Happy Easter - 2007

Easter
Dave Wilton, (Original citation - Sunday, June 11, 2006)*

Easter, or Eastre as it is originally, was the name of a pagan goddess of the dawn whose festival was held on the vernal equinox. The Christians adopted her name and many of the celebratory practices (as they did with Saturnalia and Christmas) for their celebration of Christ’s resurrection. The pagan holiday roughly corresponded with the time of year of the crucifixion and resurrection (Passover).

From the translation of Bede’s Ecclesiastical History commonly attributed to King Alfred, c.890:

Ic thas tide Eastrena ecelice healdan wille.

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(Source: Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd Edition)

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(My source: Wordorigins.org - http://www.wordorigins.org/index.php/easter/ )*

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(Source for Easter Bunny image - Wikipedia - http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3e/Easter_bunny.jpg/300px-Easter_bunny.jpg )

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Wordorigins.org is a website first brought to my attention by my son Sean (so you know the website is excellent). One should first click and scan the "The Big List" for some more popular word origins.
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Hoppy Eastre. ;-) GC