A (, , , ) was a medieval East Slavic actor, who could also sing, dance, play musical instruments and compose for oral/musical and dramatic performances. The term has an unclear etymology.
Etymology The etymology of the word is not completely clear. There are hypotheses that the word is derived from the Greek term (), from (, 'joke'); from the Italian term ('joker', cf. English scaramouch); from the Arabic term (); and many others.
History The appeared in Kievan Rus' no later than the mid-11th century, but fresco depictions of musicians in the Saint Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv date to the 11th century.
The Primary Chronicle on concurs with the period. The monk chronicler denounced them as devil servants. Furthermore, the Eastern Orthodox Church often railed against them and other elements of popular culture as being irreverent, detracting from the worship of God, or being downright diabolical. For example, Theodosius of Kiev, one of the co-founders of the Caves Monastery in the 11th century, called the "evils to be shunned by good Christians".Feodosii Pecherskii, Sochinenia, I. I. (Izmail Ivanovich) Sreznevskii, ed., in Ucheniia zapiski vtorogo otdelenie Imperatorskoi Akademii Nauk, Vol. 2, no. 2, (St. Petersburg: Tipografii Imperatorskoi Akademii Nauk, 1856), 195; See Russell Zguta, "Skomorokhi: The Russian Minstrel-Entertainers", Slavic Review 31 No. 2 (June 1972), 297–298; Idem, Russian Minstrels: A History of the Skomorokhi (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1978). Their art was related and addressed to the common people and usually opposed the ruling groups. They were considered not just useless but even ideologically detrimental and dangerous by both the feudalists and the clergy.
were persecuted in the years of the Mongol yoke (1230s), when the church strenuously propagated ascetic living. Their art reached its peak in the 15th to the 17th centuries. Their repertoire included mock songs, dramatic and satirical sketches, called () in Russian or () in Ukrainian, performed in masks and dresses to the sounds of domra, balalaika, gudok, bagpipes, or buben (a kind of tambourine). The appearance of Russian puppet theatre was directly associated with performances.
performed in the streets and city squares, engaging with the spectators to draw them into their play. Usually, the main character of the performance was a fun-loving saucy () of comic simplicity. In the 16th and 17th centuries, would sometimes combine their efforts and perform in a (, 'big crowd'), numbering 70 to 100 people. The were often persecuted by the Russian Orthodox Church and civilian authorities.
In 1648 and 1657, Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich issued ukases banning art as blasphemous, their inventory was destroyed, fell into captivity, were pursued but actors would still occasionally perform during popular celebrations. In the 18th century, art gradually died away; passing on some of its traditions to the () and ().
The role of the in the preservation and dissemination of folklore was closely linked with their important contribution to the development of secular music, first in Kievan Rus' and later in Muscovite Russia. Before the introduction of Christianity in the late tenth century, Kievan music was characterized primarily by ritualistic songs of worship, ceremonial (e.g., wedding, funeral) songs, and seasonal songs such as and . With Byzantine Christianity came Byzantine chant and a vigorous attempt to suppress native music because of its close identification with paganism. This attempted suppression was only partially successful, because it was mainly aimed at the more populous urban centers and left the remote rural areas with their flourishing folk music relatively untouched.
See also Bandurists Busking Goliards Kobzar Lirnyks Minstrel Troubadour
References
External links
Skomorokhi, the Troubadours of Old Rus