游余

Did you know that in Mexico， the first piece of your birthday cake must begiven to the person you love the most？ Whether you buy a nice cake at a store ormake one at home with love， celebrating any birthday is not finished without acake glimmering1 with candles！

你知道嗎？在墨西哥，你生日蛋糕的第一塊必須送給你最愛的人。無論你是在商店里買一個漂亮的蛋糕，還是在家里帶著愛動手做一個蛋糕，慶祝任何生日都離不開一個點著蠟燭的蛋糕！

So why is a birthday celebration in need of a birthday cake？ The answer tothis goes way back to the beginning of written history！ Well be going over theorigins of the first birthday cake and following it from the history of human tothese days. If its your birthday today， make a wish， and lets learn about cake！

那么，為什么慶祝生日需要一個生日蛋糕呢？這個問題的答案可以追溯到有文字記載的歷史開端！我們將從生日蛋糕的起源開始，追溯它在人類史上的發(fā)展直至今日。如果今天是你的生日，許完愿就讓我們了解一下蛋糕的知識吧！

The ancient Greeks started the idea of having cakes when celebratinganother year of life as we know it today. The Greeks got this idea of celebratingbirthdays from something the Ancient Egyptians2 did. They had a tradition inmemory of a pharaoh爺s3 coronation4 as a god or goddess， which they calledtheir“birthday”. Cakes were made as sacrifices5.

正如我們今天所知，古希臘人在慶祝自己又活了一年時萌生了吃蛋糕的想法。希臘人慶祝生日的想法來源于古埃及人的習(xí)俗，他們有一個紀(jì)念法老加冕為神或女神的傳統(tǒng)，稱之為“生日”。而蛋糕是被當(dāng)作貢品制作的。

The Greeks first offered cakes to Artemis， their moon goddess. They alsoplaced candles on the cake to make it glimmer like a full moon in honor of themoon goddess， Artemis.

希臘人首先向他們的月亮女神阿爾忒彌斯獻(xiàn)上蛋糕。他們還在蛋糕上放了蠟燭，讓它像滿月一樣閃閃發(fā)光，以紀(jì)念月亮女神阿爾忒彌斯。

In the 16th and 17th centuries， the price of goods such as sugar was cut downa lot， so people could buy cakes. In the 1800s， it was more and more usual to seebirthday parties. Birthday cakes became very popular， and the idea of“moderncakes”was born.

在16 世紀(jì)和17 世紀(jì)，糖等商品的價格大幅下降，因此人們可以買得起蛋糕了。到19 世紀(jì)，人們越來越經(jīng)?？吹接腥伺e行生日聚會，生日蛋糕變得非常流行，“現(xiàn)代蛋糕”的概念由此誕生了。

In todays world， there has been a big rise in memory of important things， suchas birthdays or festivals. Celebrating a birthday may be different from country tocountry; however， there comes a similarity6—cakes on birthdays for you and me.

在當(dāng)今世界，紀(jì)念諸如生日或節(jié)日之類重要事情的活動大量增加。慶祝生日可能因國家而異，然而也有相似之處———你我生日時都會吃的蛋糕。