The country is bast shoes. A master weaving bast shoes about his unusual craft. From the history of bast shoes

24.07.2016 0 10464

For some reason bast shoes are considered a purely Russian type of casual footwear. But this is far from true. Of course, in different countries they were woven differently and not only from bast. But the very principle of weaving shoes was used by Karelians, Finns, Mordvins, Tatars, and Chuvashs. The Japanese (Waraji), North American Indians and even Australian aborigines also had a similar type of footwear.

Participants in the medieval peasant war in Norway got their nickname from the name of bast shoes - these light and cheap shoes. They wore bast shoes made of birch bark, for which they were dubbed Birkebeiners (“birch-footed” or “bast-footed”).

Cheap and cheerful

Why did bast shoes become so widespread in Rus'? First of all, they were cheaper than good quality leather shoes. Bast shoes were most often woven from linden bast, which could be procured in huge quantities in the forest.

Of course, bast shoes were less durable shoes than boots. No wonder the Russian proverb said: “To go on the road, weave five bast shoes.” In winter, only bast shoes were worn for no more than 10 days, and in the summer, at the very peak of the harvest, the peasant trampled down only bast shoes in four days. On average, one villager wore out about 50-60 pairs of bast shoes per year.

Each region of Russia had its own technique for weaving bast shoes. For example, Great Russian bast shoes, unlike Belarusian and Ukrainian ones, had oblique weaving - “oblique lattice”, while in the western regions they preferred straight weaving, or “straight lattice”.

If in Ukraine and Belarus bast shoes began to be woven from the toe, then Russian peasants made the braid from the back, so that a knowledgeable person could immediately determine from which region the master was from. Moreover, each locality had its own material from which bast shoes were woven and a “style.”

For example, Moscow and the provinces adjacent to the Mother See were characterized by bast shoes woven from bast, with high sides and rounded heads (toes). The northern, or Novgorod, type of bast shoes was most often woven from birch bark, with triangular toes and relatively low sides. Mordovian bast shoes, common in the Nizhny Novgorod province, were woven from elm bast. The heads of these models were usually trapezoidal in shape.

Bast shoes were often named after the number of bast strips used in weaving: five, six, seven. Winter bast shoes were usually woven at seven basts, although sometimes for those who were especially cold, the number of basts reached 12. For strength, warmth and beauty, bast shoes were woven a second time, for which hemp ropes were used. For the same purpose, a leather outsole (undersole) was sometimes sewn on.

For holidays - “going out” - written elm bast shoes made of thin bast with black woolen (not hemp) frills (that is, braid securing the bast shoes on the legs) or reddish elm sevens were intended. For autumn and spring work in the yard, the peasants considered high wicker feet, which did not have frills at all, more convenient.

Bast shoes were worn with foot wraps, or, as they were also called, onuchas. From the bast shoe up and around the shin, in the manner of an ancient Greek sandal, there was a bast cord, which was attached at the bottom and kept the footcloth from unwinding. Nevertheless, when walking for a long time, I periodically had to change my shoes and rewind my stray footcloths.

Bast industry

Most often, peasants made bast shoes for themselves. It was rare for anyone in a village environment to not know how to weave such shoes. But there were villages where bast shoes were made not only for their own needs, but also for sale.

A description of this fishery in the Simbirsk province has been preserved. Lykoders went into the forest in whole teams.

They removed the bast with a special wooden prick, leaving a completely bare trunk. The best was considered to be the bast obtained in the spring, when the first leaves began to bloom on the linden tree. Therefore, most often such an operation destroyed the tree (hence the well-known popular expression “rip it off like a stick”).

Before weaving bast shoes, the bast was necessarily soaked in warm water for 24 hours. The bark was then scraped off, leaving the phloem. From the cart of bast shoes - from 40 to 60 bundles of 50 tubes each - approximately 300 pairs of bast shoes were obtained. Thus, a peasant could weave from two to ten pairs a day.

Sometimes the production of bast shoes was put, so to speak, on “industrial rails.” So, at the end of the 19th century, in the village of Smirnov, Ardatovsky district, Nizhny Novgorod province, up to 300 people were engaged in this business, and each of them prepared about 400 pairs of bast shoes in the winter. In the village of Semenovskoye, not far from Kineshma, they produced bast shoes worth 100 thousand rubles. And from the village of Myt, Shuisky district, Vladimir province, up to half a million pairs of bast shoes were sent to Moscow.

Nowadays, bast shoes are worn only by members of folklore ensembles, but some artels continue to make them - for sale as souvenirs.

Victor TSVETKOV

At the beginning of the 20th century, Russia was still often called a “bast shoe” country, putting into this concept a connotation of primitiveness and backwardness. Bast shoes, which have become a kind of symbol, included in many proverbs and sayings, have traditionally been considered the shoes of the poorest part of the population. And it’s no coincidence. The entire Russian village, with the exception of Siberia and the Cossack regions, wore bast shoes all year round. It would seem that the theme of the history of bast shoes is complex? Meanwhile, even the exact time of the appearance of bast shoes in the lives of our distant ancestors is unknown to this day.

Lapti (" ";" ";" ") are the most common footwear in Rus', woven from tree bark. The first mentions of bast shoes are found in documents dating back to the 10th century, although the kochedyk itself (“svayka”; “shvaiko”), the tool used for weaving bast shoes, is found in ancient sites dating back to the early Iron Age (1st millennium BC .e.).

At all times, our ancestors willingly put on bast shoes, and, despite the name, they were often woven not only from bast, but also from birch bark and even leather straps. “Picking” (hemming) bast shoes with leather was also practiced.

In Russia, only villagers, that is, peasants, wore bast shoes. Well, peasants made up the overwhelming population of Rus'. Lapti are low shoes, common in Rus' in the old days, but, nevertheless, widely used in rural areas until the 1930s, woven from tree bast (linden, elm and others) or birch bark. The bast shoe was tied to the leg with laces twisted from the same bast from which the bast shoes themselves were made.

Depending on the material, they were called differently: birch bark, elm, oak, broom... The strongest and softest in this series were considered bast bast shoes made from linden bast, and the worst were willow carpets and bast shoes, which were made from bast.

Often bast shoes were named according to the number of bast strips used in weaving: five, six, seven. Winter bast shoes were usually woven into seven basts, although there were instances where the number of basts reached up to twelve. For strength, warmth and beauty, bast shoes were woven a second time, for which, as a rule, hemp ropes were used. For the same purpose, a leather outsole (undersole) was sometimes sewn on.

For a festive appearance, they were made of thin bast with black woolen (not hemp) frills (that is, braid that secures bast shoes on the legs) or reddish elm sevens. For autumn and spring work in the yard, high wicker feet, which did not have frills at all, were considered more convenient.

Shoes were woven not only from tree bark, thin roots were also used, and therefore the bast shoes woven from them were called korotniks. Models made from strips of fabric and cloth edges were called plaits. Lapti were also made from hemp rope - kurpas, or krutsy, and even from horsehair - volosyaniki. These shoes were often worn at home or worn in hot weather.

As a rule, men and teenage boys wove bast shoes; this was considered an exclusively male activity; women were trusted only to “pick” soles. A woman’s ability to weave a good bast shoe aroused the distrust of men and the special respect of fellow village women. Boys began to learn how to weave bast shoes early, at the age of 7-8, and they could observe this process from the cradle, since all the men in the family in winter prepared bast shoes for the whole family for the whole year, 5-6 pairs each. By the age of ten or twelve, a teenager could weave a bast shoe no worse than an adult, although not so dexterously, i.e. fast.

The methods of weaving bast shoes - for example, in a straight check or obliquely, from the heel or from the toe - were different for each tribe and, until the beginning of our century, varied by region. Thus, the ancient Vyatichi preferred bast shoes of oblique weaving, the Novgorod Slovenians also, but mostly made of birch bark and with lower sides. But the Polyans, Drevlyans, Dregovichs, Radimichi, apparently, wore bast shoes in a straight check. Weaving bast shoes was considered an easy job that men did literally “in between times.” It’s not for nothing that they still say about a heavily drunk person that he, they say, “doesn’t knit,” that is, he is incapable of basic actions. But by “tying the bast”, the man provided shoes for the whole family - there were no special workshops for a very long time. Kochedyki were made from bones (animal ribs) or metal.

It requires seven basts, each two meters long. The width of one bast is approximately equal to the width of the thumb on the hand of a man, who prepared the bast himself and, subsequently, wove bast shoes himself. For weaving, a bast was required from a flat part of the linden trunk so that along its entire length it would not have defects. That is, for harvesting bast, mature, even, tall linden trees were selected. Often, after the total loss of bark suitable for weaving, the tree did not survive and stood with a bare, “stripped” trunk. This is reflected in the Russian language in the form of a figurative expression “to peel off like a sticky stick” meaning “to take away all the useful resources available to someone or something and thereby create a threat to the life and existence of someone or something.”

The technique of weaving bast shoes was also very diverse. For example, Great Russian bast shoes, unlike Belarusian and Ukrainian ones, had oblique weaving - “oblique lattice”, while in the western regions there was a more conservative type - straight weaving, or “straight lattice”. If in Ukraine and Belarus bast shoes began to be woven from the toe, then Russian peasants made the braid from the back. So the place where this or that wicker shoe appeared can be judged by the shape and material from which it is made. For example, Moscow models woven from bast are characterized by high sides and rounded heads (that is, socks). The northern, or Novgorod, type was more often made of birch bark with triangular toes and relatively low sides. Mordovian bast shoes, common in the Nizhny Novgorod and Penza provinces, were woven from elm bast. The heads of these models were usually trapezoidal in shape.

It was rare for anyone among the peasants to not know how to weave bast shoes. A description of this trade has been preserved in the Simbirsk province, where whole artels of lykoders went into the forest. For a tithe of linden forest rented from a landowner, they paid up to one hundred rubles.

Carefully removed basts were then tied in hundreds into bundles and stored in the hallway or attic. Before weaving bast shoes, the bast was necessarily soaked in warm water for 24 hours. The bark was then scraped off, leaving the phloem. From the baskets - from 40 to 60 bundles of 50 tubes each - approximately 300 pairs of bast shoes were obtained. Different sources speak differently about the speed of weaving bast shoes: from two to ten pairs per day.

To weave bast shoes, you needed a wooden block and, as already mentioned, a bone or iron hook - a kochedyk. Weaving the point where all the basts were brought together required special skill. They tried to tie the loops in such a way that after holding the loops, they would not bend the bast shoes and would not force the legs to one side. There is a legend that Peter I himself learned to weave bast shoes and that a sample he wove was kept among his belongings in the Hermitage at the beginning of the last (XX) century.

Lapti were not woven in all regions of Russia, that is, they were a commodity or an item of barter. As a rule, bast shoes were not woven in villages where the population was mostly engaged not in agriculture, but in crafts, for example, pottery or blacksmithing. The Old Believers “Kerzhaks” who lived in the Urals in the 19th century did not wear bast shoes. But the dead were buried exclusively in bast shoes. Lapti were common not only among the Eastern and Western Slavs, but also among some non-Slavic peoples of the forest belt - the Finno-Ugrians and Balts, and some Germans.

The cheapness, availability, lightness and hygiene of such shoes does not require proof. Another thing, as practice shows, bast shoes had a very short service life. In winter, they wore out in ten days, after a thaw - in four, in summer, during lean times, in three. When preparing for a long journey, we took with us more than one pair of spare bast shoes. “To go on the road, weave five bast shoes,” said the proverb. And our neighbors, the Swedes, even had the term “bast mile” - the distance that can be covered in one pair of bast shoes. How much birch bark and bast was required to keep shoes on for centuries for an entire people? Simple calculations show: if our ancestors had diligently cut down trees for bark (as, alas, was done in later times), birch and linden forests would have disappeared in prehistoric times. It is difficult, however, to imagine that the pagans, who revered trees, would act so murderously. Most likely, they knew various ways to take part of the bark without destroying the tree.

To strengthen and insulate their bast shoes, peasants “pickled” their soles with hemp rope. Feet in such bast shoes did not freeze or get wet.

When going to mowing, they put on bast shoes of rare weave that do not hold water - crustaceans.
The feet were convenient for housework - they were like galoshes, only wicker.

Rope bast shoes were called chuni; they were worn at home or for working in the fields in hot, dry weather. In some villages they managed to weave bast shoes from horsehair - volosyaniki.

The most shabby bast shoes in Rus' are known as willow and, or carpets, made from willow bark; even weaving them was considered shameful. Shelyuzhniks were woven from thala bark, and oak trees were woven from oak bark.

In the Chernigov region, bast shoes made from the bark of young oak trees were called dubochars. Hemp tows and old ropes were used; bast shoes made from them - chuni - were worn mainly at home or in hot, dry weather. They must be of Finnish origin: Finns in Russia were called "chukhna".
These bast shoes also had other names: kurpy, krutsy and even whisperers. In areas where there was no bast, and it was expensive to purchase it, resourceful peasants wove roots from thin roots; made from horsehair - volosyaniki. In the Kursk province they learned how to make straw bast shoes.

Village young dandies appeared in public in written elm bast shoes made of thin bast with black woolen (not hemp) frills and onuchs.
Elm bast shoes (made from elm bast) were considered the most beautiful. They were kept in hot water - then they turned pink and became hard.

On holidays, if it was not possible to wear leather shoes, bast shoes were woven: the bast stripes of such bast shoes were narrow, and craftsmen wove beautiful patterns from them. Sometimes braid was woven together with the bast or individual strips of bast were painted (for example, elm bast was kept in hot water, which caused it to turn pink). Such bast shoes were worn with black or red frills, which immediately stood out against the snow-white festive ones.

The life of the Lapotnik peasants is described by many Russian classics. In the story “Khor and Kalinich,” I. S. Turgenev contrasts the Oryol peasant with the Kaluga quitrent peasant: “The Oryol peasant is short in stature, stooped, gloomy, looks from under his brows, lives in crappy aspen huts, goes to corvée, does not engage in trade, eats poorly, wears bast shoes; the Kaluga obrok peasant lives in spacious pine huts, is tall, looks bold and cheerful, sells oil and tar, and wears boots on holidays."

As we see, even for a wealthy peasant, boots remained a luxury; they were worn only on holidays. Another of our writers, D.N. Mamin-Sibiryak, also emphasizes the peculiar symbolic meaning of leather shoes for a peasant: “Boots for a peasant are the most seductive object... No other part of a peasant’s costume enjoys such sympathy as the boot.” Meanwhile, leather shoes were not cheap. In 1838, at the Nizhny Novgorod fair, a pair of good bast bast shoes could be bought for three kopecks, while the roughest peasant boots at that time cost at least five to six rubles. For a peasant farmer, this is a lot of money; to collect it, he had to sell a quarter of the rye, and in other places even more (one quarter was equal to almost 210 liters of bulk solids).

Even during the Civil War (1918-1920), most of the Red Army wore bast shoes. Their preparation was carried out by the emergency commission (CHEKVALAP), which supplied the soldiers with felted shoes and bast shoes.

Many different beliefs were associated with bast shoes in the Russian village. It was generally believed that an old bast shoe hung in a chicken coop would protect chickens from diseases and promote egg production in birds. It was believed that a cow fumigated from bast shoes after calving would be healthy and give a lot of milk. A bast shoe with woodlice grass placed in it, thrown into a river during a severe drought, will cause rain, etc. The bast shoe played a certain role in family rituals. So, for example, according to custom, a bast shoe was thrown after the matchmaker who was setting off to make a match, so that the matchmaking would be successful. When they met young people returning from church, the children set fire to bast shoes filled with straw in order to provide them with a rich and happy life and protect them from misfortunes.

In the self-perception of Russians, bast shoes are one of the most important symbols of traditional national life.
Hence a number of stable expressions in Russian:
“bast shoe” as a trope denotes a simpleton, an uneducated person;
derivative adjective “bast shoes” with the same meaning;
“(Tea,) we don’t slurp cabbage soup” means “we are learned, there is no need to explain or point out to us”;
The humorous expression “plus or minus bast shoes” in science means “plus or minus an unknown quantity.”

Getting married is not putting on bast shoes.
The bast shoes are not worth the trouble.
It's like weaving a bast shoe.
You can't weave even a bast shoe without a projectile.
Without studying (without skill) you can’t weave bast shoes.
Only the bast shoes are woven on both legs, but the mittens are different.
A bast shoe is a bast shoe, and a boot is a boot!
Even in bast shoes, but the same military ones, the militia.
And we don’t put bast shoes on our hands.
Don’t try to weave bast shoes without tearing your bast.
Go on the road, weave five bast shoes.
You weave bast shoes, but you don’t know how to bury the ends.
He weaves his bast shoes and confuses them.
It gets confused, like putting porridge in sandals.
Change your shoes or change one of your boots into bast shoes.
And in a good lawsuit you won’t have to suffer.
You will begin to weave bast shoes as if there is nothing to eat.
Weave bast shoes, eat once a day, you won’t be able to make more.
One foot is in a bast shoe, the other is in a boot.
Not a servant in bast shoes: buy boots!
Don’t judge in bast shoes, boots in a sleigh, says the guest jokingly.
To call in bast shoes, to be idle.
They lost the bast shoes and looked around the yards: it was five, but it became six!
It’s not like weaving a bast shoe, you can’t do it all of a sudden.

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Until the beginning of the 20th century, peasant Russia was “bast shoes”. Every home knew how to weave bast shoes. However, this does not mean that this does not require Russian ingenuity.

“Bask doesn’t knit”

Weaving bast shoes was considered easy work. It’s not for nothing that there is a saying about a drunk person that he “doesn’t give a damn.” This means that the person is so drunk that he cannot do a basic thing.

Winter work

In Rus', men weaved bast shoes in the winter, when they were not busy with other work. A lot of bast shoes had to be woven over the winter. “In bad times, a good man would wear out at least two pairs of bast shoes in one week” (ethnographer S. Maksimov).

Men's craft

A man in each house provided bast shoes for the whole family, and a lot had to be woven for sale.

When preparing to travel, peasants took with them additional pairs of bast shoes:

“To go on the road, weave five bast shoes.”

"Range"

Lapti were woven not only from bast, but also from birch bark and leather straps. Bast shoes made from elm bast were considered the most beautiful, and those made from willow bark were considered the most shameful (they deteriorated very quickly). Shelyuzhniks were woven from the bark of the thala, and oak barks were woven from oak bark. Bast shoes made from hemp tows and old ropes were called chuni (kurpy, krutsy) and were worn in hot, dry weather. In the Kursk province they made bast shoes from straw, which were stronger, did not get wet and did not freeze.

Models

In different regions, bast shoes were woven differently. Russian bast shoes were distinguished by a rounded toe, very low sides and a high back, in the upper part of which there was a hole for frills. The sole was “picked” in two or three layers, which gave the bast shoes strength. The ancient Vyatichi and Novgorod Slovenes preferred obliquely woven bast shoes made of birch bark and with lower sides.

Some wove bast shoes in four bast stripes (fours), five stripes of bast (fives), others in six (sixes) or seven (sevens).

At the beginning of the 20th century, Russia was still often called a “bast shoe” country, putting into this concept a connotation of primitiveness and backwardness. Bast shoes, which have become a kind of symbol, included in many proverbs and sayings, have traditionally been considered the shoes of the poorest part of the population. And it’s no coincidence.

The entire Russian village, with the exception of Siberia and the Cossack regions, wore bast shoes all year round. It would seem that the theme of the history of bast shoes is complex? Meanwhile, even the exact time of the appearance of bast shoes in the lives of our distant ancestors is unknown to this day.

It is generally accepted that bast shoes are one of the most ancient types of shoes. In any case, archaeologists find bone kochedyki - hooks for weaving bast shoes - even at Neolithic sites. Does this not give reason to assume that already in the Stone Age people may have been weaving shoes from plant fibers?

The wide distribution of wicker shoes has given rise to an incredible variety of varieties and styles, depending primarily on the raw materials used in the work. And bast shoes were woven from the bark and subbark of many deciduous trees: linden, birch, elm, oak, broom, etc.

Depending on the material, wicker shoes were called differently: birch bark, elm, oak, broom... The strongest and softest in this series were considered bast bast shoes made from linden bast, and the worst were willow carpets and bast shoes, which were made from bast. five, six, seven. Winter bast shoes were usually woven into seven basts, although there were instances where the number of basts reached up to twelve. For strength, warmth and beauty, bast shoes were woven a second time, for which, as a rule, hemp ropes were used. For the same purpose, a leather outsole (undersole) was sometimes sewn on. For a festive appearance, written elm bast shoes made of thin bast with black woolen (not hemp) frills (that is, braid securing the bast shoes on the legs) or reddish elm sevens were intended. For autumn and spring work in the yard, high wicker feet, which did not have frills at all, were considered more convenient.

Shoes were woven not only from tree bark, thin roots were also used, and therefore the bast shoes woven from them were called korotniks.

Models made from strips of fabric and cloth edges were called plaits. Lapti were also made from hemp rope - kurpy, or krutsy, and even from horsehair - volosyaniki. These shoes were often worn at home or worn in hot weather. The technique of weaving bast shoes was also very diverse.

For example, Great Russian bast shoes, unlike Belarusian and Ukrainian ones, had oblique weaving - “oblique lattice”, while in the western regions there was a more conservative type - straight weaving, or “straight lattice”. If in Ukraine and Belarus bast shoes began to be woven from the toe, then Russian peasants made the braid from the back. So the place where this or that wicker shoe appeared can be judged by the shape and material from which it is made. For example, Moscow models woven from bast are characterized by high sides and rounded heads (that is, socks). The northern, or Novgorod, type was more often made of birch bark with triangular toes and relatively low sides. Mordovian bast shoes, common in the Nizhny Novgorod and Penza provinces, were woven from elm bast. The heads of these models were usually trapezoidal in shape.

Carefully removed basts were then tied in hundreds into bundles and stored in the hallway or attic. Before weaving bast shoes, the bast was necessarily soaked in warm water for 24 hours. The bark was then scraped off, leaving the phloem. From the bast shoes - from 40 to 60 bundles of 50 tubes each - approximately 300 pairs of bast shoes were obtained. Different sources speak differently about the speed of weaving bast shoes: from two to ten pairs per day.

To weave bast shoes, you needed a wooden block and, as already mentioned, a bone or iron hook - a kochedyk.

Weaving the point where all the basts were brought together required special skill. They tried to tie the loops in such a way that after holding the loops, they would not bend the bast shoes and would not force the legs to one side. There is a legend that Peter I himself learned to weave bast shoes and that a sample he wove was kept among his belongings in the Hermitage at the beginning of the last (XX) century.

Boots, which differed from bast shoes in their comfort, beauty and durability, were unavailable to most serfs. So they made do with bast shoes. The fragility of wicker shoes is evidenced by the saying: “To go on the road, weave five bast shoes.” In winter, a man wore only bast shoes for no more than ten days, and in the summer, during working hours, he wore them down in four days. The life of the Lapotnik peasants is described by many Russian classics. In the story “Khor and Kalinich” by I.S. Turgenev contrasts the Oryol peasant with the Kaluga quitrent peasant:

“The Oryol peasant is short, stooped, gloomy, looks from under his brows, lives in crappy aspen huts, goes to corvée, does not engage in trade, eats poorly, wears bast shoes; Kaluga obrok peasant lives in spacious pine huts, is tall, looks bold and cheerful, sells oil and tar, and wears boots on holidays.” As we see, even for a wealthy peasant, boots remained a luxury; they were worn only on holidays. Another of our writers, D.N., also emphasizes the peculiar symbolic meaning of leather shoes for the peasant. Mamin-Sibiryak:“Boots are the most seductive item for a man... No other part of a man’s costume enjoys such sympathy as the boot.”

Even during the Civil War (1918-1920), most of the Red Army wore bast shoes. Their preparation was carried out by the emergency commission (CHEKVALAP), which supplied the soldiers with felted shoes and bast shoes.

In written sources, the word “bast shoe”, or more precisely, its derivative – “bast shoe”, is first found in the “Tale of Bygone Years” (in the Laurentian Chronicle): “In the summer of 6493 (985), Volodymer went to the Bolgars with Dobrynya and his party in boats, and brought Torquay along the shore to the horses, and defeated the Bulgarians. Dobrynya said to Volodimer: I saw the convict was all in boots, so don’t give us tribute, let’s go look for the bastards. And Volodimer create peace with Bolgara...” In another written source from the era of Ancient Rus', “The Word of Daniel the Sharper,” the term “lychenitsa” as the name of a type of wicker shoe is contrasted with a boot: “It would be better for me to see my foot in a lychenitsa in your house than in a scarlet boot in a boyar’s courtyard.”

Historians know, however, that the names of things known from written sources are not always the same as the things that correspond to those terms today. For example, in the 16th century, a “sarafan” was a name for men’s outerwear in the form of a caftan, and a “fly” was a name for a richly embroidered neckerchief.

An interesting article on the history of bast shoes was published by the modern St. Petersburg archaeologist A.V. Kurbatov, who proposes to consider the history of bast shoes not from the point of view of a philologist, but from the position of a historian of material culture. Referring to the recently accumulated archaeological materials and the expanded linguistic base, he reconsiders the conclusions expressed by the Finnish researcher of the last century I.S. Vakhros in a very interesting monograph “Name of shoes in Russian”.

In particular, Kurbatov is trying to prove that wicker shoes began to spread in Russia no earlier than the 16th century. Moreover, he attributes the opinion about the initial predominance of bast shoes among rural residents to the mythologization of history, as well as the social explanation of this phenomenon as a consequence of the extreme poverty of the peasantry. These ideas developed, according to the author of the article, among the educated part of Russian society only in the 18th century.

Indeed, in the published materials devoted to large-scale archaeological research in Novgorod, Staraya Ladoga, Polotsk and other Russian cities, where a cultural layer synchronous with the Tale of Bygone Years was recorded, no traces of wicker shoes were found. But what about the bone kochedyki found during excavations? They could, according to the author of the article, be used for other purposes - for weaving birch bark boxes or fishing nets. In the urban layers, the researcher emphasizes, bast shoes appear no earlier than the turn of the 15th-16th centuries.

The author’s next argument: there are no images of those shod in bast shoes either on the icons, or on the frescoes, or in the miniatures of the front vault. The earliest miniature showing a peasant shod in bast shoes is a plowing scene from the Life of Sergius of Radonezh, but it dates back to the beginning of the 16th century. The information from scribe books dates back to the same time, where “bast workers” are mentioned for the first time, that is, artisans engaged in making bast shoes for sale. In the works of foreign authors who visited Russia, the first mention of bast shoes, dating back to the middle of the 17th century, is found by A. Kurbatov in a certain Nicolaas Witsen.

One cannot help but mention the original, in my opinion, interpretation that Kurbatov gives to early medieval written sources, where bast shoes are discussed for the first time. This, for example, is the above excerpt from The Tale of Bygone Years, where Dobrynya gives Vladimir advice to “look for bast shoes.” A.V. Kurbatov explains it not by the poverty of the Lapotniks, opposed to the rich Bulgarian captives, shod in boots, but sees in this a hint of nomads. After all, collecting tribute from sedentary residents (lapotniks) is easier than chasing hordes of nomadic tribes across the steppe (boots, the footwear most suitable for riding, were actively used by nomads). In this case, the word “bast shoe,” that is, shod in “bast shoe,” mentioned by Dobrynya, perhaps means some special type of low shoe, but not woven from plant fibers, but leather. Therefore, the assertion about the poverty of the ancient Lapotniks, who actually wore leather shoes, is, according to Kurbatov, groundless.

Everything that has been said again and again confirms the complexity and ambiguity of assessing medieval material culture from the perspective of our time. I repeat: we often do not know what the terms found in written sources mean, and at the same time we do not know the purpose and name of many objects found during excavations. However, in my opinion, one can argue with the conclusions presented by archaeologist Kurbatov, defending the point of view that the bast shoe is a much older human invention.

So, archaeologists traditionally explain single finds of wicker shoes during excavations of ancient Russian cities by the fact that bast shoes are, first of all, an attribute of village life, while city dwellers preferred to wear leather shoes, the remains of which are found in huge quantities in the cultural layer during excavations. And yet, an analysis of several archaeological reports and publications, in my opinion, does not give reason to believe that wicker shoes did not exist before the end of the 15th - beginning of the 16th centuries. Why? But the fact is that publications (and even reports) do not always reflect the entire spectrum of mass material discovered by archaeologists. It is quite possible that the publications did not say anything about poorly preserved scraps of bast shoes, or that they were presented in some other way.

To give an unambiguous answer to the question of whether bast shoes were worn in Russia before the 15th century, it is necessary to carefully review the inventory of finds, check the dating of the layer, etc. After all, it is known that there are publications that went unnoticed, which mention the remains of wicker shoes from the early medieval strata of the Lyadinsky burial ground (Mordovia) and the Vyatiche mounds (Moscow region). Bast shoes were also found in the pre-Mongol strata of Smolensk. Information about this may be found in other reports.
If bast shoes really became widespread only in the late Middle Ages, then in the 16th-17th centuries they would have been found everywhere. However, in cities, fragments of wicker shoes from this time are found during excavations very rarely, while parts of leather shoes number in the tens of thousands.
Now about the information content of medieval illustrative material - icons, frescoes, miniatures. It is impossible not to take into account that it is greatly reduced by the conventionality of images that are far from real life. And long-skirted clothes often hide the legs of the characters depicted. It is no coincidence that historian A.V. Artsikhovsky, who studied more than ten thousand miniatures of the Facial Vault and summarized the results of his research in the solid monograph “Ancient Russian Miniatures as a Historical Source,” does not concern shoes at all.
Why is the necessary information not included in written documents? First of all, due to the scarcity and fragmentary nature of the sources themselves, in which the least attention is paid to the description of the costume, especially the clothing of a commoner. The appearance on the pages of scribe books of the 16th century of references to artisans specially engaged in weaving shoes does not at all exclude the fact that even earlier bast shoes were woven by the peasants themselves.

A.V. Kurbatov does not seem to notice the above-mentioned fragment from “The Word of Daniel the Sharper”, where the word “lychenitsa”, opposed to “scarlet boot”, appears for the first time. The chronicle evidence of 1205, which speaks of tribute in the form of bast, taken by the Russian princes after the victory over Lithuania and the Yatvingians, is also not explained in any way. Kurbatov's commentary on the passage from The Tale of Bygone Years, where the defeated Bulgarians are presented as elusive nomads, although interesting, also raises questions. The Bulgar state of the late 10th century, which united many tribes of the Middle Volga region, cannot be considered a nomadic empire. Feudal relations already dominated here, huge cities flourished - Bolgar, Suvar, Bilyar, growing rich from transit trade. In addition, the campaign against Bolgar in 985 was not the first (mention of the first campaign dates back to 977), so Vladimir already had an idea about the enemy and hardly needed Dobrynya’s explanations.
And finally, regarding the notes of Western European travelers who visited Russia. They appear only at the end of the 15th century, so earlier evidence in the sources of this category simply does not exist. Moreover, the notes of foreigners focused on political events. The outlandish, from a European point of view, clothing of the Russians almost did not interest them.

Of particular interest is the book by the famous German diplomat Baron Sigismund Herberstein, who visited Moscow in 1517 as an ambassador of Emperor Maximilian I. His notes contain an engraving depicting a sleigh ride scene, in which skiers shod in bast shoes accompanying the sleigh are clearly visible. In any case, in his notes, Herberstein notes that people went skiing in many places in Russia. There is also a clear image of peasants wearing bast shoes in the book “Travel to Muscovy” by A. Olearius, who visited Moscow twice in the 30s of the 17th century. True, the bast shoes themselves are not mentioned in the text of the book.

Ethnographers also do not have a clear opinion about the time of spread of wicker shoes and its role in the life of the peasant population of the early Middle Ages. Some researchers question the antiquity of bast shoes, believing that previously peasants wore leather shoes. Others refer to customs and beliefs that speak precisely of the deep antiquity of bast shoes, for example, pointing to their ritual significance in those places where wicker shoes have long been consigned to oblivion. In particular, the already mentioned Finnish researcher I.S. Vakhros refers to a description of a funeral among the Ural Old Believers-Kerzhaks, who did not wear wicker shoes, but buried the deceased shod in bast shoes.

To summarize the above, we note: it is difficult to believe that bast and kochedyki, widespread in the early Middle Ages, were used only for weaving boxes and nets. I am sure that shoes made from plant fiber were a traditional part of the East Slavic costume and are well known not only to Russians, but also to Poles, Czechs, and Germans.

It would seem that the question of the date and nature of the spread of wicker shoes is a very particular moment in our history. However, in this case he touches on the large-scale problem of the difference between city and countryside. At one time, historians noted that the rather close connection between the city and the rural area, the absence of a significant legal difference between the “black” population of the urban settlement and the peasants did not allow drawing a sharp boundary between them. Nevertheless, the results of excavations indicate that bast shoes are extremely rare in cities. This is understandable. Shoes woven from bast, birch bark or other plant fibers were more suitable for peasant life and work, and the city, as you know, lived mainly on crafts and trade.

Redichev S. “Science and Life” No. 3, 2007

Lapti are the oldest shoes in Rus'.

LAPTI (VERZNI, KOVERZNI, CROSSERS, LYCHNIKI, LYCHNITSI, CRAPEASTS)- They were low, lightweight shoes, used all year round and tied to the foot with long cords - RURLS

Russia remained Lapotnaya until the 30s of the 20th century.

Material for bast shoes was always at hand: they were woven from linden, elm, willow, heather, birch bark and bast. Three young (4-6 years old) stickies were peeled off for a couple of bast shoes.

I needed a lot of bast shoes - both for my daily use and for sale. “In bad times, a good man would wear out at least two pairs of bast shoes in one week,” testified S. Maksimov, a well-known writer and ethnographer before the revolution.

They tried to make bast shoes for everyday life durable so that they would last longer. They were woven from rough wide bast. Soles were attached to them, which were braided with hemp ropes or thin strips of oak wood soaked in boiling water. In some villages, when the street was dirty, thick wooden blocks, consisting of two parts, were tied to the bast shoes: one part was tied to the front of the foot, the other to the back. Everyday bast shoes, without additional accessories, had a shelf life of three to ten days.

To strengthen and insulate their bast shoes, peasants “pickled” their soles with hemp rope. Feet in such bast shoes did not freeze or get wet.

When going to mowing, they put on bast shoes of rare weave that do not hold water - crustaceans.
For housework, feet were convenient - they were like galoshes, only wicker.

Rope bast shoes were called chuni; they were worn at home or for working in the fields in hot, dry weather. In some villages they managed to weave bast shoes from horsehair - volosyaniki.

The bast shoes were held on by frills - narrow leather straps or hemp fiber ropes (mochens). The legs were wrapped in canvas footcloths, and then wrapped in cloth onuchi.

Village young dandies appeared in public in written elm bast shoes made of thin bast with black woolen (not hemp) frills and onuchs.

Elm bast shoes (made from elm bast) were considered the most beautiful. They were kept in hot water - then they turned pink and became hard.

The most shabby bast shoes in Rus' are known as willow and, or carpets, made from willow bark; even weaving them was considered shameful. Shelyuzhniks were woven from thala bark, and oak trees were woven from oak bark.

In the Chernigov region, bast shoes made from the bark of young oak trees were called dubochars. Hemp tows and old ropes were used; bast shoes made from them - chuni - were worn mainly at home or in hot, dry weather. They must be of Finnish origin: Finns in Russia were called “chukhna”.

These bast shoes also had other names: kurpy, krutsy and even whisperers. In areas where there was no bast, and it was expensive to purchase it, resourceful peasants wove roots from thin roots; made from horsehair - volosyaniki. In the Kursk province they learned how to make straw bast shoes. To make the bast shoes stronger and to prevent the feet from getting wet and freezing, the bottom was “picked up” with hemp rope.

Before putting on bast shoes, the legs were wrapped in canvas footcloths, and then wrapped in cloth onuchi.

Weaved bast shoes on a block using an iron (or bone) hook -
Kochetyk: they also called him svaika or shvaiko

They also stripped bark from trees.

“The most dexterous workers managed to weave no more than five pairs of bast shoes per day. The sole, front and ear pad (sides) were easy to grasp. But not everyone is given a heel: all the basts are brought together on it and the loops are tied together - so that the frills threaded through them do not bend the bast shoe and do not force the leg in one direction. People say that Tsar Peter knew how to do everything, he achieved everything himself, but he thought about the heel of the bast shoe and abandoned it. In St. Petersburg they keep and show that unwoven bast shoe,”— wrote S. Maksimov.

Some bast shoes were woven into five strips of bast, or lines - these were fives; woven into six lines - sixes and seven - sevens.

The Great Russian bast shoe was distinguished by oblique weaving of bast; Belarusian and Ukrainian - direct.

The front and collar of Russian bast shoes were dense and hard.

For housework, wicker feet were convenient - something like high galoshes (rubber galoshes, still expensive, entered village life only at the beginning of the 20th century and were worn only on holidays).

The feet were left at the doorstep so that they could quickly be put on for housework, especially in spring or autumn, when the yard is muddy, and putting on bast shoes with foot wraps, foot wraps and frills is long and troublesome.

In not so long ago, Russian bast shoes (as opposed to boots) were different for the right and left legs, but among the Volga peoples - Mordvins, Chuvash and Tatars - they did not differ according to the leg. Living side by side with these peoples, the Russians adopted more practical footwear: when one bast shoe was worn out, torn or lost, the other could not be thrown away.

During the Civil War (1918-1920), most of the Red Army wore bast shoes. Their preparation was carried out by the emergency commission (CHEKVALAP), which supplied the soldiers with felted shoes and bast shoes.

Many different beliefs were associated with bast shoes in the Russian village. It was generally believed that an old bast shoe hung in a chicken coop would protect chickens from diseases and promote egg production in birds. It was believed that a cow fumigated from bast shoes after calving would be healthy and give a lot of milk. A bast shoe with woodlice grass placed in it, thrown into a river during a severe drought, will cause rain, etc. The bast shoe played a certain role in family rituals. So, for example, according to custom, a bast shoe was thrown after the matchmaker who was setting off to make a match, so that the matchmaking would be successful. When they met young people returning from church, the children set fire to bast shoes filled with straw in order to provide them with a rich and happy life and protect them from misfortunes.

Lapti - bast shoes, which were worn by the Slavic population of Eastern Europe for many centuries. In Russia, only villagers, that is, peasants, wore bast shoes. Well, peasants made up the overwhelming population of Rus'. Lapot and peasant were almost synonymous. This is where the saying “bastard Russia” comes from.

And indeed, even at the beginning of the 20th century, Russia was still often called a “bast shoe” country, putting into this concept a connotation of primitiveness and backwardness. Bast shoes became a kind of symbol, included in many proverbs and sayings; they were traditionally considered the shoes of the poorest part of the population. And it’s no coincidence. The entire Russian village, with the exception of Siberia and the Cossack regions, wore bast shoes all year round. When did bast shoes first appear in Rus'? There is still no exact answer to this seemingly simple question.

It is generally accepted that bast shoes are one of the most ancient types of shoes. One way or another, archaeologists find bone kochedyki - hooks for weaving bast shoes - even at Neolithic sites. Did people really weave shoes using plant fibers back in the Stone Age?

Since ancient times, wicker shoes have been widespread in Rus'. Bast shoes were woven from the bark of many deciduous trees: linden, birch, elm, oak, broom, etc. Depending on the material, wicker shoes were called differently: birch bark, elm, oak, and broom. The strongest and softest in this series were considered to be bast bast shoes, made from linden bast, and the worst were willow carpets and bast shoes, which were made from bast.

Often bast shoes were named according to the number of bast strips used in weaving: five, six, seven. At seven o'clock they usually wove winter bast shoes. For strength, warmth and beauty, the bast shoes were woven a second time using hemp ropes. For the same purpose, a leather outsole was sometimes sewn on.

For a festive occasion, written elm bast shoes made of thin bast with a black woolen braid, which was fastened to the legs, were intended. For autumn-spring chores in the yard, simple high wicker feet without any braid were considered more convenient.

Shoes were woven not only from tree bark, thin roots were also used, and therefore the bast shoes woven from them were called korotniks. Models of bast shoes made from strips of fabric were called plaits. Lapti were also made from hemp rope - krutsy, and even from horsehair - hair. These shoes were often worn at home or worn in hot weather.

The technique of weaving bast shoes was also very diverse. For example, Great Russian bast shoes, unlike Belarusian and Ukrainian ones, had oblique weaving, while in the western regions they used straight weaving, or “straight lattice”. If in Ukraine and Belarus bast shoes began to be woven from the toe, then Russian peasants did the work from the back. So the place where this or that wicker shoe appeared can be judged by the shape and material from which it is made. Moscow models woven from bast are characterized by high sides and rounded toes. In the North, in particular in Novgorod, bast shoes were more often made from birch bark with triangular toes and relatively low sides. Mordovian bast shoes, common in the Nizhny Novgorod and Penza provinces, were woven from elm bast.

The methods of weaving bast shoes - for example, in a straight check or obliquely, from the heel or from the toe - were different for each tribe and, until the beginning of our century, varied by region. Thus, the ancient Vyatichi preferred bast shoes of oblique weaving, the Novgorod Slovenians too, but mostly made of birch bark and with lower sides. But the Polyans, Drevlyans, Dregovichs, Radimichi wore bast shoes in a straight check.

Weaving bast shoes was considered a simple job, but it required dexterity and skill. It’s not for nothing that they still say about a heavily drunk person that he “doesn’t know what to do,” that is, he’s incapable of basic actions! But by “tying the bast”, the man provided shoes for the whole family - then there were no special workshops for a very long time. The main tools for weaving bast shoes - kochedyki - were made from animal bones or metal. As already mentioned, the first kochedyks date back to the Stone Age. In Russian written sources, the word "bast shoe", or more precisely, its derivative - "bast shoe", is first found in The Tale of Bygone Years.

It was rare for anyone among the peasants to not know how to weave bast shoes. There were whole artels of braiders, who, according to surviving descriptions, went into the forest in whole parties. For a tithe of linden forest they paid up to one hundred rubles. They removed the bast with a special wooden prick, leaving a completely bare trunk. The best was considered to be the bast obtained in the spring, when the first leaves began to bloom on the linden tree, so most often such an operation ruined the tree. This is where the expression “to peel off like a sticky stick” comes from.

Carefully removed basts were then tied into bundles and stored in the hallway or attic. Before weaving bast shoes, the bast was necessarily soaked in warm water for 24 hours. The bark was then scraped off, leaving the phloem. The cart yielded approximately 300 pairs of bast shoes. They wove bast shoes from two to ten pairs a day, depending on experience and skill.

To weave bast shoes, you needed a wooden block and a bone or iron hook - a kochedyk. Weaving the point where all the basts were brought together required special skill. They say that Peter I himself learned to weave bast shoes and that a sample he wove was kept among his belongings in the Hermitage at the beginning of the last century.

Leather shoes were not cheap. In the 19th century, a pair of good bast bast shoes could be bought for three kopecks, while the roughest peasant boots cost five or six rubles. For a peasant farmer, this is a lot of money; to collect it, he had to sell a quarter of the rye (one quarter was equal to almost 210 liters of bulk solids). Boots, which differed from bast shoes in their comfort, beauty and durability, were unavailable to most serfs. Even for a wealthy peasant, boots remained a luxury; they were worn only on holidays. So they made do with bast shoes. The fragility of wicker shoes is evidenced by the saying: “To go on the road, weave five bast shoes.” In winter, a man wore only bast shoes for no more than ten days, and in the summer, during working hours, he wore them down in four days.

Even during the Civil War (1918-1920), most of the Red Army wore bast shoes. Their preparation was carried out by a special commission, which supplied the soldiers with felted shoes and bast shoes.

This raises an interesting question. How much birch bark and bast was required to keep shoes on for centuries for an entire people? Simple calculations show: if our ancestors had diligently cut down trees for bark, birch and linden forests would have disappeared in prehistoric times. However, this did not happen. Why?

The fact is that our distant pagan ancestors treated nature, trees, waters, and lakes with great reverence. The surrounding nature was deified and considered sacred. Pagan gods protected and preserved fields, rivers, lakes and trees. Therefore, it is unlikely that the ancient Slavs acted murderously with trees. Most likely, the Russians knew various ways to take part of the bark without destroying the tree, and managed to remove the bark from the same birch every few years. Or maybe they knew some other secrets of obtaining material for bast shoes, unknown to us?

Lapti have existed for centuries, and are now a symbol of the Russian village and a good monument to our glorious ancestors.

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