Tag Archives: Russia

Firebird

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Ivan Bilibin’s illustration to a Russian fairy tale about the Firebird, 1899.

Russian composer Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971) was born on June 17 near St. Petersburg. Among his best known works, the ballets The Firebird (1910), Petrushka (1911) and The Rite of Spring (1913), and the choral work Symphony of Psalms (1930).

The Firebird character is one of the most poplar in Russian fairy tales. The Firebird is essentially a phoenix, a golden immortal bird that is reborn from its own incinerated ashes. Its flames and beauty save a variety of heroes and heroines–often princes and princesses–from evil wizards and devils, as in the famous Stravinsky ballet. Some tales say that the Firebird never eats but only sips dew. It saw Adam and Eve expelled from Paradise and is often a messenger between humans and the Otherworld.

One story about the Firebird tells us that a modest and gentle orphan girl named Maryushka lives in a small village. People would come from all over to buy her embroidery, and many merchants asked her to come away and work for them. She told them all that she would sell to any who found her work beautiful, but she would never leave the village of her birth. One day the evil sorcerer Kaschei the Immortal heard of Maryushka’s beautiful needlework and transformed himself into a beautiful young man and visited her. Upon seeing her ability he became enraged that a mere mortal could produce finer work than he himself possessed. He tried to tempt her by offering to make her Queen if she would embroider for him alone, but she refused saying she never wanted to leave her village. Because of this last insult to his ego he turned Maryushka into a Firebird, and himself into a great black Falcon, picked her up in his talons, and stole her away from her village. To leave a memory of herself with her village forever she shed her feathers onto the land below. As the last feather fell Maryushka died in the falcon’s talons. The glowing rainbow feathers were magic and remain undimmed, but show their colors only to those who love beauty and seek to make beauty for others

The Firebird concept has parallels in Iranian legends of magical birds, in the Brothers Grimm fairy tale about The Golden Bird. In an Armenian tale, the Firebird does not burn but rather makes the land bloom through its song. In Czech folklore, it is called Pták Ohnivák (Fire-like Bird) and appears, for example, in a Karel Jaromír Erben fairy tale, also as an object of a difficult quest. Moreover, in the beginning of this fairy tale, the bird steals magical golden apples belonging to a king and is therefore pursued by the king’s servants in order to protect the precious apples.

St. Andrew’s Day

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Fran Francken II (Flanders, Antwerp, 1581-1642) painting of St. Andrew’s crucifixion, circa 1620, on exhibit in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

St. Andrew, the first man to join Christ as an apostle, was crucified on an X-shaped cross. He is now widely venerated as the patron of Scotland, Russia, and many other places. His X-shaped cross appears on the flags of many countries that looked to him for protection. His feast–on November 29 in some places and November 30 in other places–is both especially popular for magic that reveals a young woman’s future husband and was believed to be the start of the most popular time for vampires to come hunt the living, which would last until Saint George’s Eve (22 April).

In Romania, it is customary for young women to put 41 grains of wheat beneath their pillow before they go to sleep, and if they dream that someone is coming to steal their grains that means that they are going to get married next year. Also in some other parts of the country the young women light a candle from the Easter celebration and bring it, at midnight, to a fountain. They ask Saint Andrew to let them glimpse their future husband. Saint Andrew is invoked to ward off wolves, who are thought to be able to eat any animal they want on this night, and to speak to humans. A human hearing a wolf speak to him will die.

In Póvoa de Varzim, an ancient fishing town in Portugal there is Cape Santo André (Portuguese for “Saint Andrew”) and near the cape there are small pits in the rocks that the people believe these are footprints of Saint Andrew. Saint Andrew Chapel there was built in the Middle Ages and is the burial site of drowned fishermen found at the cape. (St. Andrew was also a fisherman in the New Testament.) Fishermen also asked St. Andrew for help while fishing.

It was common to see groups of fishermen, holding candles in their hands, making a pilgrimage to the Cape’s chapel on Saint Andrew’s Eve. Many might still believe that any Portuguese fisherman who does not visit Santo André in life will have to make the pilgrimage after they die.

Emerald

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Emerald is regarded as the traditional birthstone for May, as well as the traditional gemstone for the astrological signs of Taurus, Gemini and sometimes Cancer. Astrologers also consider emerald a gem of the planets Mercury, Venus and Jupiter.

Emerald is regarded as the traditional birthstone for May, as well as the traditional gemstone for the astrological signs of Taurus, Gemini and sometimes Cancer. Astrologers also consider emerald a gem of the planets Mercury, Venus and Jupiter.

Emerald is a stone of hope and wisdom. Some consider emerald similar to a “magic mirror”, capable of reflecting experiences of a person’s past lives. Because it can reveal the past, the gem is also considered able to reveal the future.

In 15th–16th century Russia, Emerald was considered as a talisman bringing wisdom and serenity often used by mothers and seafarers because it also protects from infidelity. There is a belief that emerald will shatter or crumble if one of the spouses is unfaithful to another. It is also used to prevent or drive away storms.

Emerald helps to treat fever, inflammations, illness of liver, diabetes. It was believed to be very helpful against epilepsy, skin diseases as well as diseases of urinal-genital system of women. It was also said that just looking at this stone before going to sleep could prevent insomnia.

Emeralds can be used to strengthen health and bring longevity. The gem can also protect against snakebites. According to one legend, seeing an Emerald is fatal for poisonous snakes, as they are blinded by it.

One of the quainter anecdotes on emeralds was by the 16th-century historian Brantôme, who referred to the many impressive emeralds the Spanish under Cortez had brought back to Europe from Latin America. On one of Cortez’s most notable emeralds he had engraved Inter Natos Mulierum non sur-rexit mayor (“Among those born of woman there hath not arisen a greater,” Matthew 11:11) which referred to John the Baptist. Brantôme considered engraving such a beautiful and simple product of nature sacrilegious and considered this act the cause for Cortez’s loss of an extremely precious pearl (to which he dedicated a work, A beautiful and incomparable pearl), and even for the death of King Charles IX of France, who died soon after.

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