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« 2025. # 4 (184)

The Ethnology Notebooks. 2025. № 4 (184), 969—978

UDK726.95:745.51:64](477)”16/17″:069](477)(045)

DOI https://doi.org/10.15407/

THE CROSSES ON THE UKRAINIAN EARLY MODERN PERIOD CEILING BEAMS

SHCHERBAN Anatolii

  • ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9530-6453
  • Doctor of Culturolodgy, Candidate of Historical Sciences,
  • Professor, Head of the Department of Culturology and Museum Activity,
  • Kharkiv State Academy of Culture,
  • 4, Bursatskyi uzviz, 61057, Kharkiv, Ukraine,
  • Contacts: e-mail: kosaks_1978@ukr.net

VEKLENKO Viktor

  • ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9530-6453
  • Director, Public Historical-Ethnographic 
  • Stavrographic Museum of the Cross, 28, Kozatska St., 51813,
  • Hrechane village, Dnipropetrovsk region, Ukraine,
  • Contacts: e-mail: vik88tormusseum@gmail.com

Abstract. Problem Statement. The study of crosses as a significant component of Ukrainian cultural heritage has been extensively covered in scholarly literature. However, their depictions on ceiling beams (svoloky) from the Early Modern period remain largely underexplored. Given the abundance of such signs, along with the frequent availability of information about the owner, the original location, and the date of creation, these artifacts represent a valuable resource for the field of cross studies.

Purpose. To provide a comprehensive overview of crosses depicted on Ukrainian ceiling beams of the Early Modern era, analyzing them as elements of decoration, markers and symbols. 

Methods. The complex of methods and approaches characteristic of museological, historical and art history disciplines were involved. In particular, the principle of historicism, methods of comparative and visual analysis, formal-stylistic. 

Results. The study summarizes the analysis of 29 carved crosses found on 26 Ukrainian ceiling beams (svoloky) dated between 1667 and 1780. These ceiling beams originate from museum and reserve collections and from photographs and drawings. 

Conclusion. The cross is a meaningful and semantically rich element of the «carved» Ukrainian ceiling beams from the Early Modern period. It appears on 73% of the examined items from 1667—1780. Four regional groups of ceiling beams bearing such signs have been identified. «northern» region includes three examples. The «southern» region includes two examples. All featuring six-pointed crosses of a single type but with different ornamentation and lower crossbars. The «western» group comprises three ceiling beams, but their crosses are of varied types. The most representative region is Central Naddniprianshchyna, with 17 ceiling beams, displaying a diversity of cross types and variations. This variety may indicate that the crosses were carved by artisans from different woodworking centers and that there was no universally accepted canon for the image of the cross as a domestic symbol in certain Ukrainian lands during the late 17th to 18th centuries. It may also reflect historical changes in church life.

Keywords: wood, carving, ceiling beam (svolok), сross.

Received 2.07.2025

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