Nagy Gyula: Parasztélet a vásárhelyi pusztán (A Békés Megyei Múzeumok Közleményei 4. Békéscsaba, 1975)
Idegennyelvű kivonatok, képaláírások, képek
'puszta", they used to help at deliveries. They used to deliver lying in bed, sitting on chair or on bench or in kneeling position. There were quite many popular beliefs about conception, gravidity and delivery. The most common of these was that they had to be concerned for the little baby mainly till the baptism because of the malefic ghosts. At the betterto-do families baptism was a great celebration with determined menu ; mutton stewed with paprika, curd-cake and paper-thin layers of dough baked and filled with curd as well as such a round pretzel "keyed milk bread" as at the wedding. They asked but to be godparents not so much the brothers and sisters but rather their friends of the same age. Before the middle of the 19 th century they used to ask more couples to be god-parents. It occured sometimes that poor families asked wealthy farmer to be god-parent trusting in his support. God-parents gave the first equipment when the child entered the school they used to give money and clothes at confirmation as a present but the wedding-present was even bigger than this (e.g. bridal gown). They used to give the mother in child-bed chicken or goose as a present. The first step of the preparations for the married life was the sexual enlightment, which happened in a spontanous way. The pubescent children could frequently observe the mating animals and they themselves inquired about biological questions. Though the mother took care very much of pubescent daughters the co-educational school, the collective works, social meetings brought the young ones of the two different sexes near to each other. Nevertheless propriety and moral recquired of the girls to behave non-committally and saving virginity up to the marriage was a basic requirement. If the young ones felt mutual attraction, then the lad went to the parents of the girl and asked permission to visit them frequently. This meant a serious intention because after a few week they could rely on the suitor's coming and then the engagement took place. The parents usually did not oppose the young ones' desire if they had no financial or human objection. First of all the wealthy families held fast to propertied partner in marriage. They concluded an exact agreement about financial questions at the engagement. In the last century it was recurrent that they waited even one or two years after the engagement before they married, but coming closer to our days this time became very short. Wedding was the greatest festive event of the peasant-life on the "puszta" as well therefore it can be understood that it needed long preparation. Preparing food and drink, the clothes, the trousseau, the official ceremony, selecting the guests gave much work to do. Wedding was held mostly on the bridegroom's house, rarely in restaurent, more often in the reading circle. However at midnight they went over to the house of the bridegroom or to the house of the bride. Most weddings kept in autumn or in winter-time but never in April. It was the bridesman who arranged the invitations with poems specially written for this purpose. Before the mariage they used to organize the bridegroom's farewell party. They went to the house of the bride with big ceremony on decorated coaches for the trousseau and took it to the house of the bridegroom one day before the wedding. This trousseautransport was one of the outstanding parts of the wedding-rite. Many archaic elements of the woman-fair lives in the wedding-ceremony as funny play (hiding the bride, banging in the march, the disguise of the bride etc.). The ceremony is ended by the valediction and the bride's dance. The wedding-party itself spreads over the next day. The office-bearers of the wedding are chosen from the blood relatives and not genuine relatives. The menu is traditional locally determined but it has changed two three times during hundred years. Inhabitants of the "puszta" take death as a natural concomitant of life. Old men themselves prepare their graveclothes chose their burial-place and make their will. They call priest to the seriously ill person to do the death-ceremonies. Men of Vásárhely origin remember that in older times they made the bed for the dying man of the floor. If the person had wished they put some of his favorite articles into the coffin beside him (pipe, 642
