Back to the journal2017 year №2

Contribution of Ukrainian Intellectuals to Ethnographic Research of the Pokuttia region (Second Half of the XIXth to Early XXth Centuries)

Read the articleRead the articleDownload the article
The authors of the publication:
Tryniak Liliya
p.:
81-88
UDC:
316.344.32(=161.2):39(477.85/.87)
Bibliographic description:
Tryniak, L. (2017) Contribution of Ukrainian Intellectuals to Ethnographic Research of the Pokuttia Region (Second Half of the XIXth to Early XXth Centuries). Folk Art and Ethnology, 1 (365), 81–88.

Author

Tryniak Liliya – a postgraduate of the Vasyl Stefanyk Ciscarpathian National University, a research fellow of the National Hutsulshchyna and Pokuttia Folk Art Museum

 

Contribution of Ukrainian Intellectuals to Ethnographic Research of the Pokuttia region (Second Half of the XIXth to Early XXth Centuries)

 

Abstract

The article analyses the folkloric and ethnographic records made in Pokuttia by local intellectuals in the mid- to late XIXth – early XXth centuries. It is ascertained that the 1830s–1840s can be considered as the commencement of ethnographic research of Pokuttia. This period was related to the ethnographic activities of The Rusian Trinity. They were the earliest who began going to see ordinary people and pursuing the work on gathering, recording songs, tales, narratives and sayings. Among the associates of The Rusian Trinity, Ya. Holovatskyi was the first one to depart to an ethnographic journey. In the issue of those trips, the researcher has left behind valuable ethnographic materials originated from the terrains of Pokuttia. In particular, there were ones about folk nourishment, clothes, and a way of housekeeping. His other studies incidentally had mentions of Pokuttian beliefs and folklore as well.

In the same period, local teacher H. Ilkevych was also engaged in Pokuttia ethnological studies. His ethnographic records were collected in Kolomyya and Horodenka districts. The researcher’s most efficient work was done within the frame of collecting Pokuttia folk sayings and proverbs. It is worth remarking that his miscellany was one of the earliest separate ethnographic editions of that time.

In the 1850s, the stage of stagnation took place in ethnological activities. However, since the late 1860s, a new surge of interest in Ukrainian culture had developed amidst the Ukrainian public. In the first half of the 1870s, a well-known public figure, lawyer, scholar and folklorist M. Buchynskyi continued to investigate the ethnological heritage of Pokuttia. He has carried out a great deal of work on collecting folk materials. He has gathered most of his ethnographic materials in the villages of Hrynivtsi, Kolyntsi, Markivtsi and Kutyshchi in Tlumach District. His unpublished materials are presrved in various funds of scientific libraries.

Since the late 1880s, in the pages of such periodicals as Friend (“Друг”) and Truth (“Правда”) had been issued the studies of other domestic ethnologists. Such a published research was M. Koltsuniak`s study Wedding in Kovalivka. M. Koltsuniak was a teacher and public figure. His description of the wedding contains extensive information on each moment of wedding ceremony, as well as has a well-defined structural precision. The researcher distinctly divided the solemnity into individual components, while exposing each of them in succession.  The description is accompanied by auctorial comments, in which the author endeavours to reveal the semantics of certain customs existing in the country of Kolomyya Foothills.

The early XXth century was marked by a new phase in the development of Ukrainian folklore and ethnography. This period was characterized as a quite fruitful in the realm of ethnographic research. The Ethnographic Committee, which had been created at the Shevchenko Scientific Society, contributed to it. During this period, a large number of Pokuttian intellectuals, including V. Ravliuk, I. Voloshynskyi, O. Ivanchuk, and A. Onyshchuk, was attracted to collecting ethnological materials. It was in this time that materials from the region were vastly represented in the Shevchenko Scientific Society’s editions.

Thus, in the issue of ethnographic activities of Ukrainian intellectuals in the mid- to late XIXth to early XXth centuries, there has been accumulated a considerable layer of observations from various spheres of Pokuttian spiritual culture. Their publications on ethnology were all but the sole ones thenadays and are still topical for modern ethnologists.

 

Keywords

Pokuttia, intellectuals, ethnographic studies.

 

References

  1. ARSENYCH, Petro. Ethnographic Activities of Antin Onyshchuk. FolkArtandEthnography, 1989, 4, 22–28 [in Ukrainian].
  2. ARSENYCH, Petro. One of the Hutsulshchyna Enlighteners Mykola Koltsuniak. The Hutsul School Education, 1994, 2 (Dec2), 62–65 [in Ukrainian].
  3. BILOUS, Vira. Ethnographical Studies in West Ukrainian Lands in the Third Quarter of the XIXth Century. Lviv, 188 pp. [in Ukrainian].
  4. VOLOSHYNSKYI, Iv. Funeral Customs and Keening in Horodenka District. In: Materials for Ukrainian Ethnology. Lviv, 1919, vol. 19–20, pp. 194–213 [in Ukrainian].
  5. VOLOSHYNSKYI, Iv. Espousals at the Village of Daleshove (Horodenka District). In: Materials for Ukrainian Ethnology. Lviv, 1919, vol. 19–20, pp. 2–34 [in Ukrainian].
  6. ILKEVYCH, Hryhoriy, collector. Galician Proverbs and Riddles. Vienna, 1841, 124 pp. [in Ukrainian].
  7. Vasyl Stefanyk Lviv National Scientific Library of Ukraine’s Manuscripts Department (thereafter– VSLNSLU’s MD): f. 36, u. i. 758, folder 52, 12 folios: HOLOVATSKYI, Yakiv. Ukrainian Folk Epic Songs, Dumas, and Songs of Everyday Life (Collected by Myroslav (Hryhoriy) Ilkevych). Kolomyya District, 1833 [in Ukrainian].
  8. VSLNSLU’s MD: f. 36, u.i. 738, folder 50: HOLOVATSKYI, Yakiv. Materials for the Collection «Folk Songs of Galician Ruthenia and Hungarian Ruthenia» [in Ukrainian].
  9. HOLOVATSKYI, Yakiv, compiler. An Exposition of Old Slavonic Legends, or Mythology. Kyiv: Dovira, 1991, 94 pp. [in Ukrainian].
  10. HOLOVATSKYI, Yakiv. Tours of Galician Ruthenia and Hungarian Ruthenia Depicted in Correspondence with a Pal. A Regional Ethnographer of Ciscarpathia, 2019, 14, 63–69 [in Ukrainian].
  11. HOLOVATSKIY, Yakov. Folk Songs of Galician Ruthenia and Hungarian Ruthenia: in Four Parts. Moscow, 1878, pt. 1, 400 pp. [in Russian].
  12. ZBYR, Iryna. «The Ruthenian Triad» and the Pokuttian Folklore: On the Issue of Their Interrelations. The Traveller: A Journal of the Humanities, 2006, 2, 43–48 [in Ukrainian].
  13. VSLNSLU’s MD: f. 34 (Hnatiuk), u.i. 230: IVANCHUK, Oleksa. Correspondence with V. Hnatiuk. 1904–18, undated. Trostianets, Kosiv, Lviv [in Ukrainian].
  14. KACHKAN, Volodymyr. Pia Desideria. A Piece of Information for the Biography of Oleksa Ivanchuk. In: Volodymyr KACHKAN. Hallowed be Thy Name. Ivano-Frankivsk, 2000, bk. 4, pp. 178–183 [in Ukrainian].
  15. KYRCHIV, Roman. Ethnographic and Folkloristic Activities of the «Ruthenian Triad». Lviv, 2011, 424 pp. [in Ukrainian].
  16. KYRCHIV, Roman. The Historiography of Pokuttia’s Ethnographic Studies. The Ethnology Notebooks, 2015, 1(121), 70–90 [in Ukrainian].
  17. KOLTSUNIAK, Mykola. Nuptials in the Village of Kovalivka. Ethnographic Notes by Mykola Koltsuniak. Kolomyya: Publishing and Typographical Company «Vik», 2015, 126 pp. [in Ukrainian].
  18. VSLNSLU’s MD: f. 4554 (Barvinskyi), folder267: KOLTSUNIAK, Mykola. Nuptials in the Village of Kovalivka (Kolomyya District): An Ethnographic Description. With an Appendix «Author’s Letter to [O. Barvinskyi]» [in Ukrainian].
  19. VSLNSLU’s MD: f. 83, folder10: Folk Songs Gathered by Popadiuk, And. Sliuzar, Biretskyi, Yavorskyi in Kolomyyshchyna [in Ukrainian].
  20. ONYSHCHUK, Antin. Funeral Customs and Rites in the Village of Karliv (Sniatyn District). In: The Ethnographical Collection. Lviv, 1912, vol. 31–32, pp. 315–338 [in Ukrainian].
  21. VSLNSLU’s MD: f. 34 (Hnatiuk), u.i. 417: ONYSHCHUK, Antin. Correspondence with V. Hnatiuk [in Ukrainian].
  22. ANON. Ravliuk Vasyl. In: The Encyclopedia of Ukraine. Reprinted in Ukraine. Lviv, 1998, vol. 7, p. 2431 [in Ukrainian].
  23. RAVLIUK, Vasyl. Wedding in the Village of Orelets (Sniatyn District, Stanislavshchyna). In: M.SHUBRAVSKA, compiler. Weddings: in Two Books. Kyiv: Naukova dumka, 1970, bk. 2, pp. 183–214 [in Ukrainian].
  24. SOKIL, Hanna. Pokuttia’s Folklore Recorded by Vasyl Ravliuk. Mythology and Folklore, 2013, 1, 72–79 [in Ukrainian].
  25. SOKIL, Hanna. Galician Folklorists and Their Notes on Folklore. The Ethnology Notebooks, 2009, 1–2, 147–158 [in Ukrainian].
  26. VSLNSLU’s MD: f. 265 (Buch.), folder7: Folkloristic Materials Collected by M. Buchynskyi in Ciscarpathia in 1866–1868. Villages of Kolyntsi, Kutyshchi, Markivtsi and others [in Ukrainian].
  27. Franko, Ivan. Galician-Ruthenian Folk Proverbs. An Exordium. In: The Ethnographical Collection, Lviv, 1901–1905, vol. 16. [in Ukrainian].
  28. MIROSŁAW [ILKEVYCH, H.]. Zabobony istnіеjącу mięndzy ludem prostym w Galicyi. Rozmaitości, Lwów, 1836, 27, 217–218 [in Polish].
  29. M. z H. [ILKEVYCH, H.]. Zabobony w niektórych cyrkułach Galicji. Rozmaitości, Lwów, 1835, 42 [in Polish].
  30. VSLNSLU’s MD: f. 106, folder 13: Sobranyje Piseń ruskich historycznych czrez Mirosława Ilkіewicza [in Polish].

The texts are available under the terms of the Creative Commons
international license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0
© ІМФЕ