Furrowing or squeezing through a garment are ancient rituals that go together and are performed with one express purpose. They are not accompanied by any particular songs or incantations, in fact they are done in complete silence in the dead of night – after nightfall and before the first cock crow; in this, what is known as the “twin cult” is paramount. That is why the traditional stories and songs selected by Albena Bezovska are about twin boys and girls and about the dark hours.

Furrowing was once done to ward off epidemics, hail, floods, fires or demonic beings that could do people harm. There were times when the wells in the village would run dry, disease would afflict many of its inhabitants or some other calamity would make the life of the community impossible. That was when the elders would select a new place – a big meadow on stable ground, close to water, well protected by woodland etc. To protect the new village, people would perform the ritual of furrowing. There was a series of rituals that would be done if calamity befell the people even when they did not move away. Preparing for this ritual was no easy thing, there were all sorts of rules, that is why it was performed only rarely, writes eminent ethnographer Dimitar Marinov. At the beginning of the 20th century he writes that he had found just one “furrowed” village (from about a hundred years before that) and in many others he had been given information about the ritual, but only in Eastern Bulgaria. In some of the towns and villages there were emigrants from Edirne, Lozengrad, Dedeagach etc. As Dimitar Marinov says in Central Northern and in Western Bulgaria this ritual does not exist.

But what does furrowing involve? First people had to find a forked tree (twinned), i.e. a tree with two trunks which were cut down; from the timber the wooden parts of the plough were made. The iron for the ploughshare was taken from nine different places – nine districts. The ploughshare itself was hammered out in one night by twin-blacksmiths who only worked at night. Once the cock crowed, they stopped their work. The people making the plough had to work in the nude and in complete silence. As soon as it was ready, another pair of twin brothers harnessed a twin pair of oxen and made one or three furrows around the village. The ploughmen had to be in the nude too and plough in the dead of night. The furrows were made in three concentric circles, 2-3 meters apart. The entire village knew when the ritual was being performed and nobody left the house. Nobody was allowed to enter the village either – all crossroads were watched. It was believed that if anyone saw the ritual of furrowing it would lose its magic power and would not be able to ward off calamity or disease. In some villages the twins would start out in opposite directions and on the spot they met up they would slaughter oxen and bury them, together with a locked padlock.

This ritual is often accompanied by other magical ceremonies. After furrowing the fire in all fireplaces was extinguished. The twin brothers obtained fire in the most primitive way possible – by rubbing dry twigs together. All people in the village would take of this fire and take it home – according to popular belief, live or young fire kept evil at bay. In some parts, while the ground was being ploughed and fire obtained, two pairs of twin girls would make ritual bread.

In some parts, the difficult ritual of furrowing was replaced by what was known as squeezing through a garment. Interestingly, information about this ritual has been obtained in the same towns and villages where furrowing was performed. This ritual needed black wool and “pure women”. A black ram was found which was sheared, the wool was washed, dried, spun and woven into cloth from which an item of clothing was made. In some parts hemp was used instead of wool. And all this had to be done in one night – the ram was sheared after sundown and the garment had to be ready by sunup. Women would get together in a house on the edge of the village where they would weave the fabric called chumino (derived from the word chuma, plague). The item of clothing made this way was thought to be magical and bring health. All members of the household would squeeze through this garment (in places through the fabric). In this ritual too the participants had to be in the nude, so it was performed by men and women separately and again in the dead of night. The squeezing was done outside the village – in a garden or a field. It was believed that no disease could touch the people who had squeezed through such a garment. When this was done, the item was given to the neighbours who had helped in its making. If the ritual was performed by the entire community, an orphan girl would ride the cloth like a horse and make the rounds of the village three times. After the third time, the fabric and everything used to make it – cloth-beam, distaff, spindle – would be buried underneath the boundary between two fields.

English version: Milena Daynova