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Journal of Ethnology 4/2012 with its thematic studies pays attention to the issues relating to the aesthetics of folklore. Juraj Hamar in its contribution (Folklore from the Point of View of Aesthetic Categories) summarizes the issue of aesthetic categories and folklore. Marta Ulrychová focuses on the analysis of demonological legends in the Bohemian Forest in selected works by German authors in the 1920s. (Demonological Legends from the Northern Part of Královský hvozd (Royal Forest) / Waldhwozd ). Miroslava Záhumenská explains the collection of folk literature in Slovakia in the late-19th century (Folk Song Manuscript Collection Assembled by Ján Klempa Jacovský in Relation to Literary and Aesthetic Criteria of the Last Third of the 19th Century). In Other Studies Section, Eva Románková presents a new project of the National Institute of Folk Culture (Ethnological Terminology and Methodology of Compiling a Bilingual Dictionary of Ethnology) and Jarmila Teturová submits the knowledge obtained in a field research aimed at the development of folk tradition (Male Dance “Verbuňk” in the Village of Žatčany in the Region of Brněnsko within the Contemporary Cultural and Social Context).
Transferring Tradition column publishes a feuilleton by Josef Holcman, who contemplates the contemporary social recession on the ground of this year’s selected folklore festivals and local ethno-cultural traditions; and an article by Alena Schauerová, which is devoted to a glance into the history of the children’s folklore festival in Strážnice. Social Chronicle remembers the anniversaries of writer Josef Holcman (born 1952), Luděk Štěpán (born 1932), an expert for the protection of folk architecture, and Eva Davidová (born 1932), a specialist for Roma studies. Moreover, the Journal includes regular reports from the branch, conferences, exhibitions, and reviews of new books.
In the last decades, a lot of scientific disciplines have dealt rather with the folklore poetics than the folklore aesthetics. Such ideas were represented especially by literary scientists, ethnologists, linguists, and philosophers from the environment of the Prague Linguistics Circle, the Russian formalists and the Tartu School. In folklore, the presence of antique aesthetic tradition has been evident until today. The aesthetics of folklore is based on the archetype essence of folk art, which is symptomatic especially for literary folklore. For example, the space, the characters, the stories etc. dispose of predestined trajectories that are forming the entire theme and action and the topics and metaphoric of the story, the place, the characters, and their behaviour. This is similar to the aesthetic categories in folklore. Within folk environment, the aesthetic function plays an important role when the facts are adopted through cognition and feelings of beauty. Nowadays, folklore is losing the natural conditions of its existence, which directly endangers the syncretism nature of folk art.
The author devotes herself to the legends from Královský hvozd, an area situated in the northernmost part of the Bohemian Forest. In the 1920s, the legends were published by Gustav Jungbauer and Hans Watzlik - the German-writing authors from Bohemia. In her geographic definition of the area, the author is referring to the Josef Blau publication titled Geschichte der künnischen Freibauern im Böhmerwalde from 1934. Her typology of legends is based on the catalogue of demonological legends, which is a part of the thesis defended by Jan Luffer at Department of Ethnology, Faculty of Arts of Charles University, in 2011. The principal part of the study is divided into six groups defined by Luffer. The author tries to compare the collected materials with the particular types that are signed with a title and a three-digit code in the catalogue. She applies the same way when analyzing Stilzel der Kobold des Böhmerwaldes by Watzlik. She is reaching a view that the most types, defined by Luffer, are represented in the legends from Královský hvozd. The legends from this part of the Bohemian Forest relate to rural culture. They express the value system of descendants from the then Bavarian settlers. Plentifully represented are the motifs related to deep forests (poaching, casting of magic balls, and meeting with a danger creature, storms, and natural disasters) and provincial border between Bohemia and Bavaria.
The study pays attention to the manuscript collection assembled by Ján Klempa Jacovský, which came into being in the last third of the 19th century. It consists of two volumes, the first of which contains 95 song texts and the other one contains up to 127 song texts. A part of Jancovský´s records was published in 1880 in the book titled Písně slovenské (The Slovakian Songs), edited by Andrej Halaša. The manuscript collection as a whole is an important proof for the contemporary work of those who collect and record the texts of Slovakian folk songs. It also documents the repertoire from the area around the town of Trnava, to which not much attention has been paid so far. In his manuscript, Ján Klempa Jacovský refers to an older collection compiled by Ján Kollár. As resulting from his comments, Jacovský knew the Kollár´s work very well, resp. he worked with it and compared the recorded song texts. Although Ján Klempa Jacovský recorded the texts of folk songs without their melodies, his collection’s historic value is inestimable for us today. Even if the text of a folk song, i.e. a fragment of the song’s original, is recorded, such a record bears witness about the simultaneous relation to folk songs and their aesthetical and artistic value.
The development of different scientific fields has brought about the formation of specialized vocabularies or terminologies whose aim is to standardise the designations of things, activities and processes in the individual branches. Today, many researchers study literature in foreign languages or publish their work abroad; almost every academic journal contains summaries in English. Ethnology is a very specific field, as it covers all areas of human life and its terminology is highly culture dependent. When translating ethnological texts into English, we encounter many problems. The expressions for elements of traditional material, spiritual and social culture in different countries vary in the same way as their cultural and social background does. No specialized Czech-English dictionary of ethnology has been published so far. The National Institute of Folk Culture is planning to publish such handbook in the form of an online database which will include a wide range of linguistic, semantic and encyclopaedic data. An examination of the identified needs and available resources followed with a presentation of the working methods as well as the methodology formulation including the dictionary structure, selection of headwords and analysis of problematic issues in translation, are summarised in this study and should lay the groundwork of the dictionary project.
The study has developed in connection with this year’s field research project of the National Institute of Folk Culture, which focused on the extension of Slovak verbuňk outside the original region of its occurrence. The study describes different localities, in which verbuňk occurs, putting stress on the area south of Brno. The attention is paid to the village of Žatčany and to the description of verbuňk occurrence in this locality within the context of its cultural and social development. The study explains the importance of folklore movement for the safeguarding, renewal and development of folk culture. Verbuňk is observed as a cultural phenomenon with respect to the contemporary dance culture, dance opportunities, changes in dance order and reconstruction of folk costumes from the mid-20th century until today.
Journal of Ethnology 3/2012 has chosen as its major theme the Marian cult in the light of ethnological researches. Věra Frolcová concentrates herself on one of ethnomusicological aspects of this theme (A Legend on Peregrination of the Virgin Mary, Miraculous Recovery of a Child and Repentant Smith in Ceremonial Singing in the 19th-21st Centuries as a Phenomena of Central-European Cultural Commons). Monika Kropej writes about the Marian issues within a wider interpretation of folk culture in Slovenia (The Virgin Mary in Slovenian Folk Tradition). The material contribution by Eva Krekovičová submits the theme of Marian songs of Slovaks in Hungary (On Spiritual Songs in Oral Repertoire of Slovakian Minority in Hungary (Preliminary Results of Researches at the Turn of the Millennium). Out the main theme, a contribution by Jiří Höhn has been included, who pays attention to a folk producer of musical instruments from Moravské Kopanice (Štěpán Šopík´s Musical Insruments in the Collections at the National Institute of Folk Culture).
In Stopping with Photo column, Helena Beránková publishes her contribution A Pilgrimage to the Virgin Mary of Žarošice in the Photos by Jaroslav Pulicar. Social Chronicle remembers the anniversaries of ethnologists Jana Pospíšilová (born 1952) and Jiřina Kosíková (born 1952) and publishes obituaries for choreographer Libuše Hynková (1923-2012), musician and radio editor Jan Rokyta (1938-2012) and sociologist Miloslav Petrusek (1936-2012). Other regular columns include reports from conferences, exhibitions, festivals, reviews of new books, and news from the branch.
The legendic song on the Virgin Mary and a smith develops within the context of looking for an accommodation and Jesus birth in Bethlehem. It has been documented as an oral tradition since 1843 and it constitutes a Central-European song type that can be found in Bohemian, Silesian, Polish, Slovakian, Hungarian, and Ukrainian variations. The study submits the first results of the comparison of songs from hand-written and printed sources, from the text and melody point of views. A song is not connected with a place of pilgrimage. Its lifetime is supported by the tradition (Nativity Scenes, Christmas and Easter carolling, religious services venerating the Virgin Mary) and the printed media (school reading book, printed broadside ballads). The legend as a carol presents a genre of the Western-Slavic folklore called “the Marian carol”. The song has several melodies. The enclosed musical notation shows the common Bohemian-Moravian-Silesian-Polish-Slovenian song type, which has been the tradition bearer from 1845 until today. The author documents also the relations between the spiritual song and the secular dance melody. The legend as a song type covers a certain part of the Christian West, touching the Greek-Catholic region in Ukraine. Although it includes some fragments of the late-medieval passion (the Virgin Mary and the smith) and apocrypha from Jesus´ childhood (the healed hand), the Czech wording of the song can be documented at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries. The Central-European theme “the Virgin Mary and a smith” has a thought parallel in the theme “the Virgin Mary and a ferryman” developed by the Slovenian and Croatian songs. Both types include the motif of the sinner’s conversion through the miraculous rescue of the Child, mediated by the Virgin Mary. It is one of the pictures portraying the task of the Mother of God of Perpetual Help in folk songs.
The study focuses on various forms of worship and veneration of the Virgin Mary as preserved in Slovenian folklore. Folk tradition and customs suggest that personifications of the days Friday, Saturday and Sunday - St. Parasceve/Sv. Petka, Santa Sabida/Sv. Sobota and Santa Domenica/Sv. Nedelja have found a place in Christianity and have churches dedicated to them or appear in church paintings. In folk tradition, the veneration of „Saint Sunday“ or the „Sunday Church“ is strongly connected with the veneration of the Virgin Mary and in some cases it even merges with it. In Christian iconography, depictions often present the Virgin Mary with a unicorn, the Madonna of Mercy with a mantle, the Virgin Mary in an enclosed garden or „hortus conclusus“ and mystical engagement of Virgin Mary. Numerous holidays are dedicated to the Virgin Mary, and the entire month of May is dedicated to her with May Devotions. The veneration of the Virgin Mary has been especially strong in the Catholic world, and is perhaps particularly so in Slovenia. This is attested by numerous churches, chapels, and statues, as well as legends, songs, apparitions, and miracles connected with the Virgin Mary. The majority of Slovenian pilgrimage churches are dedicated to the Virgin Mary, including the best-known Slovenian pilgrimage church in Brezje. All of this contributed to the fact, that the veneration of Madonna still reflects in rich spiritual life, folk customs, holidays, folk narrative and song tradition of Slovenian people.
The essay is a probe into the material acquired within a wider research of songs related to folk religiosity in the regions with Catholic inhabitants. The research is implemented in a bilingual environment with the members of Slovakian language islands in Hungary (1991-2011) and with the Slovaks living in Slovakia. The author draws upon the materials acquired during her own field research of song repertoire in Slovakian language with the members of Slovakian diaspora in Hungary that features its hybrid character. The spiritual songs were recorded as orally interpreted by their direct bearers and local contemporaries, or in the form of written texts used for the song interpretation. The contribution follows the following aspects: a) difficulties concerning the connection of the orally interpreted spiritual songs with the pilgrim songs; b) the portion of Marian songs within the acquired fund; c) frequented themes of spiritual songs and their contextual relations.
The essay is devoted to the production of folk violinmaker and musician Štěpán Šopík from the ethnographic area of Moravian Kopanice. Through the analysis of his products safeguarded in the collection at the National Institute of Folk Culture in Strážnice, the author thereof tries to characterize the Šopík´s works setting them against another folk violinmaker, Martin Kuča from Strážnice. The workmanship of the string instruments made by Š. Šopík substantiates his focus especially on the functionality of an instrument while its aesthetical feature is put in the shade. Four of the Šopík´s safeguarded musical instruments are in the collections at the National Institute of Folk Culture in Strážnice (three violins and a baset/violoncello); some other instruments are in the possession of the Jan Amos Komenský´s Museum in Uherský Brod.
Journal of Ethnology 2/2012 has chosen the research of folk clothing as its major theme. Petra Mertová pays attention to the types of textile materials (An Overview of Types of Wool Fabrics on Men’s Folk Garments in Moravia between 1850 and 1950), Klára Binderová writes about blueprint and its applications (Changes in the Production of Jochs´ Blueprint Workshop in Strážnice between 1906 and 1993), Lenka Drápalová presents the men’s waistcoats as a part of folk costumes around Rožnov pod Radhoštěm (Men’s Garment Called Brunclek in the Region around Rožnov - Identification of a Specific Garment Variant), Daniel Dědovský explains the symbol of Czech national dress from 1848 (Čamara in European Culture (an ethno-linguistic study). In Other Studies section, Martin Novotný pays attention to the building material dominating in the ethnographic area of Hana (Clay as a Building Material (an example from the ethnographic area of Hana in Central Moravia).
In Stopping with Photo column, Alena Křížová publishes postcards with folk costume motifs from the 1920s. Barbora Machová conducts an interview with Bulgarian ethnologist Zoranč Malinov.
Social Chronicle remembers the anniversaries of music editor Jaromír Nečas (born 1922), ethnologist and musicologist Marta Ulrychová (born 1952) and ethnologists Helena Bočková (born 1952) and Helena Mevaldová (born 1952), and publishes obituary for folklorist Dagmar Klímová (1926-2012). Other regular columns include reports from conferences and exhibitions, reviews of new books, and actual news from the branch.
Traditional clothing worn by the inhabitants in Moravian villages has been the matter of ethnologists´ interest for more than one hundred years. In expert literature, one can find descriptions of techniques related to spinning, weaving, knitting, fulling, and other textile techniques. The ways of extracting and processing the natural raw materials used for making the traditional textile materials, i.e. those made from flax, hemp, cotton, silk and wool yarns, have been documented. It was not only ethnologists but also historians and regional researchers, who - in their essays and monographs - paid attention to the historical background of textile production and its legal and social framework. Available are quite many reports on textile production as well as descriptions of garments worn by the village inhabitants in Moravia. Therefore, it should not be difficult to summarize the fabrics used for making the folk clothes in Moravia within the period from the late-19th century until the end of the first half of the 20th century. The submitted text constitutes an overview just - for the time being - of wool fabrics documented in the literature in connection with the men’s folk garments from Moravia between 1850 and 1950. The listing is accompanied by the characteristics of fabrics; it has been compiled by means of the encyclopaedic handbooks and ethnographic texts of the time as well as the modern ones. The listing shall be completed by photo documentation presenting the concrete fabrics along with the constructive and technological analysis thereof. Such documentation could help the researchers identify the textile fabrics, especially in case of museum exhibits.
The essay speaks about the almost ninety-years-long history of the blueprint workshop in a small Moravian town Strážnice, which is run by family Joch. It submits brief information about blue-print tradition in the region as well as about the conditions for workshop´s work; it deals also with peculiarities of the blue-print production at this dying workshop between 1906 and 1951, comparing them with the production in the following period (1954-1993). Within the aforementioned two periods, Jochs´ blueprint workshop was going through significant changes. In its original form, the workshop produced blueprint only for a narrow group of inhabitants living in rural area around the town of Strážnice. They used the blueprinted fabrics as a usual consumption material for their garments. The blueprint motifs were adapted to this way of use as well. With the change of political regime, the workshop became in 1954 a part of a centralized organization taking care for the so-called folk artistic manufacture. Under the head of this organization, the blueprint fabrics were modified in products maintaining their traditional basis but replying to modern requirements in the branch of textile production. The products were intended for all those appreciating especially the cultural value of a new piece of work.
Through geographical, historical, economical, social, and cultural influences, the traditional dress in Rožnov and its environs developed in a typical form of clothing, which differed from other types of Wallachian folk costume. Its appearance has been documented by written, picture and tangible sources since the late-18th century, as well as by expert literature. Nevertheless, a variant of men’s brunclek with different solution of the back part escaped the attention of the respondents and researchers. The author of this study identifies the above type of brunclek as a brunclek of Rožnov type with the double Princess cut of the back part. Based on comparing works in museum depositaries, the study offers the sight of making and using this different form of brunclek including the cut modification.
The garment known in Bohemia as “čamara” has been documented since the High Middle Ages in the European culture of clothing; its roots date back to Oriental civilizations. In European languages and their dialects, there are lots of terminologically relative modifications relating to the garment in question. This garment found its way into the culture of clothing of several continents gradually; it was worn by members of all social classes - as a part of folk costumes, feudal lords´ clothes, dress and jerkins of church dignitaries within both the Catholic and Protestant environment; in many places, it has survived in different forms until today. Although in particular cultures and periods čamara differs in the cut and applications, it has always kept its function as an overcoat. The material shows notable identities as well. Mostly the garment is made from the fabric of animal origin - silk, wool, hair, or fur. The name “čamara” might be derived from the name of sheep or goat fur, which occurs in the languages in Near East, Northern Africa, and South Europe. Polish word czamary from the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries shows the influence of especially Hungarian and Oriental environment. These czamary were a significant source for the Czech designers of national formal dress. The continuity of this garment can be traced back to the Renaissance fashion in Italy and Spain.
The essay speaks about some aspects of mining and preparation of building materials used for constructions of earth buildings in Central Moravia, in the ethnographic area of Hana. Based on the sources of narrative nature and the literature, we have depicted the already extinct tradition within the above region. We pay attention to the way in which the raw material was extracted and processed in connection with the intended kind of bricklaying. In Hana, they used mainly the pre-shaped building units - clay lumps and unburnt bricks. The specific role of brickmakers and builders of earth buildings as well as their position within the village community are taken into consideration as well. The attention was paid also to the maintenance of these buildings, which was based on several acts repeated regularly in certain periodical intervals.
Journal of Ethnology 1/2012 is devoted to wanderlust, travelling and cultural contacts. Barbora Půtová focuses her study on fortunes and works of three important Czech travellers - E. S. Vráz, A. V. Frič and J. Kořenský (Czech Travellers and Ethnographers on the Boundary of Civilizations: Vráz, Frič and Kořenský). Jana Jiroušková pays attention to the personality of M. B. Lány (1876-1941), who spent his life as an Evangelic missionary in East Africa and included his observations and knowledge into the correspondence and collection he sent to Bohemia. (A Proud Warrior, a Lazy Maidservant and a Superstitious Native. One of the European Views of Non-European Culture). Stanislav Brouček presents the fortunes of Helena Šťastná-Bübelová (born 1920), who created her relationship to Africa between 1946 and 1947 as a traveller, and between 1948 and 1964 as an expatriate (Africa as a Traveller’s Experience and a Place to Live for a European: (Story of Helena Šťastná-Bübelová).
Kateřina Štěpánová writes about the travellers´ relationship to the creation of exotic collections within the Czech environment. (The Influence of Czech Travellers on Exotic Art Collections / since the Beginnings of Czech Collections until the World War II).
In Stopping with Photos column, Hana Dvořáková presents a selection from photo albums compiled by Jindřich Vávra, Knight Fernsee (1831-1887), a ship doctor, botanist and donator of the Moravian Museum. Transferring Tradition column includes a Tereza Indráková contribution about the contemporary Israeli dance (Dancing Israel), an Eva Šipöczová article about the actual political anecdote in Slovakia (The Government Fell! The Government Fell! Who Will Form a New One?) and an Eva Večerková contribution about a producer of traditional Easter eggs (Easter Eggs Made by Anna Rusová). Social Chronicle remembers the anniversaries of Slovakian ethnologist Oľga Danglová (born 1941) and Czech ethnologist Miloš Tomandl (born 1952), and publishes obituaries for ethnologist Olga Skalníková (1922-2012), Slovakian folklorist and worker in public education Kliment Ondrejka (1929-2011) and composer Blahoslav Smišovský (1931-2011). Other regular columns include reports from conferences, reviews of new books, and actual professional activities.
This study is a theoretic analysis of lives and works of three Czech travellers - Enrique Stanko Vráz, Alberto Vojtěch Frič and Josef Kořenský. These pioneers of the nascent social and cultural anthropology found themselves on the boundary of different civilizations and were among the first white men who set their foot on the exotic world of "the others". With their travels, vividly described in their literal work, they not only did an extraordinary job when gathering authentic ethnographic material in the form of literature, photographs and exotic artefacts in Czech cultural context, but they also deconstructed the doctrine of Eurocentrism. The study focuses mainly on their literal heritage and their desire to describe, understand and interpret a different cultural reality. Works of these travellers represent original effort to integrate collecting, observing and research intentions. The study presents their travel books as a specific gnoseologic tool enabling to analyse their field findings ranging from the description to the comparison and interpretation of the exoticism and unknown socio-cultural reality. The study also points out the fact that the travellers transformed the different in their books into a cultural construction created within the author's personality and his own civilization. Through the strange and different, the travellers thus gave rise to an authentic and complex picture of a different and unknown world including, however, also the author's own description and interpretation of different forms of cultural reality. This study also aspires to prove that the works of these travellers represent their different personal approaches to perception of cultural boundaries and to their studies of different ethnicities and nations.
The article focuses on the historical reconstruction of a vision of “exotic” reality. The example chosen is that of former missionary, Martin Bohdan Lány (1876-1941), a man whose determination is documented by the surroundings and the time he lived in. M. B. Lány was a long-term co-worker of the Náprstek Museum to which he sent several hundred objects from 1903 to 1911 from East Africa in the area around Mount Kilimanjaro. His choice of objects influenced the perception of East African culture in Bohemia and contributed to the creation of several stereotypes associated with the local population: a proud warrior or a patient, less intelligent governess. The study is based on an evaluation of the primary sources stored in the archives of the National Museum - Náprstek Museum of Asian, African and American Cultures.
The study is based on the thesis that travelling has become a part of the process of globalization. On the one hand, it covers the unbridled tourism while on the other hand one can see wanderlust as a state of soul. The text pays attention to the second line, observing the fortunes of Helena Šťastná-Bübelová, an important Czech traveller, who was travelling through Central Africa between 1946 and 1947. After February 1948, she became an expatriate; before settling in the south of France at Cap Ferat near Nice (1965), she worked in Kenya, got married, and lived with her second husband in Madagascar for many years (1953-1964). The study is based on the personal experience of the traveller in various civilizations. In addition to the materials obtained from Helena Šťastná-Bübelová, (written materials: correspondence, notes, and her African diary published in book form), the study also includes the observations of her friends, for example traveller Miroslav Zikmund.
The study introduces the Czech travellers who helped form the exotic art collections in the Czech Republic significantly and supported the relationship between Czech culture and non-European nations in this way. The author pays attention to the terminology and the first collections of exotic art within the Czech Republic. She points out not only the importance of exotic art but also the interesting stories of artefacts appearing in our collections. The next part of the study presents Czech travellers whose contribution to the theme was the most essential ((Vojtěch Náprstek, Emil Holub, Enrike Stanko Vráz, Alberto Vojtěch Frič, Josef Kořenský, Joe Hloucha, Jiří Hanzelka and Miroslav Zikmund, Miloslav Stingl etc.); the development, present condition and listing of institutions exhibiting the exotic collections cannot be missing. The author puts stress on ethnological, anthropological, and artistic aspects of the theme that - even if not preferred by the present society - had a fundamental influence on forming the attitude of Czech culture to the distant civilizations. The travellers play one of the most important roles within this theme.
