INFORMATION BULLETIN

Saint Paul, Minnesota is the home of a group of Romanians that came to the United States in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. Since the majority of these people were from small, iso­lated villages located in the wooded valleys and mountains of Romania, there was great opportunity for folk customs and beliefs to spring up and endure. Naturally, many of the tales, superstitions and customs were per­petuated in their new colony in Saint Paul. The early settlers built a small church and social center on the cor­ner of Woodbridge and Atwater Streets in the North End District of Saint Paul. They established their homes around the church and met each week after worship to discuss the local news in the Romanian language and to par­take of the social customs much as they did in Romania.

The following stories were told to me by my friends and relatives in our small ethnic community. Although I am only a second generation Ameri­can, my ties to the Romanian group are still strong and I can remember hearing most of the sayings and sto­ries when I was a child.

The Holy Water

Grandmother Eva Palade has re­sided in South Saint Paul. Minnesota for almost fifty-five years and although she says she doesn’t want to visit Romania, she has more ties to the “old country” than to life in South Saint Paul. For instance, she is quite certain that red ribbons tied around a young girl’s ankles will promote good luck. There has always been a vial of “holy water” in her house, as holy water has the power to cure illness and provide a tonic effect to the user. This water is prepared during Janu­ary by the local priest, both in the home and in the church. The priest celebrates a religious service and blesses the water which is reputed to have magical powers.

Blessed water is always used in sanctifying new dwellings and is sprinkled on the walls and furnish­ings at least once a year in Romanian homes. For the sprinkling the priest uses a busuioc which is usually made by an old member of the church out of branches of basil leaves tied together with red ribbon.

The holy water has the power to foretell the future when used in com­pany with the busuioc. If a single girl takes a small branch of the busuioc that has been used during the bless­ing cf the house in January (The Epiphany) and places it under her pillov.’. she will dream of the man she will marry.

Superstitions and Sayings

Phillip Toconita. Sr. recalled a number of superstitions that made their way from Romania to Saint Paul. These beliefs were usee to ward off bad luck and served ai reminders for certain social meres particularly tor children. Parents used variations of these peasant beliefs to make their children behave. Mr. Toconita relates that there was very little a child could do without coming up against some superstition that covered the situa­tion. For example, if you sing at the dinner table. your bride will be crazy, so a child better spend his time eat­ing. Children were told that eating only the soft pan of the bread caused your arms to be limp. Other good reasons for eating all your bread was that the crusts would keep your eye­brow s from falling out and would also make them dark and beautiful.

Both young people and elders alike knew that if you saw a dead cat you had better grab your hair, otherwise you would become baldheaded. To ward off an untimely end, a person entering a crossroad should spit and say, “Cross of the road.” However, spitting in the fire would cause your tongue to blister.

In order to have a beautiful hus­band or wife you must clean your plate at meals. Eating dark toast pro­motes dark eyes. A person should always close cupboard doors and all doors in general because good luck may go out or hide in the cupboard and bad luck is sure to come in the house. To insure a good time at a party, wear one article of underwear or one stocking inside out.

Marriage and Birth Control

If a bride-to-be does not wish any children for a certain number of years, she may practice this method of birth control. The bride must jump into the air and touch the top of the doorway as she enters the church for her wed­ding. Then she must say, “No chil­dren for one, two or as many years,” as she wishes.

Another method insuring no chil­dren at all worked for a relative of Mrs. Yorga. The story was the rela­tive was thwarted in marrying the man she loved because his mother thought that they would have too many chil­dren. (The relative came from a fam­ily of nine children.) The bride-to-be chose someone else and to spite the other family she invoked the follow­ing charm to show them she would be childless.

This event happened in Saint Paul and is a well known Romanian super­stition. Mrs. Yorga’s relative went to a grocery store and stole some poppy seeds. When she arrived home she put her hand in water and then into the poppy seeds. The seeds that ad­hered to her hand were carefully saved. On the day of the wedding the bride took the seeds to the church and said during the wedding ceremony, “May I be childless for as many years as I have seeds in my hand and that many years more.” It is remembered in Saint Paul that this lady did remain child­less much to her husband’s dismay.

Funerals, Death and Bad Luck

To avoid bad luck, don’t pass in front of a funeral or eat anything when the hearse goes by. The person that exits right after the casket as it leaves the church is sure to be the next one to die. In the same respect, an owl singing on your roof or your dog howling in the yard foretells of a death in the family.

Never walk backwards, if you are foolish enough to do so, some acci dent will happen or you will sud­denly pass away. Make sure you never turn back if you forget something because you will court bad luck. In fact, it’s best not to even glance over your shoulder because you may see death or some enchantress.

If an old person says, “I’m going to die,” the proper answer is to reply, “It’s not stamped on your forehead when you’re going to die.” This will counteract any spell on the old per­son.

When coming from a burial you must wash your hands before enter­ing your house so death will not fol­low you. After a funeral, it is custom­ary for the family of the deceased to entertain the mourners at a memorial dinner or pomana. The first drink poured is spilled on the ground to placate the deceased’s spirit.

Another piece of good advice is to never walk with only one shoe on as this will have fatal effects on one of your parents.

Animal Lore

There is a nocturnal animal called a “Precuricu” that can only be seen by dogs. Since this animal is invis­ible, we can be sure it is around us whenever we hear a dog bark during the night.

Never leave the clothes of your children outdoors for long on washdays. If the clothes are dry and left on the line they may be visited by a strange creature called a “Zina” or flying beauty. The beauty will leave a spell causing blindness or other harm or in some rare instances a talent. These creatures, forepart human and hindpart bird, have knee length black hair and make their homes on the tops of the Carpathian Mountains. Since they fly swiftly they are world­wide in range. Should you meet some flying beauties you will notice that they will not speak to you or to an­other person, but simply walk away. If you see them without them seeing you, you will agree that they have beautiful voices.

Anna Massen reminded me that many of the horror stories that we see in the movies or on television star such creatures as the werewolf or Count Dracula, the Vampire. These movies usually originate in Transylvania and show a dark, awe­some castle deep in a foggy forest. Transylvania is a province of Roma­nia and Dracula is a derivative of the Slavonic-Romanian word “Dracu” meaning devil. Miss Massen told me about a trip taken in Romania before World War II where she actually saw a castle that belonged to a Romanian nobleman named Voivod Dracu or Count Dracula. This man had the repu­tation of changing into a bat or wolf in order to stalk his human prey and drink their blood.

Regardless of the truth of Mr. Dracu’s historical escapades, he has provided the basis for the vampire legend that has persisted to modern day. Ways to thwart a vampire or a werewolf are well known to watchers of the midnight movies, however, Anna Massen is not a television or a movie fan and credits as her sources the peasants that live in the vicinity of Dracu’s castle.

She was told on her journey that garlic or dill worn on a person’s body was insurance against these creatures. Vampires and werewolves do not like reflections in mirrors or enter a room in which there is a cross. The similar­ity between the peasant beliefs and the Hollywood movie versions are startlingly familiar and indicates that a good horror story is accepted and passed from generation to generation.

Healing Power and the Evil Eye

The Romanian’s belief in healing power s connected to the force of de ochi, o:” evil eye.

Persons with green eyes are to be avoided by children that are not wear­ing red clothing because these people may cause illness or misbehavior in the unprotected child. Should the child show symptoms of either because the precaution of wearing red was not taken, the following procedures breaks the spell.

1. Take three burning charcoals;

2. Say the Lord’s Prayer as you put one charcoal into a vial of water;

3. Repeat step 2 for the second and third charcoal;

4. Say, “The evil eye must die.”

5. Give the child the water to drink and wash his face with it also. The healing process of passing the hands over a fainted to headache-rid­den person is called “descântat” and is a method that is quite popular among the older Romanians in Saint Paul. For a stronger effect you should touch the sick person’s head and say three times, “The Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, Amen.”

If a person is very sick, take some of the person’s hair to someone that has healing powers. The healer will say a prayer and place the hair into water. The water is taken to the sick person and he must drink it.

Witchcraft and Fortune Telling

Witchcraft and fortune telling seem to be very close together in the folk lore of the Saint Paul Romanians. During the various interviews the terms witchcraft and fortune teller were interchanged frequently. It ap­pears that a person might be consid­ered both a witch and a fortune teller to some people and just a fortune teller to others.

One method of telling fortunes uses yellow grains of corn and is called “Boabe.” The fortune teller counts the kernels and places them in certain piles to predict the future or throws them in order to read your fortune from the position in which they land.

If you call a fortune teller on New Year’s Eve, she will melt lead and drop it into cold water and read your fortune in the shapes of cooling lead.

It is suggested that girls who want to win a man’s heart visit the local witch to secure a secret poem. They are to repeat this poem and dance naked in the town square in the moon­light. Sooner or later the man they want will come to their house.

PHILLIP J. TOCONITA, Jr.