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« 2024. # 5 (179)

The Ethnology Notebooks. 2024. № 5 (179), 1127—1136

UDK 398.332.4(=161.2:477.86/.87)

DOI https://doi.org/10.15407/

«KWOK, KWOK, A HUNDRED HENS, AND ONE COCK, SO MANY EGGS AS THE STARS IN THE SKY»: HOUSEHOLD MAGIC IN THE RITES OF THE CHRISTMAS AND EPIPHANY OF THE BOYKOS

SEREBRYAKOVA Olena

  • ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1039-2920
  • Candidate of Historical Sciences (= Ph.D. in history).
  • Senior researcher of the department of Modern Ethnology
  • of the Ethnology Institute
  • of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine,
  • 15, Svobody Avenue, 79000, Lviv, Ukraine,
  • Contacts: e-mail: o-sereb@ukr.net

Abstract. The aim of the offered article is coverage of the layer of customary and ritual, worldview phenomena associated with magical rites of economic direction. For this purpose, the information obtained during field research on the territory of Boykivshchyna region is introduced into scientific circulation, syste­matized and analyzed. The object of the research is the traditional worldview and customary-ritual culture of the residents of Boykivshchyna region, and the subject is the magic actions of sound imitation of the voices and behavior of domestic birds, in particular hens, which is made during the Christmas and Epiphany cycle of holidays. The ceremonial time, place (on the floor, under the table, in the corner or in the middle of the house, on the threshold, in the wicker basket) and the perfor­mers of magic actions (children, hostess, host, older family members) are set. The functional purpose, actional and verbal levels of the studied magic custom are revealed. Among the verbal magic, sayings, ritual dialogues are separate. Examples of contact and harmful magic are presented. The means of protective magic are considered. The use of Christmas attributes and ritual food with production semantics is also worth attention. The varieties, local differences, interpretations, beliefs, custom instructions, ritual taboos, are characterized. The archaic methods of increasing the number of hens in the household and the existence of additional rituals have been found. It is found that in some places of Boykivshchyna the researched custom has been preserved till nowadays.

The basis of the article are the materials of the field research, local history essays, works of the second half of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twenty-first centuries.

The methodology of this work is based on general scientific methodological principles and the basic requirements that apply to the works of historical and ethnological direction. The author uses a various methods (field observation, comparative-historical, comparative, reconstructive, structural-semantic).

Keywords: Boykivshchyna, Holy Evening, conception, beliefs, taboo, magic, hens.

Received 6.09.2024

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