colindă

The tradition & historical record

A colindă (pl. colinde; also colind, pl. colinduri) is a traditional Christmas carol in Romania and the Republic of Moldova. ¹

Although the text of all colinde is concerned with the events of the Nativity, certain elements of the folk rituals performed around Christmas are probably pre-Christian in origin, having their roots in the Roman Saturnalia and pagan rituals related to the winter solstice and soil fertility. Colinde are performed in all parts of Romania (including Moldova), with regional variations in terms of number of participants, exact timing of different melodies and lyrics. In terms of artistic mastery of verse and melody, colinde occupy an important place in the creation of the Romanian people. They form a unity with doine, popular ballads and songs of bravery, with tales, riddles, proverbs and sayings. Coming from the world of village communities, colinde preserve some of the oldest Romanian poetic achievements. They are inspired by the Holy Scripture and Holy Tradition, by the religious services and by the iconography. Colinde have had a role in preserving and defending the Orthodox faith when heterodox proselytizing tried to break the unity of the Orthodox faith, and to dismantle, at the same time, national unity. The Mother of God, who occupies a central place in piety and Orthodox worship, is present everywhere in Romanian colinde, together with her son, Jesus Christ. In traditional Romanian rural society, preparations for colinde started well in advance (sometimes weeks) before Christmas. The village youth (usually boys) would begin to form groups in different places and designate a leader in order to practice singing in unison. These groups are called cete de colindători, and their numbers vary from region to region. Then, starting on Christmas Eve, the groups would go to different houses and begin singing. ¹

The text above is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Colindă”, available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 licence. ¹

colindă is Christmas music from Romanian folklore with ritualistic and pagan roots; intangible cultural heritage, according to the structured record cited below. This entry was generated automatically from that record and has not yet been reviewed by a person familiar with the tradition. ²

The source record links this tradition to 4 external registers, which can be verified through the citation. ²