Sacred Corner in a Peasant’s Dwelling: Sacred, Informational and Communicative Functions

Abstract

The article analyzes the evolution of the «sacred corner» and its structure in the Russian peasant tradition from the point of view of vernacular functions that it performed in the peasant house of the 19th — early 21st centuries. The work was carried out at the intersection of ethno‑linguistic, ethnographic and cultural methods. The material for the work comes from field research of the last two decades in the Lower Volga region and in the northwestern regions of Russia as well as ethnographic data of the 19th–20th centuries. The evidences of foreigners who visited Russia in the 16th–18th centuries are used to understand the history of а sacred corner formation. A pragmatic analysis of the available data makes it possible to consider the sacred corner (in the form in which it has been known since the 19th century) as a complexly structured locus of a peasant dwelling. The sacred corner performed broader mental and information functions besides the sacral one. The sacred corner was a symbolic center that reflected the intellectual interests and the worlview of the house owner. The sacred corder retained and expanded the status of an information and communicative center in the 20th century in spite of atheistic persecution it now included both a radio or TV sets as well as the most important information, from psalms and the Bible to medical prescriptions and notes with ritual spells.