Dated maids

Eg, moms and dads sensed it unbecoming to help you marry from other youngest child ahead of the eldest and you may, due to the fact eldest wanted a bridegroom and you may attending functions and gatherings, new youngest was not permitted to and you can, thus, remained “from inside the maidenhood”. Obviously, there were and additionally girls who merely could not see one or two it preferred. Peasant area Slaviska datingsajter online handled them very harshly it is unpleasantly surprising today.

Individuals who ended up being leftover while the girls was in fact entitled an option off insulting nicknames: vekovukha (‘century-dated one’), odnokosok (‘one-braided girl’, because single girls used an individual braid even yet in adulthood), ‘gray-haired’, perespelok (‘the latest extremely ripe one’). Such as an effective girl could even be removed within the community because of the her moms and dads on an effective sledge, shouting: “Nadolba, nadolba! (A word definition around “thicker as a stone”) Who desires good nadolba?” If the a family group conformed, they may currently “strike a deal” and possess married the following day.

To keep a beneficial vekovukha was believed in the town a good disgrace – it was considered that including a female had not realized their particular virility possible. Actually lameness, lop-sidedness or becoming hunchbacked just weren’t experienced a barrier so you’re able to matrimony.

In the event that a girl failed to e more than twenty five years old, youths manage stop inviting their unique to their events and you may she would getting forbidden to wear girls’ clothing. Now, their particular gowns had to be off dark color, like those of widows and you will old feminine. The vekovukhas usually lived ilies within the a unique building, in which they leftover her own house.

Widows and vekovukhas, even with their quite disadvantaged reputation, was indeed regarded as in the village since the bearers regarding physical and you may religious purity. As a result, they satisfied of a lot extremely important ceremonial services – mainly related to brand new change to another globe. Given that icons away from condition and you may low-parity, widows and you will centenarians did not attend weddings, births, christenings – nonetheless they took part in brand new rites and you can laundry of your own dead, saw across the human body up until the funeral, typically was able and you can kept brand new funeral service living.

Another significant “work” try the latest “plowing” of your own arable homes by vekovukhas and widows, which had been common in lots of provinces, which have pregnant women (exactly who displayed fertility) harnessed towards the plow. Which extremely important ritual were to be done only symbolically of the “barren” ladies in the fresh new darkness of evening, to make sure that, quite the opposite, the residential property could well be rich whenever date emerged.

Of numerous vekovukhas and you will widows, just after using decades contained in this status, first started doing men and women medication and you may witchcraft in their old age. But, there have been as well as ladies in the latest Russian country, whom felt like which they perform alive alone from their younger many years.

Nuns

The brand new girls which didn’t follow the loved ones road off lives, but chose the highway out of servitude to help you God, were named chernichkas. The word chernichka are an excellent feminitive style of the phrase chernets (‘the one within the black robes’) – a monk who belonged on the “black” (celibate) clergy. To become a great chernichka, a girl needed to state their need after achieving the period of marriage – and here the fresh new girl carry out start to be allowed so you’re able to gatherings and you may people by the town young people. This could takes place by girl’s style of private piety – otherwise because of a guarantee made by their unique moms and dads.

Upon claiming her interest, the new girl was required to share all their own colorful maidenly clothing and wear dark dresses, instance a vekovukha or an excellent widow. Brand new braid was also symbolically slash if you find yourself uttering the text: “Due to the fact my hair doesn’t return together, I will not go back to my personal maidenhood.”