The bathhouse in the ancient pagan tradition of Russia has always occupied a special place, since it was the focus of all natural elements at once - earth, water, air and fire. This attribute of the usual peasant life was a sacred space, within the walls of which rituals were held, timed to all important stages in a person's life. In the bath, they not only washed and warmed themselves, were treated and rested, conjured and purified the spirit, but also carried out maternity, wedding and funeral and memorial rites.
Funeral bath
According to Anichkov, the bathhouse among the Slavs and Finno-Ugric tribes was a kind of ancestral temple, where, before the adoption of Christianity, the spirits of deceased relatives were venerated and the gods were worshiped.
It was considered the border between the world of the living - reality and the world of the dead - navu, which the deceased crossed after ritual ablution.
The Karelians, just like the inhabitants of the Minsk and Novgorod provinces, heated a special funeral bath, where they called the soul of a newly deceased relative, who could come not alone, but together with all the deceased relatives. According to Vasiliev's research, it turned out that the only people for whom funeral baths were not heated were babies.
There is evidence from the ethnographer Galkovsky that, while singing the ritual lamentation, the living opened the door of the bathhouse and, before entering, let the spirits forward, for which a special place was prepared with a hitherto unused scalded broom and a piece of soap. After waiting a few minutes, during which the soul of the deceased had to have time to wash, the relatives began to take water procedures themselves, spraying water towards the corner of the deceased. At the same time, it was strictly forbidden to throw steam in the funeral bath, so as not to randomly scald the invisible spirit of the deceased.
Studying the funeral traditions of the Karelians, Taroeva, found data that after taking out the coffin with the body of the deceased from the house, they brought the coffin with the body of the deceased to the walls of the bath and stopped, giving the deceased the opportunity to say goodbye to her.
Return from the cemetery
After returning from the cemetery, before sitting down at the memorial table, all participants in the funeral had to visit the bathhouse to wash and steam. Thus, according to Surkhako, the Russians of the Vladimir land and the Segozero and Loyanitsk Karelians cleansed themselves of the evil spirits of the kingdom of the dead and warmed themselves up from the cold of the other world.
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Baths for the forties
The custom was almost widespread to melt the funeral baths in the evening on the eve of the fortieth day after the death of a loved one.
Having studied this issue, Vinokurova came to the conclusion that the Vepsians regarded this memorial ablution as the last bathing of the deceased in the world of the living, and therefore accompanied him with bitter cry.
On this day, like the residents of the Vologda region, they kindled a fire in the bathhouse, filled a basin with warm water, brought soap and a soft broom, and also hung a towel and belongings of the deceased.
Then the mourner summoned the spirit of the deceased and began to wash and wipe down some member of his family who imitated the deceased.
After this ceremony, all the guests of the commemoration were supposed to bathe in the bathhouse, who, dressed in the best clothes, were invited to a feast. It was believed that a lavishly laid table pleased the deceased, who, accompanied by three angels and in the guise of a butterfly or a bird, visited his earthly home for a farewell time and parted with his family.
Funeral baths
In addition to the forties, baths for deceased relatives were heated on other important memorial dates of the year, which fell on the eve of great church festivals and parental Saturdays.
Although the Orthodox priests opposed this pagan rite in every possible way, they did not manage to finally overcome the popular superstition.
In the Perm province, until the middle of the 19th century, before parents' day on Foma week, a bathhouse was heated for the deceased relatives, in which it was forbidden to wash alive on the same evening.
The historian Bobrov stated that on the territory of present-day Ukraine and Belarus on Trinity, graves were swept with a steam-steamed broom. And Vinokurova in her work draws attention to the tradition of the Vepsians to heat the bathhouse before St. George's Day, when the owner of the house at night with his bare head went out into the street and invited his ancestors to steam, and in the morning he sent them to the edge of the field, pouring wine over the land.
Navya banya
In the XIII-XIV centuries, on Maundy Thursday during Easter week in the south-west of Russia, there was a custom to organize a bath for deceased relatives, the so-called navi.
In other districts, “Navsky Day” fell on the memorial Radunitsa, however, in both cases, inviting the spirits of their ancestors to wash, the living covered the “Navi meal” in the bathhouse and sprinkled ash from the oven on the floor. This was done so that in the morning to find traces of the dead who came to dine and to make sure that their offerings were accepted.
Usually, the hooves of livestock or the legs of birds walking around the yard were imprinted on the floor, but the peasants stubbornly believed that these prints belonged to their relatives, who appeared in the world of the living in animal form.
Bath superstitions
Memorial baths were so common in Slavic and Finno-Ugric culture that they became part of everyday life.
In the Smolensk province, the last one who left the bathhouse usually brought a bucket of cold water into it, left it a little warm and, having doused the hot stove, quickly left, inviting the dead to wash.
In Belarus, according to Bobrov, people who had been steaming for a long time were urged to leave the bathhouse, with the appeal: "Let the dead go already," especially since, according to legend, after midnight, the souls of the dead always gathered in it.
Ashkhen Avanesova