Superstitions, funeral ceremonies, and old russian epigraphy
Abstract
This article analyses the narrative sources and epigraphic monuments of Muscovite Russia which are related to various cases of violent (“vain”) death (drowning, murder, etc.); these were traditionally regarded as an obstacle to being buried in a Christian cemetery and to the subsequent church commemoration. The data registered by ethnographers in the latter half of the 19th — 20th centuries made them believe that these views were leftovers of heathendom. The article draws on epitaphs of the 16th — early 18th centuries as well as on epistles of hierarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church and draws a conclusion about the absence of obstacles to being buried in a cemetery and to a regular commemoration of those who died a violent death. Besides, inscriptions on funerary crosses set up on the place of death symbolised martyrdom. The sources analysed allow us to believe that the death while being in czar’s service came to be regarded as one of the basic values of those in service since the 1560s. Moreover, my conclusion is that the superstitions in question are not related to heathendom. They originated in Christian times and were gradually overcome in the culture of commemoration during the 16th — 17th centuries being preserved in the background of the people’s consciousness.
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