Talk:Kukeri

"Kukeri" as the article title

Since the article discusses a ritual, it should be called something like kukerstvo (кукерство), right? After all, the kukeri (кукери) are the men who don the costumes and perform. Even the Bulgarian article uses the term "кукери" for the performers ("българските карнавални фигури - мъже"/"the Bulgarian carnival figures - men"), not the ritual. On another note, there must be a better reference than that professor Gerald Creed's short bio page.Raskovnik (talk) 20:17, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Fear of Slavic paganism?

Why no mentioning about Slavic paganism? The tradition is equal to Slovenian kurentovanje festival of god Kurent or Korant, so why such a silence about pre christian slavic faith? Besides Christianity "borrowed" many pre Christian traditions which survived until today.

The Golden Apple

It looks like these guys (https://goldenappleseries.com/) are producing animated adaptions featuring characters in this role. Is this a suitable addition to the "Kukeri in media" section? 69.25.143.33 (talk) 20:26, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

External links modified

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Kukeri's origin

The origin of the Kukeri is often associated with the pre-Christian Greco-Thracian cult of Dionysus. This view was first proposed in 1873 by the Greek theologian Anastasios Hurmuziadis, who, while condemning the custom as a pagan superstition, saw in it an argument against Jacob Falmerayer's thesis of the broken continuity between ancient Greece and modern Greeks. In the early years of the twentieth century, this theory was further developed by the English archaeologist Richard Dawkins, who found a number of analogies between the plots and figures presented in the ancient Dionysian festivals and in modern Kukeri - falophoria, swing with a child, murder and revival of Dionysus. The Bulgarian ethnographer Mihail Arnaudov connects the origin of the Kukeri with the ancient Greek holiday Antesterii, considering the character of the Tsar as an echo of the role of the Archon-Basileus in Antesterii.

At the same time, Kukeri are part of a Europe-wide tradition of carnival masquerades, which in some places are very similar to the Balkan ones - for example, bushojarash to Croats in southern Hungary, courents in Slovenia, Czechs in Switzerland. Authors such as the Greek archaeologist Constantinos Romeos explain this by the even more ancient origin of the ritual - common in prehistoric Europe, it precedes the feasts of Dionysus, which are only one of its manifestations. Authors, such as the Greek ethnographer Maria Michael-Dede, completely reject the connection of kalogeros with the cult of Dionysus, and interpret it as a naturalistic ritual to ensure fertility. Researchers, such as the Bulgarian historian Gavril Katsarov, are skeptical of the ancient origin of the Kukeri, which they consider insufficiently substantiated. According to Katsarov, the custom is rarely practiced in Bulgaria, and in a simplified form, compared to its Greek version. As a whole it is not sure. Jingiby (talk) 05:19, 31 May 2021 (UTC)

https://www.newyorker.com/video/watch/the-new-yorker-documentary-kukeri-dancing-evil-spirits-away

Watch Kukeri: Dancing Evil Spirits Away | The New Yorker Documentary | The New Yorker Nagy susan (talk) 21:50, 13 June 2023 (UTC)