Birthday Celebrations & Dessert

The skill of animation for amusement, the habit of having dessert after a meal, and the practice of opulent birthday celebrations were all originally developed by the Persians. Birthday festivities began with a festival commemorating the monarch's birth (as they did in other civilizations), but they eventually moved to the nobility and subsequently the lower classes. A cake with lit candles was offered after the dinner as part of these celebrations, which also featured special dishes made for the honored guest. Animation may have been used as entertainment, as shown by artifacts like a cup that, when quickly turned, depicted a goat leaping in the air to snag leaves from a tree. Music may have also included vocals accompanied by stringed instruments like the carter (also known as the tar) and the sestar, a precursor to the modern guitar. Dessert was often offered as the final course of every dinner, not only on special occasions like birthdays.

Although the cake itself may have been made especially for the occasion, it was customary for people to follow dinner with dessert or some type of treat. The Persians felt the Greeks were savage and illiterate for not realizing the worth of sweets and thought them uncultured and underfed whereas the Greek authors chastised the Persians for this habit. The celebration of a birthday and the idea of dessert both emphasize the importance of enjoyment in Persian culture.