Busójárás

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Street parade in Mohács near Busójárás 2009
Portrait of a Busó

As Busójárás the total of six days lasting celebration of the end of are Carnival (ung. Farsang ) in Mohács in southern Hungary referred. They are best known for the Busós clad with carved wooden masks and furs . The Busójárás has been part of the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO since 2009 .

Origin and history

Busó masks (1973)

According to legend, the Busójárás goes back to the siege of Hungary by the Ottomans, who also took Mohács after the Battle of Mohács in 1526. The Šokci , who had fled into the swamps on the left bank of the Danube, crossed the Danube by boat one night and drove the Ottoman troops out of the village with terrifying masks and noise. However, the Croatian minority of the Šokci (ung. Sokác ) only settled in Mohács after the end of Ottoman rule at the end of the 17th century. She probably brought with her the customs that developed over time into the current form of Busójárás.

The first evidence of Mardi Gras celebrations in Mohács comes from 1783, even if masks and busós were not mentioned at that time. Originally it was a fertility ritual and the expulsion of evil spirits, with participants going from house to house. It was not until the end of the 19th century that the street parade, and from 1912 the name Busójárás, was documented in the press. After the First World War , the Busójárás Sunday parade became an attraction that attracted several thousand visitors from the area; the Busó masks were now an integral part of the disguise. However, as early as the late 1920s, the number of Busós decreased significantly before they almost completely disappeared after the Second World War. Only the ball of the “Šokci Reading Group ” ( Sokác Olvasókör ) remained from the carnival .

In 1955 Anna Raffay and István Szőts made a film about the Busójárás in Mohács, which was not completed. Instead, two short films were made, which nonetheless aroused new interest in the tradition. The communist political leadership also saw the resurgence of Mardi Gras in Mohács as an opportunity to establish a non-political folklore and to improve relations with Yugoslavia . From the 1960s onwards, the Busójárás took place again in an organized manner; in 1965 the local press reported that there were 5,000 domestic and roughly the same number of foreign visitors.

After the end of the Croatian War, the tradition of busójárás was also revived in some of Šokci-inhabited places on the other side of the Hungarian-Croatian border in the 2000s. Groups from Draž and its Topolje district are now taking part in the Mohács parade , while some Busó groups from Mohács visit places in Croatia on Monday.

Today around 50,000 tourists, mainly from the surrounding area, visit the Busójárás every year.

procedure

The Busójárás begins on the Thursday before Ash Wednesday with the children's carnival ( kisfarsang ), which also includes a costume competition. The official opening ceremony and a craft exhibition will follow on Friday, and on Saturday the Busó groups will jointly commemorate the numerous events in Mohács' history.

The coffin is let over the Danube

The highlight of the celebrations is the parade of the Busó groups on Sunday. The Busós first take rowboats from Újmohács across the Danube to Mohács and then move in self-designed wagons from Kóló tér in the former Šokci district to the city's main square ( Széchényi tér ). The Busós, ringing with cowbells, share wine, pálinka and Faschingskrapfen ( Fánk ) with the audience. They also “kidnap” women from the crowd. In the afternoon, a coffin symbolizing winter is dropped across the Danube before a large fire is lit in the city center after dark. The dance around the fire is accompanied by tambura and bagpipe players.

On Monday, the Busós move from door to door, especially in the former Šokci district, and celebrate with family and friends at home or in restaurants. The conclusion of the celebrations is finally the "Burial of Carnival" ( farsangtemetés ), the symbolic burning of the coffin - and winter - on Shrove Tuesday is.

Attendees

Busós and mask wearers

The central and most famous figures of Busójárás are the eponymous Busó . These are people who wear a carved wooden mask and special leather shoes ( bocskor ) and are dressed in a sheepskin and loose, white trousers. The fur is tied with a cord or chain to which the cowbells are attached. Other typical accessories are a rattle , a hammer and a long horn.

The Busós are organized into around 20 independent groups, each with between ten and 70 members, which are active all year round. A total of 500 to 600 Busós take part in Busójárás (as of 2009). Today the participants are no longer exclusively Šokci, but also Hungarians and members of other minorities ( Hungarian Germans , Serbs).

In addition to the busó, there are other forms of disguise, for example devils, witches and jankele . The latter are mostly boys who are dressed in rags and carry a bag of ashes, flour or rags. This is to prevent the Busós from being unmasked or otherwise recognized. Other participants (male and female) wear traditional Šokci clothing and carnival masks.

literature

  • Melinda Harlov: The Intangible World Heritage Carneval of Hungary and other winter closing traditions of the region . In: International Symposium «Dialogue among cultures. Carnivals in the world ” . Florence 2016 ( researchgate.net ).
  • Zoltán Füredi: Busójárás, az élő rítus . In: Éva Pócs (ed.): Rítus és ünnep az ezredfordulón . L'Harmattan, Budapest 2004, ISBN 978-963-9457-72-0 , pp. 315-357 ( academia.edu ).

Web links

Commons : Busójárás in Hungary  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. a b Busó-walking of Mohács: the Hungarian carnival banishing winter. Europeana Blog, February 20, 2020, accessed March 22, 2020.
  2. Zoltán Füredi: Busójárás, az élő rite , S. 317th
  3. a b c d e Nomination for Inscription on the Representative List in 2009 (Reference No. 00252). UNESCO, Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage, 4th meeting. Abu Dhabi, September 28 to October 2, 2009, accessed on March 22, 2020 (DOC, 239 kB).
  4. Zoltán Füredi: Busójárás, az élő rite , S. 319th
  5. Zoltán Füredi: Busójárás, az élő rite , S. 322nd
  6. Nóra Gelányi, Mónika Ginzer: The Characteristics of Tourism in the Small Towns of Baranya County . In: Jiří Ježek, Lukáš Kaňka (Ed.): Competitiveness and sustainable development of small towns and rural regions in Europe . Pilsen 2011, ISBN 978-80-261-0096-6 , p. 44-45 ( semanticscholar.org [PDF]).
  7. Melinda Harlov: The Intangible World Heritage Carneval of Hungary and other winter closing traditions of the region , p. 4.