Rites and ritual folklore. Ritual folklore Sources and additional information

6th grade

Lesson topic: "Calendar and ritual folklore."

Lesson type: Lesson of studying and primary consolidation of new knowledge.

Target: acquaintance of students with the concept of "calendar-ritual folklore"

Planned results: knowledge of the concept of folklore, ritual folklore, the main features of folklore in the life of the people, to interest in ancient Russian ritual poetry, to learn to compare folklore and literary works, to expressively read folklore works.

Tasks:

1. to reveal the basic concepts of the topic: folklore, ritual, ritual folklore, calendar and ritual poetry.

2. Get acquainted with samples of ritual folklore and ancient Russian ritual poetry.

3. Raise love and respect for the traditions of the Russian people.

Equipment: Anikin V.P., Kruglov Yu.G. "Russian folk poetry", presentation, illustrations for works of oral folk art, videos of the reconstruction of folk ritual holidays

During the classes:

-Organizing time.

- Formulation of the problem:

Which words from the topic are familiar to you?

What words do you know the meaning of?

Children learn the exact meaning of words.

RITE - a set of actions established by custom, in which religious ideas and customs are embodied.

ritual folklore - these are songs, dances, various actions that are performed during the rituals.

Calendar-ritual folklore - These are rituals associated with the folk calendar, which was based on the change of seasons and the schedule of agricultural work.

Oral folk art is embodied in ritual songs, dances, fairy tales, legends, traditions, and other works.

Folklore was an integral part of folk life. He accompanied the first plowing and harvesting of the last sheaf in the field, youth festivities and Christmas or Trinity rites, christenings and weddings. Ritual songs were considered as an obligatory part of the rite, as well as the main ritual actions. It was even believed that if all ritual actions were not performed and the songs accompanying them were not performed, then the desired result would not be achieved.

Scenes from various rituals are played out:

Carols.

Stoneflies-callings.

Ritual songs.

Folk rites are divided into two cycles:

- calendar rituals associated with the economic activity of the peasant (agriculture, animal husbandry, hunting). Calendar rituals are timed to winter, spring, summer, autumn - in connection with the schedule of agricultural work for the seasons, as well as the winter and summer solstice (December 21, 22 and June 21, 22)

- family rituals associated with the birth of a person, his marriage, seeing off into the army or death. The wedding ceremony consisted of a series of successive actions, none of which was skipped. At the funeral, lamentations were performed by professional mourners (shouters): these laments accompanied all episodes of the funeral rite.

Let's look at the calendar-ritual folklore.

Ritual calendar songs belong to the oldest type of folk art, and they got their name because of the connection with the folk agricultural calendar - the work schedule for the seasons. Calendar-ritual songs, as a rule, are small in volume and simple in poetic structure. In the songs they beg, call for good Kolyada, Shrovetide, Spring, Trinity, and sometimes reproach for deceit and frivolity.

Winter holidays.

Christmas time.

Christmas New Year holidays lasted from December 24 to January 6. These holidays were associated with the winter solstice - one of the most important days of the agricultural calendar, which separated one annual life cycle from another. The Christian Church refers to this day and the day of the birth of Jesus Christ.

Caroling began on Christmas Eve, December 24th. This was the name of the festive detours of houses with the singing of carols, in which the owners of the house were famous and contained wishes for wealth, harvest, etc.carols were performed by children or young people who carried a star on a pole. This star symbolized the Star of Bethlehem, which appeared in the sky at the time of the birth of Christ.

The hosts presented carolers with sweets, cookies, and money. If the owners were stingy, then carolers sang mischievous carols with comic threats(listening to the audio recording of "Kolyada walking-wandering"):

Kolyada came
On the eve of Christmas.
Give me a cow
Butterhead!
And God forbid that
Who is in this house!
The rye is thick for him,
supper rye;
Him with an ear of octopus,
From the grain of his carpet,
From half-grain - a pie.
The Lord would give you
And live, and be,
And wealth
And create for you, Lord,
Even better than that!

The meaning of any carol is in a kind of “calling” of happiness and wealth to a generous owner. The more he gives to carolers, the more he will gain in the coming year. Treats are a sign of the fullness of the house. A carol is a spell song, a conspiracy song, a conditional magical game of the owner and carolers.

The composition of carols is simple: the formula for the arrival of the holiday, then - the formula for finding a house, its description (with exaggeration), the formula for praising the owners, a request, and in the finale - a wish or a threat.

The beginning of the year was given special significance. As you spend the New Year, so will the whole coming year. Therefore, they tried to make the table plentiful, people cheerful, wishing each other happiness and good luck. Cheerful short carols were the song form of such wishes.

One of the types of New Year's songs and rites of the holy week is "sub-satellite songs", when the girls guessed their fate, taking out their decorations from a dish covered with a towel to the songs.

Fortune-telling scene.

Spring holidays.

Maslenitsa.

Maslenitsa is a moving holiday. On Shrovetide they had fun from the heart: they rode troikas with bells, went to visit, baked ruddy pancakes, sang, danced and played. V. I. Dal wrote that every day of Maslenitsa had its own name: Monday - meeting, Tuesday - flirting, Wednesday - gourmet, Thursday - wide Thursday, Friday - mother-in-law evenings, Saturday - sister-in-law gatherings, Sunday - seeing off. In the same week, it was customary to ride from the mountains on a sled. The central ritual actions of the holiday were the meeting of Maslenitsa and seeing it off, which, obviously, personified the end of winter and the beginning of spring. To meet Maslenitsa they went outside the village, putting a stuffed animal in a sleigh, solemnly returned and drove through the streets singing songs in which they praised Maslenitsa. At the end of the week, she was also taken out of the village with songs and burned, which, according to the peasants, should have contributed to a rich harvest.

Characterizingcarnival songs , it can be noted that in them she, Maslenitsa, is scolded, ridiculed, urged to return, called comic human names: Avdotyushka, Izotievna, Akulina Savvishna, etc.

(listening to the audio recording “Oh, oily near”)

Our annual Shrovetide
She is a dear guest
She does not walk to us,
Everything rides on horseback,
So that the horses were black,
To keep the servants young.

The performers of the Maslenitsa rites peculiarly "conjured the sun" and this, according to popular beliefs, caused its spring "flare up." the sign of the sun.

The rituals of seeing off Shrovetide were accompanied by traditional songs. In some, they asked not to leave longer:

And we saw off our oil,
It’s hard - importantly, they sighed for her:
- And butter, butter, come back,
Stretch until the greatest day!

In others, the expression of love for Shrove Tuesday was replaced by a manifestation of joy that it was held:

And we rolled our oil,
Buried in a hole
Lie down, carnival, until the raid ...
Maslyanitsa - wettail!
Drive home from the yard
Your time has passed!
We have streams from the mountains,
play ravines,
Turn out the shafts
Set up a sohu.

Spring meeting.

In Russia, the rite of meeting spring was widely used. Late spring brought famine. At the beginning of March, adults baked ritual cookies in the form of larks, and children carried them into the field or climbed onto the roofs, tossed them up and called outspring songs, in which they conjured spring to come quickly and drive away the cold winter.

(listening to the audio recording "Oh, larks, larks ..."

Spring Rites were performed on the days of the main Great Lent of the year, so they almost did not have a festive game character.

The main spring genre is stoneflies. They, in fact, were not sung, but called, climbing the hillocks and roofs. They called for spring and parted with winter.

The joyfully welcomed spring was supposed to bring its gifts - a rich harvest, livestock offspring, good luck in economic affairs.

Spring, beautiful spring!
Come, spring, with joy,
With joy, with joy
With great mercy:
Freak flax high,
Rye, oats are good!

In the evening, on the eve of Palm Sunday and the Annunciation, women and girls gathered on the river bank, lit a fire, which symbolized the spring "flare up" and danced around it.

summer holidays - open widefeast of the Trinity.

Trinity was bright and poetic - the seventh Sunday after Easter. This time was popularly called the "mermaid" week or "green Christmas time". This holiday celebrated the flowering of nature. They decorated the porch and the house with greenery, flowers, and more often with fresh birch branches. The center of the holiday was a birch tree, which was "curled" and "developed". The birch among the Russian people personified spring nature:

Curl, birch,
Curly, curly!
We came to you, we came
With dumplings, with fried eggs,
With wheat pies!

Curled and decorated "birch" was cut down and worn around the village. If birch trees were "curled" in the forest, then the rite of "nepotism" was added to this: the girls kissed each other in pairs through wreaths and thus swore to each other in friendship and love, they became "godfathers".

Ivan Kupala Day - the culmination of the earth's annual circle.

Kupala rites . A major holiday was the feast of Ivan Kupala. For the peasant, after Ivan Kupala, the hottest time began - haymaking and harvest. An important place was occupied by rituals with water: to be healthy, strong, beautiful, they poured themselves with water, bathed. In some places, young people walked around the village and sang a song that conjured the rye “clean, spiked, vigorous” so that the harvest would be rich.

autumn holidays

Harvest, hay.

At the beginning of the harvest, rituals were performed with the first sheaf. It was called the name day, with songs it was transferred from the field to the threshing floor. During the harvest they sangliving songs.

Reflection

Questions are being discussed.

1. What kind of folklore is called ritual?

2. What songs can be called calendar-ritual?

3. When and where were carols performed? How are they different from other songs?

4. What calendar and ritual songs can be called the most fun?

5. Have you heard similar songs? Where and under what circumstances?

6. Have you ever performed such songs yourself? Tell us more about it.

Homework. Group mini-project "Come to our holiday"

Used Books:

Textbook - reader for educational institutions in 2 parts. Author - compiler V.P. Polukhina, V.Ya. Korovina and others - M.: Enlightenment

Explanatory dictionary of the Russian language: In 3 volumes / Ed. Prof. D.N. Ushakova - M .: Veche. Book World, 2001

Anikin V.P., Kruglov Yu.G. Russian folk poetry. - L .: Education, Leningrad. department, - 1987

Erudite series. Language and folklore. - M .: LLC "TD" Publishing House "World of Books", 2006

ritual folklore

Ritual folklore

Folklore genres performed as part of various rituals. The rite is a complex of symbolic actions, the purpose of which is to influence otherworldly forces in order to achieve the desired result (fertility, cure from illness, birth of a child, protection from dangers, etc.). The vast majority of rituals are accompanied by texts of different genres. Calendar rituals are characterized by the use of calendar songs (carols, Shrovetide, Kupala, etc.), during the wedding ceremony, along with songs, laments or lamentations are performed, somewhat reminiscent of funeral lamentations. The most common genre of ritual folklore is incantations, magical texts that accompany medical, meteorological, agrarian, and other rites and directly express the purpose of the rite.

Literature and language. Modern illustrated encyclopedia. - M.: Rosman. Under the editorship of prof. Gorkina A.P. 2006 .

See what "ritual folklore" is in other dictionaries:

Family ritual folklore- texts accompanying the commission of this. rites (and, more broadly, rites of the life cycle). Resp. these are the texts accompanying all the main. events in people life. On the one hand, on the basis of ritual confinement, they belong to the rite. ... ... Russian humanitarian encyclopedic dictionary

- (in the culturological aspect) in the “broad” sense (all folk traditional peasant spiritual and partly material culture) and “narrow” (oral peasant verbal artistic tradition). Folklore is a collection of ... ... Encyclopedia of cultural studies

Musical folklore of the Urals- multinational by nature, which is due to the diversity of nat. composition of us. region. The areas of settlement of peoples on the territory. U. intertwined, this contributes to the emergence of decomp. ethnic contacts, which are also manifested in music. folklore. Naib.… …

folklore- a, only unit, m. 1) Oral folk art. Collectors of folklore. Cossack folklore. Urban folklore. school folklore. The high level of development of folklore made it possible to perceive new aesthetic values, which she introduced ... ... Popular dictionary of the Russian language

The totality of texts of Russian folk culture, transmitted mainly orally, having the status of authorless, anonymous and not belonging to certain individual performers, although the names of some outstanding masters of performers are known: ... ... Literary Encyclopedia

Bashkir folklore- distributed not only in Bashkir, but also in adjacent Saratov, Samara, Perm., Sverdl., Chelyab., Kurg., Orenb. region, in Tatarstan, where the Bashkirs live compactly, as well as in the Rep. Sakha, Tyumen region and in a number of CIS countries. The most ancient... Ural Historical Encyclopedia

RSFSR. I. General Information The RSFSR was formed on October 25 (November 7), 1917. It borders in the northwest on Norway and Finland, in the west on Poland, in the southeast on China, the MPR, and the DPRK, as well as on the union republics that are part of to the USSR: to the west with ... ...

VIII. Public education and cultural and educational institutions = The history of public education on the territory of the RSFSR goes back to ancient times. In Kievan Rus, elementary literacy was widespread among different segments of the population, about which ... ... Great Soviet Encyclopedia

Tsintsius, Vera Ivanovna- (1903 1981) Ethnographer; linguist, specialist in Tunguso Manchu. lang. Genus. in the city of Ligovo, Petersburg province. She studied at the women's gymnasium Nikitina Podobed. OK. ethnogr. otd. geogr. fact ta/in ta Leningrad State University (1923 29). From stud. years participated in ethnogr. ... ... Biobibliographic Dictionary of Orientalists - Victims of Political Terror in the Soviet Period

Books

Folklore of small social groups. Tradition and modernity, . The collection presents the materials of the conference "Folklore of Small Social Groups: Traditions and Modernity", held by the State Republican Center of Russian Folklore and dedicated to…

Do not give the pie - We are a cow by the horns.
Do not give the gut - We are a pig by the temple.
You won't give a blink - We are the master in kick.

Folklore is an English word and in translation means "folk wisdom, folk knowledge".

These are epics, fairy tales, songs, riddles, legends, proverbs, ditties, created, invented by the people, their joint work, passed down from generation to generation.

They reflect the individuality of this or that people, thanks to them we can find out how our ancestors lived, their thoughts and aspirations, how they spent their time.

In the life of Ancient Rus', folklore played a special role; it firmly entered everyday life, public, family and even personal life.

Let's define for ourselves what the rite itself is?

A rite is a mandatory traditional action, customs associated with any social relations (weddings, funerals, christenings, etc.), religious beliefs (conspiracies, fortune-telling, appeasing the gods, etc.), labor activity (agriculture , cattle breeding, hunting).
And in all these rituals, a certain song, game component was traditionally used.

Folklore, closely connected with the agricultural calendar, with the idea of the ancient Slavs about the cycle of nature, the rules for conducting family rituals;
carrying in itself certain canons and a religious orientation (appeasement of pagan gods), used in ritual actions and is - RITUAL FOLKLORE.

In a word, these are the songs, sayings, spells, dances that were performed during the ceremony.

He was closely connected in Rus' with paganism

After all, when people performed the ceremony and used certain song forms in it, they believed that these spells and songs would be heard by the gods, and that they would have a good harvest, a happy family life, a comfortable year, healthy livestock, etc.

Songs, incantations, actions were an obligatory component of any rite, otherwise the desired result would not be achieved.

Example

We are well aware of the Maslenitsa festivities, we even use some of the nicknames that have survived to this day, or Christmas carols and fortune-telling, dancing and fortune-telling on Ivan Kupala Day.
But there were many songs and incantations, which we don’t even suspect, accompanying the first furrow or the first collected sheaf, wedding songs, baptisms, commemorations.

After Christianity appeared in Rus', pagan beliefs gradually lost their meaning and meaning, which was invested in certain actions, but the very form of holidays took root.

Ritual folklore is the works of oral folk art, which, unlike non-ritual folklore, were an organic part of traditional folk rites and were performed in rituals. In the life of the people, rituals occupied an important place: they evolved from century to century, gradually accumulating the diverse experience of many generations.

The rites had a ritual and magical significance, they contained the rules of human behavior in everyday life and work.

Russian rites

Russian rituals are genetically related to the rituals of other Slavic peoples and have a typological similarity with the rituals of many peoples of the world. Russian ritual folklore was published in the collections of P.V. Kireevsky, E.V. Barsov, P.V. Shein, A.I. Sobolevsky.

Types of rituals

Rituals are usually divided into production and family. Already in ancient times, the Slavic farmers celebrated the winter and summer solstice and the associated changes in nature with special holidays. The observations developed into a system of mythological beliefs and practical labor skills, which was fixed by the annual (calendar) cycle of agrarian ritual holidays and ritual folklore accompanying them.

A complex symbiosis was formed by annual church folk agrarian holidays, which was partly reflected in ritual folklore. On the night before Christmas and on the eve of the New Year, while going around the yards, bypass songs were sung, which had different names: carols (in the south), oats (in the central regions), grapes (in the northern regions). During the entire Christmas week, Christ was glorified with special songs, his birth was depicted in the folk puppet theater - den.

At Christmas time (from Christmas to Epiphany), fortune-telling with songs was common, and funny dramatic scenes were played out. Songs, incantations, lamentations, sentences were also performed during other calendar rites. Family rites developed on a common basis with calendar ones and are genetically connected with them, however, a specific real person was at the center of family rites.

Rites and events of life

Rites accompanied many events of his life, among which the most important are birth, marriage and death. Traces of ancient maternity songs of wishes are preserved in lullabies. Lamentations were the main genre of funeral and memorial rites. Lamentations were included in the recruiting ceremony and in the wedding of the Northern Russian type, where they were especially developed. Wedding poetry was rich and varied. At the wedding, sentences were also performed, dramatic scenes were played.

In ancient times, the main function of wedding folklore was utilitarian and magical: according to the ideas of the people, oral works contributed to a happy fate and prosperity; but gradually they began to play a different role - ceremonial and aesthetic. The genre composition of ritual folklore is diverse: verbal-musical, dramatic, playful, choreographic works. Ritual songs are especially important - the most ancient layer of musical and poetic folklore. The songs were sung in chorus. Ritual songs reflected the rite itself, contributed to its formation and implementation.

Incantation songs were a magical appeal to the forces of nature in order to gain well-being in the household and family. In the songs of praise, the participants of the ritual were poetically idealized, glorified: real people (groom, bride) or mythological images (Kolyada, Shrovetide). The reproachful songs that ridiculed the participants in the ritual, often in a grotesque form, are opposite to the glorious ones; their content was humorous or satirical. Game and round dance songs were performed during various youth games, they described and accompanied by imitation of field work, family scenes were played out (for example: matchmaking). Lyrical songs are the latest occurrence in the rite. Their main purpose is to express thoughts, feelings and moods. Thanks to lyrical songs, a certain emotional flavor was created, and traditional ethics were established.

Ritual folklore includes also conspiracies, spells, some bylichki, beliefs, signs, proverbs, sayings, riddles, in the 20th century. ritual ditties appeared. The composition of the ritual complex could spontaneously include works of non-ritual folklore.

Folk rituals and ritual folklore received a deep and multifaceted reflection in Russian literature (“Eugene Onegin”, 1823-31, A.S. Pushkin, “Evenings on a farm near Dikanka”, 1831-32, N.V. Gogol, “To whom on Russia to live well”, 1863-77, N.A. Nekrasov, “The Snow Maiden”, 1873, A.N. Ostrovsky, “War and Peace”, 1863-69, L.N. Tolstoy, lyrics by S.A. Yesenin and etc.).

The rites had a ritual and magical significance, they contained the rules of human behavior in everyday life and work.

Russian rites

Types of rituals

Rites and events of life

Folklore(English) folk lore) - folk art; a type of collective verbal activity, which is carried out mainly orally. Folklore is divided into two groups: ritual and non-ritual.

To ritual folklore relate:

(carols, carnival songs, stoneflies),
family folklore (family stories, lullabies, wedding songs, lamentations),
occasional (conspiracies, incantations, counting rhymes).

non-ritual folklore is divided into four groups:

folklore drama;
poetry;
prose;
folklore of speech situations.

ritual folklore constituted verbal-musical, dramatic, game, choreographic genres, which were part of the traditional folk rituals. Rituals played an important role in the life of the people. They evolved from century to century, gradually accumulating the diverse experience of many generations. The rituals had a ritual and magical significance, they contained the rules of human behavior in everyday life and work. They are usually divided into labor (agricultural) and family. Russian rites are genetically related to the rites of other Slavic peoples and have a typological analogy with the rites of many peoples of the world. Ritual poetry interacted with folk rituals and contained elements of a dramatic game. It had a ritual and magical significance, and also performed psychological and aesthetic functions. Ritual folklore is syncretic in its essence, so it is advisable to consider it as part of the corresponding rituals. However, there is a different, strictly philological approach. So., Yu.G. Kruglov identifies three types of works in ritual poetry:

sentences,
songs
lamentations.

Each type is represented by a group of genres. Songs are predominantly important - the oldest layer of musical and poetic folklore. In many ceremonies, they occupied a leading place, combining magical, utilitarian-practical and artistic functions. The songs were sung in chorus. ritual songs reflected the rite itself, contributed to its formation and implementation. spell songs were a magical appeal to the forces of nature in order to obtain well-being in the household and family. IN praise songs participants in the ritual were poetically idealized, glorified: real people or mythological images (Kolyada, Shrovetide, etc.). They were the opposite of majestic corny songs who ridiculed the participants in the ritual, often in a grotesque form; their content was humorous or satirical. Game songs performed during various youth games; they described and accompanied by imitation of field work, played out family scenes (for example, matchmaking). Lyric songs- the latest occurrence in the rite. Their main purpose is to determine thoughts, feelings and moods. Thanks to lyrical songs, a certain emotional flavor was created, and traditional ethics were established.

Sources and additional information:

en.wikipedia.org - material from Wikipedia;
feb-web.ru - material from the "Literary Encyclopedia" (30s of the XX century);
lit.1september.ru - ritual folklore; calendar rituals;

What is ritual folklore? First of all, it is folk art, collective or individual, oral, less often written. The folklore style of communication between people usually did not involve emotions. It expressed thoughts and desires associated with certain events and timed to coincide with them. Therefore, the rituals mainly consist of songs, lamentations, family stories, lullabies, wedding praises. Occasional conspiracies, spells and incantations, counting rhymes and slander are considered a separate category.

What is ritual folklore in a broader sense

These are works of art of a small form associated with traditions, customs, religious and ethnographic genres. It should be noted that in all cases the rites bear signs of a folk character. At the same time, modernity seems to be blurred. Old traditions with customs fit best into the past tense.

The range of folklore rituals is quite wide. This is village choreography, choral singing in nature, during field work, haymaking or grazing. Since traditional customs were constantly present in the lives of ordinary people, the ritual folklore of the Russian people was and remains an integral part of their existence. The emergence of customs is always associated with long-term circumstances. The incessant drought that threatens the harvest can be an occasion for people to turn to God for help. Any natural phenomena that are dangerous for a person also make him look for a way out of this situation. And most often these are prayers and requests, candles and notes in churches.

Many rituals and ritual folklore in general have a ritual and magical significance. They underlie behavioral norms in society, and sometimes even acquire features of a national character. This fact testifies to the depth of folklore values, which means that

Folklore rituals are divided into labor, holiday, family and love rituals. Russians are closely intertwined with the folklore of other Slavic peoples. And besides, they are often associated typologically with the population of some countries located on the other side of the world. The interrelationship of seemingly different cultures is often due to a historically established analogy.

Feast of Ivan Kupala

Ritual folklore in Russia has always been self-sufficient and did not need to be fed from outside. The originality of Russian traditions and customs not only passed from generation to generation, but also grew with new rituals, often exotic ones. The most notable folklore rite is This rite has pagan roots. On the night of Ivan Kupala, high bonfires were lit, and each of those present had to jump over the fire. This was not always possible, there was a danger of falling and getting burned.

At night on Ivan Kupala, it was customary to perform ritual atrocities, steal livestock from neighbors, destroy beehives, trample gardens and firmly prop up the doors in the huts with sticks so that the residents could not leave. The motives for all these actions are still unclear. The next day, the outrageous fellow villagers again became balanced citizens.

Song ritual

A significant place in Russian ritual folklore is occupied by poetry, which can be conditionally divided into song (spells, reproachful, laudatory songs) and magic (love spells, sentences, lamentations).

Songs-spells turned to nature, asked for well-being in the economy and family affairs. Magnificent sang at Maslenitsa, carols and other celebrations. The reprimanding chants were of a mocking nature.

Rites and calendar

Along with others, in Rus' there was a ritual folklore of the calendar type, which was directly related to agricultural work in the broadest sense. Calendar and ritual songs are the most ancient folk art, historically formed over the long years of peasant labor in the field and in haymaking.

The agricultural calendar, the schedule of field work according to the seasons - this is a kind of program of the song genre. Melodies are all folk, born behind the plow, harrow and weeding. The words are simple, but this song poetry contained the whole gamut of human experiences, hope for good luck, anxious expectations, uncertainty, replaced by jubilation. Nothing brings people together like a common goal for all, whether it's harvesting or singing in a choir. Social values inevitably take some form. In this case, it is folklore and with it Russian customs.

Folklore by seasons

The songs of the spring ritual repertoire sounded cheerful. They look like jokes, reckless and daring. The tunes of the summer months seemed deeper, they were sung with a sense of accomplishment, but as if with a hidden expectation of a miracle - a good harvest. In the autumn, harvest time, ritual songs rang like a stretched string. People did not relax even for a minute, otherwise you would not have time to collect everything before the rains.

Reason for fun

And when the bins were full, then folk fun began, ditties, round dances, dances and weddings. Ritual folklore of the calendar phase of hard work smoothly turned into festivities and free life with feasts. The youth looked closely at each other, made new acquaintances. And here the traditional customs were not forgotten, the ritual folklore of the Russian people "rose to its full height." In the huts, fortune-telling began on the betrothed, the mummers, the girls burned candles for hours and swayed rings on thin threads. Boots and felt boots were thrown over the shoulder, a whisper was heard in the upper room.

Christmas carols

What is ritual folklore in terms of religion? The holiday of the Nativity of Christ is considered one of the most traditional in Rus'. It follows immediately after the New Year. It is generally accepted that how you spend this holiday, so the whole year will be. Christmas is considered by some to be the beginning of a new year. This is the main Russian religious event. On January 6, on Christmas Eve, caroling began. These are festive rounds of houses and apartments with songs and bags full of grain. Children usually go caroling. Everyone wants to receive a pie or a handful of sweets from the owners of the house in response to congratulations on the holiday.

The eldest in the procession of carolers usually carries on a pole the "Star of Bethlehem", which appeared in the sky when Jesus Christ was born. The hosts, to whom they came with carols, should not skimp on gifts for children, otherwise they will have to listen to the comic reproaches of the children.

Main night of the year

A few days after Christmas, the New Year began (today we call it the Old New Year), which was also accompanied by folklore rites. People wished each other happiness, long life and every success in business. Congratulations were presented in the form of short carols. The folk rite was also "observant" songs that accompanied divination after midnight. That's what ritual folklore is on New Year's Eve!

And when winter is running out, it's time to see her off - and the people take to the streets to celebrate Maslenitsa. This is the time of cheerful folklore winter rites with skating in troikas, with races on squeaky sledges, with games on skates with clubs. The fun continues until dark, and late in the evening the whole family sits down by the stove and remembers the past holiday. During such gatherings, they sang songs, sang ditties, played games. This is also the ritual family folklore of the Russian people. It includes family stories, wedding songs, lullabies, lamentations, and much more.