Kashpar N. Chuvash Belt Pendants Chӗkeś khu̇ri and Chalma: Origins and Evolution
Natalja Kashpar
The Russian Museum of Ethnography
Saint Petersburg, Russian Federation
ORCID: 0000-0002-8117-9131
E-mail: nkashpar@yandex.ru
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ABSTRACT. The article discusses the origins and evolution of two types of triangular belt pendants, i.e. chӗkeś khu̇ri and chalma, which occured in the second half of the nineteenth century among the Upper and Mid-Lower Chuvash. Belt pendants were part of women’s, mostly wedding, costume. Drawing on her analysis of the collections of the Russian Museum of Ethnography, as well as museum objects described in the State Catalog of the Museum Fund of the Russian Federation, the author concludes that belt pendants of both types appeared around the middle of the nineteenth century as a result of a change in the function of objects in the ritual costume. Belt pendants chӗkeś khu̇rideveloped from wedding shawls, which were folded into a triangle and attached to the lower back over the caftan by the participants of a wedding ceremony. The chalma pendants evolved from the headdress of the same name. For the half a century of their existence, belt pendants of both types have gone through similar stages of development, due to the successive changes of red silk and woolen braid, red calico, multi-colored factory silk ribbons, passementerie and other materials. By the late nineteenth century, as a result of these changes, belt pendants chӗkeś khu̇ri and chalma had moved away from their prototypes significantly.
KEYWORDS: Chuvash costume, belt pendants, wedding shawl
DOI 10.31250/2618-8619-2021-2(12)-63-73
УДК 391.4
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