De Stejar Irina

With Romanians, the winter feasts are

full cry from 24 December to 7 January.
There central events occur during the
Christmas Day, New Year and Epiphany,
with their respective events. The most
important feature of these feasts is their
incomparably reach repertoire of customs,
traditions, and believes, of artistic,
literary, musical, choreographic and other
folklore events, which make the winter
holidays to be some of the most original
and spectacular spiritual manifestations of
the Romanian people.
 Children and lads go from house
to house singing Christmas carols, or
through the streets on New Year's Eve
reciting congratulatory verse. The whole
traditional village participates in waists,
although this custom is practiced by
children mostly. They are organised in
troops, according to a well-ordered
hierarchy, each with its own chosen leader
and established meeting place. This is a
the dominating structure in village life
during the Christmas-tide festivals.
Another custom practised by children individually
on New Year's Day is a 'sorcova'. This is a small
branch or stick adorned with differently coloured
artificial flowers, cooled sorcova with which they
touch rhythmically their elders lightly, while
congratulating them on the occasion and wishing
them a long life to a hoary age and a Happy New
Year in a specific recitative of forty words,
corresponding to the forty touches with the
sorcova (from Slav. soroku = forty), which runs
somewhat as follows:
The Merry sorcova
Long may you live,
Long may you flourish,
Like apple trees,
Like pear trees,
In midsummer,
Like the rich autumn
Overflowing with abundance,
Hard as steel
Fast as an arrow,
For many years to come!
Happy New Year!
A similar custom is practised by the
children of Hunedoara (in Transylvania) on
Christmas Eve, when they go from house to
house with a nicely printed headkerchief
tied to a lance, locally called pizãrã,
(whence the name of the groups of
children: pizãrãi) which represents a kind of
sorcova reciting:

As many lumps of coal in the hearth,

Just as many suitors to the lass;
As many stones in the river,
Just a many wheat stacks in the field;
As a many chips from the cutter,
Just a many children around the hearth!
Another interesting and decorous custom is the
Star (Steaua). This is a large star made of
coloured glossy paper, lighted inside like a lantern,
which school children, in a groups of three carry in
the evening of Christmas-tide from house to house,
singing a star-recitative celebrating Christ's birth:

The Star is rising high,

Like a hidden mystery,
The Star shines brightly,
And to the world announces,
That today the pure,
The immaculate Virgin Mary,
Gives birth to Messiah,
December 6 - the Orthodox calendar: St.
Nicholas? On the evening of the eve
(December 5), parents bring in children's
footwear, which they and a carefully
prepared, various gifts: candy, toys, small
items of clothing, in some there are places
to put together a “nuielusa” custom and
moral course effect. Also on this day, in
other areas (Wallachia, Transylvania) is
organized bands of young men, as described
above. ? December 20 - the Orthodox
calendar: St. Ignatius? This day is killing
pigs in the early hours, which is feeding the
Christmas ritual for all Romanians.
With the Romanians, the goat was believed
to be the animal that could show if the
weather was to be fine or foul. Most
certainly at first the "capra" dance (the
kiling, the mourning, the burial, the
resurection) was a solemn ceremony, a part
of the cult. As part of the agrarian
festivities the dance has become a ritual
designed to bring fertility in the coming
year, an increase in the number of animals
in the shepherds’ flocks, bumper crops -
invoked and evoked by the grains flung by
the host over the procession of the
„capra".
The same as in the
other dances with
masks performed
during the winter
holidays, in the
"capra" dance,
besides the
classical masks,
the goat, the
shepherd, the
gipsy, the woodman
masks of „devils"
and of
„greybeards" were
introduced, where
yells, lusty cheers,
funny gestures,
intensified the
cheerful, humorous
aspect, at times
lending it a nuance
of grotesque.
Bear Custom  * Ursul
This custom is known only in Moldavia, a
part of Romania, on the Christmas Eve. In
this case a young person dresses up in a
bear costume adorned with red tassels on
its ears, on his head and shoulders. The
person wearing the bear costume is
accompanied by fiddlers and followed by a
whole procession of characters, among
them a child dressed-up as the bear's cub.
Inspired by the crowd’s singing:
"Dance well, you old bear,
 And I’ll give you bread and olives",
the bear grumbles and imitates the steps
of the bear, striking strongly against the
earth with the soles of its feet to the
sound of drums and pipes.
Bibliografie:
-google.com

http://www.roembus.org/english/com
munities/copii/romanian_winter_seas
on_tradition.htm#Bear%20Custom
%20%20*%20Ursul