As a practice and a votive site, the vow has a significant place in traditional culture and is quite vital to the present day. It has its roots in Antiquity and is based on the belief that supernatural powers haunt all natural objects – caves, water springs, trees, etc., and are their owners. In order to settle on a particular territory and to use its resources, people should fight with the spirits and pay them for it – with gifts and sacrifices. Moreover, the sacrifices should be in a way equivalent to people’s expectations for favourable living conditions and abundant harvest, that is, the sacrifice should consist of what is most precious for the community. There are a number of rites containing some relics indicating that once even human life was sacrificed. Barbarous as they are, such rites suggest that striving for their living and paying a high price for all the earthly possessions they get from nature, people could not afford to squander and waste the earned resources; they were compelled to respect and highly evaluate them.
THE VOW IN FOLK CULTURE – A SIGN FOR DEPENDENCY AND FOR REDEEMED RIGHTS
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Albena Georgieva
Institute of Ethnology and Folklore Studies with Ethnographic Museum – Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, БългарияАЛБЕНА ГЕОРГИЕВА (1954–2024), доктор на науките и професор в Института за етнология и фолклористика с етнографски музей при БАН. Автор е на книгите „Етиологичните легенди в българския фолклор“ (1990), „Разкази и разказване в българския фолклор“ (2000), „Образи на другостта в българския фолклор“ (2003) и „Фолклорни измерения на християнството. Устни разкази и локална религиозност в района на Бачковския манастир «Успение на Пресвета Богородица» и на Хаджидимовския манастир «Св. Великомъченик Георги Победоносец»“ (2012), както и на редица студии и статии. Съставител е на сборници и автор на коментари към фолклорни текстове, сред които „Когато Господ ходеше по земята. 77 легенди с тълку- вания“ (1993), тематичен брой „Жената и фолклорът“ на сп. „Български фолклор“, 2001, кн. 4, „Свети места в Софийско – култове, разкази, образи“ (2013). Основни области на изследователските ѝ интереси са типология на устните разкази, функ- ции на фолклорното разказване, локална религиозна култура и др.
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Abstract:ABSTRACTAs a practice and a votive site, the vow has a significant place in traditional culture and is quite vital to the present day. It has its roots in Antiquity and is based on the belief that supernatural powers haunt all natural objects – caves, water springs, trees, etc., and are their owners. In order to settle on a particular territory and to use its resources, people should fight with the spirits and pay them for it – with gifts and sacrifices. Moreover, the sacrifices should be in a way equivalent to people’s expectations for favourable living conditions and abundant harvest, that is, the sacrifice should consist of what is most precious for the community. There are a number of rites containing some relics indicating that once even human life was sacrificed. Barbarous as they are, such rites suggest that striving for their living and paying a high price for all the earthly possessions they get from nature, people could not afford to squander and waste the earned resources; they were compelled to respect and highly evaluate them.
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