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Cultural Heritage or Traces of the War? A Case Study From Oblivion to Memory and ’Heritagisation’
139-154Views:268The paper explores the memory of the internment camp in Tiszalök (Upper Tisza region, Hungary) in selected social, historical, and ethnic contexts. After a brief theoretical overview of key concepts such as heritagization, the author highlights some significant facts and events from the history of the camp. This camp was established after the Second World War, and deportees of German origin, who could not go home to their families after returning to Hungary from Russian captivity, were held there. Furthermore, the paper outlines how the history of the camp was first concealed in public, then gradually discovered by scholars and memorialized through commemorative events and a monument which was erected by the local community and former inmates. Subsequently, the author presents the case study of a deceased Hungarian woman who used to work in the camp’s kitchen. Based on several interviews with her relatives and after the careful examination of a wooden box from her estate, the author demonstrates that her family history and the history of the interned members of the German minority are closely intertwined in a way, which had been unknown to her family. Finally, the author argues that similar personal objects may reveal further untold stories and entangled memories from the postwar years.
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Ancia Zarichanska and Folk Belief in Transcarpathia: A Comparative Perspective
7-28Views:26This study focuses on the historical figure of Ancia Zarichanska (Anna Poidyn), a spiritual mediator and charismatic healer from the Transcarpathian village of Zarichchia. Based on extensive ethnographic fieldwork (2018–2019) and qualitative interviews with local informants, the article examines the narrative construction of this woman in collective memory, as well as her magical abilities, ritual practices, and ascetic lifestyle. Her unusual behavior – including voluntary seclusion, visionary experiences, fasting, and selective social interaction - is interpreted as an expression of religious asceticism, deviant piety, and spiritual authority.
Central elements such as near-death experience, rebirth motifs, and prophetic healing are analyzed in comparison with European folk healers, visionary figures, and shamanic initiation processes. Zarichanska’s case demonstrates how spiritual legitimacy can be established outside institutional religion. Particular attention is paid to the cultural logic underlying the attribution of mystical authority, the emergence of local rituals such as “Hercna Wednesday,” and the ritual veneration of her grave as a site of popular devotion.
This study contributes to the ethnology of folk belief by showing how collective memory, oral tradition, demonological narratives, and religious-magical practices interweave to shape local forms of “folk sainthood.” The figure of Zarichanska is presented as a paradigmatic example of trans-cultural patterns of non-institutional spirituality, which fulfill identity-forming functions, especially in times of social transformation.
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Ethnic Peculiarities and Inter-ethnic Parallels in the Traditional Material Culture of the Hungarians of Ugocsa
233-252Views:178The Hungarians living in the present-day Transcarpathian region have lived peacefully for centuries together with the majority Ruthenian/Ukrainian population, as well as with the Romanian, German, Roma and other ethnic groups, who live in a similar minority to the Hungarians. Ethnographers and tourists visiting the region are convinced that these nationalities have retained the characteristics of their culture to this day. At the same time, it is worth observing how this long historical coexistence is reflected in the way of life and mentality of these people. The parallels between Ruthenian and Hungarian language and folklore, folk customs are excellent examples of interethnic relations, but I have also encountered similar examples when researching the traditional material culture of the villages in Ugocsa. In the field of folk architecture, for example, the gate called tőkés kapu, as well as the abora, aszaló [the dryer] and the barn. Interethnic phenomena between Hungarians, Ruthenians and other nationalities of the region can also be observed in folk costumes (the guba, or the shoes called bochkor). Throughout history, in Transcarpathia, which belonged to different state formations, it was noticeable that culture was not strictly tied to peoples. Thanks to the tolerance shown towards each other, the nationalities of the region have preserved their ethnic and religious characteristics and identity, but we can also find many similarities in their cultures. When studying the interactions that mutually enrich each other's culture and provide a colorful and attractive image to the region, it is often impossible to find out who borrowed from whom and when. During the ethnographic research of the local communities, the main point is to take into account the ethnic interaction of the nationalities living here, as the folk culture of the local Hungarians is determined by the aggregation of the cultures of different ethnicities.
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The expulsion as historical turning point in the religious and cultural life of the German-Hungarian village Budaörs/Wudersch?
87-118Views:272The expulsion of the German minority in Hungary at the end of World War II started on the 19th of January 1946 in the small village Budaörs/Wudersch close to the capital Budapest. The village has become well-known in the interwar period for its flower carpets prepared for the feast Corpus Christi, made by its German-speaking population until over 90% of the inhabitants were forced to leave the country for the American occupation zone of Germany, a moment that has been long established as the historical turning point in the history and culture of the German minority in Hungary. The expulsion thus divides the tradition of making flower carpets for Corpus Christi into two eras. Previous research has often struggled with connecting these two eras with each other, when analyzing the development of the feast. The main goal of the research paper is to describe the situation of the Catholic Church in Hungary in the times of transition to Socialism, both on national and local level and to deconstruct the idea of the year 1946 being the one and only possible turning point when considering the changes in the tradition. A newly found source in the Esztergom Primatial Archives, an album with photos taken of the flower carpet in 1948, a present made for Cardinal Mindszenty, shows that the route of the procession has stayed the same, although changes in the number of observants and the lack of women wearing the traditional costume of Budaörs can be observed. These findings demonstrate a continuity of tradition and village life, straddling the supposed divide, and hence suggest a re-interpretation of the feast’s significance as demonstration of the catholic inhabitants’ resistance to the slowly establishing soviet system.
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The Lazarki Procession in Inyevo, Radoviš: Ritual and Tradition in North Macedonia
65-90Views:50Lazarus Day is an important springtime tradition among Orthodox Christians in the Balkans. In the Republic of North Macedonia, many villages mark the occasion with a ritual conducted by female performers, the lazarki. Traditionally, the lazarki visit each home in the village to bless family members by singing unique songs. This ethnographic work intends to explore and document the tradition in Inyevo, a lowland and upland community in the Municipality of Radovis. Compared to other villages in Macedonia, the lazarki in Inyevo perform two connected rituals conducted eight days before Palm Sunday. On a Saturday, the lazarki perform the willow picking and willow offering in the monasteries, while the traditional home visitations happen on a Sunday. In exploring and documenting the tradition, fieldwork was conducted between 27 and 28 April 2024. The fieldwork included interviews (i.e., with the performers, a local family, people in the village) and observation of the rituals performed by the lazarki. The Lazarki in Inyevo exemplifies a tradition evoking themes on gender, the contemporary role of women in rituals, and as a form of authentic expression of faith.
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The Interpretation of Strangeness and its Impact on the Local Society in Beregdéda, Transcarpathia
87-106Views:208My work focuses on the different patterns of experiencing strangeness. Based on my ethnographic fieldwork in Beregdéda, Transcarpathia, Ukraine, I try to reflect on why the articulation of strangeness becomes necessary, and how does the appearance of the stranger modify, erode, rebuild or create symbolic boundaries between the Hungarian-Ukrainian-Gypsy ethnic groups living together. At the time of the fieldwork, in spring 2015, the Ukrainian-Russian war conflict provided a breeding ground for stereotypical perceptions of ethnicity, while the appearance of the stranger tourist also led to the strengthening of the relationship between Ukrainians, Hungarians and Gypsies in the local society, and to the formation of a united front. The understanding of the stranger is constantly changing in line with the various regional and global cultural and economic processes and is formulated with individual interests in mind.
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Changing Economic Strategies in the Ecsed Marsh: An Example of Renewal in Nagyecsed
129-149Views:198The Ecsed Swamp was formed in the New Holocene Era in the lowest areas of Nyírség and Szatmár Plains. Besides the protective nature of the swamp, it was a significant source of livelihood for the local population – loach fish collecting (csikász), bird hunting and egg collecting (pákász) were the main occupations of the “swamp people”. The Ecsed Swamp, which once covered almost 432 km2 was drained at the end of the 19th century that caused significant changes in everyday life and farming. The inhabitants of the so-called “Loach land” (Csíkország) tried to dig up and cultivate marshy areas even before the drainage. Burning, cutting and cleaning were already known among the swamp people, since this was the only way to carry out farming activities in this area. In their frustration the swamp people effected by the drainage tried to obtain land for cultivation. They worked on the lands purchased by the Károlyi noble family. More prosperous ones also built farms on the border of the neighbouring villages, thus the process of homesteading began. In the 21st century, the cultivation of agricultural land in the area of former swamps is causing significant problems since water shortage is now characteristic towhole Europe. Reedfires in the former swamp areais a phenomenon that exists to this day. With the transformation of landscape and ways of farming and living, the need to apply different economic strategies arose, which I will discuss t in my research study with case studies from the 19th and 21st centuries.
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The Traditional Way of Thinking of Small Farmer Housewives in Finland
91-102Views:19The aim of this article is to throw light on the historical experiences and their memories of a housewife from a small farm in Upper Savo (Yläsavo) in Finland. Its motivation emanates from the fact that neither local, commissioned histories nor ethnographical studies have touched the orbit of their lives and their traditional, three-dimensional way of thought. The theoretical vantage-point applied here was put forward by Paul Ricoeur and further developed by Frank Ankersmit: memories of witnesses of historical experiences can tell more intimate and accurate narratives than documentary histories. As evidence, culled from interviews and diverse biographical and autobiographical material, they can complement the work of ethnographers who operate on the same field by recording past as lived life.
