Virgin Mary Pretzel Update

“SAGA OF PRIZED PRETZEL TAKES SAD TWIST FOR SELLERS”: So reads the headline of this article from Eugene, Oregon’s The Herald-Guard. Remember the Virgin Mary Pretzel from a couple of weeks ago? Over the course of a few days, thanks to plenty of radio publicity, an eBay auction for this Rold Gold pretzel that to its seller resembled the Virgin Mary (in a joke, “Look at what people will buy” kind of way) had incited bids for as much as $2 million! Now, that was most likely a hoax, but the supposedly sacred snack did get several seemingly legitimate bids in the $5,000 range. Thing is, eBay shut down the auction: twice.

Michael Fleming, owner of the pretzel, is flummoxed. At first, eBay revoked the auction because the item was perishable, and thus a health risk. But then the pretzel reappeared, which commenced more bidding, as well as many spin-off pretzels.

From the article:

When bidding ended at 8:51 p.m. Thursday — dozens of offers ranging up to $5,100 were logged.

That’s when a computer-generated e-mail from eBay arrived, informing them that the site had once again invalidated their auction: This time, administrators had reason to believe an “unauthorized third party” had posted the auction, Fleming said.

The message also informed them, “Do not respond to this e-mail.”

Now the pretzel is in a safety deposit box, and Fleming blames eBay for denying a charity a financial windfall, for he and his radio-show cronies, in light of the high bidding, had agreed to donate a portion of the proceeds.

When you look at eBay’s policies regarding such sales, it doesn’t say that sellers cannot offer perishable items. It says this: “Sellers who list perishable items should clearly identify in the item description the steps that they will take to ensure that the goods are delivered to the buyer safely. For example, sellers of perishable goods should offer overnight delivery and ensure that the goods are properly packaged.” I don’t think Fleming and friends included any specific language about how the pretzel was being preserved, but I also find it hard to believe that anyone willing to spend real money on such an item would eat it. Nonetheless, I can understand why eBay has to be cautious about such sales.



I wonder if these policies came about as a direct result of Diana Duyser’s infamous Virgin Mary Grilled Cheese, which I describe in Madonna of the Toast as “a foodstuff transfiguration created from the alchemy of Land ‘O Lakes Cheese, Publix brand bread and no oil or butter.” Duyser’s auction was also once revoked by eBay, but only because people thought it was a hoax. When it became apparent that Duyser’s grilled cheese would indeed by sold and delivered to the highest bidder, the auction was reinstated, and the rest is history.

Michael Fleming might not make the history books, but he certainly got his 15 minutes of fame, and since the pretzel remains available, I bet he’ll give himself another go on the media merry-go-round. I just hope that his safety deposit box is climate controlled. If the pretzel is anything like Duyser's grilled cheese, it will resist mold for over a decade.

Salted Simulacra

This story is careening like the salted twists of a giant pretzel, like Johannes Kepler’s understanding of the universe. Earlier this week, Michael Fleming, of Eugene, Oregon, let a radio DJ post a 3-year-old pretzel found in a bag of Rold Gold on eBay, saying that he thought it resembled the Virgin Mary holding Baby Jesus. According to this article from The Oregonian, Fleming has this to say about his pretzel: “People seemed generally moved by these images . . . And they really seem to believe that the Virgin Mary is before them.” The pretzel got a big publicity boost from Tanner Hanney, host of KVAL radio’s “Donkey Show.” Hanney is eschewing the spiritual side of these phenomena: “We're kind of capitalizing on the stupidity of eBay and that people will buy anything.”

Calling eBay stupid seems stupid to me, but Hanney’s point about people’s willingness to buy pretty much anything is spot-on. The bidding on Fleming’s pretzel has reached $10,950. In terms of this story, however, the bigger point is people’s willingness to try selling pretty much anything on eBay, like this spate of Virgin Mary pretzels, all put on auction within the last couple of days.



The seller of this one makes no secret about needing some quick cash.



And then there’s this one (above), found four months ago, but just now offered up in light of all this hoopla.



I like this one: Mary kneeling in prayer.



And for good measure, especially if $1.75 is more in your price range.

This is not the first such pretzel auctioned on eBay. Back in 2005, the online casino Goldenpalace.com (the folks who bought Diana Duyser’s grilled cheese for $28,000) bought a Virgin Mary pretzel for $10,600 (below).



Some of these pretzels are being sold by people who claim that these shapes, by virtue of being noticed before they were chomped, are holy signs of a higher power. Others clearly went looking for some misshaped rolled dough and, voila! Either way, there are some interesting religious connections to pretzels. The origin of the pretzel is debated, but German bakery signage from the early 12th century is the earliest verifiable appearance of these tasty snacks. (As an aside, when I was in Frankfurt last October, I had an amazing ham and cheese sandwich, with great tangy mustard, on pretzel bread, something I had never had before. Loved it.)

One unsubstantiated reference credits an Italian monk who in 610 C.E. made pretzels to reward children for learning their prayers. The theory goes on to claim that the shape was intended to evoke the devotional pose of arms crossed against one’s chest.

There is also a connection between pretzels and Lent in that the snacks were eaten to make up for abstaining from other foods. In his book Astronomia nova, published in 1609, Johannes Kepler, assuming Earth as the center of the universe, equated the movement of orbiting planets “with the appearance of Lenten bread.” That’s a pretzel to you and me.

We’ll see how many of these pretzels sell, and for how much. Does anyone else think that these Virgin Mary pretzels look like something Pablo Picasso might have done had he been a baker? Makes me thirsty for a beer!