Kunt Ernő szerk.: Kép-hagyomány – Nép-hagyomány (Miskolc, 1990)

I. RÉSZTANULMÁNYOK - Tatiana Voronina: A lubok helye és szerepe az orosz népi kultúra rendszerében a 19. század 20-as és 60-as évei között

yard than anywhere else. This shop did indeed offer a diversified collection of curiosities. . . plus a few engraved images: the portrait of Hozreva-Mirza wearing a sheepskin cap, portraits of some generals with crooked noses wearing cocked hats. Moreover, the doors of such shops would usually be covered with bundles of pictures imprinted with dies on huge sheets of paper testifying to the originality of the creation talent of Russian folk. One print depicted princess Miliktrisa Kirbityevna, another the city of Jerusalem with its houses and churches unceremoniously covered with red paint, and a stretch of landscape with two Russian peasants at prayer wearing mittens. Usually there were few buyers of these pictures but the crowd of spectators was great"* (III. 4). The entertainment functions of lubok pictures were displayed at numerous fairs and bazars. Annually there were 245 of these in the Moscow province alone. Lubok comedies, performed in galleries, constituted a special entertainment. The main appeal of luboks were their brightness, garish inscriptions and the poignancy of their plots, and this attracted numerous spectators (III. 5). Lubok was an information carrier, disseminating material about wonderful and unusual, abnormal and ridiculous things: „Here is a fair maiden Yulia Pastrana, 23, and her most wonderful fiance Rogerom Barcom, 53" (1852). As a rule, the image itself carried the entire narrative content; the picture itself presented the entire story. The inscription and the tiny text were only prodding the imagination of the spectators, the rest being the product of their own fantasy. The freedom of interpretation constituted a special attraction for the urban population. Besides Moscow and Petersburg, there were numerous small towns, whose residents were not predominently engaged in industrial production, but mainly constituted petty bourgeoisie, merchants, officials, craftsmen and labourers. Old traditions sometimes adapted to the new conditions, were almost as tenacious in such towns as in rural milieux. The conservative character of the merchants, and the daily life of petty bourgeoisie, helped preserve more or less inchanged the patriarchal order, oldfashioned clothes and time-honoured decor of living rooms. In the 5s merchants of Moscow constituted a specific social class of the city. Their educational level has considerably improved, but they persisted in being old-believers. The numerical strength of merchants jointly with the petty bourgeoisie in Moscow amounted to approximately 12 000. The themes dawn from everyday life, gradually introduced into lubok pictures in the 4s, reflected the features of the merchants' home life (III. 6), and of matchmaking (III. 7). Lubok pictures with edifying themes constituted a specific group: they conveyed the dangers of heavy drinking, the usefulness of smallpox vaccination, the perniciousness of greed for money, laziness, etc. But these pictures did not aim to describe the petty bourgeois morals and manners: quite the reverse. These pictures invited the viewers to admire an idealised Russian village, rather than real life. This is proved by the names of the sheets: „Country entertainments" (1852), „Happy solitude" (1859) with the inscription ..Everything is wonderful in this world." Some sheets were used for fortune telling, and were deemed to be indispensable for the daily life of merchants and petty bourgeoisie. The sheets were divided into sections, wheat or barley grains were thrown at the surface, and the location of the grains indicated the future. In such cases, the pictures had a magic function. In the mid 19th century, the changes in culture of everyday life took place in socially heterogeneous urban conditions: hence the difference of their effects amongst various groups of urban population.

9 In Russian towns they were enhanced by strong class prejudices, as well as the specific peculiarities of professional activities of certain groups, such as craftsmen working in small industrial enterprises, tradesmen, carriers, etc. Along with the process of urbanisation, which to some extent integrated everyday