Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Wedding Wednesday - Turn of the Century Wedding - Large Group Shot

This photograph features nineteen members an early 1900's ethnic wedding party.  The photo has ten females consisting of the bride in the middle and what I believe to be her maid of honor, possibly a sister to the far right.  On the left of the photo is a young girl that was possibly a flower girl.  There are ten males in the photo, the groom in the middle next to the bride and at the bride's right, most likely the best man or perhaps even the bride's father.  I would guess that the woman sitting between the groom and the maid of honor with the white blouse and dark skirt could be the bride's mother.  Most of the women are wearing the Gibson Girl hairstyle and the fashions that were prevalent at the time.  The bride looks extremely young to me as does the groom.  The bride's bodice is very lacy and lovely, the sleeves of her gown, although difficult to see, seem to be tighter at the elbow and have a large pouf at the wrist.  Her veil appears quite simple with just a few flowers at the top of the headdress and I believe she is wearing gloves so cannot tell if she is wearing a ring.  Her groom however is wearing a ring on his right hand.

It is a very interesting photo and there is is no identification of the subjects or the photographer.  However, on the back are two words written in some foreign language, perhaps someone can translate - see below:


8 comments:

  1. Could those words be Polish or Slovak?

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  2. I put the words into Google Translate and it said "Swedish detected." Just Googling in general, another site said Polish. In fact, it took me to a cemetery in Pennsylvania with a number of Polish graves with a link to explanations of the words on Polish tombstones. "Bytom" = life. "Lat stary" means years old, and "Lat stara" could mean the same although "stara" also means try or look. I wonder if someone in the picture is 16 years old.
    http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/allegheny/tsphotos/ststanislaus-shaler/section-o.htm

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    1. Impressive detective work, Wendy! Perhaps it is the bride?

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  3. I think it might be Polish. From what I could find the polish "bytam" corresponds to the sanscrit bhuta 'smi : "the woman having been am I" ... and I think 16 lat stara is polish for 16 years old. It could be the writer stating this is her at 16 years old. Beautiful photo.

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  4. very nice wedding photo. The groom looks young too.

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  5. hi I`m from poland and the words are "byłam 16 lat stara" and they means "i was 16 years old" but the sentence is not the way polish say nowadays. now we say "miałam 16 lat" = "i had 16 years". nobody uses "byłam 16 lat stara" nowadays. i`m so excited it`s in polish! cool.. :)

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    Replies
    1. Thanks for your comments, too bad the bride did not add their names!

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  6. this note is written in polish which means " i was 16 years old"

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