Masks of strangers in Lithuanian feasts: sustained tradition or discrimination of foreigners?

LTReikšminiai žodžiai: Diskriminacija; Etninė ir konfesinė tolerancija; Kaukės; Kitataučiai; Lietuviškos šventės; Tautosaka; Persirengėliai; Svetimšaliai; Tradicija; Šventės; Discrimination; Ethnical and confessional tolerance; Festivals; Foreigners; Lithuanian feasts; Lithuanian folklore; Masks; Strangers; Tradition.

ENPeople of all European nations like to disguise as strangers for various feasts; it is common to use masks of Jews, Gypsies and inhabitants of neighbouring countries, especially if those people are of a different religion. In Lithuania, similarly, the most popular masks of this kind were those of Jews, Gypsies and Hungarians1. In the 19th-20th centuries masks of strangers prevailed over the other types of masks. They were characteristic for the period between Christmas and the Epiphany, as well as for Shrove Tuesday, Easter, weddings and flax braking feasts. Even though Lithuania is not a big country, the tradition of such entertainers in disguise varied from region to region. Christmas season mummers were more characteristic of the east of Lithuania (Higher Lithuania or Aukštaitija), while Easter period disguisers were more common to the west of Lithuania (Lower Lithuania or Samogitia). Wearing masks on Shrove Tuesday and wedding festivals was popular all around Lithuania. The custom of wearing masks and costumes was called čigonavimas (which means visits of Gypsies) by Highlanders or ėjimas žydais (going as Jews) by Samogitians, even though the teams of disguisers included many other masks (such as animals, devils, beggars, the Reaper, etc.). It is also worth mentioning that the custom to impersonate Gypsies was more common to the Highland region, while the custom to impersonate Jews was more characteristic of the Lowland region. The mask of Hungarian was rarer in comparison with masks of other strangers; it was used on Shrove Tuesday in the west of Lithuania, and in the North of Lithuania the character performing the same actions was called a doctor (Vaicekauskas 2005: 136-137). [Extract, p. 174]