News & Features

In the days before literacy, from at least the 1600's, rich shortcake, caraway flavoured biscuits were used as invitations to a funeral in the Yorkshire Dales throughout the Pennines, and were still in use up to the 1950's (Craven district).
The circular biscuits were made from a mould and could be large, several inches across. In West Yorkshire the biscuit often depicted the heart which was an old symbol representing the soul and the heart can still be seen on gravestones in West Yorkshire particularly around Calderdale.
The biscuits were distributed by a 'bidder'.* Another tradition was to hand biscuits to mourners, wrapped in paper printed with a prayer or hymn.
*thanks to www.crow-pie.co.uk