Bashkir ornament. Bashkir ornaments and patterns

Bashkir ornaments and patterns are an important component of material culture and at the same time one of the forms of spiritual creativity of the people of Bashkortostan. In this sense, folk art is the result of centuries of development: in ornamentation, in individual patterns, in colors, in their combination, folk craftsmen figuratively reflected the life of people and their understanding of the surrounding reality at different stages of history.

Ornament as a relationship of cultures

Major events in the history of the Bashkirs, some or other turns in their destiny have always or almost always found artistic reflection in art, including decorative: in ornamentation, in technique of execution, in the development of new or extinction of existing forms of creativity.

Bashkir ornament, technical methods of ornamentation, color scale, terminology of patterns are a concentrated reflection of intertwining ethnic history of the Bashkir people. This concerns its origin, ethnic processes during the Middle Ages, ancient and modern cultural and historical interactions with neighboring peoples. Fine art for a number of reasons, first of all, thanks to the great stability of the ornament, is more complete and more bold than many other types of material culture, bears traces of different eras and interactions of different ethnic groups.

National ornaments and patterns can be found on almost all types of products made with the caring hands of folk artists:

• Carpets, clothes, towels, curtains, bed linen;
• Leather goods, decorative articles made of natural materials;
• Utensils, household utensils;
• Art painting, drawings, engravings, polygraphy and so on.

Carpet weaving

Ornament of the Bashkir people is especially clearly traced in carpet weaving. Patterned carpets were an indispensable part of the dowry girl. Palaces with a striped pattern were distributed throughout southern Bashkiria and among the Bashkir population of the Kurgan region. In the south-western, western and partly central Bashkiria, in the basins of the rivers Dema and Ik, as well as in the middle and lower reaches of the Belaya River, carpets with a geometric pattern were mainly woven.

Since the middle of the 20th century, plant motifs in the form of curls and branches with flowers, leaves, berries, apples, etc. have become widespread in the ornamentation of carpets in the south-west of the republic. In fact, this is a new, modern stage of the evolution of ornamentation and patterns in the territory of Bashkiria.

Carpets with a striped pattern

Carpets with a pattern in stripes are woven with cloths 20-22 cm wide. The striped striped pattern is created by a base of colored sheep or goat wool. The pattern of the carpet is simple - it is longitudinal, serrated or smooth multicolored strips. A very simple striped Bashkir ornament suggests that this is the most ancient type of carpets.

Carpets with a geometric and floral pattern

They are sewn from two, sometimes three woven cloths with a width of 40-60 cm and are enclosed in a narrow border. The rim is usually woven with a separate cloth and with a pattern slightly different from that of the central field. Sometimes such a carpet does not have a rim at all.

Bashkir ornament of carpets with a geometric pattern is predominantly rectilinear, with clear figures. Its main elements are concave multicolored rhombs, squares, eight-pointed stars and other figures filling the ornamented carpet field with the correct rows. They, in turn, are developed inside by the same, but smaller figures. Elements of the ornament, if considered separately, are found in the ornamentation of many other peoples. However, in combination, in the overall composition, especially with well-chosen colors, they form that peculiar colorful pattern that gives the ornament a unique Bashkir national flavor.

In the case of the vegetative interpretation of the geometric pattern, the processes of the traditional rhombus take on the outlines of twigs with leaves, and the eight-pointed star is treated as an eight-petalled flower.

Color spectrum

The Bashkir national ornament concerning a color scale is various. The colors of the strips are red, yellow, green, blue, blue, violet and others in the deepest tones with the absolute predominance of the color of the madder. In an effort not to repeat each other, weavers achieve a significant variety in coloring. With the simplest composition by skillful selection and a combination of colors, they achieve a great colorful ornament.

Patterned fabrics

Bashkir ornaments and patterns are still found on the national dress. Fabrics from vegetable fibers of the Bashkirs differ rich and juicy ornamentation, a variety of decoration techniques. For sewing everyday clothes, everyday items, the so-called pestryd was made - a colored canvas in a cage or a strip. Festive and ceremonial clothes, objects decorating the dwelling, were ornamented with patterns of mortgaged or brushed textile (woven cloth).

From the motley cloth, women's shirts, aprons, women's and men's pants were sewed. She also made tablecloths, towels, napkins, curtains, various bags, etc. The checkered pattern of the pestle is formed by the intersection of colored bands. In the southern regions of Bashkortostan and in the Trans-Urals, the pestle is weaved with large cells. The color is dominated by red, white and black colors. The national ornament of the variegated fabric of the northern regions is distinguished by small cells of the figure and a more colorful coloring. Often checkered pestry, intended for aprons, tablecloths and curtains, was decorated and decorated with bridal patterns like rosettes-medallions.

Types of ornament

Patterns of embedded textile adorned only objects of decorative decoration for the house: curtains, towels and tablecloths. In the ornamentation of clothing, the mortgage technique was not used. The most simple elements of the ornament, executed by bookmarks, are massive concave lines - this is a typical Bashkir ornament. The pattern of these lines is complicated, they, joining together, form X-shaped, 3-shaped, diamond-shaped, 8-shaped figures and other more complex patterns. The eight-pointed star, the cross, the swastika, the rhombus with extended sides or with twin curls on the corners, horn-shaped figures are very characteristic.

Embroidery

Traditionally, in Bashkiria, embroidery was even more important than patterned fabrics. This is explained by a simpler technique of work, and more creative efforts can be made. For weaving, raw materials and weaving looms were required , and with the spreading of finished fabrics, the making of own ones became an anachronism. But embroidery is in demand even now. Bashkir patterns and ornaments are of great variety. The drawings depend on the embroidery technique and the way the rough image is imprinted on the embroidered surface.

The main elements of the ornament are figures in the form of pair horns of a ram, S-shaped lines that in different combinations give patterns in the form of the letter X, swastikas or form strongly stylized plant motifs. Bashkir ornament is executed by embroidery on a cloth, a velvet, is more rare on a cotton fabric silk, woolen or cotton threads. Patterns on the caps are usually embroidered on a red or green background, and on the pendants and decorative ribbons there is also a black background, which gives the pattern a great brightness and ensures a clear sound of each color in the pattern. For the patterns themselves, colors of warm tones are usually chosen, but, as a rule, contrasting with the background. More often used red, yellow, green and very rarely blue and blue. A favorite red color is often found on patterns with a red background.

Woodcarving

The carving, the ornament on the dishes and the painting on wood were not so widespread among the Bashkirs, as, for example, embroidery or weaving. The only exception is architectural carving, which appeared in Bashkortostan from the second half of the 19th century everywhere. The greatest distribution of artistic carving in wood was in the mountainous part of south-eastern Bashkiria, where the most extensive taiga forests of the Southern Urals are concentrated, which gave a variety of raw materials for "wooden production."

The needs of subsistence farming and the availability of wood have long made it necessary and possible to make various utensils from wood, household items. At the same time the Bashkirs had practicality, expediency was connected and closely intertwined with aesthetic tastes. By making objects of domestic use, the Bashkirs tried to make them not only strong, comfortable to use, but also beautiful. It is not by accident that the most striking, interesting was the ornament on dishes and objects, which were daily, constantly used in everyday life. At the same time, in the manufacture of buckets for koumiss, in the ornamentation of utensils, in the painting of wooden stands under the trunk, along with the national color worked out over the centuries, elements of patterns characteristic of the ancient tribes that once participated in the ethnic formation of the Bashkir people were preserved.

Conclusion

Ornament of the Bashkir people is the same folklore. It is the product of the collective creativity of succeeding generations. Each pattern is the result of collective creativity, while at the same time it is the product of the artistic imagination of an individual person. Many masters not only make changes to their known patterns, but also create new ones. In turn, the newly created patterns do not remain unchanged. Other artists grind them or, drawing on traditional patterns, create their own. Hence the diversity and richness of forms that we observe in the folk ornament of Bashkiria.