Calendar rites and the respective terminology of krasnoufimsk udmurts

Abstract

© 2019, Estonian Academy Publishers. All rights reserved. The materials on the calendar rites of Krasnoufimsk Udmurts collected by the author in the 1990s, with texts and ethnological and etymological comments are presented, describing the New Year, Shrovetide-Pancake festival, the Great Day-Easter, end of ploughing, Semik-Trinity Day, the great summer sacrifice and praying for rain. Krasnoufimsk Udmurts were the most eastern peripheral Udmurt group, never formally Christianized, who for more than three centuries lived separately from other Udmurts but together with Mari and thus under their great cultural and linguistic influence. Therefore the Krasnoufimsk dialect, discovered and first described in the 1970s by R. Š. Nasibullin, developed into a very special Udmurt vernacular with strong features of interference from the Mari language, which became dominant among the Krasnoufimsk Udmurts in the late 20th century. Nowadays the Krasnoufimsk dialect is very probably extinct and the published materials represent the last information available on the language and culture of this interesting group.