Деянията на светците: южнославянския просешки епос
The Deeds of Saints: South-Slavic Beggars Epics

Summary/Abstract: There are different historical strata forming the tradition of Bulgarian folklore songs: Indo-European, Balto-Slavic, Common Slavic, as the formulaic language of the songs indicates. The corpus of the Beggars’ epics is relatively late. The songs are mainly devoted to Christian saints and their deeds presented through folklore poetics. It have been claimed that the characters of the saints had their pagan prototypes and originated from the pre-Christian oral tradition. Still, our analyses of several folklore texts suggest that the Christian vision prevails in the songs and that the characters were formed upon the visions of the Middle Ages. The vision of the saints is formed upon the picture of their relics (the physical remains of the saints - Saint Parascevе /Veneranda and Saint Nedelya / Dominica). This representation of the relics of both saints in Bulgarian folklore songs may have reflected their popularity in the Second Bulgarian Kingdom (1185-1396) and especially in its capital, Turnovo.

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