LL-L "Traditions" 2009.06.21 (08) [EN]

[Lowlands-L List]

===========================================
L O W L A N D S - L - 21 June 2009 - Volume 08
Encoding: Unicode (UTF-08)
Language Codes: lowlands-l.net/codes.php
===========================================

From: Hellinckx Luc <luc.hellinckx at gmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Traditions"

Beste Ron,
You wrote:

Roger cites a report about a tiny community on the edge of Limburg in which
the first wedding was celebrated in nine years. One of the old traditions
followed at the event was burning of straw to dispel evil spirits. Roger
asks if burning straw at weddings is a tradition in other areas.

To start off, I will have to go beyond the Lowlands and enter my usual, much
larger playground: Eurasia. I think that the straw part is incidental, that
the fire part is all important. Lighting fires for ritual cleansing purposes
is connected with ancient rituals found all over Central Asia all the way
south to parts of Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan, and as far east as
Xinjiang (Eastern Turkestan) and Qinghai (青海,
མཚོ་སྔོན་, Köke Naɣur, Gökdeñiz), areas under Chinese
power.

The tradition of fires at weddings is particularly wide spread among Central
Asians of Iranian and Turkic descent. It seems to belong to an areal
cultural feature that may have emanated from pre-Islamic Iranian cultures.
Among traditional Tajiks and various other Iranian-speaking peoples,
including those living on the eastern slopes of the Pamir Mountains in
China, also among traditional Uzbeks, Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples with
close Iranian ties, a bridebroom and his party fetch the bride from her
parents' home and take her on horseback to the bridegroom's parents' home;
before entering, the couple (with the bridegroom either leading the horse or
sitting on horseback in front of the bride) circumambulates a bonfire three
or more times. This cleansing ritual is required before the bride may enter
her new home.

Fire as a cleansing element plays an important role among traditional
speakers of Iranian languages. Its pre-Islamic importance can be witnessed
in Zoroastrianism where water (*apo*) and fire (*atar*) are elements of
ritual purity. Fire temples serve as strongholds of light and purity, and
there are several purifying rituals involving fire. Zoroastrianism has by
some been described as likely being a remnant of the oldest Eurasian
religion (not counting Shamanism, I suppose). The Iranian language group is
a branch of Indo-European (as is the Germanic group). The name Iran (*
(An)ērān*) is etymologically connected with "Aryan" ("Noble", also the
name of the people that invaded Southern Asia from the north, the name later
misused by the Nazis).

Anyway, even though this may seem a bit farfetched at first thought, I
propose that it is possible that in Europe there are some remnant rituals
that originated in a more widespread, possibly Indo-European feature of fire
as a cleansing power. Who knows? Herstappe may be one of those places where
it survives.


Fascinating. Ireland also has something similar. "Strawboys", who would also
attend weddings, dressed in straw. If they were welcome and hospitably
treated, upon returning, they would burn their straw hats. Otherwise, they
would hang them in the trees, in order to let the other villagers know what
kind of people the bride and groom were.

http://www.shantranex.com/danceworld/strawboys.html

Am wondering if the "Burning Man"-event in Nevada (and "Wickerman" in
Scotland) have not been influenced by this custom.

Kind greetings,

Luc Hellinckx, Halle

•

==============================END===================================

 * Please submit postings to lowlands-l at listserv.linguistlist.org.

 * Postings will be displayed unedited in digest form.

 * Please display only the relevant parts of quotes in your replies.

 * Commands for automated functions (including "signoff lowlands-l")

   are to be sent to listserv at listserv.linguistlist.org or at

   http://linguistlist.org/subscribing/sub-lowlands-l.html.

*********************************************************************
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/lowlands-l/attachments/20090621/7cbcf015/attachment.htm>