Confetti

<h2 id="history">History</h2>
Since the <a href="/facts/Middle_Ages/RqzEKB9v">Middle Ages</a>, in <a href="/facts/Northern_Italy/paEuCnnf">northern Italy</a> it was common usage for the participants of carnival parades to throw objects at the crowd, mostly mud balls, eggs, coins or fruit. These traditions are still present in some towns in different forms, such as the "Battle of the Oranges" in <a href="/facts/Ivrea/ESGAEUGm">Ivrea</a>.
The throwing of objects at parades is well-documented in Milan from the 14th century. The nobles would throw candies and flowers during the parades, while dames threw eggshells filled with essences and perfumes. Lower-class people mocked the nobles by throwing rotten eggs, and battles among enemy factions or districts became common. In 1597, the city governor <a href="/facts/Juan_Fern%C3%A1ndez_de_Velasco_y_Tovar,_5th_Duke_of_Fr%C3%ADas/wtQnjr2E">Juan Fernández de Velasco y Tovar</a> imposed a ban on egg-throwing and squittaroli (spraying liquids in the street)<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:4" href="#fn:4">4</a> along with other immoral behaviors. The custom disappeared for about a century, re-emerging in the 1700s in the form of thrown small candies, typically sugar-coated seeds. The seeds used were mostly <a href="/facts/Coriander/v4Sa5K4T">coriander</a>, a common plant in the area: the Italian name for confetti is coriandoli, from the name of the herb.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:5" href="#fn:5">5</a>
The candies were expensive, and the lower classes often used small <a href="/facts/Chalk/b6hepsNS">chalk</a> balls instead, called benis de gess (chalk candy). Those were officially defined as the only material allowed to be thrown during the parades in an edict by the Prefect of Milan in 1808, but the battles fought with them in the 1800s became too large and dangerous, with hundreds of people involved, leading to a ban of the chalk pellets. Some circumvented the ban by throwing balls of mud.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:6" href="#fn:6">6</a>
In 1875, an Italian businessman from <a href="/facts/Milan/0xrtbPdt">Milan</a>, Enrico Mangili, began selling paper confetti for use in the upcoming carnevale di Milano, the yearly parade held along the streets of the city. At that time, the province of Milan was one of the main hubs of silk manufacturing. Mangili begun collecting the small punched paper disks that were left as a byproduct from the production of the holed sheets used by the <a href="/facts/Bombyx_mori/r4IJIUtk">silkworm</a> breeders as cage bedding, and selling them for profit. The new paper confetti was well received by the customers, being less harmful, cheaper and more entertaining than the alternatives, and their use quickly replaced previous customs in Milan and northern Italy.
<a href="/facts/Scientific_American/jkl8bhUN">Scientific American</a> recorded that the throwing of paper confetti (in the form of plain shredded paper) occurred at the 1885 New Year's Eve in Paris. Paper confetti became common in all of Europe within the next two decades (unlike <a href="/facts/Ticker-tape_parade/Mde4szB1">ticker-tape parade</a>, which never received as wide a diffusion as they did in the U.S.).

<h2 id="alternatives">Alternatives</h2>

Some weddings use natural petal confetti. These are made from freeze-dried flower petals and are completely <a href="/facts/Biodegradation/d1UW4dfR">biodegradable</a>. In fact, venues may now only allow these biodegradable versions to be used. Some wedding venues have decided that due to the mess and potential inconvenience caused by the use of confetti to ban its usage completely. One way that this restriction has been circumvented is to use soap bubbles in place of confetti.

<h2 id="etymology-and-italian-confetti">Etymology and Italian confetti</h2>
See also: <a href="/facts/Confetti_di_Sulmona/TygzTNXF">Confetti di Sulmona</a>

The English word confetti (to denote <a href="/facts/Drag%C3%A9e/plpwalRr">Jordan almonds</a>) is adopted from the Italian <a href="/facts/Confectionery/7h760gLH">confectionery</a> of the same name, which was a small sweet traditionally thrown during <a href="/facts/Carnival/zwDJMMS9">carnivals</a>. Also known as <a href="/facts/Drag%C3%A9e/plpwalRr">dragée</a> or <a href="/facts/Comfit/6L06s9V8">comfit</a>, Italian confetti are <a href="/facts/Almond/oArfgmdq">almonds</a> with a hard <a href="/facts/Sugar/jb5KXRHT">sugar</a> coating; their name equates to French <a href="/facts/Confit/ffj97PnR">confit</a>. The Italian word for paper confetti is coriandoli, which refers to the <a href="/facts/Coriander/v4Sa5K4T">coriander</a> seeds originally contained within the sweet.
By tradition, the Italian confetti (sugar coated almonds) are given out at weddings (white coating) and baptisms (blue or pink coating, according to the sex of the newborn baby), or graduations (red coating), often wrapped in a small <a href="/facts/Tulle_(netting)/ALk9x3MP">tulle</a> bag as a gift to the guests.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:7" href="#fn:7">7</a> For a wedding, they are said to represent the hope that the new couple will have a fertile <a href="/facts/Marriage/foMxzuxl">marriage</a>. The British adapted the missiles to <a href="/facts/Wedding/9UfjkTDk">weddings</a> (displacing the traditional grains or rice symbolising sexual fertility) at the end of the 19th century, using symbolic shreds of coloured paper rather than real sweets.

<h2 id="see-also">See also</h2>
 Media related to Confetti at Wikimedia Commons
 The dictionary definition of confetti at Wiktionary

<ul><li><a href="/facts/Chad_(paper)/ccm3LK3I">Chad (paper)</a> – recycling paper fragments into confetti use</li>
<li><a href="/facts/Chaff_(countermeasure)/V8TAMysf">Chaff (countermeasure)</a> – recycling paper fragments into confetti use</li>
<li><a href="/facts/Confetti_candy/sL5lgE2B">Confetti candy</a></li>
<li><a href="/facts/Sulmona/ocFd55UD">Sulmona</a></li></ul>

<h2 id="references">References</h2>

<ol>
<li id="fn:1">"American Heritage Dictionary". Yourdictionary.com. 20 June 2014. Retrieved 21 July 2014. <a href="http://www.yourdictionary.com/confetti" target="_blank">http://www.yourdictionary.com/confetti</a> <a href="#fnref:1" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:2">"Confetti - Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary". Merriam-webster.com. 31 August 2012. Retrieved 21 July 2014. <a href="http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/confetti" target="_blank">http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/confetti</a> <a href="#fnref:2" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:3">"confetti - definition of confetti by The Free Dictionary". Thefreedictionary.com. Retrieved 21 July 2014. <a href="http://www.thefreedictionary.com/confetti" target="_blank">http://www.thefreedictionary.com/confetti</a> <a href="#fnref:3" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:4">Montague, Bruce (July 2014). Wedding Bells and Chimney Sweeps « Bruce Montague. John Blake. ISBN 9781784180423. Retrieved 3 November 2016. <a href="9781784180423" target="_blank">9781784180423</a> <a href="#fnref:4" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:5">[1] Archived July 3, 2010, at the Wayback Machine <a href="http://milano.corriere.it/vivimilano/arte_e_cultura/articoli/2004/02_Febbraio/25/coriandoli.shtml" target="_blank">http://milano.corriere.it/vivimilano/arte_e_cultura/articoli/2004/02_Febbraio/25/coriandoli.shtml</a> <a href="#fnref:5" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:6">[1] Archived July 3, 2010, at the Wayback Machine <a href="http://milano.corriere.it/vivimilano/arte_e_cultura/articoli/2004/02_Febbraio/25/coriandoli.shtml" target="_blank">http://milano.corriere.it/vivimilano/arte_e_cultura/articoli/2004/02_Febbraio/25/coriandoli.shtml</a> <a href="#fnref:6" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:7">"Confetti: qual è il colore giusto per ogni festa e anniversario? Il significato del colore dei confetti" (in Italian). 16 October 2018. Retrieved 29 November 2021. <a href="https://www.pianetadonna.it/coppia/matrimonio/colore-confetti-significato.html" target="_blank">https://www.pianetadonna.it/coppia/matrimonio/colore-confetti-significato.html</a> <a href="#fnref:7" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
</ol>

Confetti open-in-new

Confetti