THE RITUAL CALENDAR OF BOIKOS IN THE WORKS OF POLISH ETHNOGRAPHERS FROM THE BEGINNING OF THE 19th CENTURY UNTIL THE 1930’S (A HISTORIOGRAPHY OF THE PROBLEM)

Abstract

The article analyses the history of investigation of Boikos’ ritual calendar by Polish ethnographers during the period from the beginning of the 19th century until 1930s. Boikos as an ethnographic group among the population of the Eastern Carpathians have been investigated for the first time by Polish researchers of the early 19th century. For example Ignacy Liubich-Chervinsky wrote a book devoted to Boikos’ locality based on the ethnographic characteristic of the population of one of his estates in the territory of the Precarpathian region. In the 1840s–1860’s a well-known Polish scientist, ethnographer Vincenty Pol studied the Boikos. At that time, systematic fieldwork of the traditional culture of the population of Galicia was influenced by this scholar. Oskar Kolberg was one of the key researchers of this group. For the first time, a scientist offered a holistic description of the annual cycle of holidays among Boikos inhabiting the western part of the Eastern Beskids. At the end of the XIXth century the investigation of rituals of the Boikos ethnographic group was conducted according to a scientific methodology, as well as a scientific program. This period of study is connected with the names of J. Schnaider, J. Falkovsky, V. Pashnitsky, R. Reinfuss and others.