Sárospataki Füzetek 21. (2017)
2017 / 2. szám - ARTICLES-STUDIEN - INTERCULTURAL DIALOGUE SINCE THE AGE OF THE REFORMATION-INTERKULTURELLER DIALOG SEIT DER REFORMATION - Nagy Károly Zsolt: Leaving a Mark: The calvinist landscapes of remembrance
Károly Zsolt Nagy example those preparing for their confirmation were seated on a separate bench, in front of the Lord’s table. The peripheral, transitional spaces were used by those on the periphery on society: beggars, gypsies and strangers. Most scribbles can be found on the back benches, the gallery staircases, the galleries, on the top and the inside wall of the parapets of the gallery, and the back side of the organs; we rarely find these on the benches of the nave. This is virtually the same in urban environments as well. In Sárospatak, where students of the College and the town congregation uses the church together, scribbles are mostly in the benches set apart for students, that is, in the benches under the galleries, as well as in the assumed places of soldiers and apprentices, the galleries. In Miskolc, in the Calvinist church in Kossuth Street, we can see lots of scribbles in the last gallery benches maintained for craft-shops; and in the back benches of the second gallery we can find rather elaborate engravings. This would support the interpretation which sees more of a “disorderliness” or “defacement” in scribbles. However, there is the question of what can we add to this based on the context of the scribbles. Under the context of the scribbles I mean the corpus of texts placed in the church space by the community, usually in a location of high visibility. This context, of course, varies from church to church. The carriers of the texts are for example the clenodia, the paramenia, the visible surfaces of benches and galleries, possibly the ceiling cassettes, the memorial tablets, epitaphs, memorial stones placed in the church (or many times outside the church on the wall or fence), and often the Scripture kept left open on the Lord’s table. In the majority of the texts we see three recurring elements: 1) Names, many times not by themselves but in a list. Registers of pastors, deacons, confirmed members, those who died in battle, the victims of disasters, those who donated gifts, and prominent members of the community. 2) Inscriptions commemorating certain events, many times just a date, but usually the name of the event as well, or even a longer description. 3) Quotations or more rarely paraphrases from the Bible of religious songs, mostly psalms. An especially important part of the context is the clenodia on the one hand, and the so called paramenta, which are drapery offered by the community in many regions for decorating the church. Both types of objects gain their significance from that they usually contain all of the above elements at the same time; that is, the inscription captured on the object is usually tied to a - many times relatively12 determined — date and an denoted event with actual names tied to it, and related to a Biblical context. We find the same about the paramenta as well; only, when the latter usually present their message “long-winded”, and are on display on each day of the year, the former — obviously due to problems related to the creation — use fewer words and we can see them only on special occasions. It is true for both types 12 That is, not referencing a year, but the service period of X curator. 18 Sárospataki Füzetek 21, 2017 -2
