Once Again About the «Dancing Little Men»: Is It Embroidery or Not?

Author

Balushok Vasyl

a Ph.D. in History, a senior research fellow at the Ukrainian Ethnological Center Department of M. Rylskyi Institute of Art Studies, Folkloristics and Ethnology of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine (Kyiv, Ukraine).

ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1362-8270

Once Again About the «Dancing Little Men»: Is It Embroidery or Not?

Abstract

An attempt is made to analyse the appearance of the «dancing little men» from the famous Martynivka treasure of the 7th century and, especially, the decor on their clothing, in the context of genesis of embroidery on Ukrainian clothing. Examination of these silver figurines, as well as the statuette of the so-called «candle keeper» (candlestick) from the Poltava region, along with the comparative material, confirms the depiction of everyday details on them. And this means a high probability of decorating the clothes of these, supposedly Slavic (with a centre in the Over Dnipro Lands) pieces of small plastic art with embroidered decor. The probability of this fact increases when considering them in the context of small plastic art and other images («The Barberini Ivory», Byzantine mosaics, miniatures, etc.), originating from the entire European region and adjacent territories of Asia. The mentioned images are connected with a special complex of ideas and traditions of «beast fights» (including gladiatorial fights) of the peoples of this area and therefore are widespread in various versions. And the hypothesis of O. Shchehlova about the reflection of the biblical motif «Daniel with the Lions» in the studied Martynivka-type figurines is consistent with the complex of traditions and ideas of «beast fights». At the same time, we think that the appearance, including the clothes of the «Martynivka dancers», conveys both borrowed and also aboriginal features, including embroidery. Taking into account the existence of a tradition of clothes embroidery on the territory of Ukraine among the Sarmatians of the 1st century AD and the Huns of the mid-5th century, we can hypothetically consider the decor on the clothes of the Martynivka figurines of the 7th century and the «candle keeper» of the 7th–8th centuries as a continuation of this chain, which thus leads to embroidery on the clothes of the Kyivan Rus (Black Tomb in Chernihiv and the Shestovytsia burial ground of the 10th century).

Keywords

Martynivka little men, embroidery, decor, small plastic art, clothing.

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