Janó Ákos: Hortobágy pusztáról fú a szél... Tanulmányok az alföldi pásztorkodás köréből (Hortobágy, Kiskunság) / A Hajdú-Bihar Megyei Múzeumok Közleményei 62. (Debrecen, 2011)

Ákos Janó: The wind blows from Hortobágy Puszta

AKOS JANO: THE WIND BLOWS FROM HORTOBÁGY PUSZTA Chapters from the farming and pastoral life in Alföld -ffThe title of the publication refers to an old song originating from the Hortobágy area which evokes the ancient farming and shepherding traditions and the everyday life of the people of the puszta. The author graduated from the Arts Faculty at the CJniversity of Debrecen in the middle of the 20th century. As a student of Béla Gunda his research interest was soon directed towards the traditional pastoral culture of the vast steppe grazing near Debrecen, the Hortobágy. As a young museologist working in the Hajdúsági Museum in Hajdúböszörmény he conducted intensive fieldwork predominantly around the borders of Hajdúnánás and Hajdúböszörmény. The results of this fieldwork undertaken in the 1950s are in the centre of the first part of this publication. Those days the more traditional extensive and rigid farming methods were directly observable together with the more modern semi-rigid method. From the stories of the sheperds and their families unfolds the way of life of the people of Hortobágy. We also get a credible picture of the hierarchy between the herdsmen and the relationships between shepherds and peasants from the contemporary texts quoted in this book. The author draws a portrait of the „healing man" - this member of the community with the most outsanding herdsman's knowledge-based on a number of personal encounters. At the end of the chapter we can read a brief biography of the shepherds who had been interviewed. Original contemporary pictures taken by the author illustrate the text throughout the book. The plain everyday life of the penniless peasants of Hortobágy has been best captured in literature in the works of Péter Veres. In a report published in 1936 he depicts one of the last remaining elements of the pastoral society: the family of the herdsman. The first chapter concludes with this report. The second chapter provides an insight into the past of the farming and shepherding in Kiskunság. In the late 1950s and early 1960s the author - who at that time was already a museum director in Kiskunság- conducted intensive research and fieldwork amongst herdsmen living near Bugac puszta right in the middle between the Duna and the Tisza rivers. In the past this territory had a pastoral life similarly rich to that of 4 185 *