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“Already the sky breathed in autumn, the sun shone less often,” the classic wrote about the last month of autumn, calling it “a boring time.” November is really conducive to spleen: gray skies, almost bare trees… However, for our ancestors, November was one of the brightest months of the year. Why?
This November…
November in the folk calendar is the month that marks the transition from autumn to winter. Nature falls into a dream: the first snow falls, the rivers are covered with ice. Our ancestors believed that the first frosts frighten all evil spirits, and they flee from the earth. So they said: “Winter comes on a piebald mare and disperses all the unclean.”
November is a Latin name that comes from the word novem, which means “nine”. According to the old Roman calendar, which began in March, November was the ninth month. This name came to us along with the baptism of Russia, and before this month was called leaf fall. By the way, until 1492, the “first day of the year” also fell on March 1 for us. But why leaf fall?
If you look at the current weather, this name is more suitable for October or November, but in the south of Russia. The fact is that our Slavic ancestors lived in a territory where it was still relatively warm this month – in Central, Eastern and South-Eastern Europe. Belarusians, Ukrainians, Czechs and Poles still call November that way.
Like a chicken name day
In the People’s Calendar, November 1 – a special day called “chicken birthdays” (in the modern calendar it falls on November 14). On this day, he won the saints and Damian – doctors and the wonderworkers. In a folk tradition, they became craftsmen of the Blacksmiths Kuzma and Demyan, and somewhere this image was transformed even in the “Mother Kuzmodemyan”.
In November, Kuzma and Demyan were a lot of killed – wedding shackles, the first frosts, ice on the river: “It’s small in Kuzma-Demyan a forge, and the whole holy rus in it is ice chains.” But not one forging was busy workers. By the way, not only in the villages: in Moscow, this custom was also widely known.
On November 1, women took a bunch of chickens and gathered around the church of Cosmas and Damian, served prayers. Sending a chicken as a gift to relatives on this day was prestigious, “in a rich way”. And in the villages they kept special, “petition” chickens – their peasant women gave them to the boyars “for a red life.”
The chickens themselves also lived well, satisfyingly and for a long time – they used to believe that their eggs were healing and able to cure gall disease. It was much worse by roosters. The eldest member of the family had to choose a rooster and cut off his head. The legs should have been thrown into the hut so that the chickens would not be transferred, and the “Petya” himself should be boiled and eaten at dinner.
Save the animal
Yard – the same brownie, he only managed in the courtyard of the house, “in charge” of livestock and keeping order. His mood could deteriorate as often as people’s. For no reason at all, the courtyard became dashing: he scoffed at the cattle and in every possible way mischievous. He suddenly dislikes the horse, and the animal becomes ill.
For such cases there was a security ritual who quickly put on the place. It was necessary to take a gathering and sit on the horse, which was unbelieving the courtyard. Waving a broom and climbing on the horse’s horse, treated the yard as follows: “The father of the courtyard, do not disseminate the yard and do not destroy the animal!”
The effect came regardless of whether the animal gets better or not: the owner becomes calm, being firmly convinced that the dashing one has calmed down. This was the whole essence of security rituals, no matter how ridiculous they may seem to us now. But how? Both the horse and the cow have always been the breadwinners.
Train of relatives
Winter sleigh festivities began at the end of November. The first such outing was especially important in the family where the wedding took place in the fall. On this day, the young wife went out into the world for the first time and, as the custom commanded, bowed to all the neighbors.
The newlyweds were the first to sit in the painted, gilded sleigh, and behind them, as the collector of folk legends and customs Ivan Sakharov described it, “a long train of relatives” – on wagons decorated with wolf and bear furs.
In the book “Study of the Russian People”, Sakharov writes: “Beetor and mother-in-law, sending their daughter-in-law on a walk, asked the roots to take care of the young from every misfortune, and most of all – from a dumb eye. Near the threshold, in the hallway, they laid a sheepskin coat inside out. When they came from a walk, the father-in-law and mother-in-law met their daughter-in-law on this fur coat. Here, the escorts handed over the young from hand to hand. Evening feast eared the celebration. “
Who is unborn?
Previously, November 26 – St. George’s Day was a national holiday: on this date, St. George the Victorious was venerated. And at the end of November, the annual cycle of agricultural work was completed, and the peasants could move from one landowner to another. The landowner was warned about the transition in advance, usually a week in advance. And he could not keep the peasants and demand too much from them.
But in 1607, King Vasily Shuisky canceled the right of such a transition for the peasants. So they began to say: “Here you are, grandmother, and St. George’s Day!” With the same cancellation, the phraseologism “to burn” is also associated – on behalf of Yegoriy, as the people called St. George. Phraseologism means “inflate, deceive, not to fulfill his promise,” and hears the disappearance of peasants, who were in Yuriev day without the right to go.
Many folk beliefs are associated with St. George’s Day.
BURY HORSES
“Egoriy sets the wolves free,” they said that day, remembering that St. George patronizes not only domestic animals, but also portages and bears. The peasants believed: the saint would not allow the wolf to “slaughter the animal” if he prayed hard.
Also in the villages they prepared a special ritual baking – two “horse” from each courtyard. They were attached to the field and turned to the saint: “Hiring is merciful! Do not beat our cattle and do not eat. Here we brought you horses!” Then the pastries were buried in the snow.
Fall in the coffin
It was believed that from the winter St. George’s Day, bears fall asleep in their dens. In an older time, in some places there was a belief that some particularly calculating people from behind their storms were located on November 26 in the Grombie home and fell asleep in a bearishway until spring. For example, the poet and prose writer Apollo of Corinth wrote about this in the book “People’s Russia”.
LISTEN TO THE WATER
Korinfsky also told about another belief: “After Yuri the cold, the village old-timers, seeing off the sunset, go out into the yard to the wells and “listen to the water.” If it does not move, it portends a warm winter. If any sounds are heard from the well, it means that we must wait for severe frosts.