Great article from a cool blog about the relationship between food and funerals.
During the mid-nineteenth century in Sweden hard sugar candies, typically in the form of a corpse and wrapped in black crepe paper with fringes became a popular funeral favor.
Offered to funeral attendees with wine prior to the service, these little candy corpses wrapped up in a black shroud soon became a Swedish custom.
According to Mats Bigert, “The wrapper was fringed, and the length and width of the fringes suggested the age of the deceased; long and thin would indicate the death of an old person.” Shorter, wider fringe would then be indicative of a child or younger individual.
The wrappers would sometimes be adorned with ornately patterned silver paper, pictures of cherubs, or the more somber choice of a silhouetted crucifix or graveside setting.
Verses, prayers and poems attached to the candies were also commonplace. They ran the gamut from such grim treasures as:
The dark, quiet abyss;
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