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- Convenors:
-
Nemanja Radulovic
(University of Belgrade)
Dejan Ajdacic (University of Gdansk)
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Short Abstract
The official panel of the Folklore Committee of the International Committee of Slavists (MKS) has the aim of presenting the research of natural forces in Slavic folkloristics.
Long Abstract
The research of natural forces in Slavic beliefs, belief narratives and folktales has a long tradition within Slavic folklore studies. The research encompasses different approaches: comparing common themes in different Slavic languages, diachronic tracing of possible mythological and ritual origins of narratives, fieldwork, ethnolinguistics and others. The panel looks to bring together specialists in Slavic folklore from different countries and to present both contemporary research and the history of scholarship to the ISFNR audience. This will be the official panel of the Folklore Committee of the International Committee of Slavists (MKS), the oldest association of Slavic scholars, with the aim of making a bridge between the two associations.
Accepted papers
Session 1 Saturday 13 June, 2026, -Paper short abstract
Students of folklore sometimes argued that the pre-Christian Slavonic religion included the cult of Mother Earth as a separate deity. This hypothesis does not seem to be correct. The presentation aims at assessing the data on Earth’s image in Russian popular culture of the last centuries.
Paper long abstract
Since at least the mid-19th century, students of East Slavic folklore and popular culture argued that the pre-Christian Slavonic religion included the cult of Mother Earth as a separate and especially venerated deity and that “folk Orthodoxy” (viewed as “double belief”) preserved certain notable survivals of this cult. This point of view was supported by specialists in comparative mythology and various modernist writers and philosophers (referring, in particular, to the image of Mother Earth in Dostoevsky’s novels). On the other hand, it found certain resemblance in European scholarship on Classical antiquity (especially by Albrecht Dieterich) and “primitive religions” in general. Later in the 20th century, the image of this “invented goddess” was promoted by various groups of “neo-mythological” scholars (including Russian structuralists), and more recently by feminist and pagan authors.
This presentation aims not only at deconstruction of scholarly and literary mythologies related to the imagined East Slavic cult of Mother Earth but also at assessing the data on Earth’s image in agrarian culture of the last centuries. It seems likely that these beliefs, rituals, norms, and prohibitions intertwine local ontologies related to various natural objects with certain religious metaphors borrowed from both the Bible and the Christian tradition. I intend to demonstrate how this combination “worked” in agrarian communities and how it was (mis)interpreted and transformed by Russian scholars and writers.
Paper short abstract
The paper examines Ukrainian folk tales where Frost, Sun, and Wind act as moral agents. Focusing on the tale “The Sun, the Frost, and the Wind,” it shows how elemental forces reflect cultural hierarchies of power, survival strategies, and ethical meanings in Slavic oral tradition.
Paper long abstract
This paper investigates the role of natural elements as moral agents in Ukrainian folk narratives, with particular attention to the tale commonly known as “The Sun, the Frost, and the Wind.” In this story, a peasant is forced to engage with personified elemental forces, whose judgments shape his fate. The analysis highlights the paradoxical outcome: while Frost and Sun display recognizable qualities of severity or warmth, Wind receives the greatest respect – not for benevolence, but for sheer strength and danger. Such a hierarchy of values underscores how folk culture interprets natural forces less through the lens of ethical virtue than through their capacity to affect human survival.
Drawing on textual and motif analysis, the study situates this tale within a broader corpus of Ukrainian folklore where natural elements function as arbiters, judges, and distributors of punishment or reward. It argues that these figures cannot be reduced to decorative personifications; rather, they embody a moralized vision of nature, in which environmental powers are inherently active, animated, and ethically charged. By presenting nature as both threatening and protective, Ukrainian folk tradition encodes strategies of adaptation, endurance, and moral judgment that are integral to its worldview.
In doing so, the paper contributes to a deeper understanding of the intersection between ecological perception and moral order in Slavic oral tradition, offering insight into how communities conceptualized their relationship with the elements not merely as physical realities but as agents of justice and power.
Paper short abstract
Before seismology, people believed earthquakes were caused by a dragon moving underground, while its flight brought storms and hail. This legend reappeared after the 2020 earthquakes in Zagreb and Banija, Croatia.
Paper long abstract
Before the development of seismology, earthquakes were "caused," according to mythological understandings of nature, by dragons from oral traditions. Specifically, the meteorological myth and the myth of earthquakes suggest that the dragon’s movement in the depths of the earth, according to belief, would cause an earthquake, while its flight through the sky would bring about storms and hail. For example, in Iceland and Scandinavia, it was believed that dragons and monsters beneath the ground could trigger earthquakes with their movements.
I refer to an oral belief from the area around Zagreb (Croatia), which says: "The dragon sleeps beneath the hill, his head by the water in Susedgrad, his tail in Kašina. When he awakens, he strikes with his tail—so be quiet, lest the dragon awaken. While he sleeps, he brings peace..."
This belief legend was revived after the recent earthquake in Zagreb and Banija (Croatia, 2020).
What is common in the legends of the Grabancijaš and the Pozoj is the idea that only a student sorcerer (the Grabancijaš or “črnoškolec” – literally "black-school student") can defeat or summon the Pozoj (dragon). Both variants emphasize that disturbing the dragon is dangerous—it can lead to earthquakes and storms. As one version notes, if that were to happen, a part of the town of Čakovec would collapse.
Paper short abstract
The role water plays as a border between the worlds in folkore is well known in Slavic folkloristics. We will present some aspects of this role in Serbian oral narratives, paying special attention to different genre rules, fairy tales and belief legends at first place (specially ATU 934).
Paper long abstract
The role water plays as a border between the worlds in folkore is well known in Slavic folkloristics. We will address some aspects of it in Serbian narrative folklore.The interplay between various sets of genre rules and common ethnographic background can provide a new perspective on a water as border. Genres analyzed are fairy-tales and belief legends (singling out ATU 934). Water comes as a border both in horizontal and vertical "projections" and in some cases water is not just a semantic point (border) but plays much more active role in the plot.
Paper short abstract
The paper explores nature-related clothing in Slavic variants of ATU 510B, where heroine wear fur garments as well as cosmic or metallic dresses. The motif is read through ritual parallels, questioning human–nature boundaries and the appropriation or reverence of nature.
Paper long abstract
Clothing correlated with nature is a common motif in folk magic tales. It appears in particularly intriguing ways in variants of tale type ATU 510B, especially in Slavic traditions. On the one hand, the heroine wears, in everyday life, garments made from the furs of all animals or of a single one (a donkey, a mouse, a pig). On the other hand, during festive occasions, she dons dresses inspired by the properties of celestial bodies and/or precious metals. This raises the question of the nature of this motif and how it should be understood: as an expression of the marvellous, a defining generic feature of the magic tale; as a form of human identification with nature and recognition of its superiority; or as an act of appropriating nature for one’s own purposes and subordinating it to particular interests. To shed light on this issue, and to determine the functions of nature-related clothing in magic tales, it may be useful to turn to ritual realizations of the motif of wondrous dressing—including folk charms and wedding rituals, with their elaborate protective practices and rich fertility symbolism. This paper forms part of a broader inquiry that encourages reflection on the need to move beyond the binary distinction between what is natural and unnatural, on the permeability of the boundaries between human beings and nature, and on the ways in which we live with and through nature.
Paper short abstract
The paper identifies the names of demons associated with wind in Slavic folk cultures and delineates their characteristics. It further highlights the mythological foundations underlying representations of winds as demonic entities and refers to works by folklorists and scholars of mythology.
Paper long abstract
Conceptualizations of winds in Slavic oral tradition and belief systems comprise a range of mythological constructs and cultural influences. Certain representations originate in pre-Christian polytheistic times, when winds were regarded as spiritualized beings inhabiting pits and caves; in some contexts, they are linked to the realm of the dead, while other demons associate some winds with human beings whose souls detach from their bodies and ascend into the heights to protect their communities from destructive winds and storms. In some traditions, winds acquire anthropomorphic features, whereas with the advent of Christianity they become associated with saints and masters of the winds. The paper examines the nomenclature of such wind-related beings: chmurnik, gradobranitelj, oblakogonac, oblačar, obłocznik, płanetnik, škrat, vetrovnjak, vetrogo(n)ja, vjedogonja, vetrenik, vetrovoj, vetryanij, vikhor, wietrznik, zduhač / zduvač.
In narrative folklore, winds appear across a variety of prose genres, most notably in fairy tales and etiological legends. The analysis focuses on the traits of wind-related beings that are associated with diverse demonic figures and identifies the themes and motifs connected with them. The paper further elucidates the interrelations between winds and other demons, in particular ale, fairies, and dragons. Winds are also linked to various diseases. Finally, attention is drawn to folkloristic and mythological interpretations of these oral tradition texts, especially those advanced by K. Moszyński, V. Čajkanović, N. Tolstoy, M. Matičetov, A. Loma, K. Smyk, J. Bartmiński, and L. Šešo.
Paper short abstract
Based on field and published material recorded in the areas of southeastern Serbia, this research is aimed at investigating several aspects of the motif of thunder and thunderbolt in various plot models of the tradition.
Paper long abstract
Based on field and published material recorded in the areas of southeastern Serbia, this research is aimed at investigating several aspects of the motif of thunder and thunderbolt in various plot models of the tradition (motif and motifeme, plot type, actors, interpenetration of genres). Functional in the environment of different narrative units (defense of the settlement from disaster, the occurrence of a storm, punishment for sin, etc.), active in narratives about several demonic beings ('ala', devil), this motif simultaneously shows in some plots the ability to connect the incantation and belief narrative. The inclusion of the incantation text in the narrative about defense against thunder is one example of the interpenetration of genre structures and adaptation in accordance with the new environment and different functions. The paper will also consider beliefs, as segments of the narrative and as subsequent comments by the narrator, especially frequent in more recent field records, in the function of a supplementary or basic explanation of the functioning of the actors, the course of the plot, and the magical significance of individual sequences within it.
Paper short abstract
The paper focuses on the folklore symbolism of natural elements that depict social cataclysms and ecocidal manifestations. The analysis is based on oneiric narratives with motifs of prophetic dreams “to the war”, which express national identity and represent attempts to structure the future.
Paper long abstract
The paper will explore the question: What natural elements are typical in the oral oneiric narratives of Ukrainians with the motif of ‘the prophetic dream,’ which is interpreted as a dream ‘the war will be,’ and what functions do such images play in personal stories? The author will focus on the peculiarities of the vernacular in expressing human existentialism during the ongoing war. The main focus is on the folklore samples recorded by the author in 2022-2024, which contain images of natural disasters (‘great water’ such as a river, sea, ocean, lake; land that is subsiding; a burning house; a burned city, whirlwinds, black clouds, a bright sky). The author will analyse and compare these Slavic oneiric narratives with other Slavic ones, as well as traditional images and symbols that shape folk ideas about death and life, and the meanings of ‘destruction’ and ‘rebirth.’
Additional questions for research: Why is a ‘prophetic’ dream about war a ‘narrative of personal experience’? What is the connection between the symbolic codes of dreams and the narrator/listener's interpretation of their future life? What is the scene of a dream about war in women's narratives? Based on discursive analysis, the significance of cultural heritage and ‘background’ mythological and folkloric knowledge will be traced through verbalised personal narratives. The author believes that oneiric and personal narratives in everyday wartime life perform not only compensatory, communicative and identificatory functions, but also an important informational and prognostic function necessary for overcoming trauma in uncertain times.
Paper short abstract
The transformation of humans into non-human animals in Serbian aetiological belief narratives, usually of young, liminal figures, is explored through different frameworks, which include punishment, salvation, or release from societal roles, while also reflecting cultural patterns.
Paper long abstract
Aetiological belief narratives represent a narrative form that explains the origins, causes, and structure of phenomena in nature and society. Some belief narratives centre on the transformation of humans into non-human animals, such as narratives about the origin of the cuckoo, the swallow, the bear, the mole, or the chick. Although these aetiologies are often associated with moral or punitive functions, the act of bodily transformation can be interpreted beyond this framework.
The subject of transformation is usually a young person – a girl or a boy who has not yet assumed social or gender roles. Positioned in a liminal state between childhood and adulthood, these figures are marked by indeterminacy and symbolic openness to change. Neither fully a child nor entirely integrated into adult society, they become particularly susceptible to transformation. The metamorphosis is not necessarily a consequence of transgression; at times, it occurs as a form of salvation – a means of escaping threat, violence, or other life circumstances that allow no resolution within the human domain.
The transformation into a non-human animal in aetiological belief narratives can also signify a release from social constraints, roles, and expectations. It marks not only a physical but also an ontological shift – the new existence becomes a strategy of survival where human agency has failed, offering a rebalancing between natural law and human values. On a cultural level, such transformations can be interpreted within the fact that fairy tales about persecuted maidens and children are frequent in Serbian folktale collections.
Paper short abstract
There are semantic differences between nominating soil in ritual speech and naming it in oral narratives in Russian. In our report, we will try to determine what symbolic meaning the soil has in ritual actions, speech, and oral narratives.
Paper long abstract
In the Northern Russian tradition, soil as a substance is often used in magical practices. A healer takes soil from a special locus to treat adults and children. Mothers still bless their sons with soil before they join the army or go to war. Often people who leave home, take the soil with them to not miss their native land. If the person did not die in his homeland, their relatives try to bring the soil from the deceased person's grave and place it in the family's tombs. There are many more similar examples.
The word ‘soil’ in the Russian language has a female gender. In сharming speech, it is called a ‘mother’ and is described as ‘damp soil’. Sometimes the actions are accompanied by charm words. In ritual speech and in сharms, the ‘mother earth’ is always a participant in communication for people. When the soil is an object of ritual acts, our interlocutors use (‘zeml’a’ (full form) and ‘zemel’ka’ (diminutive form)).
Often in Russian diminutives is not to show the size of the subject, but the quality and relationship with it. As we consider the diminutive as a marker of the shared focus of the interlocutors.
In our report, we will try to determine what symbolic meaning the soil has in ritual actions and speech and look at what situations the diminutives appear in and what it is a marker of. The material for the report is the recordings of the Russian ‘Daytodaydata’ archive.