12/04/2024
Interesting information about traditional Ukrainian head wears.
What headdresses did Ukrainian girls wear at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century? The first thing that comes to mind is wreaths. To some extent it is. But to be precise, we should not talk about a wreath as such, but about wreath-like headdresses, the main features of which are a crown-like shape and open head hair.
Traditionally, a wreath is perceived as a girl's headdress or as a bride's headdress in a wedding ceremony. Instead, the wreath in the Ukrainian folk tradition has a wider symbolic meaning: ethnographers recorded it not only as a girl's headdress and not only as a bride's headdress. During the wedding ceremony in some regions of Ukraine, the young man wore a wreath on top of his hat.
In the Ukrainian folk tradition, the wreath is common in all regions of Ukraine. It is widely used in various archaic rituals: calendar (Kupal, obzhynkov) and family (funeral, wedding, family). The most archaic of those listed are bathing and burial rites, which were closely related to the cult of ancestors and the transition to another, "other" world. If the ritual death-sacrifice is imitated in the Kupala rite, then in the funeral it is a direct departure to the "other world". Everyone who found himself on this "border" between two worlds was endowed with this talisman. The high symbolic status of the braided amulet-wreath also stimulated the choice of material for its manufacture, namely, natural, non-baptized: herbs, flowers, leaves. In the winter period, due to the lack of living plants, other natural materials (wool, feathers, yarn, dry cereals, etc.) were used to imitate natural fauna; at the same time, they sought to preserve the archetype of living woven wreaths.
Various crown-like headdresses - integral attributes of a wedding - had a rather complex design, and various materials were used for their manufacture, which retained an attractive appearance for a long time: feathers, ribbons, paper flowers, metal and bead ornaments, wool, wax. The only "living" material added to the wedding wreath is green periwinkle.
The use of dyed feathers for wedding wreaths was quite interesting. In Volhynia Polissia, girls decorated their heads with small chicken feathers dyed green. In Western Podillya, girls decorated their hair with "kachurik" from the tail of a drake, dipping them in melted, green colored wax. Once upon a time in the Kyiv region, green feathers from the tail of a drake were sewn between two ribbons, and then knitted with this decoration below the wreath. Hutsuls of Bukovyna wore carabul wreaths made of glassware, ribbons, artificial flowers and peacock feathers. Wedding vase-shaped wreaths in Bukovina were richly decorated with beaded garlands, ribbons, paper flowers, and a lush bunch of yellow and white cotton was inserted from above.
Poltava region and Kyiv region are known for their wreaths made of silk or woolen ribbons assembled in different ways: either in the form of rosettes, or in the form of a ribbon gathered in folds. In the Galician Hutsul region, the wedding wreath-chiltse was decorated with a large number of narrow brass plaques in the form of small petals and leaves, and instead of ribbons, "labels" - bundles of red woolen threads - were attached to the back. In Western Podillya, the wedding wreath was a kind of cap, made of beaded garlands, colorful flowers, a periwinkle wreath and "zombirok" - vertical pendants made of beads that went down on the forehead.
In Odesa, so-called "candy" wreaths were used in the border areas with Modavia. The main elements of the wreath were made from candy wrappers, hence the name. Such a wreath was decorated with a glass necklace and paper flowers. Urban fashion at the beginning of the 20th century brought white wax wreaths, which imitated wreaths of orange flowers, into rural life. Such wreaths were supplemented with colored paper flowers and leaves. The paper was also treated with wax for this purpose.
If the wreath was a ritual-celebratory girl's headdress, then ribbons and handkerchiefs were the festive-everyday girl's headdress.
Ribbons were a rather expensive gift given to a girl by her father, brother or lover. They were brought from Europe and Russia and sold at fairs. Usually they were not plain, but woven with floral, mostly floral, ornament. The girl wore a ribbon as long as it was. If the ribbon was too long, it was simply wrapped in a loop and worn like that. They did not dare to cut such a precious thing. They saved the ribbons by folding them into triangles. Therefore, when such a ribbon was worn, it had beautiful folds, like waves.
In addition to ordinary silk ribbons, so-called "ribbons" - embroidered ribbons on a solid base - were worn in the Kyiv region. Ordinary silk ribbons were lowered behind such ribbons. In the summer, such an outfit could be decorated with fresh flowers. In Chernihiv Oblast, girls used to tie two ribbons of different colors at once - a regular silk one, and a lace one on top of it. In Podilla and Pokutta, a woolen or silk ribbon was decorated with paper flowers-cones, which were attached to the ribbon with large pins.
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