Folk puppet theater "Vertep.

03.03.2019

Natalya Plakhteeva

Word "nativity scene" comes from Old Church Slavonic "nativity scene" - "cave". This name is used by the Orthodox Church to refer to the birthplace of Jesus Christ.

Nativity scene in the narrow sense of the word is a folk Christmas performance about the history of the Nativity of Christ, played out in a special box. Previously, the Vertep action was necessarily accompanied by the singing of various religious chants, which distinguished it from the secular folk drama.

The Nativity Theater was part of the folk Christmas carols and the walking of mummers with a "star". The time of walking with the nativity scene continued throughout Christmas time, that is, from the Nativity of Christ (January 7) until the Baptism of the Lord (January 19). The mummers carried the crib box on a sled when they went from house to house with their performance. Rising to the porch, they asked permission to carol. If the hosts were willing to accept them, carolers would bring the theater into the room and the performance would begin. The children sang the troparion of the holiday:

"Your Christmas, Christ our God,

ascension of the world, the light of reason,

in it, for the stars serving as a star, I study

Bow to you, the Sun of Truth,

and lead you from the height of the East.

Lord, glory to Thee!”

Your Christmas, Christ our God,

illumined the world with the light of knowledge of God;

for then - the stars, as God, who served

Were taught by a star

to worship You, the Sun of righteousness,

and know You, East from on high.

In our kindergarten Christmas holidays are traditionally held on Svyatki. Its indispensable attribute, which occupies a place of honor, is the Christmas puppet show or nativity scene. We have several types of this theatre.

I made my first theater about six years ago. To make a cave, I took cardboard box and decorated it with papier-mâché. Then I painted the resulting cave with paints.

To depict a starry night, I decided to make a background. To do this, I took a cardboard sheet, painted it black paint, and when it dried, she glued the stars, roughly depicting the constellation Pisces. According to legend, this is where the Star of Bethlehem appeared.

To show the nativity theater, the background is attached to the cave-nativity scene with special wire fasteners

I made all the characters from fabric using the traditional folk doll method.

With the help of this Nativity scene, every year I tell children a Christmas story

Our pupils participated in the city Christmas competition. They made and sent him three works. But the jury chose the creative work "Christmas Nativity Scene" . Arina made it. She made the cave in the same way as I did, and Arina made the main characters using the technique "Paper plastic"

The children also took part in the Christmas craft competition. And there was this good job in a flat image

And once the leaders of the children's Orthodox center "Grain of Faith" for the Christmas holiday offered us several ideas for decorating the hall, as well as their Nativity Theatre. All figures of fine workmanship were made of porcelain

The priest of our church, father Pavel, presented beautiful figures of the main characters of the Christmas story

Gathering them together and placing them near the nativity scene, they will take pride of place on our Christmas holiday!

The modern Christmas theater is preserved in kindergartens, schools, centers children's creativity. In some families, parents arrange their own cribs, reviving the tradition of home theater.

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In our kindergarten, teachers often show puppet shows to children. The puppet show contributes to the development of such aspects of education.

T old unnecessary rubber toys cut off the bottom and threw away. For work, we only need the head from the toy. From unnecessary.

puppet theater plays big role in shaping the personality of the child. It brings a lot of joy to children. The doll itself is very close.

Puppet theater in kindergarten Preschoolers are very fond of watching puppet theater performances. It is close, understandable, accessible and very interesting to them.

The parents of our group suggested visiting the Saratov Regional Puppet Theatre. We took advantage of the offer. Parents organized.

The Nativity Theater was a large box, inside of which there was a stage, usually two-tiered. On the upper stage, the worship of the newborn baby Jesus was shown, on the lower stage - episodes with Herod, after whose death the everyday part of the performance followed. Wooden puppets were attached from below to a wire, with the help of which the crib-maker moved them along the slots in the floor. The main scenery on the stage is a nursery with a baby. At the back wall were the figures of the righteous Joseph with a long beard and the holy Virgin Mary. Scenes with the birth of Christ were traditionally played out in the upper tier. The owner of the den usually spoke the text himself different voices and drove puppets. The chorus boys sang Christmas carols. And if a musician was present, he accompanied the singing and dancing with music. The puppeteers and accompanying musicians and the choir went from house to house, or staged performances in places of public gathering - in the marketplaces.

Plot

Christmas Drama

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The modern recreated nativity scene of Ensemble Dm. Pokrovsky

Social base

The environment from which the nativity scene grew is usually considered to be the Ukrainian students, mainly the Kyiv "spuds", who contributed to its introduction to the north, for example, to Siberia. The time of existence of the crib drama in Poland and Russia is estimated at approximately 200 years. In the first half of the 19th century, the nativity scene disappeared as an everyday phenomenon, appearing at times in remote places in Belarus and Ukraine and more firmly lingering in the life of the Ukrainian peasantry of Eastern Galicia. The text of the Khorolsky den, published in the book by E. Markovsky, recorded in 1928, testifies that the den drama in Ukraine survived until the beginning of the 20th century.

Nativity theater was a favorite entertainment for children pre-revolutionary Russia. Went with theater-boxes from December 25 during Christmas week, and sometimes even until Great Lent itself, but after the Christmas week it was forbidden to show the spiritual part, only the secular part remained.

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Literature

Markovsky. Ukrainian nativity scene. Research and texts, v. I, view. All-Ukrainian. acad. Sciences, - Kiev, 1929 (Ukrainian)
Beletskiy A. ancient theater in Russia. The beginnings of the theater in the folk life and school life of Southern Rus' in Ukraine, - M ., 1923
Petrov, the South Russian theater and in particular the nativity scene, - “Kyiv. old.", 1882, XII
Kisil O. Ukrainian theater - Kiev: view. "Knigospilka", 1905 (Ukrainian)
Galagan. Ukrainian nativity scene - Kharkiv: “Kyiv. old.», 1882 (Ukrainian)
Franco. Before the history of Ukrainian nativity scene of the 18th century, 1st century, - “Zap. Sciences. t-va im. Shevchenko”, Lvov, 1906, v. 71-73 (Ukrainian)
His own. New materials on the history of the Ukrainian nativity scene, ibid., vol. 82, 1908; Shchukin N., Nativity scene, Vestn. Geographic islands, vol. II, - St. Petersburg. , 1860
Peretz Vl. Puppet theater in Rus' ( historical sketch), “Annually. imp. theatres, St. Petersburg. , season 1894-1895 (appendix, book 1), etc., - St. Petersburg. , 1895
Vinogradov N. N. Great Russian nativity scene, “Izv. Dep. Russian lang. and verbal Acad. Sciences, vol. X, book. 3 and 4, St. Petersburg, 1905 (with detailed bibliography); vol. XI, book. 4, - St. Petersburg. , 1906 (additions to the bibliography)
His own, Belarusian nativity scene, ibid., vol. XIII, book. 2, - St. Petersburg. , 1908
Kisel O. Ukrainian crib. - Pt., 1916. - 79 p.
Kulakov A.E. Seventeenth century television. - Ethnosphere. - 2011. N 2 (149). - S. 36-40 - phot. col. - ISSN 2078-5380

Notes

An excerpt characterizing the Nativity scene (theater)

- Je suis votre [I am your] faithful slave, et a vous seule je puis l "avouer. My children are ce sont les entraves de mon existence. [I can confess to you alone. My children are a burden to my existence.] - He paused, expressing with a gesture his humility to a cruel fate.
Anna Pavlovna thought for a moment.
- Have you ever thought about marrying your prodigal son Anatole? They say, she said, that old maids are ont la manie des Marieiages. [they have a mania for marriage.] I still do not feel this weakness behind me, but I have one petite personne [little lady], who is very unhappy with her father, une parente a nous, une princesse [our relative, princess] Bolkonskaya. - Prince Vasily did not answer, although with the quickness of thought and memory characteristic of secular people, he showed with a movement of his head that he had taken this information into consideration.
“No, do you know that this Anatole costs me 40,000 a year,” he said, apparently unable to restrain his sad train of thought. He paused.
– What will happen in five years if it goes like this? Voila l "avantage d" etre pere. [Here is the benefit of being a father.] Is she rich, your princess?
“My father is very rich and stingy. He lives in the village. You know, this well-known prince Bolkonsky, who was retired under the late emperor and nicknamed the Prussian king. He is very clever man but odd and heavy. La pauvre petite est malheureuse, comme les pierres. [The poor thing is as unhappy as stones.] She has a brother, that's what recently married Lise Meinen, Kutuzov's adjutant. He will be with me today.
- Ecoutez, chere Annette, [Listen, dear Annette,] - said the prince, suddenly taking his interlocutor by the hand and bending her down for some reason. - Arrangez moi cette affaire et je suis votre [Arrange this business for me, and I'm yours forever] the most faithful slave a tout jamais pan, comme mon headman m "ecrit des [as my headman writes to me] reports: rest er n !. She is good surname and rich.All I need.
And he, with those free and familiar, graceful movements that distinguished him, took the lady-in-waiting by the hand, kissed her, and, kissing her, waved the lady-in-waiting's hand, lounging on an armchair and looking away.
- Attendez [Wait], - said Anna Pavlovna, thinking. - I'll talk to Lise today (la femme du jeune Bolkonsky). [with Lisa (wife of the young Bolkonsky).] And maybe this will be settled. Ce sera dans votre famille, que je ferai mon apprentissage de vieille fille. [In your family, I will begin to learn the trade of the old girl.]

Anna Pavlovna's drawing room began to gradually fill up. The highest nobility of St. Petersburg arrived, people of the most heterogeneous in age and character, but the same in the society in which everyone lived; the daughter of Prince Vasily, the beautiful Helen, arrived, who had called in for her father to go with him to the feast of the envoy. She was in cipher and ball gown. Also known as la femme la plus seduisante de Petersbourg [the most charming woman in St. Petersburg], the young, little princess Bolkonskaya, who got married last winter and now did not go out to the big world because of her pregnancy, but went on small evenings, also arrived. Prince Hippolyte, son of Prince Vasily, arrived with Mortemar, whom he introduced; Abbé Morio and many others also came.
- You haven't seen it yet? or: - you don't know ma tante [with my aunt]? - Anna Pavlovna said to the visiting guests and very seriously led them to a little old woman in high bows, who floated out of another room, as soon as the guests began to arrive, she called them by name, slowly shifting her eyes from the guest to ma tante [aunt], and then departed.
All the guests performed the ceremony of greeting an unknown, uninteresting and unnecessary aunt to no one. Anna Pavlovna followed their greetings with sad, solemn sympathy, tacitly approving them. Ma tante spoke to everyone in the same terms about his health, about her health and about the health of Her Majesty, which today was, thank God, better. All those who approached, without showing haste out of decency, with a sense of relief from the heavy duty they had performed, moved away from the old woman, so that they would not go up to her all evening.
The young Princess Bolkonskaya arrived with work in an embroidered gold velvet bag. Her pretty, with a slightly blackened mustache, her upper lip was short in teeth, but it opened all the nicer and stretched out even more nicely sometimes and fell on the lower one. As is always the case with quite attractive women, her shortcoming - the shortness of her lips and her half-open mouth - seemed to be her special, her own beauty. It was fun for everyone to look at this pretty mother-to-be, full of health and liveliness, who so easily endured her situation. It seemed to the old men and the bored, gloomy young people who looked at her that they themselves were becoming like her after having been and talked with her for some time. Anyone who spoke to her and saw at every word her bright smile and shining white teeth, which were constantly visible, thought that he was especially amiable today. And that's what everyone thought.
The little princess, waddling, walked around the table with small quick steps with a work bag on her arm and, gaily straightening her dress, sat down on the sofa, near the silver samovar, as if everything she did was part de plaisir [entertainment] for her and for everyone those around her.
- J "ai apporte mon ouvrage [I grabbed the job]," she said, unfolding her purse and addressing everyone together.
“Look, Annette, ne me jouez pas un mauvais tour,” she turned to the hostess. - Vous m "avez ecrit, que c" etait une toute petite soiree; voyez, comme je suis attifee. [Don't play a bad joke on me; you wrote to me that you had a very small evening. See how badly I'm dressed.]
And she spread her hands to show her, in lace, an elegant gray dress, girded with a wide ribbon a little below her breasts.
- Soyez tranquille, Lise, vous serez toujours la plus jolie [Be calm, you will be the best], - answered Anna Pavlovna.
- Vous savez, mon mari m "abandonne," she continued in the same tone, referring to the general, "il va se faire tuer. Dites moi, pourquoi cette vilaine guerre, [You know, my husband is leaving me. Going to his death. Say , why this nasty war,] - she said to Prince Vasily and, without waiting for an answer, turned to the daughter of Prince Vasily, to the beautiful Helen.
- Quelle delicieuse personne, que cette petite princesse! [What a charming person this little princess is!] - said Prince Vasily quietly to Anna Pavlovna.
Shortly after the little princess, a massive, stout young man with a cropped head, spectacles, light trousers in the fashion of the time, with a high frill, and in a brown tailcoat, entered. This fat young man was the illegitimate son of the famous Catherine's nobleman, Count Bezukhoi, who was now dying in Moscow. He had not served anywhere yet, had just arrived from abroad, where he had been brought up, and was for the first time in society. Anna Pavlovna greeted him with a bow, which belonged to the people of the lowest hierarchy in her salon. But, despite this inferior greeting, at the sight of Pierre entering, Anna Pavlovna displayed anxiety and fear, similar to that which is expressed at the sight of something too huge and unusual for a place. Although, indeed, Pierre was somewhat larger than the other men in the room, but this fear could only relate to that intelligent and at the same time timid, observant and natural look that distinguished him from everyone in this living room.
- C "est bien aimable a vous, monsieur Pierre, d" etre venu voir une pauvre malade, [It is very kind of you, Pierre, that you came to visit the poor patient,] Anna Pavlovna told him, exchanging frightened glances with her aunt, to which she let him down. Pierre murmured something incomprehensible and continued to look for something with his eyes. He smiled joyfully, cheerfully, bowing to the little princess as if he were a close acquaintance, and went up to his aunt. Anna Pavlovna's fear was not in vain, because Pierre, without listening to his aunt's speech about her majesty's health, left her. Anna Pavlovna stopped him in fright with the words:
"You don't know Abbe Morio?" he is very interesting person… - she said.
– Yes, I heard about his plan for eternal peace, and it is very interesting, but hardly possible…
“Do you think? ...” said Anna Pavlovna, in order to say something and turn again to her occupations as a mistress of the house, but Pierre did the reverse impoliteness. First, he, without listening to the words of his interlocutor, left; now he stopped his interlocutor with his conversation, who needed to leave him. Bending his head and spreading his big legs, he began to prove to Anna Pavlovna why he believed that the abbot's plan was a chimera.
"We'll talk later," said Anna Pavlovna, smiling.
And getting rid of young man unable to live, she returned to her occupations as a mistress of the house and continued to listen and look, ready to give help at the point where the conversation was weakening. Just as the owner of a spinning shop, having seated the workers in their places, paces around the establishment, noticing the immobility or the unusual, creaking, too loud sound of the spindle, hurriedly walks, restrains or sets it in its proper course, so Anna Pavlovna, pacing around her drawing room, approached the silent or a mug that was talking too much, and with one word or movement would start up again a regular, decent conversational machine. But among these worries, one could still see in her a special fear for Pierre. She looked at him solicitously as he approached to hear what was being said about Mortemart, and went to another circle where the abbe was speaking. For Pierre, brought up abroad, this evening of Anna Pavlovna was the first he saw in Russia. He knew that all the intelligentsia of St. Petersburg were gathered here, and his eyes widened like a child in a toy shop. He was afraid of missing the smart conversations he might overhear. Looking at the confident and graceful expressions of the faces gathered here, he kept waiting for something particularly clever. Finally, he approached Morio. The conversation seemed interesting to him, and he stopped, waiting for an opportunity to express his thoughts, as young people like it.

) is a folk puppet theater, which is a two-story wooden box resembling a stage platform. In Russia, the crib theater penetrated into late XVII - early XVIII centuries from Poland through Ukraine and Belarus. The name is associated with the original depiction of scenes about the life of Jesus Christ in a cave, where he was hidden from King Herod.

For Ukrainians, Belarusians and Russians, the idea was divided into two parts: religious and domestic. Over time, the religious part was reduced and acquired a local color, and the repertoire expanded and the nativity scene turned into a folk theater.

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Nativity device

The Nativity Theater was a large box, inside of which there was a stage, usually two-tiered. On the upper stage, the worship of the newborn baby Jesus was shown, on the lower stage - episodes with Herod, after whose death the everyday part of the performance followed. Wooden puppets were attached from below to a wire, with the help of which the crib-maker moved them along the slots in the floor. The main scenery on the stage is a nursery with a baby. At the back wall were the figures of the righteous Joseph with a long beard and the holy Virgin Mary. Scenes with the birth of Christ were traditionally played out in the upper tier. The owner of the den usually recited the text in different voices and led the puppets. The chorus boys sang Christmas carols. And if a musician was present, he accompanied the singing and dancing with music. The puppeteers and accompanying musicians and the choir went from house to house, or staged performances in places of public gathering - in the marketplaces.

Plot

Christmas Drama

see also

Literature
- Markovsky. Ukrainian nativity scene. Research and texts, v. I, view. All-Ukrainian. acad. Sciences, - Kiev, 1929 (Ukrainian)
- Beletskiy A. Ancient theater in Russia. The beginnings of the theater in the folk life and school life of Southern Rus' in Ukraine, - M., 1923
- Petrov, the South Russian theater and in particular the nativity scene, - “Kyiv. old.", 1882, XII
- Kisil O. Ukrainian theater - Kiev: view. "Knigospilka", 1905 (Ukrainian)
- Galagan. Ukrainian nativity scene - Kharkiv: “Kyiv. old.», 1882 (Ukrainian)
- Franco. Before the history of Ukrainian nativity scene of the 18th century, 1st century, - “Zap. Sciences. t-va im. Shevchenko”, Lvov, 1906, v. 71-73 (Ukrainian)
- His own. New materials on the history of the Ukrainian nativity scene, ibid., vol. 82, 1908; Shchukin N., Nativity scene, Vestn. Geographic islands, vol. II, - St. Petersburg. , 1860
- Peretz Vl. Puppet theater in Rus' (historical essay), “Yearly. imp. theatres, St. Petersburg. , season 1894-1895 (appendix, book 1), etc., - St. Petersburg. , 1895
- Vinogradov N. N. Great Russian nativity scene, “Izv. Dep. Russian lang. and verbal Acad. Sciences, vol. X, book. 3 and 4, St. Petersburg, 1905 (with detailed bibliography); vol. XI, book. 4, - St. Petersburg. , 1906 (additions to the bibliography)
- His own, Belarusian nativity scene, ibid., vol. XIII, book. 2, - St. Petersburg. , 1908
- Kisel O. Ukrainian crib. - Pt., 1916. - 79 p.

In the 19th century, on the eve of the Nativity of Christ in Belarus and Ukraine, in the Pskov region and Siberia, they went with a Nativity scene. Village children in high paper crowns, with epaulettes on their shoulders and elegant staffs in their hands 1 are the "Persian kings" who came to bow to the Divine Infant. Decorated with gilded paper and popular prints a small plywood box with a gable roof, traveling with the Christmas kings - this is a Christmas puppet theater or nativity scene. The mummers usually carried the crib on a sled when they went from house to house with their performance. Having risen to the porch and entered the hallway, they asked permission to carol. If the hosts were disposed to accept the nativity scene, the carolers would bring the theater into the room, put it on a table or two chairs, and the performance would begin. The children sang the troparion of the holiday: "Your Christmas, Christ our God, rise to the world the light of reason, in it, for the stars serving as a star, I learn to bow to You, to the Sun of Truth and lead You from the height of the East, Lord, glory to You!" The painted doors of the theater box opened, the curtains parted, a doll representing an Angel lit candles at a tiny footlight. Church chants were replaced by instructive spiritual verses or folk carols, the rhythmic speech of the characters flowed either into prose or into song. Before the audience was the story of the expulsion of Adam and Eve from paradise, the Nativity of the Savior and the beating of the Bethlehem babies, ending with the death of Herod. After the spiritual action, dramas were often shown comic scene secular content 2 to the accompaniment of a peasant instrumental ensemble, such as "troist music" (violin, tambourine, sopilka, drum, bandura) [Arkhimovich 1976, 151]. The ensemble performed as a folk dance music(Levonikha, Komarinsky, Gopachok), as well as accompaniment to songs taken from popular prints 3 .

The time of walking with the nativity scene varied depending on the locality. For example, in the Vitebsk and Mogilev provinces, the performance was shown on the first three days of the Christmas holidays, as well as on the eve of Christmas and on New Year's Day [Romanov 1912, 103]. In Minsk, the puppet play was watched from Christmas to Candlemas (December 25/January 7 - February 2/15) [Shane 1902, 121]. In the Pskov villages, the Christ-worship of the verteppers could continue all Christmas time, i.e. from Christmas until the Epiphany (until January 6/19) [Kopanevich 1896, 8], and in the Kupyansky district of the Kharkov province until Great Lent [Selivanov 1884, 515].

Village performances were closely connected with folk Christmas rituals and therefore were rarely shown during non-Christmas time. But professional city verteppers could perform at fairs in any calendar period. Thus, in the city of Baturin in the Ukraine, the owner of the nativity scene demonstrated the secular part of the drama to the officers during the summer camps [Markovsky 1929, 177].

The word "nativity scene" comes from the Old Slavonic "vertep" - "cave". It is this name that is used in Orthodox church poetry to designate the birthplace of the Savior: "Today the Virgin gives birth to the Most Substantial, and the earth brings a den to the Unapproachable ..." (kontakion of the holiday). Some researchers prefer folk etymology, linking the word "nativity scene" with the verb "twirl". Christmas puppet theaters were often decorated with spinning round dances of flat figures or stars, which could give rise to such an etymology [Fedas 1987, 7-9].

In Ukrainian Transcarpathia, the word "Bethlehem" (from Bethlehem) has taken root. The Belarusian puppet drama has acquired the names "Betleyka" or "Batleyka" (from "Betleyem" - Bethlehem). In the regions of Belarus bordering Poland, the name "shopka" is adopted (from the Polish "szopka" - hayloft).

Nativity scene in the narrow sense of the word is a folk Christmas performance played in a special box with the help of rod puppets, accompanied by singing and dialogues. In a broad sense, a crib performance can be called any Christmas act about the beating of babies or Christmas, performed both by puppets and by people. The nativity scene must necessarily be accompanied by the singing of various religious cants, which distinguishes it from the secular folk drama of live actors, which could also be shown at Christmas (about Russian folk drama see [Savushkina 1988]). In a broad sense, the nativity scene is part of the carol complex4 of folk Christmas time and is almost always inextricably linked with different forms caroling: walking mummers with a "star" (in the form of a multi-colored lantern on a pole) or a manger with a Baby; schoolchildren reading Christmas poems "racey" or rhythmic dialogues of a "catechizing" nature, singing spiritual verses in order to receive rewards, etc.

This article is devoted mainly to the crib theater in the narrow sense of the word.

The nativity scene as a puppet theater with extended dialogues of the characters (or the nativity scene in the narrow sense of the word) is a relatively late phenomenon that developed among the Eastern Slavs no earlier than the 18th century. It could, of course, have been preceded by plays by live actors. school theater, similar in content and composition to subsequent puppet shows. The singing of Christmas chants by seminarians or clerics at a portable Christmas box with motionless figures can also be considered the initial stage in the development of the crib drama, the first performers of which were precisely the students of theological schools. Gradually, from the heritage of book culture, the crib theater became a phenomenon of folklore [Petrov 1882, 438-480]. It should be noted here that in the XVIII - early XIX century. there was no insurmountable gap between the oral (folk) and book (school) spectacle traditions. On the one hand, the verbal creativity of the seminarians was based on the canon (and canonicity is characteristic of folklore creativity), and they easily saturate stereotypical plots and generally recognized compositional models used in their own works with ornate syllabic verses. On the other hand, the peasants and the middle strata of the urban population were introduced to book literature through the church, popular engravings and popular prints.

I. Franko considered the text contained in the Polish-Russian school handwritten collection of 1788-1791 to be the oldest copy of the nativity drama and recreating, from the point of view of the researcher, the presentation of the second half of XVII in. Since the list identified by Franco, in his opinion, is older than all known Polish and Ukrainian texts nativity scene, the researcher is inclined to consider Volhynia as the birthplace of the nativity theater as a region of coexistence and interaction of the cultures of Poland, Ukraine and Belarus [Franko 1906, 35-38]. If we accept the famous and very controversial testimony of Erazm Izopolsky [Izopolsky 1843, 65-66], who saw a nativity scene in Stavischi with the date 1591, the appearance of the nativity drama among the Eastern Slavs can be attributed to the 16th century. To this evidence, unlike I. Franko, V.N. Vsevolozhsky-Gerngross, who even believes that the nativity scene in Ukraine could have appeared earlier than this date [Vsevolozhsky-Gerngross 1959, 85]. Most researchers, however, give the palm in the issue of the origin of the nativity scene to Poland, attributing its occurrence to the 16th-17th centuries. (Ts.K. Norvid, I.I. Krashevsky, H. Yurkovsky and others). However, citing such early dates for the appearance of the crib theater among the Slavs, researchers do not always specify which theater is meant. Evidence of the XVI-XVII centuries. about the den can be conditionally divided into two groups: the texts of plays from handwritten collections and documents that testify to the existence of early crib boxes. At the same time, there is no sufficiently convincing evidence that the pieces of handwritten collections were really played by puppets, and that the mentioned boxes were really intended for theatrical action, and were not just still images of the Nativity, with which they went caroling. In the latter case, one should speak not about the theater, but about a quasi-theatrical phenomenon. Apparently, the crib as a theater could not have appeared before the Union of Lublin, since the crib drama is a kind of peculiar synthesis of Catholic-Orthodox tendencies, which make up the whole originality of the crib Christmas play - its "flavor".

Almost all indisputable records of East Slavic crib puppet shows were made at the end of the 18th - beginning of the 19th century. 19th century The final stage of the life of the nativity scene can be considered individual performances in the beginning. 20th century (Minsk Batleyka 1915 [Byadulya 1922]). The last fixation of folk crib texts from eyewitnesses is the recordings of Oleksa Oshurkevich in Volyn in the 80s of the XX century. [Oshurkevich 1996].

So, the most favorable conditions for the formation of the crib theater were formed on the vast territory of the western lands of tsarist Russia (in some regions of Ukraine, Belarus, Poland). In all these lands, similar ideas could have arisen almost simultaneously. Their similarity can be explained not so much by borrowing as by the commonality of the cultural environment that gave rise to them. An important and unique sign of such an environment can be considered the coexistence and interpenetration of Catholic and Orthodox cultures 5 .

In the external forms of crib boxes, elements of the Catholic and Orthodox church art. Thus, the boxes of the Mogilevsky [Romanov 1912, 73] and Sokirensky [Markovsky 1929, 11-13] nativity scenes resemble a retable (Catholic image behind the altar) in their structure 6 . At the same time, these same forms can be "seen" through the outlines of some Orthodox iconostases of the post-Petrine period.

Nativity boxes were often built in the image of temples. The final register of the nativity scene, of the "retable" type (Sokirensky nativity scene), could resemble an Orthodox iconostasis, and the upper floor of the nativity scene, of the "church" type (Elninsky nativity scene [Vinogradov 1908, 3-7]), was often designed as an altar barrier in a church. The structure of the iconostasis was sometimes imitated here by the backdrop paintings. In the Elninsk theater "above the main arch there is the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove. Under the top (under the roof) there are clouds and cherubim (twelve in number) soaring in pairs on them. In the piers between the arches and windows there are six angels in long robes" [Vinogradov 1908, 5 ]. Russian high iconostasis from the 16th-17th centuries. crowned with the icon "New Testament Trinity", in which there was an image of the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove [Icon, 14]. The composition of the Deesis row could include icons of archangels in long robes. Thus, the individual elements of the painting of the den echo the images of the iconostasis. Nativity boxes in the form of an Orthodox church with rounded domes were widespread in the eastern part of Belarus 7 . In Volhynia and Transcarpathia, there were also cribs like temples, only here their outlines resembled the facade of a Catholic double-towered basilica (Slavutinsky nativity scene [Markovsky 1929, 116-118]). In Ukraine, scenes in the form of a house or a retable were more accepted. Although it is impossible to deduce immutable laws here, one-story box-houses are more characteristic of areas not too far from Poland (see the description of the Lvov nativity scene [Fedas 1987, 161]). Perhaps this is due to the influence of the Catholic tradition of still temple images of the Nativity 8 .

Actually, the Russian one-story crib theater is a phenomenon of a different order than the one-story boxes of Western Ukrainian or Western Belarusian lands. In Russia, the nativity theater was perceived as separate from church life, since the voluminous and even more puppet images of sacred Persons could not be combined with the canons of Orthodox art. The nativity scene ceases to be associated with the temple, the iconostasis; it is made into a simple box for puppet shows. The religious part starts to come to naught here. The main emphasis falls on the events associated with Herod and the massacre of the babies. The latter is connected with the wide distribution in Russia of the folk Christmas drama "Tsar Maximilian" for live actors, which tells about the godless tyrant and his son, "the recalcitrant Prince Adolf," who was killed by him. In cases where the reduction of the religious part in the Russian nativity scene did not occur - which is typical for Siberian tradition[Shchukin 1860, 25-35; Krasheninnikov 1966, 57-58] - the nativity play seemed to be "flattened", becoming not so much "sculptural" as "icon-painting". This was manifested in an increase in the conventionality and "detachment" of the expressive language of the dramatic narrative: the dialogues of the characters completely disappeared, they were replaced by the singing of the choir, attention to repentant topics increased (performing spiritual verses about death, etc.). The secular part of the performance began to be perceived as incompatible with the religious part, so that the comic scenes were performed in addition to the nativity scene by live actors.

The philosophy of the vertep space has two aspects: the symbolic content of its elements external decoration- and formulas of etiquette behavior of characters, determined by this content. Thus, the crib box is simultaneously a kind of symbolic-plastic formula that organizes the space of representation, and the Space of this representation as such. (Note that the illusory scenery of the modern theater, on the contrary, is not identical to the space that it creates). The Christmas that is dramatized actually happens, as the drama is traditionally shown on Christmas Day or during those festive times that are saturated with Christmas Time. The intersection of theatrical and festive (church) realities at the level of nativity scenery is manifested in the fact that, along with props (the throne of King Herod), genuine signs of reality (icons) appear here. The latter coexist with metaphorical and symbolic temple signs. Metaphors include a puppet crib bell tower, from where a bell announces at the beginning of the performance, just as a bell announces the beginning of worship; imitation of iconostasis murals, etc. The symbolic aspect includes the concept of the space of the den and the temple as the sphere of the Last Judgment.

In the altar space Orthodox church The altar, which occupies a central place, and the Diakonnik, located in the southern part and associated with funerary semantics (commemorative food is brought here), are contrasted, which symbolically recalls the apocalyptic separation of the sinners and the righteous [Buseva-Davydova 1994, 199].

The opposition of the northern and southern, as well as the western and eastern sides of the temple, finds expression in the themes of the paintings on the eastern and western walls (respectively, the Last Supper and Last Judgment), in a pious custom, women stand on the left, and men on the right. Nativity scene theater is not alien to this system of oppositions. If we apply the temple coordinate system to it, the upper tier will be associated with the east, the iconostasis, paradise; lower register - with the west, the narthex, the Last Judgment; the right side of the stage (when viewed from the space of the theater) is the place of the righteous, the left side is the sphere of the appearance and action of sinners. The etiquette of the behavior of the heroes of the den drama is determined by their place in a given coordinate system. The puppet Priest and Deacon, Angels and Prophets Aaron and David, worshiping the God-Child Christ, appear only on the upper stage. Interestingly, from the XVI century. in the prophetic row of the Russian high iconostasis of the Mother of God with Christ, the Old Testament prophets were on their knees, among whom Aaron and David were always present [Icon, 14]. Thus, the theme of the iconostasis can arise in the nativity scene not only at the level of scenery, but also at the level of characters. The prophets of the den drama appear on the stage on the right - from the "northern" doors of the "altar" part of the den, like the clergy during an Orthodox service. On the lower tier of the nativity scene, several times during one play, various wicked people are judged. The scene of such a "court" is always constructed in the same way: villain dies, the Devil and Death appear and, expressing joy, take their victim to the left into hell.

If we take a closer look at the traditional images of sinners in the Uniate images of the Last Judgment, we will see Melnik, Shinkarka, the enchantress, Plyasavitsa, Dudar (Skomorokh), etc. The Lawless Dancer is present in the person of Herodias (daughter or wife of Herod); The sorceress or "whispering woman," as she is called in the play, is a Gypsy who heals with her charms from a snake bite. The puppet buffoon usually leads a bear in the den, which amuses the audience with funny tricks (Minsk tradition), Melnik and Shinkarka dance. Comparable with the icon of the Last Judgment is the multinational "procession" of crib characters to the manger of the Savior 9 . Among the condemned in the middle register of the icon, one can see, first of all, the Jews, whom Moses reproaches. Behind them, as a rule, are placed first non-Orthodox (non-Greek Catholic) Christians, and then Muslims. The lists of outcast peoples on the icon can be different: "Jews, Lyakhs, Germans, Tatars, Murini, Turks" (an icon from the village of Polyana, Krakow Museum); "Jews, Lithuanians, Kezalbashs, Araps" (lubok), etc. (Lyahov - Poles, Murini - Ethiopians, Turks - Turks; Lithuania - Lithuanians, Kezalbashs - apparently Bashkirs (?)) 10. In the den drama, a Gide selling vodka is dragged into hell, and the Turkish Knight, defeated by the Christian Knight. The Poles, Gypsies, Lytvyn and Nemets take an active part in the action, mostly dancing with the ladies 11, starting fights among themselves and worshiping the Nativity of Christ.

Another theme characteristic of the icon "The Last Judgment" - the death of the righteous and the sinner - found its expression both in the obverse handwritten collections of soul-saving stories of the 16th-17th centuries, and in the extensive popular print tradition of the 18th-19th centuries. The den theater, feeding on the verbal and artistic images of religious and secular popular prints, nevertheless rarely borrowed any of them directly. Rather, he interpreted 12 themes common to all democratic culture in terms of those associative series that the ascetic and naive world of the instructive Russian baroque "prompted" to him. That is why the crib Herod, at the approach of Death, pronounces the traditional monologue of the dying wicked, prescribed by the etiquette of popular popular artistic piety:
Ah, alas! trouble! The line is coming to me!
I'm afraid of the Last Judgment! etc. - (Surazh nativity scene [Romanov 1912, 74-91]).

Unlike the Last Judgment icon, only the death of the sinner (Herod) is shown in the Nativity action. The plot of the den drama does not oppose Herod to any one righteous man. The function of the latter is performed by the murdered Bethlehem babies, about whose heavenly bliss an angel sings. Thus, the Christmas theme is closely intertwined in the den representation of the Eastern Slavs with apocalyptic motifs. At the same time, some elements of the texts of the plays reveal associative series of meanings that refer the viewer to the images of Lenten 13 and Christmas services.

Despite the fact that the appearance of crib boxes is comparable to the forms of church art and architecture, the crib does not imitate a temple, retable or icon, just as the text of the action does not imitate a church service. similarity appearance, and partly of the internal content, gives the viewer an interpretive code for the performance. A certain form of the box is, as it were, an index of the Christmas events that will be discussed in the drama.

Despite the importance of the religious side of the performance, the theater could be decorated from the outside quite secular images; however, more often he was pasted over with instructive popular prints. In the latter case, we can talk about the continuation of the symbolic program of the play at the level decorative design scenes. For example, at the Novgorod theater one could see the lubok "Ages of human life", and some of the sheets depicted not only the phases of a person's earthly existence, but also a picture of the Apocalypse, which, in the light of everything that has been said, is quite natural.

Thus, a nativity scene is a theater system that expresses the fullness of verbal meanings in architectural simultaneity with its appearance, and is likened to architecture with the texts of plays. In other words, the verbal plane of the drama can be perceived as a space (reciting or singing iconostasis or temple), and the plastic plane (the appearance of a box and scenery) can be read as a text.

What is the verbal text of the den drama? What is its specificity and structure? An important distinguishing feature of nativity plays is that most of these texts are authorless. While the nativity scene retains the status of a traditional theater, the texts of the plays are created on the basis of the canon that has developed in the folklore entertainment culture. The bearer of this culture (professional nativity scene or Christmas caroler) turns out to be the compiler of the text of the play, but at the same time not so much its author as its performer; and a special kind of performer. Like any performer of traditional texts, he owns an arsenal of certain ready-made verbal formulas 14 and the rules for their mutual compatibility, knows the plot and imagines through what motives and images it can be conveyed in this tradition. (On the specifics of folklore verbal creativity see [Bogatytev 1971, Maltsev 1989, Putilov 1997, 185-212]).

Later crib performances lose their connection with tradition. Despite the anonymity of such plays, they should not be considered the fruit of folklore dramaturgy without an author. So, in a crib performance for live actors in the village of Sadiv, Lutsk region (Ukraine, Volyn). [Oshurkevich 1996, 24-32] is missing not only the folklore game language (the drama is written in rhymed verse), but even the canonical composition, which, apparently, is the last to die when the tradition is destroyed. Interestingly, the most contemporary authorial work associated with the development of the Christmas drama as celebratory event spiritual school, on the contrary, does not break with the old settings of traditional ideas. In the Christmas play of 1997 (shown in the Grodno church, Belarus) by a student of the Catholic seminary, who performed under the pseudonym of Yevgeny Bartnitsky, some structural patterns of canonical crib representations are preserved. The author, not being familiar with either the crib or school traditions of the 18th-19th centuries, reproduces the previously established compositional models due to education in the very environment that long time honed these models, borrowing them ready-made from the liturgical realities of church life.

The canonical organization of the text of the vertep drama implies the presence of two main levels of regulation of potential thematic material. At the first level, the potential material is regulated in terms of the choice of certain motifs and the composition of these motifs in the composition of the play. At the second level, the verbal arrangement of each motive is regulated.

A specific feature of folklore puppet theater is that a special and exclusive role in the construction of the text belongs to the composition, or a stable sequence of small plot units (motives). If in the Russian folk epic, as B.N. Putilov, the plot is not a text, since it can be revealed only on the basis of several texts [Putilov 1988, options textual update of a specific topic. The whole dynamics of a nativity play is based on the change of small plot units, in contrast to the Russian epic, where the narrator can limit himself to presenting a single version of the plot.

An important feature of den poetics is the use of ready-made well-known texts in the drama: folk spiritual poems and songs, religious cants. The latter were published until the beginning of the 20th century. in special collections for home singing "Bogoglasniki". Most of the researchers of the den, when fixing the pieces, did not make musical notes on the spot, from the voice of the performer, but copied musical accompaniment from that Bogoglasnik, which was in use in a given village or locality.

The thematic material of the crib drama is a common arsenal of traditional views for the Eastern Slavs (Russia, Belarus, Ukraine) on the content of the Christmas puppet action. Obligatory in tradition is the canon, which is present in an unchanged form in the collective consciousness of the bearers of culture. When the canonical notions of the nativity drama are realized in the text, its thematic material can be reduced by merging doublet scenes with similar content with different characters and the same content 15 (different content, but one character). Instead of congratulating the Angels and the scene of worship of the Magi, the performer can confine himself to singing the Christmas troparion, and then immediately go to the scenes in the palace of Herod, where the Magi are in order to inform the king about the Baby. Their procession to the place of Nativity descends. The episodes of the worship of the Shepherds and the three Kings can be cut one at the expense of the other, since they are doublets in the story. At the same time, such plays are possible, where all the potentialities of the thematic material are actualized.

The content of some motifs is the same, despite their being assigned to different thematic headings. For example, scenes of trade and scenes with cattle are clearly related, dance episodes can be saturated with military themes, etc. In shortened versions of a drama, such "double" scenes may replace several episodes. if the performer wants to increase the performance, not one, but several dancing couples will pass in front of the viewer: Pan and Pani; Merchant, Hussar and Frant with Ladies; two Krakowian women /residents of Krakow/, etc. At the same time, Gypsy, for example, will not only sell the Horse, he will also arrive on it, uttering the appropriate monologue; and dance with the Gypsy, having previously talked with her son; and even act as a doctor. For short version for the second part of the drama, any scenes with a Jew and a Gypsy, one or two dance episodes and a conclusion in the form of collecting a performance fee are completely sufficient.

The order of distribution of motives and their specificity in dramas is presented below. The proposed scheme describes some canonical regularities in the construction of nativity texts, rather than specific representations, since the nativity scene, as well as folklore creativity in general, is characterized by variation. Thus we see the most general idea on the structure of the East Slavic crib drama.

The nativity puppet theater got its name from its purpose: to present a drama in which the gospel story about the birth of Jesus Christ was reproduced in the cave where Mary and Joseph found refuge (old and old Russian "vertep" - a cave). Initially, the representations of the nativity scene were only during Christmas time, which was also emphasized in its definitions. V. I. Dal, for example, wrote: "The nativity scene is a southern spectacle in faces, arranged in a small form, in a box with which they go about Christmas time, representing the events and circumstances of the birth of I. Christ." The nativity scene entered Russia from Ukraine and Belarus at the end of the 17th - beginning of the 18th century.

The nativity scene was a portable rectangular box made of thin boards or cardboard. Outwardly, it resembled a house, which could consist of one or two floors. Most often there were two-storey nativity scenes. In the upper part, dramas of religious content were played, in the lower part - ordinary interludes, comic everyday scenes. This also determined the design of the parts of the nativity scene.

The upper part (the sky) was usually covered with dove paper from the inside, and Nativity scenes were painted on its back wall; or on the side, a model of a cave or a barn with a manger and motionless figures of Mary and Joseph, the baby Christ and domestic animals were arranged. The lower part (land or palace) was pasted over with bright colored paper, foil, etc., in the middle, on a small elevation, a throne was set up, on which there was a doll depicting King Herod.

In the bottom of the box and in the shelf that divided the box into two parts, there were slits through which the puppeteer moved the rods with puppets attached to them motionlessly - drama characters. It was possible to move the rods with dolls along the box, the dolls could turn in all directions. Doors were cut to the right and left of each part: they appeared from one doll, disappeared from another.

Puppets were carved from wood (sometimes they were molded from clay), painted and dressed up in cloth or paper clothes and fixed on metal or wooden rods.

The text of the drama was spoken by one puppeteer, changing the timbre of the voice and intonation of speech, which created the illusion of presentation by several actors.

The performance in the den consisted of the mystery drama "King Herod" and everyday scenes.

Folk theater researcher N. N. Vinogradov described the nativity scene as follows: “The action opens with the gospel of the birth of Christ. Shepherds and three kings go to bow to the newborn and bring gifts. The warriors leave and come back, leading with them to Herod Rachel, who does not give her child to die. She, with tears, on her knees, begs Herod to spare her baby, but the king is implacable and orders to raise the baby on a spear. Rachel Sobbing, she rushes about the stage, cursing Herod. The warrior drives her out. Left alone, Herod begins to think about death and, wanting to avoid it, surrounds himself with guards.

A song is heard announcing the approach of a terrible guest, a terrible crack is heard - and an ominous skeleton with a scythe on his shoulder - Death - grows on the stage. The guards flee in terror, and the trembling Herod begins to beg for mercy. Death summons the devil to help him, who appears with a cry of "goo-hoo-hoo!" Having learned what was the matter, he tells his sister to raise the scythe and kill Herod, whom he then drags to hell with the words:

"Oh, cursed Herod, for your great anger

I will take you to the abyss of hell and from the bone."

This ends the first, serious part of the den drama. The second part consists of an unequal number of scenes and dialogues in different places, representing an independent processing of plots from folk life. These scenes are often completely unrelated to each other and can follow in any order.<...>The whole action in these scenes consists almost exclusively in the fact that types of different nationalities, genders and professions are fighting or dancing.

Gradually, the first part of the presentation was reduced, and the second, on the contrary, expanded. The heroes of scenes with everyday content were a peasant, a gentleman, a dandy, newfangled ladies, a soldier, a priest, a gypsy, and so on. Nativity scene drama was played not only by puppets, but also by live amateurs - then it was called "living nativity scene".

Nativity scene interacted with folk theater live actors. As a result of the "secularization" of the den, puppeteers borrowed characters, skits, and short plays from the theater of live actors. The theater of live actors, in turn, borrowed some plays from the nativity scene (for example, the drama "King Herod").

Zueva T.V., Kirdan B.P. Russian folklore - M., 2002