Autumn Grandfathers in Belarus
Description:
In the national calendar there is a universal algorithm for calculating the dates of all national holidays. Unfortunately, with regard to the Vosensky Jiadou, when Memorial Day was included in the list of public holidays, the folk tradition was not observed. Now this holiday is celebrated on one of Saturdays from 1 to 11 November, combining almost two traditions - Orthodox and Catholic. State Remembrance Day is November 2.
Belarusians Vosensky Dzyady - a family holiday, home. Only in some western regions of Belarus are known cases when people went to visit their ancestors in the cemetery. This spring, it is customary to visit the dead at the cemetery on Radunitsa, and on Dzyadou, ancestors are invited to their home to treat and thank for their help and patronage.
On this day, all ancestors were commemorated, regardless of their place of burial. Before the Dziads cleanly cleaned, washed in the bath, where left a bucket of clean water and a new broom for the souls of ancestors. The women prepared various dishes. After lighting a candle, the host read a prayer and invited all ancestors to dinner. Before dinner, all doors were opened in the house so that the ancestors could come in and sit down at the table. Before proceeding to the next dish, part of it was laid on a special plate for perfume.
The number of dishes on the table could be different, but necessarily odd and not less than five. Each dish was served in pairs in an even amount (if 7 dishes, then on 14 plates). Thus, the situation was balanced when neither the living nor the dead should be offended.
The solemn memorial dinner lasted quite a long time, everyone behaved restrained. They remembered the best in their dead relatives, those deeds that can be proud of more than one generation of this kind.
During the festive dinner, it was allowed to talk only about grandfathers - their lives, individual cases and traits of character, their words and instructions, wise advice and good deeds were recalled. This conversation began with the story of the oldest and most famous ancestor, and ended with the memory of the dead recently.
This was done every year, gradually passing on all the information to children and grandchildren.
Each peasant family generously endowed the beggars who walked around the village.
During the XX century. the tradition of commemorating their ancestors on the Dzyads was not widespread.
In the 1990s, the autumn Grandfathers, timed to November 2, for some time became an official non-working day.
Today, despite the fact that the day of November 2 is again declared a working day, autumn Grandfathers are widespread among rural and urban residents.