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

Leaving a Mark: The Calvinist Landscapes of Remembrance

communal remembrance? What, if anything, do they have to say about the manifestation of the transcendent?

Of course it is possible to short-circuit the issue of these scribbles. Most people only see bored youngsters trying to amuse themselves behind these, or the manifestation of the ancient instinct of “leaving a mark” to say the most; a type of “hie fuit” scripts which have been around — especially in “indecent” places — since mankind mastered the art of writing. This is how Napoleon’s soldiers scribbled on the ancient works of art in Egypt, memorializing their own particular existence for eternity. And indeed, most of these scribbles contain no more than a name, sometimes just the initials, and a year. At the same time, the question may be raised: why does someone who visits the same church all his life feel the need to leave a notification on the bench to the others with whom he goes there that he was there? And why does this happen more prominently in Protestant churches, particularly in Calvinist ones, than in other ones? In order to answer these questions, it is worth-while to look at the social environment of the scribbles on the one hand, and at the actual context on the other hand.

Namely, the scribbles usually do not appear arbitrarily in the church space. One of the most important aspects of utilizing the church space in Calvinist churches used to be the regulated seating arrangement. This arrangement worked differently in town communities and in villages; moreover, the actual realization was usually location specific, although we can find more or less general characteristics. Together with the social changes of the 20th century, this strict application of this system was attenuated, and even faded away mostly, sooner in urban settings, and later in villages as well, but there are still communities where it is in use.11 The system is basically based on that the seating arrangement in the church reflects the social structure of the community. This reflection may be realized in projecting the structure of the settlement on the church (and the cemetery), but it usually follows the peculiar hierarchy of the church space. The most prestigious part of this space is center of the liturgical space, the Lord’s table and the immediate surroundings of the pulpit (the “marketplace” of the church, as they often call it). This is followed by the benches in the nave of the church (this is the part that is often called the actual “church”), and then the galleries, the spaces under the gallery, the entrances — and the atrium - followed by the entrance halls, and finally the buildings outside the church building. The men and the women usually sat in the nave, separated, on the two sides of the pulpit, facing each other; their order was determined by the position of each family in the social hierarchy, as well as their age and marital status. The youth (many times even the girls) were seated in the galleries. The children were seated variably; for

11 From the rich literature on the church seating arrangement see for example Árpád Csiszár: A régi nemzetségi rend nyomai a Felső-tiszavidéki templomokban és temetőkben, in Imre Dankó - Imola Küllös (szerk.): Vallási néprajz t„ Budapest, ELTE Folklore Tanszéke, 1985,157- 197; István Faggyas: Lakosság és templomi ülésrend, 1-2. köt., Debrecen, Kossuth Lajos Tudományegyetem Néprajzi Tanszéke, 1990-1991.

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