Bohdan Khmelnytsky Cherkasy National University has a museum devoted entirely to Ukrainian embroidered towels known as rushnyks. We were invited to explore this one-of-a-kind museum when we were presenting The Day’s books at the university. The museum is located in a former spacious classroom, where more than 500 rushnyks from Cherkasy and the neighboring oblasts of Poltava, Chernihiv, Rivne, and Kyiv are on display. An equal number of towels are stored in the depository. All of them date to the late 19th-early 20th century. Svitlana Kytova, the museum’s curator and guide, says: “I have very tender feelings for my child. The museum would not exist without the efforts of many people. Since ancient times the rushnyk has been regarded as a sacral object in our daily life,” she continued, “and it is an element in numerous rituals. As an important part of interior decorations; newborns were wrapped in them; they were worn by matchmakers; a towel bound the hands of the bride and groom; it hung from graveside crosses. At harvest time ryshnyky were used to bind sheaves. The rushnyks were restored three times a year, on Christmas Eve, Easter, and Trinity Sunday: every rushnyk was ironed, some needlework was added, or new towels were embroidered. Even today in small towns and villages in certain regions of Ukraine women wash the rushnyks and whitewash the inner and outer walls of their homes on the eve of important religious holidays.”
Svitlana took pains to point out that every rushnyk carries valuable information about the philosophy of Ukrainians, which is a blend of dual faith: paganism and Christianity. This pagan tradition dates back to the Scythian period (4 BC-3 AD) According to Kytova, proof of this is the fact that our ancestors liked to portray small objects on large ones, like a hare against the background of a lion or a small rhombus within a large one. Such patterns are found on embroidered cloths from the 19th century. Svitlana Kytova, who has a Ph.D. in Cultural Studies and is a professor at the Chair of Ukrainian Literature and Comparative Studies at Cherkasy University, knows the language of rushnyks. Several years ago she published a book about the origins of the Ukrainian rushnyk, entitled The Cloth Chronicle of Ukraine. She is also the author of The Family Tree of Songs (Mykhailo Maksymovych’s Little Russian Songs, (1827) and Their Contemporary Recordings) and Christmas and New Year’s Carols in Contemporary Recordings. In 1987, when churches were being destroyed, she went on an ethnographic expedition in search of icons, copies of the Holy Book, and priests’ vestments in old churches, where she also found rushnyks. She says that these treasures later ended up in Leningrad. Since then Ms. Kytova has made the rushnyk the focus of her research. She has learned to read information contained in them by studying world and Ukrainian classics of philosophy, psychology, history, linguistics, and ethnography: Georg Hegel, Carl Gustav Jung, Mykhailo Hrushevsky, Dmytro Antonovych, and Oleksandr Potebnia, among others.
Svitlana Kytova interprets an embroidered circle open to the outside with its rays, or closed and turned inward, as a symbol of the sun. On one side it is grand and luminous, symbolizing joy, and on the other side it is hot and dark, prophesying misfortune. “Remember that when Prince Ihor saw a solar eclipse, he asked the boyars and troops: ‘What is this sign?’” They replied: “‘Oh, prince, this is not a good sign.’ This passage appears in the Hypatian Chronicle (12th c.). A dual interpretation of this symbolism is typical of pagan magical spells. In the Christian tradition, a circle is interpreted as eternity and the continuity of existence. I asked about the significance of the letters A, Zh, M1, M2, M3 represented on various cloths. It turns out that “A,” stands for azm, meaning “the first.” This sign also stands for all or some of the 12 Apostles; Zh means zhyvot, which means “life” in Old Church Slavonic. Accordingly, M1, M2, and M3 indicate the first, second, and third prechysta (religious holidays celebrating the Virgin Mary — Ed.). “Now take a look at this,” our unique told guide told us. “The religiously significant letter ‘A’ encircles an early Christian anchor-shaped symbol or kitvytsia (its ancient name). The cross, as a Christian sign, appeared only in the 4th century. Or take the Holy Sepulcher: above it are two angels and keys, obviously to hell and paradise. Reproduced below is an eagle’s head above a serpent’s head. I wonder how the Ukrainian granny from Zhabotyn in Cherkasy oblast who made this rushnyk could have known that a pair of keys and an eagle and serpent symbolize God’s struggle against evil, according to Tertullian, one of the first Christian theologians? Obviously, this is proof that the traditions of past centuries have been powerfully preserved, as well as the link between generations. When I doubt something, I go to the regional hospital and hold a “counsel” with women there.”
Among the ornamental subjects we found some that can be easily used for painting folk pictures, for example, a couple on a stile, a girl with a shoulder-yoke, or a Cossack watering his horse.
This precious collection is being expanded with finds from expeditions whose participants include Kytova’s students. “It’s true that old rushnyks, on one of which, for example, a great-grandmother stood during the wedding ceremony, and with another she wiped an infant’s face after baptism, seem to absorb and then preserve those people’s energy and those events,” says the professor, adding: “They ‘tell’ you about our ancestors’ characters and personalities. The designs of rushnyks from the past century have been simplified. These pieces of cloth confirm only that we have survived the misfortunes Ukraine sustained in the 20th century.”
