Malefici e matrimoni. A proposito di due testi novgorodiani su corteccia di betulla scoperti nel 2005

Abstract

Sorcery and Marriages: About Two Novgorod Birchbark Documents Found in 2005

In this article the author expounds on some marginal notes on two twelfth-century gramoty (no. 954 and no. 955). When these were discovered in the summer of 2005, they were thought to display obscene implications because of the reference to female genitals in text no. 955 and because of the presence (in the other text) of the verb pošibati. If interpreted as ‘rape’, the latter would transform gramota 954 into evidence of cases of zoophilia. On closer analysis, however, these documents turn out to be of much greater interest and not bawdy at all, since they reveal evident links with East-Slavic pre-Christian cultural traditions. These notes will be further developed in a new edition of the author’s book, Iscrizioni novgorodiane su corteccia di betulla (Udine 1995), currently in progress.