WOMAN in LITHUANIAN FOLKLORE a Dissertation
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WOMAN IN LITHUANIAN FOLKLORE A Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of^plPll^aduate School of 0t1?W |^ver%,ity In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy by Maria Paplauskas-Ramunas 1952 UMI Number: DC53788 INFORMATION TO USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. Broken or indistinct print, colored or poor quality illustrations and photographs, print bleed-through, substandard margins, and improper alignment can adversely affect reproduction. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if unauthorized copyright material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. UMI® UMI Microform DC53788 Copyright 2011 by ProQuest LLC All rights reserved. This microform edition is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code. ProQuest LLC 789 East Eisenhower Parkway P.O. Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE INTRODUCTION XV I.- THE VIRGIN 1 1. Mergele—The Maiden 2 2. The Sister 27 3. The Orphan Girl 40 4. Chastity 56 5. Modesty 77 6. Diligence 89 II.- THE WIFE 98 1. Waiting for the Chosen One 98 2. The Matchmaking 116 3. Marriage by the Will of the Parents 123 4. Nuptial Rite 130 5. Farewell from the Parents' Home and from the Merry Youth 146 6. Daughter-in-law 153 7. Member of a New Kindred 156 8. Sacredness of Marriage 166 III.- THE MOTHER 176 1. The Soul of the Family 177 2. Self-denial and Sacrifices for her Children 183 3. The Children's Guardian and Guide 203 4. The Stepmother 213 5. The Immortal Mother 222 IV.- THE STATE OF THE WOMAN 228 1. The Woman in Religion 228 2. The Woman in the National Culture 249 3. The Social State of the Woman 272 CONCLUSION 283 BIBLIOGRAPHY 287 ABSTRACT 307 INTRODUCTION From the thirteenth to the fifteenth century Lithuania was a mighty state stretching from the Baltic to the Black Sea. Today Lithuania is a small, peaceful, Baltic country whose sons have died by the thousands in heroic defense of their holy native soil, and which now languishes under the crushing heel of Soviet domination. This small idyllic country is a sort of island among other European nations. It is one of the oldest nations of Europe, and has preserved to a remarkable degree both its ancient language and customs. Its language is the closest to the old Indo-Aryan Sanskrit (Sanskrit, Lithuanian, Greek, and Latin are the four sister languages of the primeval Indo-European language, which has not yet been discovered or reconstructed). Due to a deeply rooted conservatism and relative isolation, the Lithuanians have preserved very ancient traditions, customs, and lore. Historical events and geogra phical factors had a great deal to do with this. For ages the Lithuanian nation was separated from the other European nations by the Baltic Sea and the great forests. It was a time of security and peace. Then the Lithuanians fought for three hundred years against the Teutonic Knights, who cruelly pillaged and enslaved the people under the pretense of spreading INTRODUCTION iii the Gospel of Christ. It was partly in a violent reaction to these depredations that the Lithuanians clung all the more tenaciously not only to the soil of their fatherland, but to their ancestral religion and customs. After Christianity had been embraced by Lithuania, it did not eradicate the old ways and customs: for at least two hundred years the old religion survived peacefully under the supremacy of the Cross. Even up to the First World War, the villagers still kept alive most of the old pagan supersti tions and traditions handed down by their forefathers. As a result of all this, there is a rich and varied abundance of Lithuanian folklore, which beckons, almost irresistably, the serious researcher in these fields. Much of the material has been gathered and classified, but the greatest part of it is still unrecorded. Fortunately, however, it lives even today upon the lips and in the hearts and minds of the coun try folk, and reflects the philosophy, psychology and cultural history of the nation. It should be useful to enumerate the following typical elements of folklore: (1) The telling of legends, tales, narratives, anecdotes, and jokes; (2) Musical compositions with lyrics and melodies; (3) Recitation of orations, lamen tations, riddles and proverbs; (4) Mythology, demonology, superstitions and chants; (5) Customs and habits from practical INTRODUCTION iv everyday life and comprising three subdivisions (a) customs connected with the most important moments of human life — birth, baptism, matchmaking, wedding, death and funerals (b) customs connected with annual feasts (c) customs con nected with communal or collective work — harvesting, etc. (6) Folk dances and pageants.1 The study of folklore as such is a comparatively recent branch of science, but it has made great progress and promises to be a signal aid in the unravelling of the tangled story of mankind. Through its contributions to history, archeology, and linguistics, we are constantly coming closer to an understanding of the cradle of European culture and racial stock. Partly because of its comparative novelty and partly because of the difficulty in terminology, the subject matter of tne science of folklore is somewhat general and its exact boundaries in regard to related sciences are difficult to define. English-speaking scientists have done a great and laudable work in investigating even the smallest and most uncivilized races, and their speculations and hypotheses erected to reconstruct the patterns of development of cultures have been a great contribution to the ethnological sciences. 1 Jonas Balys, Lietuviu Tautosakos Skaitymai. Tuebin- gen: Patria, Vol. I, p.~5T INTRODUCTION v Lithuanian folklore, however, has been almost ignored in previous English research. The author has consulted all the books and periodicals from 1804 to the present, available through the Parliamentary Library, the Library of the Univer sity of Ottawa, and the Congressional Library; and she found in these surprisingly few mentions of Lithuanian folklore, and even these were often garbled and inaccurate. The journal of the Ethnological Society of London several times confuses the Lithuanian and Slavonic races, and therefore it skips over Lithuanian folklore in almost complete silence. Hutchinson, Natt, Newell, Dendy, Bedoe, and Babington are guilty of the same error. Not even the antiquity of the language is men tioned. Taylor, not only includes Lithuania among the Slavic nations (which are younger offshoots of the Indo-European parent stock) but he lumps together the Latvians (which are the closest relatives of the Lithuanians) and the Finns (which belong to the Uralo-Altaic Mongoloid race). Lithuania is one of the oldest European nations, and consequently an investigation of its folklore reveals a great deal and helps to lift the curtain of ignorance which has for so many thousands of years obscured the works and ways of our earliest ancestors. Foreign scholars have not 2 Griffith Taylor, Environment and Nation. Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1936, p. 24. INTRODUCTION vi been slow to probe this rich treasure. German linguists have made the most outstanding research. Although they started out to investigate only the language, their interest soon widened to include many elements of Lithuanian folklore. The work of these German scholars remains unsurpassed, but it has been very well supplemented by Polish, Russian, Finnish, French, Czech, and Italian scholars. Although Lithuanian scholars themselves have recorded many collections of folk songs, tales, proverbs, etc., they have not had sufficient time and tranquility to analyze all this material in such a way as to cast light upon the dominant national characte ristics. Lithuania is on the unfortunate borderland of friction between East and West, and the many wars which have swept over her have depleted her material goods, undermined her culture and disturbed her scholars. At present we have at our disposal only collections and classifications of folklore matter. 1'he author has attempted to go beyond this first stage and to draw from the available material and her own first-hand research a picture of the Lithuanian national character, in which we may find many clues about the culture and traditions of our earliest European ancestors. We have limited ourselves to the treat ment of "Woman in Lithuanian Folklore". Much material yet remains, and even some of our chapters could easily and INTRODUCTION vii profitably be developed into theses on their own right. Such subjects, for instance, as Lithuanian wedding customs, the Lithuanian ideal of virginity, and the Lithuanian mother, deserve to be given fuller treatment. It is the woman who is the principal educator of the children, and through them, she is the educator of the nation. She was the first agriculturalist, and through her efforts, the agricultural age was ushered in. She has greatly enriched man's spiritual consciousness by her intuitive awareness of the Mighty Power Beyond. Consciously or unconsciously she generates high ideals in, those whom she loves, and they in turn actualize these ideals, fight and die for them. Man has the dominant part in creating culture, but culture is a fragile thing, it must be taken care of, it must be watched, and loved. It is the women who nurse and preserve culture. In her life, in her family and social status we find a clear mirror of the cultural level of a race. Highly cultured races have a higher regard for the physically weak but spiritually and sensitively strong and subtle. Barbarian races give recognition only to physical power. Because women are the most careful custodians and per- petuators of national and family traditions, the author hopes 3 Zenonas Ivinskis, Dr., "Lietuviu Kulturos Tarpsniai,M in Aidai, Schwaebisoh Gmuend, June, 1949, No.