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1. SCOALA CU CLASELE I – VIII “SFANTUL ANDREI”
SECONDARY SCHOOL “SAINT ANDREW”
BRAILA, ROMANIA
FOLK DANCES FROM
ROMANIA
MULTILATERAL PARTENERSHIP
“EUROPEAN MUSICAL PORTOFOLIO”
HEADMASTER: ROTARU CATALINA
TEACHERS:
MIHAI ADINA, BABES MARIAN, CRAIOVEANU AURELIA,
MANCIULESCU CORNELIA, RADU IOANA
This project This publication reflects the views only of the
has been funded author, and the Commission cannot be held
with support from responsible for any use which may be made of
the European Commission the information contained therein

2. RHYTM AND HARMONY
• "The man received the Gods with
pleasure feeling the rhythm and
harmony.
• The Gods themselves were the
conductors of their dances, and the
name of the heart, Choros, derives
naturally from the word which
means happiness, chora" Platon,
Laws, II, 653/4.

3. FOLK DANCES
PERINITA GAMES WITH SUMMER
MASKS CUSTOMS
(the little pillow)
HORA
BRASOVEANCA
MORISCA
PENGUIN DANCE
CALUSUL GOAT’S DANCE PLOUGH

4. HORA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnhSBe8diDo
• When the incoming Greek-speaking peoples arrived into the Balkan Peninsula,
from the north, during the first millennium BC, they adopted the Pelasgian sacred
mountain, Olimpus, which was guarded by the Pelasgian priestess of Hera, the
amazons called Horai or Horae.
• In the Iliad they were the custodians of the gates of Olympus. They are also the
collective personification of justice. Hesoid, who saw them as givers of the law,
justice and peace gave them the names Eunomia (Discipline), Dike (Justice) and
Eirene (Peace).
• The Horae became in the Greek mythology, the personifications of the seasons
and goddesses of natural order.
• In later mythology the Horae became the four seasons. When the day was divided
into 12 equal parts, each of them took the name of Hora. Their yearly festival was
the Horaia or Horaea.
• The "hour" comes from Greek Hora, Pers. Houri, who kept the hours of the night
by dances - the "ladies of the hour".

5. • Hora, plural Hore (same reading as
greek Horae), is the name of an
ancient circular dance, which
survived up to nowdays in Romania.
• In the ancient times, naked women
danced it.
• In Romania there were found three
clay depictions of this dance, two of
them having five dancers and one
with six dancers.
• The last one, which is the most
famous, was found at Bodesti-
Frumusica, in Moldavia. All of them
are dating from 4000 - 3000 BC.
• These objects have been used as
crowns, during some ritual
ceremonies.
• So that you are looking at the oldest
crowns ever found!

6. • The Romanian circular dance called hora is a metaphor for the
community: the circle opens admittion nubile women, adolescent boys
entering manhood, and those ending mourning; conversely, it shuts out
anyone who has violated local moral standards. There are few patterns of
dance steps.
• The dancers, while facing the center, are stepping forward and backward,
making the hora to resemble to either to a wave, or to a whirlpool, when
they are doing quick steps in only one direction. Usually the dancers are
moving more to the right, so that the circle moves counterclockwise.
• The "entering into the hora", performed usually on Easter, marks the
entering of the girl into the adolescence.
The days before and after her wedding, the girl must dance into the hora,
because the wedding rituals are accomplished through the magic of this
dance which guarantees the abundance, the good luck and the divine
blessing during the marriage.

7. PERINITA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=px12Ec5iJtY
• "Perinita" (the little pillow) is a distinctive Romanian
dance of the kiss.
• It is a hora dance, in which alternatively, men and
women pick their partners from the circle of the
dancers, for a short swirl, and a kiss upon the dance
floor while kneeling in the middle of the hora, on a
little pillow or on an embroidered handkerchief.
• After the kissing, the last chosen will choose a new
partner, while his former partner takes his place into
the hora. This dance is performed on the night of the
New Year and is the last hora on the wedding
celebrations.

8. MORISCA
(the little mill)
• In ancient times, dances were widely used in the passing rites such as
passing of the seasons, wedding celebrations and funerary
celebrations. Such a passing rite was also the milling of the seeds. It
has already been mentioned that the name of the Morris dance
comes from the Romanian word morisca, which means "the little
mill".
• The Romanian word for mill is moara, which also means to die or
dieing, while omoara means killing. Mara was the Hindu god of death
and Moros was in Hesiod's Theogonia, a "divine being who's mother
was the night". The Romanian word moroi means ghost.
• In the village of Nerej, Vrancea county from Romania, the
participants to a funeral watch and play the funerary dance of
farewell, around a brushwood fire which symbolizes the sacred fire of
the hearth , and they wear masks.This dance is called the hora of
death watch. The majority of masques are called "unchiaşi" (uncles).
Other young boys are disguising into women, other into different
animals such as the bear, and others into devils. All of them are
dancing around the funerary fire.

9. THE PENGUIN DANCE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7MEN0cUZjSs
• The penguin dance – is the latest fashion in
Romanian’s wedding, being a dance and
song of Finnish origins.
• The Finnish dance is called “JENKA” and
arrived in Romania, most probably by the
Greek’s version, called “GIANKA”.
• The Romanian sounds is also inspired from
’50s Finnish song.

10. BRASOVEANCA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KtMt_e366M
• Brasoveanca – it is Brasoveanca - wedding dance
a pair dance, the from Brasov area
pairs are dancing • And, three steps forward and three back
on a rhythm which That's Brasoveanca which we dance
is becoming more Three steps forward and three back
and more alert. That's Brasoveanca which we dance
The girl goes left than she passes right
The girl goes left, that's Brasoveanca,
hey! (Bis stanza)
• That is how the girl dances
Also on the left and right!
And forward and back,
As we dance!

11. GAMES WITH
MASKS
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bseN7ZMGBFs
http://youtu.be/1W_I9EWL898
• In the framework of traditional communities, the
calendar cycle and its constituent moments are
marked out by sets of customs, components of each
community's folk system.
• The calendar used to organize the time from both a
material and spiritual standpoint: the dates, moments
and periods inscribed therein were not viewed as units
of measure, but as units of quality assessment of the
rhythm of time.
• The calendar was the expression of this rhythm of
time; it was, functionally speaking, a reference point
for the peasant's entire material and spiritual being.

12. • In the primitive societies, the early forms of disguising,
masking appeared in the process of work and were
connected with magic practices.
• Archaic ceremonies would resort to dance, pantomime,
music, pictorial and sculptural elements, poetic text, in
actual fact to a complex of syncretic, typically folk,
elements imitating an action.
• The characteristic element embodying this
metamorphosis was the mask. The use of mask in
theatrical representations facilitates the recognition of a
character's scenic function; the mask is a formalized
accessory that makes the person who wears it to acquire
an identity and a precise signification, according to a
given custom.
• Individual occupations, productive activities as well as
the principal moments' of a man's life - birth, marriage
and death - are rigorously ordered in the calendar by a
system of customs marked by fixed or changeable dates,
with free intervals and periods of interdiction, which are
ultimately based on a different system that coordinates
and articulates that community's whole life and activity,
namely religious system.

13. • In Romania, particularly in the Vrancea area , but also in
Maramures, and seemingly in other parts of the country, as
well games with anthropomorphic masks have been practiced
of old and vigil time, at the funerary ceremonial that preceded
the burial of the dead. Some specialists would see in it the
group of dead old men meeting the newly deceased one get,
there also exists a zoomorphic vigil goat mask, in which the
performer used to lament for the dead until the assistance
would chase him away.
• As known, a close connection exists between funerary and
fertility rites; however, one should not overlook the
importance of the Christian burial ceremonial, the gravity of
this act and the exigency of the church and the faithful in this
matter.
• The old form of the relationship between the goat's old man
and the goat itself, as played at vigil time, has developed into
the modern old man – old woman couple, which diversifies the
image of our ancestors while protecting the community and
defending fertility.

14. SUMMER CUSTOMS
• SANZIENE DANCE
• LAZARITELE It's summer time in
• PAPARUDE Romania, the sun is shining
and one can even smell the
• CUNUNA ripped corn and the newly
made bread. Summer
SECERISULUI customs seem to be magic
rituals meant to protect the
crops.

15. LAZARITELE
• The fertility of the land is required by
the custom of "Lazaritele", a relict of
the ancient worship of the sun: young
girls are going from house to house,
wishing abundance and good health to
the hosts.

16. PAPARUDE
• In case of drought, the "Paparude", very
young gipsy girls, wearing only leaves, are
dancing and singing incantation meant to
bring rain. http://youtu.be/k5ig9-Djfxw

17. http://youtu.be/TX-tudjDNxQ
CUNUNA SECERISULUI
• In many Romanian villages the harvest has had a feast
dedicated to it called "Cununa Secerissului" or "Cununa"
because of the traditional wreath made of twisted ears of
corn worn by girls on their heads. The group of girls go to all
the houses in the village, praising the people's labour and
expressing their joy for the new bread. As a matter of fact
ears of corn and grain appear figuratively in a lot of
picturesque elements of Romanian folklore and so do flowers
on either wooden objects, fabrics or ceramics.

18. SANZIENE DANCE
http://youtu.be/d4P8wCoFGA0
• On the 23rd of June, on the summer solstice, there is
the celebration of Sanziene or Rusalii, who are the
fairies protecting the crops and are dancing in the
air, over the fields and forests. During this day,
women are dancing in a hora, having at its middle
buckets with water, flowers and personal objects, as
offerings to the fairies.

19. CALUSUL
http://youtu.be/3Iw4FhBg_XY
http://youtu.be/8E-Z_ugiRnA

20. ORIGINS OF CALUSUL
• Dimitrie Cantemir, the king of Moldavia (1693, 1710-1711) and a remarkable
historian, wrote in his work "Descriptio Moldaviae", about the so called caluczeni
telling us that they gathered in groups of 7, 9 or 11, wearing woman clothing and
making their voices to sound like the women ones.
• They were jumping as if they were flying, with their swords in hands. They were
treating the sick ones, and if they killed somebody, they were not punished.
• The Caluczenii had to fulfill their ritual duties for nine years, otherways they were
punished by the spirits.
• The Romanian folklorist Fochi Adrian wrote: "They are bound to remain into the
calus for 3, 5 or 9 years. They are worshiping three fairies left by God to punish the
humans (...). If one of them gets sick during the calus, they go to find other group of
calusari, where all of them, are trying to remove the sickness of their comrade, with
dances and tours around him."

21. ABOUT DANCE OF CALUSUL
• A calusari group is active for only a ritually defined period of time during the
spring, and begins with a ceremony called "raising the flag," which is
performed secretly and includes the members swearing oaths to the group
and its leader.
• During the period of calus, the members are bound by a taboo against any
sexual contact with women, and married members must live apart from their
wives.
• There is always an old number of men in a group. In addition to the dancing,
the group also does skits very much like the folk theater.

22. • The most important part, of what they do is the ritual
curing of delirium or paralysis caused by the possession by
wood or water nymphs, or fairies.
• Before performing this ritual, one of the members draws a
magic circle around the group with his sword.
• The space inside is considered a sacred space, and no one else
is permitted to enter except the person being cured.
• The leader would divine the specific taboo that had been
violated by the victim, and pick the dance appropriate to it.
• After the dance, the cure culminated in the breaking of an
earthenware jar next to the sick person, destroying the evil
spirits.
• Sometimes one of the calusari would then become possessed as
the victim recovers. He would then be revived by one of the
many types of death and resurrection skits that are a large
part of the folk theater. Again, many of these have humorous
and bawdy aspects.

23. • The leader of the group is the one
responsible for choosing and training any
new members, and is also the keeper of
the mysteries, passing the secrets orally
to his successor. Kligman says that one
retired leader would not reveal any of the
secrets even though there was no longer a
group in his village, but indicated that he
still had to pass on the knowledge.

24. • Now days, the "calusari", often accompanied by
a masked personage (the mute) carry clubs and
are performing dances of great virtuosity. The
unexpected developments of the dance are
accompanied by "strigaturi" (humorous or
satirical verse chanted during the dance) and the
tunes sung by the groups of interpreters.
• In Slatina, every year opens the competition of
"calusari", presenting the distinct style of each
separate team of dancers. Thrilling competitions
of virtuosity are interrupted by solo dancers,
some of whom are very old men, and even
children who have inherited their parents’ talent.

25. PLOUGH
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sB6a7dybzeI
http://youtu.be/Ir-JWILveoE
• In ancient times, the New Year was celebrated at the end of
March.
• The Plough rituals are coming from that period, but changed the
date together with the change of the calendar.
• Plough is celebrated on the 31st of December. On this occasion,
people are walking with the plough, from house to house, telling
greetings of prosperity for the year to come.

26. "Plough" at Bucharest, Romania at
the beginning of the 20th century

27. THE GOAT’S DANCE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bb_iVlPUQUQ
http://youtu.be/VfrD6SV903s
• Goats dance is very old and practiced on a large scale in South – Eastern
Europe.
• In Romania it is known in the village all regions of the country, with several
names: Capra (Goat), Turca, Brezaia. The dance has deep symbolical meanings
– goat was an animal worshiped in ancient times so it is associated with fertility
cult.
• Its behavior around New Year is premonitory one in relation to the abundance
or troubles that follow. Therefore, the happy dance of goat ensures wealth in
the coming year.
• Children are particularly engaged in this dance. There are 2 or 3 dancers - one
of them are completely masked and covered with colored clothes, other two are
appointed shepherds and play the flute or recite comic texts to the goat which is
dancing.
• The mask was made earlier from animal skins. Today, the fabrics materials are
used to achieve it crepe paper, tassels, bells. The head is made of hard wood
where the skins of animals are glide. Lower jaw is mobile, so that a noise is
produced in the rhythm of the dance.

28. CONCLUSIONS
• We hope that you liked our traditional dances.
• Now, many of these dances lost their first
significance , but there are still danced on the
important events: marriage, birth or other
events.
• Many people knew these dances and they are
transmitted from generation to generation until
these days.