With Easter celebration just around the corner, Siauliai city municipality public library (Lithuania) held an
Easter workshop “Decorating eggs with wax”.
Old traditions
Decorating eggs with wax is an ancient craft that is passed down from generation to generation in many
families. Eggs painted in the traditional way look very beautiful, wishes are “encoded” in their patterns,
and it is also a pleasant and calming work. Decoration patterns mostly come from archaic times but
those patterns are common to all areas of our heritage. We will find the same sun stars in ceramics,
wood carvings, weaving patterns, and cross-stitching. Laimute Sileikiene, the head of the Readers’
Service Department, led the workshop for the members of the library’s seniors’ handicraft club.
The meaning of symbols
To paint eggs, you need a small container for melting wax, a stick with a needle and a candle for
heating. After the wax is well heated, we soak the needle in it and draw a dash. One dip, one dash.
We can create various patterns on the egg by connecting dashes. Crosses, sun stars, spirals, snakes,
bird’s feet, rings, squares, fir trees, and other plant motifs are traditionally drawn on eggs. Here are the
meanings of some of them: snakes symbolize life, energy, family well-being, dot – the beginning of
everything, sun – a circle – embodies the eternally rotating circle of life, fir tree pattern – a symbol of
the goddess Laima. The participants of the workshop dipped painted eggs into dye and were happy
with the colorful outcome.
The information was provided by the head of the Siauliai city municipality public library readers’
information department Laimute Sileikiene.
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