Primer etnološke rekonstrukcije slovanskih mitskih motivov iz folklornega gradiva

slovenian

1999

volume 27, issue 194

oral literature    Ethnopoetics    Christianity    ethnography 

Študentska založba

The analysis of the folk song entitled George Kills the Dragon and Saves the King's Daughter from the Bela Krajina region led to its comparison with Radman's song entitled Letters on Bosnia and St George. Consequently, it was determined that the song from Bela Krajina is a more recent, shorter and folk version of Radman's song, which is of an earlier date. Yet paradoxically, the younger Bela Krajina version of the song contains more and older mythological elements than the older original song. This paradox is naturally in accordancewith the ethnological diachronic perspective. Ethnographic analysis also revealed the complexity of both songs. The basis of Radman's song is the Christian biography of St. George, nevertheless the song also contains a few mythological and pagan elements which are part of the basic ancient Slavonic myth about the fertility god, the reconstruction of which has been under way for the last few years. The basic mythological elements detected in the two songs are the spring, dew, wedding and George's sword. In addition, the Bela Krajina song contains mythological elements such as the phrases "ravno polje" (flat field), "zmaja vodenoga" (water dragon) and "boga vodenoga" (water god) and associations between the girl, sacrifice and tithe. Christian elements include the saint, chivalry, baptism, mass, sin, repentance, churches. It transpires that certain motifs from both songs are ambivalent. In other words,they are of both pagan and Christian origins. These are George and his horse, the dragon, tithe and lamb.

14.10.2016