Saint Elijah Nedeia (village feast) of Polovragi
Like any village, Polovragi has long-standing customs related to important events in human life: birth, marriage, death, and also customs on the occasion of various human celebrations. To the two great holidays of the year, Easter and Christmas, when our souls are filled almost as in the years of childhood, regardless of age, in Polovragi there is another celebration that has at least as much value in the souls of the people of these places: Saint Elijah Feast, celebrated on July 20th.
The bare summits, or high grounds without trees, are known in folklore as nedei. Basically, they are the occasions where traders and producers meet to exchange goods. As a rule, these meetings are closely related to religious holidays and are preceded by various folklore-specific activities, where merchants exchange not only goods, but also opinions and experience.
Such a festivity, perhaps the oldest in our country, is held in Polovragi, on Saint Elijah’s Day, and dates back to the 17th century.
As such, by Saint Elijah Day, the shepherds from Polovragi organized, more than 200 years ago, the Nedeia of Nedeii Mount. The holiday marked the decrease of milk. Instead of two milkings, one was done. The shepherds from the barren land also came down to Nedeia. Friendships were made between the young people of the mountain. Since the beginning of the 20th century, the party from Nedeii Mount descended to Polovragi and since then, every year, for a week (July 14-20), the well-known carnival is held. The shepherds from Novaci used to exchange the boys and girls with the sheep in the mountains, so that they could come to the flock from Polovragi. People from Gorj, Sibiu, Braşov, Pitesti, etc. came to the Polovragi. In the evening, the youth start to dance the hora, an opportunity to make new acquaintances, make frindships between boys and girls and, not infrequently, these led to “runaway” marriages. Hence the expression ” Polovragi marriage “.
For the locals, this fair was not only a good opportunity to exchange products, to sell cattle, textiles, drinks, etc., but also the most appropriate opportunity to dress in the Hungarian costume. Probably the expression “it was a white world” in the sense of “very much” comes precisely from here: from the fact that people, on the day of celebration, were dressed in folk costumes, in which white prevails.
In addition to this reunion, the fair was the main attraction, because here they could exchange or buy all kinds of household items: harnesses, ropes, saddles and any other items needed throughout the year and beyond. At this point, a small market was also built, where merchants brought bells, leather saddles, shingle nails, harnesses, saddles, ropes, shoes. Over time, the Nedeia pastoral celebration moved to the estate of the Polovragi Monastery and then Vatra Târgului in the center of Polovragi village, where it is still held today.
The form of organization has changed over time, and many of the old customs have been lost. Those potters who used to bring the clay vessels – plates, bowls, jugs, large pots for boiling food on the fire in the hearth, which they brought wrapped in hay and placed in oxcarts – no longer come. We no longer meet horse-turned merry-go-rounds, nor are there any more famous tarafs in the area, to whose music the Hungarian choirs and whirlwinds would warm up.
Today, the fair is among the largest in the country and represents a special event for the social, cultural and economic life of Polovragi. It is the most important meeting of the shepherds during the summer, when they go up the mountain with their flocks. In addition to the fair, which has acquired the stamp of modernity, in recent years the habit of organizing a folk celebration has been created, which consists of a parade of the popular port of the area, a craft fair and a folklore show, which makes the popular traditions to preserve.
Folk wear and its tradition in Polovragi
Folk wear it is, like all other cultural goods, an element of social contact, a means of communication between people, a mark by which man recognizes himself in different circumstances. It differentiates and brings closer, it is a sign of the solidarity of those who are part of the same community. Through it, as through other elements of folk culture, people’s pains and joys are expressed. It is made and adorned according to a certain way of thinking, it has his own logic.
The ungurenesc costume (the word comes from the adjective Hungarian, more precisely from Transylvania), worn in the mountain area – Novaci, Polovragi, Baia de Fier, marks a moment of leaving the traditional wear in favour of elements foreign of Gorj, coming from beyond the mountains. The ungurenesc wear infiltrated from Mărginimea Sibiului into Oltenia, passing through Vama Cucului, or across the guarded border. Along with it, the songs also crossed over and together they penetrated the souls of the people from Gura Olteţului. The fact that once upon a time the traditional wear was also worn in this part of the Gorj is confirmed by Al. Vlahuţă, who also stayed at the Polovragi Monastery and described it in his book “The Picturesque Romania”: “The white shirts, sewn with arnica thread and butterflies, the scarves woven with silk thread, the flowered jackets and the sheepskin coats with tassels, the black woolen shawls, spotted with red, the narrow sashes, woven and created in-house. And how well this wear catches the Romanians, so clean, so simple and beautiful”.
The ungurenesc wear included the villages of Polovragi, Baia de Fier, Novaci, Alimpeşti, Bunbeşti-Pițic, Săcelu, Crasna, Muşeteşti, Bumbeşti-Jiu and part of Schela. Seen as a whole, the ungurenesc costume is characterized by the alternation between white and black – the colour of the cloth and the arnica with which the ornaments are sewn. The ungurenesc villages preserved the treasure of the Sibiu folk art, in the most original forms, and passed it on to the generations of the villages formed by the inhabitants who came from beyond the mountains. The costume has a special style and elegance, a fact due in equal measure to the cut, the component parts and the chromaticity that meets only two colours: white and black. Women’s hairstyles are simple, with the hair parted in two, on one side, or worn over the head and braided into a bun placed on the back of the head. women do not make an ornament of the head tops, the grace being more obvious, as it were, due to the simplicity.
The costume proved so vital that on working days it was worn by most men, and on holidays everyone wore it, in competition. Very beautifully described in a folk song by teachers Chiriţescu Maria si Marin, the costume is only worn today during festivities on holidays.
The song went like this: “I am known as a Polvragi native / By the vest and the head scarf / By the skirt and smock / That’s the wear here.// As long as the Jiu and Olt rivers flow / We shall preserve our tongue and wear / And we shall breed the sheep / And watch the country and the borders.”
The costume is also worn by the bride and groom when they leave for the ” wedding summons”. The bride, accompanied by a growing group of girls, all dressed in ungurenesc costume on the Saturday of the wedding (because in Polovragi the wedding lasts for another three days and three nights), makes the invitations to the wedding. So does the groom, accompanied by young men on horseback. It is, perhaps, one of the most beautiful free shows of the village. There is no young man soon to be a groom who does not wear the ungurenesc costume. And, my God, how beautiful they are! Otherwise, the costume is more and more “tight”… “Forests died out / And one by one / People retreated in the shadows/ Taking earthen clothes / But the spring remained.” (L. Blaga).
Contributor: Gorj County Centre for the Conservation and Promotion of Traditional Culture
