Užkalbėjimai

Abstract

Lithuanian tradition of incantation has sprung up long time ago when all spheres of human life were under control of magic. Time has passed and in order to survive the old tradition has had to keep up with changes, to correlate with Christianity, and to attain new forms. At the turn of the 19th century the incantations were still met in different spheres of ethnic culture, though by the end of the 20th century this tradition had almost disappeared. First of all, the incantations associated with agriculture disappeared. In addition, incantations associated with all natural phenomena became very rare. On the other hand, semi-professional and professional in cantators, who know the ways to charm away to arouse illness can still be found at present times. This indicates that the traditional culture in the process of its decline brings to extinction old, but presently useless ethnic forms. They are substituted with contemporary cultural phenomena or with modified forms of the traditional culture. After Lithuania regained its independence at the end of the 20th century, the spiritual vacuum formed by atheistic ideology has been filled with new cultural, religious and philosophical trends. It has become fashionable to belong to various religious societies or to study occultism, mysticism, witchcraft, etc. The art of incantations has come to life again, and more and more people have started to visit incantators with deep trust and hope. Present day incantators have been forced to expand borders of their activity in order to survive in complicated modern world. Their acti vity has consequently evolved into a new sphere of alternative medicine: "Incantation + Bioenergetics". Despite this, there are only a few incantators in Lithuania at the large scale now, and the cases observed are rather an exception than a rule.