We kindly inform you that, as long as the subject affiliation of our 300.000+ articles is in progress, you might get unsufficient or no results on your third level or second level search. In this case, please broaden your search criteria.
Judging by ethnografic descriptions, among the Slavs the swings had the significance of a ritualised way of spending the leisure time. They had been particularly popular in the Balkans: among Bulgarians, Macedonians and Serbs, as well as among the Eastern Slavs, but have been almost unknown to the Western Slavdom. On the basis of an ample comparative material, the generalisation can be made that swinging in swings as a definite ritualised action has a polyfunctional and poly¬semantic character. It has been interpreted in view of the opposition of dynamics and statics, common to traditional culture, which has been playacted in a great diversity of ways in the rituals of the springtime period. On the other hand, the instant of a kind of a passage can be stressed in the traditional interpretation of swinging: seated on a swing, a man is detached from the earth, in a way hanging in the air, taken out of the customary social "context". It is not accidental that same situation has been consistently ascribed to the mythological beings, as well. On a symbolic plane, swing¬ing creates the ideal medium for "isolation", where by the inner transformation of the personality is possible both socially (maturation, marriage), and biologically (good health, salvation from disease).
More...
The subject of the present-day manifestations of the traditional puppet theatre in the improvised shows of street musicians in Bulgaria in the late 1980s and the 1990s has been a part of the range of subjects associated with that cultural phenomenon and treated by science. At the end of the 20th century, what has been quite curious and interesting has been that repeated coming of the puppets out of the closed circle of the house onto the street stage, as an innovation or renewal of the puppet theatre at fairs. The puppet theatre with an attractive show in the programme of the street musician reproduces communication of a folklore type, accomplishing a cultural dialogue via the means of expression of inherited traditional experience. What is at hand is a kind of a folklore situation, in which the spontaneous need of a cultural self-expression has been combined with the repetitive nature of the event and its multiple variants. The article presents a classification of the traditional puppet the¬atre by various indicators: 1. systems of puppets; 2. function; 3. materials wherefrom the puppets have been made; 4. manner of performance; 5. genre characterisation of the musical repertory.
More...
The dynamic processes, taking place in the Bulgarian people's socio-political life after the Liberation from Ottoman rule exerted their influence on traditional culture, too. It began slowly and gradually to give in to the practice of everyday life. This process, affecting the population of Oryahovo has been truthfully and consistently reflected on the pages of the periodical press after the Liberation.
More...
ETHNOGRAPHIC MATERIALS
More...
Analysing Bulgarian folk songs on most diverse subjects, dealing with variant young men and "haidout" rebels, on historical family, work, love and other topics created mostly in the period of Ottoman domination, the author presents the image of "the other", as seen through the eyes of the folk singer. The ethno-religious sensitivity, exacerbated in that period, provoked the forma¬tion of a negative portrait of "the person with another faith" (not a Christian). Fut¬ting a sign of equality between the ethnic and religious affiliation, the Bulgarians con¬sidered the Moslems (Turks, Arabs, Tartars, Gypsies) and the Jews to be "the oth¬ers". In the polarised way of assessement, inherent in the folkloric way of tninking, tnese have been described as oppressors, enslavers and abductors. In opposition to the "pure" = Christian, "white" = handsome and "ruddy" = healthy Bulgarian, the one from another faith is "black" ("sallow"), ugly and well-neigh demonic in appear¬ance. The product of a specific historical reality, above all, this negative character is not an expression of xenophobia, but a natural reaction of a people who had lost their freedom.
More...
The article deals with the possibility of direct relationship between two branches of science: viz. archaeology and ethnology. What is meant is a rare kind of monuments, which have survived a millennium. These are the apocrypha prayers, said to ward off the mysterious illness, known as "nezhit". Small lead plates with protective texts, worn by the sick as amulets, existed as early as in the 10th and 11th centuries. The tradition persisted during the 13th-14th century period, which is evinced by monu¬ments, unearthed by archaeological investigations on the territories of Bulgaria and the Republic of Macedonia. In the 16th-17th period, however, there were already apocrypha prayers against "nezhit" that have been preserved and that were included in the texts of books. At last in the 19th and 20th centuries these beliefs can be found in oral folklore. At present it is hard to understand what exactly "nezhit" means. The concept has most probably undergone certain evolution during the centuries turning from what once had been an awful illness into a relatively innocent gum disease.
More...
The authoress characterizes the formation and ethnic functions of the Bulgarian saints in the periods of the First and Second Bulgarian Kingdoms. She indicates the ideological roles of the cults of the Seven Holy Saints (SS. Constantine-Cyril and Methodius, Clement, Nahum, Sava, Gorazd and Angelarius), St. John of Rila, St. Gabriel of Lesnovo, St. Prohor of Pchin. St. Michael of Ossogovo, St. Petka of Turnovo, St. Hilary of Muglen and others. She pays special attention to the development of the cults of these saints in the period of Ottoman domination, when some of the cults of the Seven Holy Saints disappeared, while that of SS. Cyril and Methodius as Bulgarian saints imposed itself with the tremendous national importance of their feast. The cult of St. John of Rila also developed and the influence of Rila Monastery on the national culture of the National Revival period was immense. The saint was placed in the calendar of feasts and was accepted as a saint common to all Bulgarians and a supporter of their faith. The cult of St. Petka was preserved and it spread wide all over the Bulgarian ethnic territory. The authoress also indicates the creation of a new type of saints — great martyrs for the faith, as a form of preserving the nationality under the conditions of alien political and religious oppression; it also stabilized the Bulgarian national consciousness. She emphasizes the national feature in the formation and action of the cult of the Bulgarian saints, their influence on folklore, the list of names and the Bulgarian calendar system.
More...
Criticism, Reviews, Books
More...
Museums, Exhibitions, Collections
More...
Criticism, Reviews, Books
More...