Ancient Sumy Land

48-57

Authors: Kukharenko O. O. PhD (philology). Institute of Ethnology of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. Kharkiv State Academy of Culture (Ukraine). ORCID: 0000-0001-5421-1004

The article is devoted to the construction and study of the structure of the cycle of Ukrainian wedding rites, and it is a kind of continuation of the author’s publications, who uses a structural and functional method to study the national family ritualism. In the course of the study, it turned out that, after the division of rites, there were extra episodes that cannot be attributed to any of the rites in which they occur - neither matchmaking, nor wedding, nor dowry. And since such unaccounted episodes are at the beginning of prewedding, wedding and post-wedding small cycles, the researcher proposes to include them in the prologues of each of these cycles. At the same time, these three prologues should be considered full-fledged rites to give the structure greater harmony and functionality. The correctness of the division of prologues into episodes is checked using five criteria of division: new-level or generalized repetition of the event, material and spiritual metamorphosis of the characters of sacred action, change of sacred chronotope, the principle of constant renewal and change of character of the action. According to the latter criterion, episodes that are adjacent but do not change the nature of the action cannot be considered as individual episodes, but only as variations of the same episode. The prologues created in this way for the three small cycles of the Ukrainian wedding took the first, eighth and fourteenth places in the structure, respectively, and the cycle of fourteen rites increased to seventeen. Two of the three prologues - wedding and post-wedding - have no culminating episodes. The prologue of the pre-wedding cycle is at the same time the general prologue to the whole great cycle of rites. The presence of prologues implies the need to identify epilogues for both the large ritual cycle and each of the small cycles. Such epilogues, according to one version, can be considered the last rites in small cycles - hiltse, komora and perezva. On the other hand, the epilogues may be the final episodes of the said rites, which are after the culmination. This version is supported by the absence of culmination episodes in two of the three prologues. But none of the options is important for the existence and functioning of the structure, because the created structure does not need to be divided into epilogues, and prologues are important from the point of view to include all the available episodes in the ritual action.

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Authors: Chyzhov O. I. PhD (History), Senior Lecturer of the Department of Fine Arts, Musicology and Cultural Studies, Sumy State Pedagogical University named after A. Makarenko (Ukraine). ORCID: 0000- 0003-2141-9903.

The paper analyses the reasons for the genesis, creation history, structural arrangement, fields of work, and problems in the functioning of Sumy Children’s Park “Kazka” from the mid1980s of the 20th century - to the early 21st century. In the study course, it has been concluded that the “Kazka” children’s park appeared in Sumy due to the need to streamline the territory of the city center. The children’s park creation was initiated by the then head of the city A. Lushpa. The prototype for the park in Sumy was the children’s playground “Kazka” in Mykolaiv. In fact, the park creation began in a directive way with the financial burden-shifting for the work execution from budgetary funds to the city enterprises’ funds, which was not uncommon under the Soviet totalitarian regime. At the same time, the children’s park was created in a short time due to the well-coordinated work of many enterprises and organizations in the city, which were helped by thousands of Sumy residents on a voluntary basis. The created park “Kazka” was a unique architectural complex on a fairy-tale topic with diverse cultural and entertainment facilities and offered visitors leisure activities for every taste. The significant amount and variety of park cultural-mass work in the first years of its existence were explained by the help, made on a voluntary basis, from a large number of local institutions and organizations. Because of its uniqueness, the park “Kazka” has become widely known throughout the country. At the same time, the flourishing of the park “Kazka” activities fell in the first years of its existence, which is largely dependent on the specific methods of the institution work organization, being typical of the Soviet economic and political systems. Those systems ceased to function effectively with the fall of the Communist Party regime. At the turn of the 1980s and 1990s, problems began to arise in front of the park due to socio-economic changes in the country. The major of them was the problem of lack of funds. Under market conditions, reliable sources of the park work financing by the city authorities disappeared due to rising prices, a decrease in the population solvency, etc. “Kazka” park’s income from paid services did not allow to resolve the institution’s financial situation. Since the second half of the 1990s, the park began to rapidly decline. Some of the unique architectural objects of the park were lost. In general, city authorities in the 1990s - at the beginning of the 21st century little dealt with the problems of the children’s park “Kazka”, and its restoration in 2003 was caused by the desire to create an eye-catching picture of the city’s improvement in front of the government delegation. This restoration has never been completed.

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Authors: Nesterenko V. A. PhD (History), Assosiate Professor (Ukraine), Sumy State University. ORCID: 0000- 0002-0469-3671.

Review of the monograph: Ancient History of Ukraine. 2nd ed., Supplement. K.: Tempora, 2021. 640 s. [Recenzija na monografiju: Starodavnja istorija Ukrai'ny.2-ge vyd., dopovn. K. : Tempora, 2021. 640 s.]