15 April2014. The Art of the Pisanka in Moscow… A True Holy Rus Tradition

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We’ve all heard “Ukrainian” caterwauling about  pisanki. Well, it’s not true. All the Slavs do them… Poles do them (including Hutsuls and Gorali)… Czechs and Slovaks do them… Russians, Carpatho-Russians, and Belarusians do them… Slovenes, Serbs, Bulgarians, and Croats do them, as do the Sorbs and Kaszubs (the most westernmost Slavic peoples, who live in Eastern Germany and Northwestern Poland, respectively). Not only do Slavs do them, most Northern Europeans do them… Magyars do… Romanians do… Germans do… Lithuanians do… and the patterns used are very similar, considering the distances involved. That’s not all, kids! It cuts across confessional lines… Orthodox do them… Catholics do them… Evangelical Lutherans do them.

In short, pisanki are a treasured part of Easter for MANY peoples, spread out over a large part of Europe. Ergo, for any one group to “claim” them isn’t only ridiculous, it’s downright nasty. Pisanki are all-Slavic (and more)… that’s that.

BMD