Deborah C. Stearns

Monday, November 17, 2014

[…] Czech Easter traditions include making elaborately decorated eggs, called kraslice.  Kraslice can be batik dyed, painted, carved, or decorated with straw or wire.  You can see more about how they are made here and here.  I didn’t get good photos of the kraslice displayed at the museum, but you can see beautifully decorated kraslice here and here.  (This is making me feel a bit embarrassed about my years spent coloring eggs with PAAS dye pellets and vinegar.)

Easter Sunday is spent decorating eggs, but come Easter Monday, Czech boys go out to thrash girls and women with a pomlázka (a switch made of braided pussy-willow branches).  Boys and men go door to door in the town to beat women’s and girls’ legs and buttocks with the pomlázka while singing an Easter carol; the girls reward them with a decorated egg, candy, or in more recent years, a shot of brandy or vodka, and tie a ribbon around the pomlázka.  In some regions, the girls and women are doused with buckets of water.  Ostensibly, this is to ensure fertility and beauty for the girls and women in the coming year.  Some believe the tradition derives from older customs to beat out disease and bad spirits.  I wonder about the gendered nature of the practice, though.  Some claim that it is all done in fun, with women eager for the whipping, while in other accounts, women give a less positive response to the tradition.  While the whipping might be symbolic, one article indicates that, at least in the past, the object was to draw blood.

Advent begins on the first Sunday in December and focuses on spirituality and preparation for Christmas.  This Advent costume reminded me of the plague doctor masks worn in the medieval era (as well as the Spy v. Spy cartoons).  In fact, it is the mask worn on St. Lucia day (or St. Lucy or St. Lucille), Dec. 13.  St. Lucia refused to wed, was sentenced to go into a brothel, and had her throat cut when she resisted prostitution.  (On a side note, I had no idea how grisly many of the saints’ stories are — I learned several horrific saints’ tales while on this trip.)  St. Lucia day included a ban on certain types of labor (e.g., no spinning or plucking feathers).  

Lucys, women in white coats with candles in their hands, walked around homes to see if anyone was violating the ban. Their faces were covered with a mask made of wood and paper similar to a stork’s beak and it made an unpleasant clicking sound. Lucys banged on doors and announced: “I’m coming, coming to sip the night away.” via

Lest you think this is the creepiest Czech Advent tradition, let’s not forget Perchta.[…]

Whole article:http://deborahstearns.blogspot.com/2014/11/czech-holiday-costumes-customs-musaion.html