Wooden Calendars from Central Rhodopes

Details Wooden Calendars from Central Rhodopes Wooden Calendars from Central Rhodopes

Oct 2008

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2008pobeo..85...65k&link_type=abstract

Publications of the Astronomical Observatory of Belgrade, vol. 85, p. 65-86

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomy

Scientific paper

Four wooden calendars from the village of Polkovnik Serafimovo, Smolyan region, in the Central Rhodopes are presented here, and three of them - for the first time. The shape and size, the kind of the signs and structure of the calendar record bear the characteristic features of the rest of the Bulgarian wooden calendars. The short notches on the edges represent the days of the year in the Julian (solar) calendar. The special signs on the sides mark the fixed festivals of the Orthodox Church calendar and are also influenced by the local tradition. The type of the signs confirms that the wooden sticks belong to the group of calendars from the Central Rhodopes. According to the beginning date of the calendar record on the sticks, two of the calendars are of the April (May) or October (November) type which corresponds to the very popular economic division of the year in the folk calendar into two periods -- warm and cold. The other two sticks, which are very similar to each other, make an exception in this respect among the rest of the Bulgarian wooden calendars. The months are divided into four groups (seasons) on each of the four edges of the stick (only one calendar from Burgas region has the same structure). The most interesting thing about the two sticks is that this is the only case among all known Bulgarian calendars that the beginning of the calendar record coincides with the beginning of the civil year on 1st January (January type) like some wooden calendars from Western Europe. Nowadays it is getting harder and harder to find wooden calendars in Bulgaria and in the neighbouring Balkan countries. The thorough knowledge about them could be helpful in various scientific fields, e.g. history of religion, ethnology, history of astronomy and mathematics, as well as semiotics.

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