Flowers 40th Ruby Ruby Ruby Nasturtium or Gladiolus 45th Sapphire Sapphire Cat's Eye Bouquet of Flowers 50th Gold Gold Golden Jubilee Violet or Yellow Roses 55th Emerald Turquoise Alexandrite Bouquet of Flowers 60th Diamond Gold Diamond Jubilee Bouquet of Flowers 70th Platinum Iron Smoky Quartz Bouquet of Flowers

Happily married couple exchanging gifts on their wedding anniversary.

The Origin of Anniversary Gifts

The origin of giving gifts for specially prescribed wedding aniversaries dates back to the middle ages, though the concept of giving gifts dates back to biblical times when the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar tried to placate a sulky concubine by giving her the population of Israel as an anniversary gift. Too much? Who's to say?

There's no doubt having a list of wedding anniversaries and anniversary gift list makes a husband's life easier. At least he doesn't have to make the grievous error of asking the wife. Just think, the Napoleonic Wars could have been avoided if only the little Corsican hadn't asked Josephine if she'd like something practical for their anniversary. `Tuscany would be nice!' she replied.

Certainly, the traditional meanings to wedding anniversaries are eventually lost in time, but the anniversary year list does speak of a time when lifespans were much shorter and few husbands lived long enough to spring for the diamond anniversary. Isn't modern medicine a wonderful thing?

Spare a thought for our descendants though, a twenty second century anniversary gift list might include trilithium crystals from the moons of Vulcan - for their 150th anniversary. Where will it end? One can but ponder...

Of course, you can always get some wedding anniversary flowers. I suspect that even in the twenty second century, a gift of flowers will be a precious thing. They are for me.

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