Paper short abstract:

The paper argues that the issues of Eduards Volters’ (1856–1941) old Latvian beliefs studies reveals imperial and national interests. Methodologically the disscussion is based on discourse analyses and archival data in relation to the history and theory of anthropology and ethnology.

Paper long abstract:

The paper argues that the issues of Eduards Volters’ (1856–1941) old Latvian beliefs studies reveals imperial and national interests. The Latvian ethnographer, linguist, mythologist, and archeologist Volters, one of the founders of Lithuanian ethnography, studied Latvian religion and identity since 1882 and the results published in the book "Материалы для этнографии латышского племени Витебской губернии" (1890). His concepts of ethnography, identity, and religion was both interlaced within major traditions of world anthropologies, as well as with the issues and case studies of Russian Empire. The paper will focus on the following questions: (1) religion – the Usiņš in the songs and memory of the Latvian calendar festivals in Vitebsk province; (2) the symbolism of Latvian families’ old beliefs rituals in the domestic sphere and in the language, 1882 and 1884; (3) hermeneutic and political concepts of Volters’ Latvian religion studies. Methodologically the disscussion is based on discourse analyses and archival data in relation to the history and theory of anthropology and ethnology.