It was believed that it was good luck to keep a hot cross bun all year round.
Frequently they were hung up as preservation against fire or pounded with water as medicine.
Sussex fishermen carried them as protection against drowning.
If buns or bread was baked on Good Friday it was thought they could not go mouldy.
Those who share a hot cross bun will enjoy a strong friendship "half for you and half for me, between us two good will shall be.
In 1592 Elizabeth I decreed that hot cross buns could not be sold on any days apart from Good Friday, Christmas and for burials because they were too sacred for daily consumption.
The cross was said to ward off evil spirits.
They may have originated in Pagan times with the cross representing each quarter of the moon.
And to finish a ditty popular in the 18th century
"Good Friday comes this month- the old woman runs
With one or two a-penny hot cross buns,
Whose virtue is, if you believe what's said
They'll not grow mouldy like the common bread."
Arilx
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