{"id":1508,"date":"2020-01-12T22:49:26","date_gmt":"2020-01-12T20:49:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/survakari.com\/en\/?p=1508"},"modified":"2020-01-12T23:07:30","modified_gmt":"2020-01-12T21:07:30","slug":"kosacha","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/survakari.com\/en\/2020\/01\/12\/kosacha\/","title":{"rendered":"Kosacha Village"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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The village of Kosacha is 22 km away\nfrom the district town Pernik. The region is mountainous with beautiful\nconiferous and mixed woods. Not far away are the municipality center\nKovachevtsi and Pchelina dam. In our days, the permanent inhabitants of the\nvillage are less than 100 people, but the cultural activities do not subside \u2013\nthe women\u2019s folk vocal group regularly takes part in the national folklore\nfestivals and frequently wins prizes, while in the masquerade at Surova\nparticipate all those who are born in Kosacha. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The day finishes with a common festal\ndinner, taking part until late at midnight. Therefore, the entire village does\nnot sleep during the whole day and night, and afterwards for a long time all of\nthe villagers recollect the joyful happenings and comment the masquerade: \u201cIf\nit doesn\u2019t come to you from the inside, you would never disguise, but it is\nstronger than you and you do it every year again and again\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The village fair is on St Petka\u2019s Day\nand then the locals welcome many guests from near and far away. At a distance\nof 3 km, on one of the southern slopes of Cherna Gora, the ruins of the medieval\n\u2018Holy Spirit\u2019 monastery (12th<\/sup>\u201314th<\/sup> c.) can be found. On that place,\nthe Kosacha inhabitants every year organize a votive offering \u2013 kurban. Some\nmonths later \u2013 on 8 November, they give another kurban \u2013 to St Archangel\nMichael. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The most abided and favorite feast in\nthe year is Surova. For the occasion, on 13 and 14 January all those who use to\nlive in the nearby or in some more remote towns come back to their birthplace.\nThe village center is crowded with impatient spectators, and the houses are\nfestively lit, awaiting to welcome the masquerade group. Towards the evening,\nat the spacious place in front of the municipality hall and the church, the\nfestive fire breaks into flames. The masked men throng from everywhere and the\nsurrounding hills resound with the ringing of their bells. Everybody takes part\nin the performance and both disguised and audience jump in step with the\nrhythm. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The masks of the survakari are\nmanufactured from wooden hollows, which at their back are covered with white or\nblack lamp pelt. The big animal horns make them even more frightening and\nbeautiful. The mayor himself manufactures most of the masks with love, for he\nis among the most passionate adherents for safeguarding the traditional custom.\nThroughout the year, the masks are kept in one of the municipality\u2019s halls, and\nin the days around Surova, the participants take them out and put them on their\nheads in order to revive the centuries old joy from the feast. The enormous\nbells, which everyone ties around his waist, resound all over Cherna Gora\nMountain. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the evening of 13 January, both\nmasked and guests stay and dance around the fire until its last sparkles die\nout. Frequently some other masquerade groups visit Kosacha or the local\nsurvakari visit some of the neighboring villages \u2013 Kovachevtsi, Svetlya,\nRakilovtsi. In the morning of 14 January, the masked group starts going around\nthe village, visiting every inhabited house and wishing health and abundance\nduring the whole year to come. At the beginning are the group\u2019s leader, the\n\u2018bride\u2019, the \u2018bridegroom\u2019, the \u2018priest\u2019, the \u2018wedding procession\u2019. The\nneighborhoods of Kosacha are many and are scattered all over the mountain\nhills. Some years before, the masquerade group started from Polyana and then\ntravelled many kilometers in order to visit the other neighborhoods \u2013 Tyutyundzhiyska,\nDomishlyarska, Poeva, Bradarska, Kyurkchiyska, Kovachka… Today some of them are\nuninhabited and the survakari visit only the houses, where people live. The hosts\nwidely open their doors and welcome the masked with eagerness and joy. The\nsurvashkari priest imitates reading a prayer and with a bunch of box-shrub\nsprinkles all houserooms with \u2018holy\u2019 water. In the pot, he has poured a bottle\nof perfume and this is another reason for even more jokes and jests. The \u2018bear\u2019\nmaules the sick for \u2018good health\u2019, dances and tumbles in the yard, while the\nmasked start their heavy survashkari chain dance (horo). And this is repeated\nin every of the inhabited houses. The parsonages in the masquerade groups are\nvarious and today become even more varied \u2013 now in this group there is a\n\u2018tax-collector\u2019. He carries a big writing-pad and puts gown all the donations\nfrom the visited hosts, as if gathering taxes. In that way, the merriment is\neven greater. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Recorded in 2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n