Tóth Arnold: Vőfélykönyvek és vőfélyversek a 19. században - Officina Musei 22. (Miskolc, 2015)
Summary
starting from origination and the appearance of the writing to internal structure, individual initials, indication of names and dating. Every chapbook and some of the manuscripts contain the verses in an order that corresponds to the customary sequence of events in any wedding scenario. A prerequisite for comparative analysis is the identification of comparable categories within the material available, the most obvious method of this being a grouping of text families according to contents and topics. To set up such a system, one needs to understand the 19th-century customs of weddings and the development thereof. The chapter titled A Customary Framework defines the types of weddings based on related literature (on-day, two-day and three-day weddings, held at one or two houses, including many transitional versions), while making it clear that this treatise is aimed at studying texts and not researching into customs. In addition to wedding event scenarios, this chapter also describes the role of wedding ushers and historical changes to this role. Chapter four is called Analysis of Texts, first looking into the surviving forms of public poetry at three different levels, including clear textual analogies and concordance (surviving variants), characteristic topoi (e.g. a nonsense menu of dishes; divine nature of marriage) and some motifs (e.g. a captain seeking lodging for his army; Noah’s dove bringing a sign) that tend to recur. The comparative analysis was performed in line with the textual types of public poetry. For derisive rhymes, relatively few analogies were found, but multiple topoi and motifs of derisive rhymes about unmarried and married women, as well as about ethnic groups appear in vőfély verses. The derisive dispute of wedding ushers evokes disputes recorded in students’ and religious polemic literature in the early modern age, as well as the classically-rooted, epically-worded rivalry and vituperation acted out in school dramas. As far as lying verses and wedding-time jesting verses are concerned, there are surprising examples of textual concordance, primarily including the topoi of the world turned upside down, a land of plenty (a notion of El Dorado) and mythical animal fights. These were generally handed down from manuscript to manuscript, without the ‘mediation’ of chapbooks, sometimes keeping alive 17th- century motifs and types of texts. Examples of adhortatory and educative poetry for wedding celebrations are mostly limited to the group of texts called wedding ushers’ dispute on marriage, though a multitude of other minor analogies are found, as well. All substantial/functional groups of vőfély verses are strongly influenced by 18th-century wedding celebration congratulatory verses, which migrate across the texts as formulary, commonplace stanzas, being loosely attached to rhymes at various points within the scenario, normally in the form of introductory/welcome or closing/farewell passages. Other types of texts discussed include one example of both abecedaria (alphabetical acrostics) and parodies/travesties, which preserve the traditions of school didactics. The three-level comparative analysis of texts is followed by a study of style and poiesis, borrowed from public poetry. Drawing on the traditions of manuscript song 534
