Legends as a genre of oral folk art. Traditions and legends

Description of the video lesson

Tradition- a genre of oral folk art, stories of historical content, folk historical prose. Traditions have come down to our days from time immemorial and have preserved the spirit of that time.

The word "tradition" accurately captures the essence of this genre. This is a story that is passed from mouth to mouth, passed from generation to generation.

In ancient times, literacy and books were available to a few, and almost everyone wanted to know their place in history, to understand events. Until the 19th century, legends replaced historical literature, telling about the past and the present in their own way. But legends do not reflect the whole course of events, they pay attention to individual bright moments of history.

Traditions often tell about the origin of a particular people. Usually we are talking about some kind of ancestor, the ancestor, with whom the name of a tribe or people is associated. For example, in medieval European historical writings, the legend about the origin of the Slavic tribes was widespread. It said that once lived three brothers: Czech, Lech and Fur, or Bear. From the first came the Czechs, from the second - the Poles, from the third - the Russians.

The past in legends is usually embellished. For example, it is said that in former times not ordinary people lived, but giants. Therefore, the human bones found at the site of the former battles of the Russians with the Lithuanians or the Chud (one of the Finnish tribes) seem to amaze with their size.

Robber or Cossack chieftains in the past also had some magical properties: for example, Yermak, according to legend, is invulnerable to bullets, Razin is a sorcerer.

The real circumstances were also reflected in the legends, but after repeated retellings, something that seemed uninteresting was forgotten, the missing details were conjectured, the characters acquired new features, and the events acquired new details. As a result, the facts in the story could be distorted beyond recognition.

In almost all legends, at the center of any event, from the largest to the smallest, there is always one bright personality: a king, a prince, a robber, an ataman, a general. This person determines everything that happens. Attention is focused precisely on this person, and the events described occur according to his will.

In the legends about historical figures, events that are widely known can be described. For example, the capture of Kazan by Ivan the Terrible, the conquest of Siberia by Yermak, the uprising in Moscow against the Poles during the reign of False Dmitry, the foundation of the city of Petrozavodsk by Peter, Suvorov's crossing of the Alps and others. Along with this, there are many stories that depict various actions of famous people that are not known from archival sources.

Many legends are devoted to the founding of cities and the development of new territories. These plots are often associated with the activities of some outstanding person.

Robbers and strong men are often found among the heroes of legends. Robbers rob, kill people, hide the loot, bury treasures. However, not always in the legends the robbers appear as villains. Often we are talking about noble robbers who distributed the loot to poor people. Stepan Razin and Emelyan Pugachev are mentioned among them.

Strongmen in legends are always simple people. Among the Cossacks - this is a Cossack, in barge stories - a barge hauler. The strongman is superior in physical strength and usually has no equal opponent. Sometimes such heroes are endowed with mythological, magical features.

Due to the presence of fiction, legends are often close to epics or fairy tales.
Tradition "On the conquest of Siberia by Yermak" tells about distant events of the 16th century. The beginning of the legend is almost fabulous: “Tsar Ivan heard that beyond the Urals lies a land richer than that which is subject to him.” And since then there was no rest for Ivan the Terrible, he wanted to annex Siberia to his lands, but he did not know how. The king was tormented by this question so much that he fell ill and "went to bed." The boyars could not help the sovereign. On the shoulder to solve such a question turned out to be a simple servant. He suggested to the king the name of a person who would be “brave and daring, who is not afraid of death, whom lightning will not strike and thunder will not deafen.” It was this servant who was able to find the Cossack Ermak Timofeevich in the vast Russian expanses. Ermak arrived to Ivan Tsar, agreed to go to the Siberian land and win it back for his state from Khan KuchUm. Since then, Siberia has entered the Muscovite state.

A completely different form of legend "About Pugachev". There is no fabulousness in it, rather, it is a household sketch, which reflects the dreams of the people about “their” ruler - a sovereign from the common people. For this reason, in the legend, Pugachev appears not as an impostor encroaching on the throne, but as the real Peter III: "He was only called Pugachev." But it so happened that he married either an Italian young lady or a princess “from our village”, who threw him off the throne, and took it herself. But Catherine II arrived and put everything in its place: Pugachev returned the reins of government, the colonel, who treated the potential tsar badly, ordered to cut off his head, made the Cossack a colonel. And Pugachev sent his treacherous wife to a monastery.

And in legend "About Pugachev", as in the legend of Ermak, the events described are very different from those that really took place. The real Pugachev was an impostor; he did not have a wife of Italian origin. Catherine II was not his ally, and therefore did not return the throne.

Many legends are completely at odds with historical reality. But in the poetic images of Ermak Timofeevich or Emelyan Pugachev, the reader sees the image of the Russian people, their autobiography. The legends are small in volume, but a lot is guessed in them: the original character of the Russian people, and its attitude towards the royal power, and the people's self-awareness of unity, and national certainty.

Traditions are imbued with love for the motherland, they tell about the historical past. They are educational. The main advantage of legends is not historical, but moral. Thanks to him, the folk epic is relevant and valuable today.

Tradition is"oral chronicle", a genre of non-fairytale prose with an emphasis on historical authenticity. Traditions are common in the folklore of different peoples. The main purpose of tradition is to preserve the memory of national history. Historicism is due to the staged state of the folklore of a given ethnic group. Ancient legends are saturated with mythological ideas, while later ones depict reality in everyday forms, however, they always contain fiction, sometimes even fantasy. Scientists distinguish different groups of legends: historical, toponymic, ethnogenetic, about the settlement and development of the region, about treasures, etiological, cultural. Traditions are often subdivided into historical and toponymic, but all legends are historical (already in terms of their genre essence), therefore, any toponymic legend is also historical. Traditions continue to exist in the oral tradition. The theme of the legends is always of general significance, the conflict is national or social, the characters are representatives of the state, nation, specific classes or estates. The general, the typical in the legend is depicted by means of the particular, the concrete. Traditions are characterized by local confinement to a village, a lake, a mountain, a house. Their reliability is sometimes supported by material evidence (a church was built by the hero, a thing was donated). Events are concentrated around historical figures, who most often appear in an ideal light. The plots of legends, as a rule, are one-motif. Around the character, consolidated (contaminated) plots can develop, cycles can arise. At the beginning or end of the narrative, direct characteristics and assessments of the hero are allowed, which are necessary for the image to be correctly understood, and acting as a general opinion (about Peter I: “Here it is the king - so the king, he didn’t eat bread for nothing, he worked better than a barge hauler”) .

Tradition in the Russian repertoire

In the Russian repertoire, one can single out the most ancient legends, legends about the “just king”, legends about the leaders of popular movements, about robbers and treasures. The most ancient legends tell about the settlement of Slavic tribes and about their ancestors. A large number of legends are devoted to the struggle of Ancient Russia with external enemies. The legends about the “just tsar” are associated with the names of Ivan IV (the Terrible) and Peter I. There is a large group of legends about the relationship of Peter I with representatives of different social strata and professions. Legends about the leaders of popular movements (Yermak, Stepan Razin, Emelyan Pugachev) complement the utopian dream of the people about a "just king". Traditions about robbers and treasures were told everywhere in Russia. The image of the “noble robber”, who robs the rich and stands up for the poor, appeared in numerous local variations (Churkin, Roshchin, Soroka). Legends about the robber Kudeyar are widespread, reflecting the genetic connection of plots about treasures with mythology. The ancient layer of the image of Kudeyar goes back to a mysterious and powerful creature, the owner of the earth's bowels and the values ​​\u200b\u200bhidden in them. The very word "Kudeyar" means a violent rebel, a wizard. The legends about Kudeyar were used by N.A. Nekrasov in the poem “Who should live well in Russia” (1863-77). There are repeating toponymic plots (about failed churches, cities). The plot about how the tsar pacified the raging water element is international (he was attributed to the Persian king Xerxes, and in the Russian oral tradition the plot began to appear in the legend about Ivan the Terrible and Peter I). In a number of cases, international legends reveal a typological commonality: throughout history they arose among different peoples independently of each other, generated by similar social and cultural conditions. Such were the legends about the noble robbers (Robin Hood, Razin, Shinderhannes, etc.). And yet the event of tradition is always depicted as a single, complete, unique event. At present, some national catalogs of legends have been compiled and the problem of creating their unified international catalog has been put forward.

"The legend of the deep antiquity, the deeds of bygone days..." Every Russian-speaking person hears, sees, reads these lines from childhood. Thus began his work "Ruslan and Lyudmila" Alexander Pushkin. Are his tales really legends? To know for sure, you need to understand the concepts.

Poetry is poetry, but what does the word "tradition" mean? We will consider the definition and special features of this phenomenon in our article.

Tradition as a genre

We will begin our acquaintance with the world of folk legends with the definition of the concept itself. So, various sources give us the following.

Tradition is a prosaic plot in which historical facts are interpreted in a folk interpretation. The legends of the people are not connected with the fairy tale genre, although sometimes events resemble mythical or fairy tale ones.

Traditions in the theory of literature are usually divided into two large groups according to the type of plot: historical and toponymic.

Traditions are part of oral folk prose

We learned, The definition gave us a general idea. Let's talk about one feature of this genre. It is noteworthy that the stories are. This means that the stories heard today were created hundreds of years ago and passed from mouth to mouth. By the time the legend was recorded on an information carrier, dozens or even hundreds of transformations of the plot and images could have taken place.

The works of the famous poet of Greece Homer "Iliad" and "Odyssey", which have an incredible size, were also transmitted orally. They also described historical events, embellished and somewhat modified. This shows some similarity between these creations and newer traditions.

As a genre of oral prose, lore is admired for its long history. Fortunately, or maybe not, it is much easier these days to distribute them in written form. We should appreciate every word, tradition, which gives important spiritual knowledge about our ancestors.

Comparison with other folkloric prose genres

Traditions can sometimes be mistakenly defined as a legend or an epic. To avoid this, let's name the following pattern: the plots of legends are aimed at explaining the origin of any cultural or natural phenomenon. They often give a certain moral assessment of the events described. And a legend is a retelling of history in a folk way with the participation of heroes widely known or famous in the local area.

From epics, the legends of the people differ in content, characters (historical figures: robbers, rulers, ordinary people, artisans), the participation of real personalities known in a certain area who have become mythological heroes.

Characteristic of this genre of folklore prose is a third-person narrative about events related to the past. The narrator of the legends was not an eyewitness to the events, but conveys a story heard from third parties.

Historical traditions

The collective memory of the people has created ancient legends from real facts, which we can read about in a slightly different light in the history books. This is how historical legends were created.

Historical legends include Joan of Arc, Tsar Ivan the Terrible, Ataman Mazepa and others.

We also include biblical stories about the creation of the world, the exit of the Israelites from Egypt in search of their land, and many others.

This group includes such legends that absorb people's ideas about the creation of their world. All folklore units create a single historical and mythological world that reflects a broad picture of the people's view of the surrounding reality.

The time frame covered by the traditions is difficult to determine: it is information from the most biblical antiquity to the present.

Toponymic legends

Toponymic include legends that record the events that became the basis for the origin of a particular name. Their heroes are, respectively, local famous characters and events that matter only there. The study of such local histories is an interesting part of toponymic and ethnographic research.

Toponymic are brief legends about the Serpent Shafts (from the Serpent), the city of Kyiv (about Kiy, his brothers and sister), the city of Orsha (Prince Orsh and his daughter Orshitsa), the city of Lvov and many other toponymic objects.

Perspectives for Researchers

In every city, every village there are such short stories about where some local name came from. Collections of such legends can be compiled endlessly. There is still a field for research today. Therefore, everyone who has discovered legends and found them an interesting object of activity has a job to do.

To publish a collection of legends collected in a particular locality is a very real prospect. New titles are popping up today, right at this moment. Also in the remote corners of Russia there are settlements in which folklore is actively developing. This means that new frontiers for ethnographic and folklore work are emerging.

It is noteworthy that at the present time there are more topographical legends. Historical ones are preserved from previous epochs, since from some time all the facts are fixed immediately after their appearance.

Traditions, myths and their historical basis

Tradition, which we have already defined, is sometimes associated with mythology. So, the stories about the exploits of the Greek hero Hercules, according to researchers, could not have arisen without real historical facts. Those mythical events and heroes that overgrown with the likely real story of the adventures of Hercules appeared over time.

Some facts from the Book of Enoch, which mentioned giants, were confirmed. In the same way, architectural monuments were found that could have witnessed the events that became the basis of the legend of the Flood.

conclusions

Thus, we learned that tradition is a folk story about historical events by word of mouth. In the process of transmission, it is common for carriers to embellish the tradition. The definition and features of this folklore genre are now known to us. We can easily distinguish it from legends and fairy tales.

Ancient legends are a reflection of the deepest layers of culture and history of a certain people. By studying and comparing them with the facts of the history of certain nationalities, one can draw conclusions about the worldview of the people who lived at that time. The value of retelling for ethnology is also extremely high.

Every person heard folk legends, historical and toponymic, but could not pay attention to this diamond, cut over the years of oral transmission. Now we can appreciate what we know and what we hear about the surrounding cultural world. May our article be useful to you and give you the opportunity to look at the creativity of the people from the other side.

From the point of view of the people, works of folklore non-fairytale prose are important as a source of information, and in some cases also as a warning, edification. Consequently, in non-fairytale prose, cognitive and didactic functions prevail over artistic ones. Non-fairytale prose has a different modality than fairy tales: its works are confined to real time, real terrain, real people. Non-fairytale prose is characterized by non-separation from the flow of everyday speech, the absence of special genre and style canons. In the most general sense, we can say that her works are characterized by the stylistic form of an epic narrative about authenticity: The old people said...; Vyksa old mantold me...; I saw miracles, it seemed to me ...; They say,what if...; My mother used to tell...; Here in our villageone woman...; Here I was myself in the redistribution.

The most stable component is the character, around which all the rest of the material is united. An important feature of non-fairytale prose is the plot (content). Usually plots have an embryonic form (one-motif), but can be transmitted both concisely and in detail. Non-fairytale prose works are capable of contamination. Sometimes plot cycles are formed - around a character or event. Many plots of folk non-fairytale prose are of a typological nature; they naturally arose in world folklore. There are also "wandering plots" recorded among different peoples in different periods of their history.

The genres of non-fairytale prose do not have the stability of the poetic form that is inherent in fairy tales, therefore they are usually determined by the nature of the content of the works. Myths were characteristic of early traditional folklore. Traditions, legends, demonological stories are known in classical folklore.

The thematic and plot fund of non-fairytale prose are oral folk stories - works that usually do not contain elements of fantasy and are designed as a story about the present or about the recent past. Oral folk stories cannot be called folklore proper, they are a kind of "raw material" for legends, traditions, etc., which, if necessary, could be claimed.

The problem of delimiting the genres of non-fairytale prose is a complex one. This is due to the fuzziness of the material itself, the great flexibility of the works. A common and characteristic feature of folk narratives of a non-fairy tale nature is inconstancy, fluidity of form. They easily adapted to local conditions. Blurring of genre boundaries often led to interactions between genres of non-fairytale prose both among themselves and with fairy tales. One and the same plot could take different forms, periodically appearing in the form of a bylichka, legend, tradition or fairy tale. It is no coincidence that legends, traditions, and especially bylichki in the 19th century. published in fairy tale collections interspersed with fairy tales.

1. lore

   1. Characteristics of the genre of legends

Tradition is a story about the past, sometimes very distant. Tradition depicts reality in everyday forms, although fiction is necessarily used, and sometimes even fantasy. The main purpose of legends is to preserve the memory of national history. Traditions began to be written down before many folklore genres, as they were an important source for chroniclers. In a large number of legends exist in the oral tradition and in our days.

Traditions are an "oral chronicle", a genre of non-fairytale prose with a focus on historical authenticity. The very word "tradition" means "to transmit, to preserve." Traditions are characterized by references to old people, ancestors. The events of the legends are concentrated around historical figures who, regardless of their social position (be it the king or the leader of the peasant uprising), most often appear in an ideal light.

Any legend is historical in its essence, because the impetus for its creation is always a true fact: a war with foreign invaders, a peasant revolt, large-scale construction, a crowning of the kingdom, and so on. However, tradition is not identical with reality. As a folklore genre, it has the right to fiction, offers its own interpretation of history. Plot fiction arises on the basis of a historical fact (for example, after the hero of a legend stays at a given point). Fiction does not contradict historical truth, but, on the contrary, contributes to its revelation.

In July 1983, during a folklore practice, students of the Moscow State Pedagogical University in Podolsk, near Moscow, recorded from A. A. Vorontsov, 78 years old, a legend about the origin of the name of this city. It is historically reliable that Peter I visited Podolsk. Tradition expresses the negative attitude of the people towards his foreign wife (Catherine I), for the sake of which the legitimate queen was exiled to a monastery (see the Reader).

There are two main ways of creating legends: 1) generalization of memories; 2) generalization of memories and their design using ready-made plot schemes. The second way is characteristic of many legends. Common motifs and plots pass from century to century (sometimes as myths or legends), being associated with different events and persons. There are recurring toponymic stories (for example, about failed churches, cities). Typically, such plots color the narrative in fabulously legendary tones, but they are able to convey something important for their era.

One of the international ones is the plot about how the king pacified the raging water element. (For example, he was attributed to the Persian Tsar Xerxes.) In the Russian oral tradition, the plot began to appear in the legends about Ivan the Terrible and Peter I (see the Reader).

Plots about Stepan Razin were also subsequently attached to other characters. For example, V. I. Chapaev, like Razin, is not taken by any bullet; he fantastically frees himself from captivity (by diving into a bucket of water or sailing away in a boat painted on the wall), and so on.

And yet the event of tradition is portrayed as a single, complete, unrepeatable event.

Tradition tells about the universally significant, important for everyone. This affects the selection of material: the theme of tradition is always of national significance or important for the inhabitants of a given area. The nature of the conflict - national or social. Accordingly, the characters are representatives of the state, nation, specific classes or estates.

Traditions developed special techniques for depicting the historical past. Attention to the details of a big event is shown. The general, the typical is depicted through the particular, the specific. Traditions are characterized by localization - geographical confinement to a village, lake, mountain, house, etc. The reliability of the plot is supported by a variety of material evidence - the so-called "traces" of the hero (a church was built by him, a road was laid, a thing was donated).

In the Olonets province. they showed silver cups and fifty dollars, allegedly donated by Peter I; in the Zhiguli, all the antiques and human bones found in the ground were attributed to the Razints.

The prevalence of legends is not the same. Traditions about tsars existed throughout the state, and legends about other figures in Russian history were told mainly in the area where these people lived and acted.

So, in the summer of 1982, the folklore expedition of the Moscow State Pedagogical University recorded in the village of Dorofeevo, Ostrovsky district, Kostroma region. from the peasant D. I. Yarovitsyn, 87 years old, the legend "About Ivan Susanin" (see in the Reader).

The plots of legends, as a rule, are one-motif. Summary (contaminated) legends could develop around the character; storylines emerged.

Legends have their own ways of depicting heroes. Usually the character is only named, and in the episode of the legend some one of his traits is shown. At the beginning or at the end of the narrative, direct characteristics and assessments are allowed, which are necessary for the image to be correctly understood. They act not as a personal judgment, but as a general opinion (about Peter I: Here it is the king - so the king did not eat bread for nothing; better burlaka worktal; about Ivan Susanin: ... after all, he did not save the tsar, but Russia.).

The portrait (appearance) of the hero was rarely portrayed. If the portrait appeared, it was laconic (for example: robbers - strong men, handsome men, stately fellows in red shirts). A portrait detail (for example, a costume) could be connected with the development of the plot: an unrecognized tsar walks around dressed in a simple dress; the robber comes to the feast in the uniform of a general.

Scientists distinguish different genre varieties of legends. Among them are historical, toponymic, ethnogenetic legends, about the settlement and development of the region, about treasures, etiological, cultural - and many others. We have to admit that all known classifications are conditional, since it is impossible to offer a universal criterion. Traditions are often divided into two groups: historical and toponymic. However, all legends are historical (already in terms of their genre essence); therefore, any toponymic tradition is also historical.

On the basis of the influence of the form or content of other genres, groups of transitional, peripheral works stand out among the legends. Legendary stories are stories with a miracle motif, in which historical events are comprehended from a religious point of view. Another phenomenon is fairy-tale plots dedicated to historical figures (see the story about Peter I and the blacksmith - the famous storyteller F.P. Gospodarev in the Reader).

In the lesson we will get acquainted with the legends as a historical genre of Russian prose. Consider the classification of legends, find out what they tell about, whether they can be historical documents. Let's read a few legends about Emelyan Pugachev and Yermak.

ON THE. Krinichnaya identifies 8 plot thematic groups (Fig. 2).

Rice. 2. Classification by N.A. Crinichnoy ()

The popularity of legends can be explained by the fact that literacy and books were accessible to few, and everyone wanted to know their place in life and understand events. Until the 19th century, legends replaced literature, interpreting the events of the past and present. Traditions tell us about events that cannot be read about in books, but most often embellished. For example, the people believed that giants lived in the old days (Fig. 3), so there are large bones at the battlefields.

Rice. 3. Giant skeleton ()

Folk heroes are endowed with magical qualities, for example, Yermak was considered invulnerable, Stepan Razin was a sorcerer. In the center of events in the legends is a bright historical figure - a king, a prince, a general, an ataman, a robber. From them you can learn about the great historical events: about the capture of Kazan by Ivan the Terrible (Fig. 4), about the conquest of Siberia by Yermak.

Rice. 4. The capture of Kazan by Ivan the Terrible ()

The private life of historical figures aroused interest, for example, the legends about how Peter I baptized the son of a simple peasant, about the 18th-century commander Rumyantsev, who was fishing on his estate, about Suvorov’s conversation with soldiers.

Strong men and robbers became the heroes of the legends (Fig. 5). Robbers attack people and rob them, hide treasures, burying them in the ground. Legends are told about robber villages, whose inhabitants lure travelers to spend the night, and at night they kill and rob them.

Rice. 5. Robbers ()

Not in all legends the robbers are negative characters, they are often presented as people's intercessors who rob the rich and help the poor. Such heroes were Stepan Razin and Emelyan Pugachev (Fig. 6). Many legends about them testify that they were popular with the common people.

Read the legend "Pugachev and the cannon" (Fig. 7).

Rice. 7. The legend "Pugachev and the gun" ()

In the legend, the narrator plays an important role, who describes the event and conveys his attitude towards it, and the image of Pugachev is formidable and inspires the reader with mystical horror. Reprisal against a person who did not obey an impostor is natural for that time. The massacre of the cannon seems pointless (Fig. 8), here the narration is colored by the narrator's irony over Pugachev.

Read the legend "On the origin of Pugachev" (Fig. 9).

Rice. 9. The legend "On the origin of Pugachev" ()

This legend does not correspond to historical truth: the narrator believes that Pugachev was in fact the king, and does not speak about the death penalty. Pugachev allegedly comes to Moscow, and the Empress cedes the throne to him. People wanted to believe in it.

Folk legends cannot be historical documents, because people tend to embellish the past.

Read for yourself the legend "On the conquest of Siberia by Ermak." We talked about this historical event at the last lesson, when we analyzed historical songs. Let's draw up a plan for this legend (Fig. 10).

Rice. 10. Plan of the legend "On the conquest of Siberia by Yermak" ()

The main task of the legend is to tell about the history of the development of Siberian lands. But again, the events are embellished, nothing is said about the hostile attitude of Ivan the Terrible towards Yermak. For Ivan the Terrible, the goal of the campaign was the development of Siberia, for Yermak it was freedom. In the legend, the boyars and the poor servant-peasant are opposed, the boyar advice is stupid, and the advice of the peasant is sensible for the tsar. This legend embodies the dream of the people that the king appreciate the wisdom and devotion of the people.

Traditions are a kind of source of epic genres of Russian literature. Writers turn to folk art to create vivid images, for example, A.S. Pushkin in The Captain's Daughter.

Bibliography

1. Merkin G.S. Literature. 8th grade. Textbook in 2 parts - 9th ed. - M.: 2013., Part 1 - 384 p., Part 2 - 384 p.
2. Kurdyumova T.F. etc. Literature. 8th grade. Textbook-reader in 2 parts Part 1 - 12th edition, 2011, 272 pages; Part 2 - 11th ed. 2010, 224 p.
3. Korovina V.Ya. etc. Literature. 8th grade. Textbook in 2 parts - 8th ed. - M.: Enlightenment, 2009. Part 1 - 399 p.; Part 2 - 399 p.
4. Buneev R.N., Buneeva E.V. Literature. 8th grade. House without walls. In 2 parts. - M.: 2011. Part 1 - 286 p.; Part 2 - 222 p.

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2. Sokrnarmira.ru ().
3. Nsportal.ru ().

Homework

1. What is a legend?
2. How can one explain the popularity of legends in its time?
3. Why can't legends be considered a reliable source of historical events?