As is well known, one of the most beloved folk holidays, Ivan Kupala, falls on the night of July 6–7. Originally, this holiday was celebrated on the day of the summer solstice. After the introduction of Christianity, it was aligned with the feast of the Nativity of John the Baptist, which was celebrated on June 24 according to the old calendar. However, Ivan’s Day was still filled with the pre-Christian rituals of our ancestors.
To this day, on the eve of Ivan Kupala, many Ukrainian cities and villages host a wide variety of festivals featuring folk songs and rituals every year, where anyone who wishes can take part in the ancient Kupala traditions. Interestingly, these days, not only do government officials not ban these events, but they sometimes even participate themselves—after all, a little PR never hurts. However, this was far from always the case.
For example, there is a well-known decree from 1719 by Ivan Ilyich Skoropadsky, Hetman of Ukraine, titled “On Evening Gatherings, Fistfights, Gatherings on Ivan Kupala Day, and Other Matters.”
In it, the hetman noted, in particular, that he had received reports from various places that many young people were gathering at night to celebrate Kupala. During these gatherings
Excesses occur, such as: sexual sins, the defilement of virginity, and the unlawful bearing of children; and from this, through the very same lawbreakers who conceal their wicked deeds, infanticide occurs
The author then points out that, because of such celebrations, God’s wrath has become evident, and crop failures, livestock deaths, and the plague have befallen the land. It is for this very reason that the hetman, in his proclamation, grants the right to physically punish, bind, and beat with sticks all those who dare to take part in “debauched festivities.” The spiritual authorities were instructed to “severely punish the unruly troublemakers and to excommunicate the disobedient from the church.”
But in 1769, the Chernihiv regimental chancellery received a decree from Empress Catherine II, which also prohibited the holding of “an age-old festival known as Kupala Fire, which the laws have long ordered to be suppressed and eradicated.” Naturally, at that time, church officials also exercised considerable vigilance regarding the celebration of Ivan Kupala, including in our lands.
For example, on February 9, 1770, the Okhtyrka Ecclesiastical Administration sent
an interesting report to the Belgorod Consistory regarding superstition observed in the Okhtyrka District. On June 26, 1769, Mikhail Zenkovsky, the priest of the Archangel Church in the town of Okhtyrka, reported:
My parishioners, the soldier Ivan Sheyka and his son Ivan, along with their companions, committed blasphemous acts on the street, at Sheyka’s gate, on June 24 of that same year, that is, on the feast day of the holy and glorious Prophet, Forerunner, and Baptist of the Lord, John, acts contrary to God and erected a certain idol, called “Kupala” or “Marina,” dressed in women’s clothing and adorned on the head with flowers and tree branches; before it stood a table, and on that table stood a glass containing an unknown beverage; and young women had gathered before that idol and were singing songs abhorrent to God…
The priest then notes that this celebration was solemnly observed every year in Okhtyrka. And local residents would come from all over to Ivan Sheyka’s house to perform the Kupala ritual; under his leadership, incidentally, the Kupala idol was then carried throughout the city.
An investigation began that lasted a full seven months. However, it yielded no results “due to the failure to appear, despite repeated summonses, of many individuals involved in the case.” In the consistory’s decree of March 8, 1780, we read:
But since that report does not specify any circumstances relevant to the request, and since it is unclear where exactly the consistory should be notified and to whom specifically, the administration must act prudently in such cases and not burden the consistory with weekly resolutions, lest, in accordance with the decrees, a fine be imposed; for this reason, the administration must, without any excuse regarding that matter (i.e., superstition), send a report to the consistory…
In other words, to put it in modern terms, the clergy from Okhtyrka were reprimanded in Belgorod and asked not to raise this issue again, or else they would face fines. Apparently, this is precisely why they wrote in their subsequent reports: “In the town of Okhtyrka and throughout the department’s jurisdiction, no superstitious practices took place…”
No matter how much the church and the authorities wanted to ban Ivan Kupala, the holiday remained popular among the people, and the issue of bans gradually faded away. In 1907, a wonderful book by the Ukrainian ethnographer Pyotr Vasilyevich Ivanov, *The Life and Beliefs of the Peasants of the Kup’yans’k District in the Kharkiv Governorate*, was published in our city.
The author writes that when it gets dark, young peasants from villages located near rivers gather on the riverbank and build a bonfire, mostly out of straw. However, in the town of Kup’yans’k and in large trading settlements, no bonfires are lit. Instead, they set up a bush of stinging nettles, thistles, or wolf’s-bane. Ivanov cites the lyrics of numerous Kupala songs and describes the customs of the celebration in various settlements, making special note of the remarkable properties of the ashes from the Kupala bonfire in the difficult task of warding off witches.
Thanks to this book, the residents of Sloboda Ukraine can still celebrate Kupala Night today just as they did 100 or more years ago. It is truly heartening that the traditions of our ancestors, despite all the bans and denunciations, are still alive among us to this day.
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