Holidays, being the most ancient and continually recurring element of culture, have always played a significant role in the life of society. They have been and remain an important agency not only of relaxation, communion with one's fellow creatures, and entertainment, but also of formation and strengthening of human society. They have the function of human socialization.1 Therefore, holidays are interesting to ethnographers, folklorists, historians of art and the theater, philosophers, sociologists, and also those representing other humanitarian disciplines. While granting the importance of art-oriented, literary, and esthetic studies of the holiday, one cannot fail to agree with the opinion of S. A. Tokarev that "only through an historical viewpoint can the very essence of the holiday, the very idea of the holiday, be comprehended."2