However, there are girls whose household members existence don’t work out

Old maids

Such as for instance, moms and dads believed it unbecoming so you can get married off their youngest child just before the fresh oldest and you will, just like the earliest wanted a bridegroom and you will browsing parties and you will events, brand new youngest was not allowed to and you will, very, stayed “inside maidenhood”. Naturally, there were and additionally girls whom just could not come across a few it liked. Peasant community treated all ytterligare tips of them so harshly it is unpleasantly surprising today.

People that got leftover since the girls was in fact called a selection off insulting nicknames: vekovukha (‘century-old one’), odnokosok (‘one-braided girl’, while the solitary girls used one braid despite adulthood), ‘gray-haired’, perespelok (‘the latest very mature one’). Like a girl can also be removed in the town by the their unique moms and dads on the good sledge, shouting: “Nadolba, nadolba! (A keyword definition around “thick due to the fact a stone”) Who desires a great nadolba?” If the children consented, they could already “strike a deal” and have hitched a day later.

To keep an excellent vekovukha try experienced on the community an excellent disgrace – it absolutely was considered that such as for instance a lady hadn’t realized their particular fertility potential. Also lameness, lop-sidedness or being hunchbacked just weren’t believed an obstacle in order to matrimony.

In the event the an effective girl did not age more 25 years dated, youngsters create avoid welcoming their own to their events and you may she’d getting forbidden to put on girls’ outfits. Today, their particular clothing needed to be out of dark tone, like those out of widows and you can old women. The brand new vekovukhas constantly lived ilies for the a unique strengthening, in which it leftover her very own home.

Widows and you may vekovukhas, even after the slightly disadvantaged status, had been regarded as in the community while the bearers from actual and you can spiritual love. Therefore, it satisfied of a lot essential ceremonial functions – generally regarding the fresh new changeover to another globe. Because the signs from condition and you can low-parity, widows and centenarians didn’t sit in wedding parties, births, christenings – but they took part in new rites and you may laundry of inactive, spotted along the body before the funeral service, overall maintained and kept this new funeral traditions.

Another significant “work” is actually the fresh new “plowing” of one’s arable land because of the vekovukhas and you can widows, that has been common in many provinces, having women that are pregnant (which symbolized virility) harnessed into plow. This crucial ritual would be to be performed simply symbolically by “barren” ladies in the latest darkness out of nights, to make certain that, on the other hand, the fresh home was fruitful whenever time came.

Many vekovukhas and you will widows, immediately following investing age inside condition, began doing group medication and you will witchcraft in their old-age. However,, there have been as well as women in the Russian country side, which felt like that they do real time by yourself straight from their more youthful many years.

Nuns

The newest girls which did not follow the family relations highway from lifestyle, but find the path regarding servitude to help you God, was in fact entitled chernichkas. The phrase chernichka is actually a beneficial feminitive type of the word chernets (‘the one in the black robes’) – good monk which belonged into “black” (celibate) clergy. In order to become an excellent chernichka, a good girl must claim their unique should following achieving the ages of relationships – that is where this new girl do begin to end up being invited to help you events and you may events because of the town youthfulness. This could occurs of the girl’s brand of personal piety – otherwise due to a vow made by their moms and dads.

Abreast of saying their unique attention, brand new girl must hand out all of the her colourful maidenly clothes and you can wear ebony attire, eg good vekovukha otherwise a good widow. The brand new braid has also been symbolically clipped whenever you are uttering what: “Since my tresses cannot return to one another, I won’t come back to my personal maidenhood.”