Rituals and customs, the origin of which is not even always clear, accompany a person at every step, from the moment of birth to death. Ritual actions accompany both the personal and social life of a person.
Traditions surround a person throughout his life, although sometimes their meaning and significance are forgotten or even lost. The ceremonies associated with birth, marriage, death are called family rites.
What are family traditions and rituals
Family household rituals Since the days of paganism, holidays reflect the full family cycle, which includes funerals, weddings and births. Divorce proceedings were not in the tradition, therefore they did not receive the appropriate ceremonial registration.
All ceremonies associated with family events carried magical properties, the purpose of which was to protect a person from evil forces and attract good luck.
Wedding ceremonies
The traditional time to celebrate weddings is in the fall, after the harvest, or in the winter after the Epiphany. The wedding ceremony and celebration took a long time and consisted of several stages. The creation of a new family was equated with a new cycle of births.
Each stage of the wedding cycle was accompanied by ritual songs appropriate to the moment. Each stage had its own magical meaning, including the theft of the bride and wedding atrocities.
Birth of a child
The sacrament of birth was indeed a sacrament, and it was believed that the less the people knew about the beginning of childbirth, the easier it would be for the woman in labor to endure the birth pangs.
However, the involvement of the child's father in childbirth was marked by a number of magical actions that secretly existed in the Kuwada code.
A woman who had passed her childbearing period was called to a midwife. At the time of childbirth, everything in the house was thrown open, untied in order to stimulate the opening of the birth canal. The umbilical cord was cut at the tool of labor, in accordance with the desired future profession of the baby.
Housewarming
Housewarming in the Russian patriarchal village was a rather rare phenomenon, but it had its own traditions of celebration.
With the advent of Christianity, a tradition arose to consecrate new dwellings. But from paganism there remained the offering of gifts for housewarming, as well as the custom to let a cat into the house (you can also have a black rooster).
Ancient traditions in modern family and household holidays
Part of the traditions of celebrating family and household holidays fell into oblivion due to the change in the social structure of society. Traditions were partially banned by the Soviet regime.
In modern life, the category of family and household holidays has moved to the category of calendar holidays celebrated in the family circle, and has lost its magical meaning.
But even in modern wedding ceremonies there are elements, the origin of which is difficult to explain without knowing the history of our own people.
