Radio România Internațional

Tag: ‘Dimitrie Gusti’ Village Museum

Dragobete

According to Romanian tradition,
Dragobete is a ‘living human being, half man half angel’, a young man, handsome
and immortal. He freely roams the world but people cannot see him because of
their sinfulness and lawlessness, ethnologist Simeon Florea Marian explains.
This folk character is known all over the country. In Maramures, northern
Romania, he is also known as Early Spring or Dragomir, a character with a
double nature, anthropomorphic and zoomorphic. Outside the Carpathian arch, he
has an ancient Thracian representation, which can also be found in other
cultures, as a man standing on ram’s legs. There are several dates for the
observation of this holiday, but February 24 is the most common.

Every year on this holiday, young
people from Romanian villages wearing their Sunday’s best go out picking magic herbs,
which they must keep all throughout the year as the common belief was that
these herbs would help them find their future wives. Groups of young peasants,
boys and girls would take oaths on this occasion pledging to be loyal to one
another, forming some sorts of brotherhoods.

In response to the similar
media-hyped Western holiday, St. Valentine’s, village museums all over the country
are celebrating the traditional Dragobete, promoting and explaining this custom
to all those willing to learn more about it. The Dimitrie Gusti Village Museum
in Bucharest has this year welcomed visitors with a special programme meant to
illustrate this holiday and its significance. Here is more on this traditional
holiday from actor Alexandru Nicolae Mihai.

On February 24 we celebrate here, at the
Village Museum, Dragobete, a traditional love holiday in Romania. This holiday
is associated with a process of conciliation when boys and girls went together
to pick the first flowers of spring. The gesture had a special significance
being some sort of a vegetal sacrifice, which was supposed to guarantee the
purity and sacredness of the period to come. According to another tradition,
the holiday marked the beginning of the mating period for birds and it was
believed that if a bird was unable to find its mate until this time, it was
doomed to stay single for the rest of the year. Worth noting is the given
timeline, a year and not the entire life, which means that it may get another
shot next year.

Narcisa Mihai tells us the story of
the Dragobete spell:

There are lots of customs related to Dragobete. Prior to this
celebration, young girls had to make sure that when they went picking snowdrops
and violas, the boys they liked would like them back. So they had to cast some
special love spells on Tuesdays and Thursdays. For this, they needed salt,
honey and ‘fairy water’. Now salt and honey are things we all have at home, but
where are we to find this ‘fairy water’? This is water obtained by melting the
last snow in the forests, hills and around villages. It was treasured just like
holy water and kept especially for these spells. In a bowl over fire, girls
would put honey and salt, and when they started crackling this fairy water
would be added. Then, the girl on which the spell was performed had to stand in
front of an icon, undressed, and this mixture would be sprinkled all over her
while the one casting the spell would say some magic words. The girl was
supposed to be naked so that love would be long-lasting, rather than shallow.
If she kept her clothes on, the water would be sprinkled on the clothes and love
would be short-lived.

After performing a Dragobete spell
for us, Narcisa Mihai added:

This spell, together with the magic
water, was believed to make sure that on the day of Dragobete young girls would
meet their beloved. If they did not get the boy they liked, there was no
problem, they would try the spell the following year as well. But most of the
time, at the Dragobete parties, the young men and women who would pair up to
pick flowers would end up marrying by autumn. Young wives did not have a quiet
night either, because love may disappear just as quickly as it emerges. So
every year they had to make sure that on Dragobete they respected separate
customs, created specifically for married women, to make sure that their love
would be long lasting. They say that on the day of Dragobete, husbands must not
upset their wives, otherwise they would be unlucky the entire year.

Women were also supposed to touch a
nice gentleman, other than their husband, and this was believed to help them
have a good year. For newlyweds to find out how their relationship would
progress, 2 nuts with their names written on them would be placed over the
embers, and if they sizzled quietly, they were destined to have a peaceful
marriage. If the nuts crackled and bounced over the embers, they were supposed
to have a troubled, love-hate relationship.

The Dragobete event also included a
performance by a traditional music ensemble, Fluierașii de la Dobrotești, who
played love and longing tunes from their native region.

26 February 2019
Dragobete

According to Romanian tradition,
Dragobete is a ‘living human being, half man half angel’, a young man, handsome
and immortal. He freely roams the world but people cannot see him because of
their sinfulness and lawlessness, ethnologist Simeon Florea Marian explains.
This folk character is known all over the country. In Maramures, northern
Romania, he is also known as Early Spring or Dragomir, a character with a
double nature, anthropomorphic and zoomorphic. Outside the Carpathian arch, he
has an ancient Thracian representation, which can also be found in other
cultures, as a man standing on ram’s legs. There are several dates for the
observation of this holiday, but February 24 is the most common.

Every year on this holiday, young
people from Romanian villages wearing their Sunday’s best go out picking magic herbs,
which they must keep all throughout the year as the common belief was that
these herbs would help them find their future wives. Groups of young peasants,
boys and girls would take oaths on this occasion pledging to be loyal to one
another, forming some sorts of brotherhoods.

In response to the similar
media-hyped Western holiday, St. Valentine’s, village museums all over the country
are celebrating the traditional Dragobete, promoting and explaining this custom
to all those willing to learn more about it. The Dimitrie Gusti Village Museum
in Bucharest has this year welcomed visitors with a special programme meant to
illustrate this holiday and its significance. Here is more on this traditional
holiday from actor Alexandru Nicolae Mihai.

On February 24 we celebrate here, at the
Village Museum, Dragobete, a traditional love holiday in Romania. This holiday
is associated with a process of conciliation when boys and girls went together
to pick the first flowers of spring. The gesture had a special significance
being some sort of a vegetal sacrifice, which was supposed to guarantee the
purity and sacredness of the period to come. According to another tradition,
the holiday marked the beginning of the mating period for birds and it was
believed that if a bird was unable to find its mate until this time, it was
doomed to stay single for the rest of the year. Worth noting is the given
timeline, a year and not the entire life, which means that it may get another
shot next year.

Narcisa Mihai tells us the story of
the Dragobete spell:

There are lots of customs related to Dragobete. Prior to this
celebration, young girls had to make sure that when they went picking snowdrops
and violas, the boys they liked would like them back. So they had to cast some
special love spells on Tuesdays and Thursdays. For this, they needed salt,
honey and ‘fairy water’. Now salt and honey are things we all have at home, but
where are we to find this ‘fairy water’? This is water obtained by melting the
last snow in the forests, hills and around villages. It was treasured just like
holy water and kept especially for these spells. In a bowl over fire, girls
would put honey and salt, and when they started crackling this fairy water
would be added. Then, the girl on which the spell was performed had to stand in
front of an icon, undressed, and this mixture would be sprinkled all over her
while the one casting the spell would say some magic words. The girl was
supposed to be naked so that love would be long-lasting, rather than shallow.
If she kept her clothes on, the water would be sprinkled on the clothes and love
would be short-lived.

After performing a Dragobete spell
for us, Narcisa Mihai added:

This spell, together with the magic
water, was believed to make sure that on the day of Dragobete young girls would
meet their beloved. If they did not get the boy they liked, there was no
problem, they would try the spell the following year as well. But most of the
time, at the Dragobete parties, the young men and women who would pair up to
pick flowers would end up marrying by autumn. Young wives did not have a quiet
night either, because love may disappear just as quickly as it emerges. So
every year they had to make sure that on Dragobete they respected separate
customs, created specifically for married women, to make sure that their love
would be long lasting. They say that on the day of Dragobete, husbands must not
upset their wives, otherwise they would be unlucky the entire year.

Women were also supposed to touch a
nice gentleman, other than their husband, and this was believed to help them
have a good year. For newlyweds to find out how their relationship would
progress, 2 nuts with their names written on them would be placed over the
embers, and if they sizzled quietly, they were destined to have a peaceful
marriage. If the nuts crackled and bounced over the embers, they were supposed
to have a troubled, love-hate relationship.

The Dragobete event also included a
performance by a traditional music ensemble, Fluierașii de la Dobrotești, who
played love and longing tunes from their native region.

26 February 2019
On the Danube Delta under a different light

The ‘Dimitrie Gusti’ national village museum in Bucharest is
among the must-see objectives in Romania’s capital city. This green spot on
Bucharest’s map is renowned for its fresh air and village households dating
back to the 17th-18th centuries. In recent years the
museum has played venue for numerous cultural events, from photo and painting
exhibitions to concerts and various workshops for children. An association
entitled ‘SOS Save the Danube Delta’s flora and fauna’ has been staging
workshops for children on the museum premises for a year. These workshops allow
children to learn everything about the Delta and its wildlife. Here is Delia
Popescu, project coordinator with the aforementioned association with more on
the issue.

We have been present here on a
weekly basis staging children events on Saturdays. Through these activities we
have been trying to teach them about the Delta, about what this delta means for
Romania and for us as a people and why we need to preserve its wildlife. All
these events have been tailored as games and playing activities for a better
assimilation of knowledge. We are glad that kids are attending these events on
a constant weekly basis.

Delia Popescu has further elaborated on the children activities
and workshops staged here at the Village Museum.

Today, as the year is drawing
to an end, our games are inspired by holidays in Dobrogea; we are making a
traditional doll, which is wearing a traditional costume that children can take
at home. So kids can get acquainted with traditional folk costumes specific to
Dobrogea and also have a toy to play with.

According to Delia Popescu, these workshops have been constantly
attended by a good number of children.

Each workshop has been attended
by 5-15 children. We’ve had pottery workshops, during which we’ve built animals
and birds from the Danube Delta. By using straws, wood and clay we have tried
to build dioramas illustrating various parts of the delta. Children have been
taught to build traditional households from the delta and windmills as the
region is renowned for its windmills. We post these activities on our webpage
at ‘www.sosdelta.ro’ or on the museum site and children submit their online
applications for the workshops, where they can join free of charge. Parents
will pay only the entrance fee to the museum.

According to Delia Popescu, children’s happiness is the most
important thing.

Kids are happy and that’s the
most important thing for us. They are excited because these activities are
interactive, different from what they do in front of a computer or a smartphone.
They work, they are making stuff and last but not least they get valuable
information about the delta and its wildlife, which will eventually come in
handy in their adult life. There are kids who have been attending these
workshops on a weekly basis and we encourage them to learn about ecology,
environment issues and things. They read books and we have round table talks on
certain issues in our next workshops.

Maria is 7 years old and has attended almost all workshops with
delight.

I am
loving it, as I am always doing new things. Today I am making dolls. I first
made a boy doll and haven’t finished his clothes yet, so I don’t know how he is
going to look like in the end. Last time I made a diorama entitled ‘Fishing in
the Delta’ when I made a pelican out of cardboard.

Delia Popescu has told us how the first
workshop organised in February has grown into what we see today:

Parents always stand by their children and proof of this is also the
workshop we’ve organised today. Parents and children alike worked shoulder to
shoulder. It’s been more difficult at the start of the year, because people
were unaware of our weekly activities here, but now they know and are deeply
involved in our actions, as we want to spend quality time with our children.
Even though the weather is not really fine outside, the Village Museum is a
spectacular museum and it is beautiful all the year around. Now, in winter, we
carry out our activities indoors, but when the weather is fine, we spend the
entire time outdoors. We try to carry out many activities in the open because
most parents do not have enough spare time and keep their children indoors. And
children should learn to spend time in the open.

It’s worth mentioning that the Save
the Flora and Fauna in the Danube Delta Association was founded in 2007, at the
initiative of a group of friends, out of their wish to protect this unique
region in Europe and the world: the Danube Delta. In time, the Association has
enriched its activities included in the initial project, such as protecting the
fauna and flora by identifying the species on the brink of extinction, cleaning
up the areas affected by pollution, promoting ecological tourism and this
educational component at an early age, a warranty to instil real values in the
young generation.

(Translated by D. Bilt & D. Vijeu)

18 December 2018
The Carols Workshop

To
celebrate the winter holidays, the Dimitrie Gusti National Village Museum in
Bucharest has re-opened the series of educational workshops titled The Elves’ Village.
We are already familiar with workshops, where people get together to make
masks, puppets or dolls in folk costumes or Christmas decorations, but this
year a group of talented musicians have won us over with a Caroling Workshop.
The initiators of the workshop unveil the magic of musical instruments to all
those curious to decipher the beauty of sounds and extend all visitors an
invitation to sing along in a choir set up on the spot. Marius Niţu, who plays
the violin in the project, told us more:

It was Sânziana who had the idea and
suggested to us to make a caroling workshop, to present something different to
the people, to come up with something new. We’ve thought it would be a good
idea to involve all the children, everyone in the museum, for each of them to
feel what’s like to contribute to the fair. We wanted something different from
the ‘we sing, they listen’ kind of events. We’ve noticed that children liked it
a lot. This has been our first project, our first Christmas workshop, and it’s
been a success. And we intend to continue and organize similar workshops in the
future.

Sânziana
Mircea, pianist and president of the Music Art Academy, the association which
brings together the artists who organized the event, has told us:

We’ve had the immense joy to be here and
organize a caroling workshop, we sang together with all the children in the
room, we set up a choir on the spot, we performed Romanian and international
carols together. Also, I played the piano, the guitar and the violin. I also
sang and took part in a beautiful children’s choir, created on the spot. We’ve
chosen to set up a caroling workshop because going caroling is one of the most
beautiful Christmas traditions, because music unites us all even though we
don’t know each other. The children befriended each other; they have all
stepped out in front of the group to sing. It was another opportunity to see
that music is a universal language and carols have a special way of making us
ready for Christmas.

Amalia
Lazarciuc delighted us with her voice, and then told us how artists prepared
for the workshop.

We have prepared the lyrics, we got the melody line ready, we also prepared a microphone,
and there were moments when the choir was accompanied by my colleagues on the piano,
by Sânziana, Marius on the violin and Raisa on the guitar.

And the
enthusiasm they put in, that brought artists loads of joy. Speaking about that,
here is Amalia Lazarciuc once again.

It is a wonderful feeling, all the
more so as this moment was spontaneous. We didn’t expect so many children to come
caroling. And these are the moments you feel wonderful, moments you don’t plan
ahead, they simply happen, especially at this time of the year, which is very
beautiful.

We
asked Raisa Mihai, who played the violin, where they got this idea of a caroling
workshop.

We wanted to make people happy and enjoy
the tradition of Christmas. We prepared some carols together with these
children who have been here today and whose reaction was awesome! I did not
expect them to react the way they did, they were delighted and joined us
straight away. They were a bit bashful at first, but after that, everyone joined
in.

And
here is what violinist Marius Nitu added to that.

At this time of the year, the tradition
of Christmas cannot go without carols, just as my colleagues have said, music
brings people together and I believe that in this boisterous world carols help
soothe our spirit so that together we may be better and calmer.

Taking
part in the workshop were lots of children, of various ages. 15-year old
Nectaria Iorgulescu told us why she joined the carols Workshop.

I found an opportunity to listen to good
music, on a beautiful winter day!

And
here is what 12-year old Andrei Cristian Iacobescu joyfully told us.

I liked it here, I wanted to see how it
was like and when I saw there were very many people, I braced up and joined in
myself! It was like doing a karaoke!

Seven-year
old Serban Ioan Andrei was brimming with joy.

I liked it! I learned many songs and it was beautiful!

Grown-ups
and kids alike joined in a genuine music celebration.

11 December 2018
Eternity was born on the village

The end of February saw an event meant to designate Romania’s
cultural villages, hosted by the ‘Dimitrie Gusti’ Village Museum in Bucharest.
The representatives of the villages that applied for obtaining the title of
Romania’s cultural village have shown much enthusiasm at the initiative and
have brought along to the Village Museum various items that are representative
of the culture and local traditions of their regions.

The 25 candidates attending the event at the Village Museum in
Bucharest, villagers capitalizing on their area’s spontaneous flora or
interested in preserving the ancient customs and traditions and representatives
of communes that are trying to make better use of the experience of the village
elderly, were all proud to play a role in the village community they belong to.
Before the jury, the mayors of the candidate communes talked about the cultural
and historical traditions of their communities, about investments in
infrastructure and the events they organized locally. The event was attended by
villagers of all ages dressed in folk costumes. Some of the communes had their
own stands where they displayed local products.

The Drăguş commune in Brasov county obtained the highest number of points at
the 3rd edition of the competition entitled Romania’s Cultural
Villages. The mayor of Drăguş commune, Gheorghe Sucaciu said that he hoped that his commune would
continue to preserve the specific traditions and costumes of the region. The
communes coming next in the classification are Sangeorgiu de Mures (in Mures
county) and Ciocanesti (Suceava county), the latter being the winner of the
2014 edition.

At the stand of the Ciocanesti commune
we were welcomed by Marilena Niculita, the director of the National Museum of
Painted Eggs of the Ciocanesti commune, in Bukovina.

Marilena Niculita: We are very happy that the
cultural events hosted by our commune are all appreciated. The national
festival of painted eggs has reached its 13th edition this year,
just as the national trout festival. We enlisted in the contest 11 cultural
events, among which: the sheep drive that takes place on May 29, the festival
called ‘Incursion into the rhododendron reserve on the Suhard mountain, the
religious feast celebrating the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul, the patron saints
of the monastery bearing the same name, or ‘The week of rafting’. This is the
very week preceding the Trout Festival. In our region tourists can go rafting
on the Bistrita River.

Other communes that have this
year been awarded the title of cultural villages are: Miroslava
(Iaşi), Vorona (Botoşani), Siseşti (Mehedinţi), Şiria (Arad), Tulgheş
(Harghita), Vadu Crişului (Bihor), Izvoarele (Prahova), Jidvei (Alba), Cândeşti
(Dâmboviţa), Băcia (Hunedoara), Horia (Constanţa), Bonţida (Cluj), Ruginoasa
(Iaşi), Dudeştii Noi (Timiş), Corneşti (Cluj), Costeşti (Vâlcea), Văcăreni
(Tulcea), Prundeni (Vâlcea), and Arcani (Gorj).

Next Stefan Aurel, a teacher of Romanian language and mayor of the
Vorona commune, will tell us more about his commune:

Stefan Aurel: Our commune has very
beautiful and varied traditions and our moral duty is to preserve and make best
use of them, as well as pass them on to the next generations. Children and
teachers alike are involved in our cultural events. We have several special
events with a wide scope such as the feast of the patron saints of the Vorona
monastery marked on September 8. The villagers of Vorona have preserved the
custom of the traditional round dance that is held in the monastery’s courtyard
after the religious feast. During the industrialization period, when the
tradition of the round dance was in danger of being lost, a villager of Vorona
had the idea to include this tradition in the Festival of song, dance and
traditional costumes entitled the ‘Forest Celebrations’. The festival has
reached its 42nd edition.

Our next interlocutor, Mihaela Sidea Magureanu,
a librarian from the Costesti commune, in Valcea county, tells us more about
her commune:

Mihaela Sidea Magureanu: We have the
Trovanti Museum, the Bistrita and Costesti Gorges, and the Buila Vanturarita
National Park. In Costesti there is an art section, called ‘Gheorghe D.
Anghel’, of the Valcea County Museum,
which displays works donated by a villager. The region also boasts many famous
monasteries among which Bistrita monastery. In the past years we have
celebrated Aurealian Sacerdoteanu, a personality of our commune who was a
historian, archivist and director of the National Archives. Another personality
of the commune is the actor Vasile Nitulescu. Soon we will celebrate general
Nicolae Ciobanu, who donated to our library as many as 10 thousand books from
his personal collection. We have an ensemble of dance and customs entitled
‘Princesses from Costesti’ which is more than 30 years old.

13 March 2016