Edited by MCK Sokół | Lesser Poland
They are hidden by the darkness of night and monstrous disguises
Country: Poland
Region: Lesser Poland
Type of inspiration: Cultural customs
Inspiracja
"They are hidden by the darkness of the night and monstrous disguises. On their faces they wear masks of black sheepskin with holes cut out for their eyes and mouth. On their heads they wear strange straw caps with three braids. Their torsos, legs and arms are covered as if with armour made of straw. When the first ray of sunlight falls on the ground they disappear without anyone knowing where." The description in the 1972 Przekrój magazine, although reminiscent of mysterious practices from exotic corners of the world, refers to spring carol singers from the vicinity of Dobra near Limanowa. More than half a century earlier, these mysterious masqueraders, known as "śmigustny" or "straw" grandfathers, fascinated the teacher and sightseer Leopold Węgrzynowicz. He described them vividly, for example in his Eagle's Flight, and for several years, during the first and second decades of the 20th century, he recorded their wanderings around the countryside in photographs (photographs in the collection of the Ethnographic Museum in Kraków, https://zbiory.etnomuzeum.eu/pl/katalog-zbiorow).
The ritual of the śmigustny grandparents is one of the archaic forms of spring carol singing. At the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, it was cultivated in many villages in southern Małopolska, including in the Limanowa district, and under the name of turkoce it was also known among the Sącz Highlanders in Szczawa and Kamienica.
The visits of these carol singers were connected with the celebration of the second day of Easter - Śmigustny Monday. As L. Węgrzynowicz reported, the carol singers appeared in the village before dawn, and finished their wanderings when the villagers started to gather for mass. They were boys dressed in costumes made of straw twisted into twine. The most impressive were straw hats in the shape of a cone, at the top of which hung three braids made of straw. Their faces were covered with sheepskin masks or blackened with soot. Each held a thick stick in his hand. In the other hand, they carried a basket lined with straw, into which they collected the customary gifts, usually in the form of eggs. In the past, they usually went in pairs; over time, groups of grandfathers expanded to five or six people. One of the boys would dress up as a grandmother, who carried a rag doll-child on her arm. Visiting one house after another, the masqueraders did not make any articulated sounds, only grunted and turtled in such a way as to twang, sometimes trumpeting on a ram's or ox's horn. The householders tried to douse the carol singers with water. At the end of their visit, the carol singers would receive a handout called a śmiguszt from the hostess. The custom, the original magical meaning of which had already been forgotten at the beginning of the 20th century, became "purely for fun and enjoyment of old and young alike".
In the Dobra municipality, the original custom of the śmiguszt grandfathers has survived to this day in an almost unchanged form. Since the 1990s, the Dobrzany Region Lovers' Association and, since 2008, the local GOK have been organising competitions for the "śmigustynik of the year" in the market square and near the church in Dobra.
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