Deb & Peter’s Handfasting Ceremony

One important aspect to our Handfasting ceremony is of course the cord (or ribbon) with which our hands are bound together.

Handfastings were the ceremonies that most people did to get married, as weddings (as we know them) could only be held by the aristocracy and affluent merchant class. As they couldn’t afford rings, the ancient folk tradition of binding the hands together was incorporated into the ceremony, and this is where we get the phrase “tying the knot”.

Strangely enough, we found our cord on Ebay. Lauren in Wendouree makes and sells Handfasting Kits, which include the handmade and custom-made cord.

In keeping with the alchemical theme of our ceremony of two people/energies coming together to create a whole – wegot our cord made from the two colours we have chosen to represent us: green (Pete) and burgundy (Deb). These two colours wind around each other to form the cord which will be tied around our hands.

I am also attaching feathers at either end of the cord, each one representing aspects of each of us – I won’t reveal here which feathers I am using, but see if you can work out on the day which feather represents whom…

There has been a slight change in terms of the celebrant. Joanna unfortunately was unable to continue to be our priestess, due to personal reasons. So we needed to find someone with the right energy to facilitate this important ceremony for us. We eventually got on to Seline - those of you ensconced firmly in Melbourne’s Pagan scene may be familiar with her from her work at Gatherings such as Euphoria.  Seline is a legal celebrant, as well as a Priestess, so now she is going to be running the ceremony for us. However, we still have to say a big, warm thank-you to Livia, who did all the preliminary paperwork and was happy and flexible enough to work with us.

We will be keeping the ceremony brief, and it won’t be full of pagan terminology or rites that may be unknown or misunderstood by our friends and family – the focus is more on us performing something sacred with our community as witnesses to the fact that we are choosing to make a heart-felt commitment to each other. But we will be including a lot of symbolism in the ceremony, following the theme which I have written about so much. Again, see if you can spot the symbols and work out how it all applies…