Easter History
There are some Christian festivities which have completely lost their connection with religious roots and became long ago temporal events and people don't know at present what were the cause of their appearance but one holiday went through the centuries in its original form and every adult and child understands the sense of Easter as the celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.
On Sunday, having the name Easter Sunday now, three days after Good Friday, the day Jesus was put on the cross, he returned to life. Some of the people who had presented at his burial came to the cave to remove his body. But they were met by an angel who informed them that He had risen. So since the second century Easter is considered to be a genuine religious event, but it also has other features there exist some older pagan bases of the holiday. The Saxons
in those ancient times were used to greet the coming back of their favorite season organizing grand fiesta in the honor of the goddess of springtime, Eastre. When the first Christian missionaries came to the north of the country, they endeavored to spread Christianity there.
They did it rather cautiously as it would be very dangerous for the early Christian adepts to mark their religious dates openly without taking into account the existed celebrations. And it was a clever decision of the missionaries not to force the inhabitants mark strange events causing fights, but let them go on celebrating pagan festivities adding Christian features.
They observed the pagan holiday of Eastre took place in the same season as the Christian event of the Resurrection of Christ. It was natural to change the festivities itself, and step by step the Christian filling of the event became more important. The goddess name Eastre transformed into present Easter.
The Easter Bunny is as well known since ancient times. The Anglo-Saxons were sure their goddess was everywhere followed by the rabbit. This token was taken to America by Germans. But the Christians in America don’t pay much attention to the rabbit. Actually, even Easter itself wasn't a great event in those years. After the Civil War the situation changed.
As far as the eggs are concerned the tradition of giving each other eggs in spring is much older then Easter. During centuries the egg was a token of renewal of life in the most civilizations. Eggs were not rarely covered by a very thin layer of gold or the people living in the country were used to boil them in the water adding various flowers and simply leaves to paint them.
The eggs became very beautiful. At present the kids know various games with the participation of eggs, and always put them into their baskets. People began to manufacture eggs of plastic or make same eatable, using chocolate and sweetmeats. Lights, candles an bonfires help people to make the holiday brighter.