Bulgarians in Bessarabia keep the tradition of a special game with Easter eggs

published on 5/5/24 5:05 AM

Photo: Private archive

Games where the main character is the egg are probably not very many. In Germany, for example, on Easter, families visit the church, and then children look for eggs in the garden, hidden by the Easter bunny - a symbol of fertility. If we look for information, however, we will find a less popular tradition preserved in the territory of today's Bessarabia, where many ethnic Bulgarians live.

"All the eggs are placed on a line - one by each participant. Then, with a tennis ball, the participant tries to push an egg out of the frame in which they are enclosed. Each egg that comes out is a trophy for the one who hit it. The game took place in the street, and a bed of sand and earth was made for each egg, in which it could stand straight," the ethnographer from Moldova Galina Manolova told us.

"When I wrote about this game, I was sure that it still existed, and what was my surprise when it turned out that the game was completely lost! I found that it was known not only in my native village of Kairaklia, but also in the surrounding, mainly Bulgarian villages", clarifies Galina Manolova. "I was looking for materials to see if this is not a Moldovan, Ukrainian or Russian loanword, but this game is observed only among Bulgarians."

On Easter with the Bulgarians in Moldova, we have an interesting publication from the collection of Radio Bulgaria, in which you can hear the researcher's story about the almost forgotten Easter game of our compatriots in Bessarabia and her wish for more peace and light in our souls:

Bessarabian ethnographer Galina Manolova revives an Easter egg game long lost in time

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Bulgarians in Bessarabia keep the tradition of a special game with Easter eggs

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