Why did the Bear actually steal Masha and other secrets of folk tales about girls in the forest?

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

Wherever the forest grows, girls of different nations live. But not all peoples have a fairy tale about a girl (or rather, a very young girl) in the forest. There is a theory that such tales appeared where women in society were more or less significant, visible and active - after all, this is a tale of initiation, and a trip to the forest is a form of initiation, which emphasizes that a girl should be able to act independently. In other cases, tales are told about girls in a tower or a mansion - such an initiation is popular among peoples where maximum submission was required from a woman.

Whom in the forest will you meet, Morozko or a stinking tiger?

The most "passive" adventure is experienced in fairy tales by girls, whose adventure was limited to the ability to be polite. In the Russian fairy tale "Morozko" the girl, taken by her father to the forest, meets the embodiment of winter cold - probably, this is the memory of the old pagan god of death and winter, Karachun. In the Indonesian fairy tale, the girl finds herself in the jungle herself and a tiger covered with abscesses comes out to meet her, which asks for help: to clean his wounds.

Both the god of death and the animal are interpreted by anthropologists as representatives of the ancestral world. Girls are rewarded for more than just being polite to a stranger: it is implied that they know how to show respect for the spirits of their ancestors, which was probably a special requirement for women. Almost everywhere, it is women who look after the graves, over the funeral rites and to ensure that the memory of the dead is honored in the family.

To test how a girl is able to keep her face and respect death and ancestors, Morozko and the tiger propose tests. Morozko makes everything colder and asks if the girl is warm. The tiger's abscesses, while being cleaned, stink terribly, and the tiger asks about their smell. A girl who has successfully learned the rules of relations with her ancestors responds, despite everything, with firm courtesy - and survives, and also receives an award that will help her to successfully marry (become an adult). And a sister or a neighbor's girl who could not keep her face dies.

Girl and Pies: Little Red Riding Hood and Masha

Everyone remembers Little Red Riding Hood's plot. The girl carrying bread (pies) and wine (in some versions modestly replaced by butter) through the forest is clearly making a ritual offering to her ancestors. Indeed, she is not going to someone, but to her recumbent grandmother. The lying old woman in the tales of initiation symbolizes the long-dead foremother, who continues to provide patronage to the family.

Interestingly, before the ceremony, the initiate was deprived of the right to use a child's name and received some kind of nickname or "common" name - too often encountered. This is reflected in the famous fairy tale, where a girl is called by a headdress, by the way, red - and among many peoples red color in clothes was allowed to adolescents only after reaching puberty. In Russian villages, for example, it was therefore considered inappropriate for children to wear red shirts.

On the way in the forest, the girl meets another ancestor - a wolf (he is a beast, and also then unambiguously replaces her grandmother). In different versions of the tale, the plot ends either with the death of the girl, or with her miraculous rescue with the help of men from the forest - hunters or lumberjacks.

In the tale of Masha and the bear, Masha happens to be at the bear's house in the forest, and the bear tells her that she will live with him and cook. clean up and so on. But this is not just about labor slavery. Later, Masha asks the bear to take the presents to her family - and this was the custom in Russian families when it came to … wife and husband. The husband visited his mother-in-law more often than his daughter visited the mother, so married women passed gifts through their husbands.

By cunning Masha makes the bear carry her out of the forest in a backpack. Notice how in a businesslike way she shouts at him: "Don't sit on a stump, don't eat a pie, I see everything!" This is also the intonation of his wife.

Despite the seemingly different plots, they have something in common: the motive of sexual intercourse with a male ancestor, temporary marriage before real adult life. If Masha behaves like a wife, then the wolf invites Little Red Riding Hood to go to bed with him (in an easy version - symbolically sit next to the bed), and she does this and starts a conversation about his too large body parts.

Of course, the whole background of these fairy tales was lost a long time ago, and you can tell them without a doubt to children: they have turned into ordinary fairy tales about how to deceive the villain. But the echoes of initiation through a temporary marriage with an ancestor (or the man of the tribe who represents him) are clearly visible upon close gaze.

There is another interesting motive, which probably reflects the anxieties of later times: both times a girl who received help from a stranger is abducted by him (in the case of a wolf, symbolically). On the other hand, it can also be an echo of an old wedding ceremony through abduction.

A girl who can stand up for herself: Vasilisa and Alyonka-Urticaria

Sometimes the girls walking in the forest in fairy tales receive attributes similar to those of the young heroes. In one of the tales, a girl named Vasilisa goes into the forest against her will - the evil stepmother drives her there to find fire, which "has ended everywhere" - no more, no less, play the role of Prometheus or Maui, stealing fire from the gods. Vasilisa in some versions is armed with an ax, and also takes with her a doll, which is the embodiment of the mother's blessing - that is, her science (how to communicate with the other world), her love and, since the mother is dead, the help of her closest ancestor.

Baba Yaga, who, unlike many fairy tales, does not sit on the stove, but controls the moon and the sun - that is, rather a goddess than just an ancestor - Vasilisa undergoes studies and finally returns home with a magic staff, on top of which - skull with fire in the eye sockets. This fire burns Vasilisa's stepmother and half-sisters. Perhaps this is a symbolic act of parting with the family - after all, in adulthood, girls got married or went to the priestess, in any case dying for their family. Perhaps the sisters suffered because they refused to undergo initiation too, going into the forest to fetch the fire, and the stepmother - as the embodiment of an unfit, unprepared daughters for the test of the mother.

In the Belarusian fairy tale, Alyonka the Urticaria is sent to look for and bring home the missing older brothers, and, moreover, like a hero, they give her a horse. Only Alyonka is not riding on horseback, but in a cart, and on the way to her it is not a gray wolf that is nailed, but a faithful dog. More often Alyonka meets a witch who changes her beyond recognition in exchange for a promise to show her brothers. She also pretends to be Alyonka, and Alyonka is a hirer, but the song helps the girl. She attracts attention, and to the brothers coming out to the song, the faithful dog, who, apparently, is not bound by unspecified vows, tells who their real sister is and who is a witch.

A girl who is at least partially outfitted as a young hero is a rather rare character in folk tales. There is a possibility that the memory of the active Varangian girls was reflected in this way among the Eastern Slavs.

The tale, as you know, is a lie, but there is a hint in it, that is, you can find a little truth. Historical. Why Lisa is Patrikeevna, Baba is Yaga, and the Serpent is Gorynych: In honor of whom were the characters of Russian fairy tales named.