The world feeds on a steady diet of love and romance and, this National Matchmaker Day, we are honoring all those who bring people together.
Held annually on August 31, this day raises a toast to the people who create happy endings for others.
Whether they are personally setting two people up, arranging a match on behalf of the family, or coaching clients as part of their professional services, we celebrate every kind of matchmaker on this day.
Matchmakers have existed probably since the dawn of time. These early matchmakers were the parents and elders (often women), who stepped in to ensure young people chose the ‘right’ life partner.
This decision was not left up to the young people themselves, as it was considered too complicated a decision for young people to handle themselves.
This tradition prevailed in most civilizations, from the Aztecs and the ancient Greeks to the Chinese.
The ancient Greek matchmakers- always women, named the ‘promnestria’- were the middlemen, passing messages and negotiations between the two families.
They also had another important job; they reported their personal opinions about the prospective spouses to the other side. This often influenced the decisions, and the blame would fall on the promnestria’s taste.
By the Victorian period, the matchmaking industry was chugging along nicely. It was at this time that courtship and matchmaking regulations gained new steam, and became more intense.
Marriageable women were to have a gigantic debutante ceremony, called the ‘coming out’ ceremony, in court around Easter time.
They all wore white and carried delicate bouquets. They participated in a ‘season,’ during which their mothers, and sometimes fathers, would endeavor to make a match with an eligible family.
Matchmaking took on a new role in Britain by the 1600s; parish vicars would match a person from their parish with another of the same social class.
The matchmaking process often found its way into literature too, such as in Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice” (the matchmaking mama), “Mulan” (the snooty matchmaker), and “Fiddler On The Roof” (“Matchmaker, Make Me A Match”).
As the world evolved during and after the 20th century, so did the idea of matchmaking.
Now, arranged marriages were not the norm in some cultures, and the concept of choosing one’s own partner took root. More and more people expanded their horizons when looking for a partner. And then came the internet.
Believe it or not, Tinder and Bumble were not the very first experiments with merging science and matchmaking.
There have been attempts to automate this process since the 1920s, and there have even been scientific tests conducted on this topic.
