Fantastična bića lovinačkog kraja
The Fantastic Creatures of the Lovinac Region

Summary/Abstract: Field research was carried out within the framework of Ethno-cultural forming of the Bunjevci and courses in Practical Field Research within the undergraduate studies in Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology, Faculty of Philosophy at the University of Zagreb, included some spiritual culture of Lika's Bunjevci within the surroundings of the municipality of Lovinac. The collection of material began in late March 2010 and a supplementary control study was conducted in late May of that year. Data was collected from the localities of Brnčevo, Lipač, Lovinac, Piplica, Poljana, Razbojine, Ričice, Sekulići, Smokrić, Sv. Rok, Vagan and Vranik. The study focused on the traditions and beliefs about supernatural powers such as fairies, vištica (witches), incubuses, vrimenjaka (elves), misečara (sleepwalkers) and a whole list of stravinja (fantastic creatures). In order to provide a more complete presentation of the traditions and beliefs of the fantastic creatures in this region, sayings were collected during the field research and associated with some of the relevant and available published sources and archive materials. Fairies are generally perceived as female creatures of exquisite beauty which was only disfigured by them having the legs of animals and narrators often pointed out that they are seen playing in circles and how they become entangled in horses' manes. Elves and sleepwalkers are considered to be people and villages. These are creatures with similar traits to those of the Istrian krsnik (vampire hunter). Also, witches and incubuses are considered to be human creatures. It was believed that witches cause people harm, livestock and crops and especially prevalent were the stories about the special way they stole milk. On the other hand incubuses were generally perceived as girls who tormented people in various ways at night whilst they slept. The term stravinja encompasses a number of different yet mutually related overlapping scary night time figures. And so stravinja are considered to be small lights which people would see at night over the landscape and in some cases equated them with the souls of dead people. Stravinja are also the restless souls of the deceased and werewolves, people who come back tomlife after death, and the same can be said about the devil or Satan, a fantastic coach which appears at night with a giant man, a demonic personification of darkness. On the basis of these images countless cirkusarije were created, humorous situations which more or less succeeded in frightening gullible cohabitants. Although these creatures are deeply rooted in the beliefs and narrative traditions of the local populations, today they represent an almost forgotten element of spiritual culture which is onlyremembered by members of the older generations.

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