SMILES AND TEARS:  OBSERVATIONS OVER THE CURRENT CHANGES IN THE BELARUSIAN CEMETERIES

Siarhei Hruntou

doi:10.23858/ethp.2025.46.3943

Published: 2025-12-23

Vol. 46 (2025)

SMILES AND TEARS

Siarhei Hruntou

Ethnologia Polona

Section: Main topic of the issue

https://doi.org/10.23858/ethp.2025.46.3943

Abstract

Until now, Belarusian cemeteries have attracted the attention of ethnologists, folklorists and historians from two main perspectives: places where historical tombstones are preserved and where traditional memorial practices can be observed. The huge new cemeteries founded outside the boundaries of growing cities in recent decades remained a “blind spot” for Belarusian researchers. This article aims to show how observation of contemporary Belarusian cemeteries and the changes taking place in them can help to understand contemporary Belarusians’ ideas about the afterlife and the development of cultural memory and memorial practices. Five characteristic examples were selected for this purpose: the spread of tombstone portraits with smiling deceased persons, the tendency to demonstrate the profession of the deceased on the tombstone, the gradual disappearance of traditional grave designs, methods of depicting and articulating ideas about the afterlife and the tradition of bringing toys to children’s graves. Interpretations of these examples are proposed. Thanks to this, we can see in the change a complex system that directly reflects the development of Belarusian society and understand what great epistemological potential modern Belarusian tombstones contain for ethnology and other social sciences.

Keywords:

Belarus, cemeteries, tombstones, practices of remembrance, culture of memory, tombstone portraits

Download files

PDF

Citation rules

Hruntou, S. (2025). SMILES AND TEARS: OBSERVATIONS OVER THE CURRENT CHANGES IN THE BELARUSIAN CEMETERIES. Ethnologia Polona, 46. https://doi.org/10.23858/ethp.2025.46.3943

Cited by / Share

Licence

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

References

Ariès, Philippe. 2011. Człowiek i śmierć. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Aletheia.
Google Scholar

Arnold, Michael, Martin Gibbs, Tamara Kohn, James Meese and Bjorn Nansen. Death and Digital Media. London: Routledge, 2017.
Google Scholar

Assmann, Aleida. 2012. Cultural Memory and Western Civilization: Functions, Media, Archives. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Google Scholar

Auseichyk, Uladzіmіr. 2015. “Kaliandarnyia paminal'nyia abrady belarusau Padzvinnia (pa materyialakh XX – pachatku XXI stst.)”. Białorutenistika Białostocka. 7: 313–331.
Google Scholar

Aŭsiejčyk, Uladzimir. 2016. “Pachavaĺnaja abradnasć bielarusaŭ”. In Narysy historyi kuĺtury Bielarusi. Vol. 3. Part 2, edited by Aliaksandr Lakotka, 445–459. Minsk: Bielaruskaja navuka.
Google Scholar

Barthes, Roland. 2000. Mitologie. Warszawa: KR.
Google Scholar

Bayburin, Al'bert. 2017. Sovetskiy pasport: istoriya – struktura – praktiki. Sankt-Peterburg: Izd-vo Yevropeyskogo universiteta v Sankt-Peterburge.
Google Scholar

Boryak, Olena. 2021. ‘Yak yanhol vestyme do Boha...’: pokhovalʹna obryadovistʹ ukrayinsʹko-bilorusʹkoho pohranychchya. Kyyiv: DIA.
Google Scholar

Curl, James Stevens. 1972. The Victorian Celebration of Death. Detroit: The Partridge Press, 1972.
Google Scholar

Czyż, Anna Sylwia, and Bartłomiej Gutowski. 2020. Podręcznik do inwentaryzacji polskich cmentarzy i nagrobków poza granicami kraju. Warszawa: Narodowy Instytut Polskiego Dziedzictwa Kulturowego za Granicą Polonika.
Google Scholar

Engelking, Anna. 2012. Kołchoźnicy. Antropologiczne studium tożsamości wsi białoruskiej przełomu XX i XXI wieku. Toruń: Wydawnictwo Naukowe UMK.
Google Scholar

Hruntou, Siarhei, and Dzianis Lisiejčykaŭ (eds). 2022. Epitaphium: pachavaĺnaja kuĺtura narodaŭ Vialikaha Kniastva Litoŭskaha. Minsk: NHAB.
Google Scholar

Hruntou, Siarhiej. 2023. Fatahrafija i kuĺtura pamiaci ŭ Bielarusaŭ u druhoj palovie XIX - pačatku XXI st. Minsk: Bielaruskaja navuka.
Google Scholar

Levkiyevskaya, Yelena. 2012. “Khodyachiy pokoynik”. In Narodnaya demonologiya Poles'ya. T. 2: Demonologizatsiya umershikh lyudey, edited by Lyudmila Vinogradova and Yelena Levkiyevskaya, 273–400. Moskva: Rukopisnyye pamyatniki Drevney Rusi.
Google Scholar

Lewkowska, Anna, Jacek Lewkowski and Wojciech Walczak. 2000–2008. Zabytkowe cmentarze na kresach wschodnich Drugiej Rzeczypospolitej. T. 1-4. Warszawa: Osrodek Ochrony Zabytkowego Krajobrazu; Wydawnictwo DiG.
Google Scholar

Lobač, Uladzimir. 2004. “Vyraj” In Bielaruskaja mifalohija: Encyklapiedyčny sloŭnik, edited by Iryna Klimkovič Siarhiej Sańko, 99. Minsk: Bielaruś.
Google Scholar

Lobač, Uladzimir. 2013. Mif. Prastora. Čalaviek: tradycyjny kuĺturny landšaft bielarusaŭ u siemijatyčnaj pierspiektyvie. Minsk: Technalohija.
Google Scholar

Lotman, Ûrij. 2001. Semiosfera. Sankt-Peterburg: Iskusstvo - SPB.
Google Scholar

Mokhov, Sergey. 2018. Rozhdeniye i smert' pokhoronnoy industrii: ot srednevekovykh pogostov do tsifrovogo bessmertiya. Moskva: Common place.
Google Scholar

Mokhov, Sergey. 2020. Arkheologiya russkoy smerti: rynok ritual'nykh uslug v sovremennoy Rossii. Moskva: Fond podderzhki sotsial'nykh issledovaniy “Khamovniki”.
Google Scholar

Ovseychik, Uladzimir. 2022. “‘Impure’ dead people in perceptions of the population of the Belarusian-Russian (Polotsk-Pskov and Vitebsk-Smolensk) borderland”. Studia Mythologica Slavica 25: 141–163.
Google Scholar

Ramaniuk, Michaś. 2000. Bielaruskija narodnyja kryžy: manahrafija. Vilnius: Naša Niva, Dzianis Ramaniuk.
Google Scholar

Sedakova, Olga. 2004. Poetika obryada: pogrebal'naya obryadnost' vostochnykh i yuzhnykh slavyan. Moskva: Indrik.
Google Scholar

Sharaya, Ol'ga. 2002. Tsennostno-normativnaya priroda pochitaniya predkov. Minsk: Tekhnalogiya.
Google Scholar

Sisto, Davide. 2020. Online Afterlives: Immortality, Memory, and Grief in Digital Culture. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
Google Scholar

Sudnik, Iwona. 2023. Cmentarze: pamięć zapisana w kamieniach. Parafia Mirska Województwo Nowogródzkie, Том 1. Oborniki Śląskie: Iwona Sudnik.
Google Scholar

van Gennep, Arnovd. 2019. The Rites of Passage. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
Google Scholar

Vinogradova, Lyudmila, аnd Yelena Levkiyevskaya (eds). 2012. Narodnaya demonologiya Poles'ya. T. 2 Demonologizatsiya umershikh lyudey. Moskva: Rukopisnyye pamyatniki Drevney Rusi.
Google Scholar

Vovelle, Michel. 2008. Śmierć w cywilizacji Zachodu: od roku 1300 po współczesność. Gdańsk: Wydawnictwo Słowo/obraz Terytoria,
Google Scholar

Walter, Tony. 2017. What death means now: Thinking Critically About Dying and Grieving. Bristol: Policy Press.
Google Scholar

Warner, William Lloyd. 1959. The living and the dead: A study of the symbolic life of Americans. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Google Scholar