| In studying
the origins and meaning of the ritual use of flowering willow branches
among Slavs in Europe and their descendants in North America, the author
found little of use available in the local libraries or in the Internet. With the
sole exceptions of His Holiness, Alexy II, Patriarch of Moscow & All
Russia, and His Grace, Jan Hirka, Greek Catholic Bishop of Preshov in
Slovakia, whose encouragement is noted herein, other religious sources
were of no value in the research. By far the most useful sources were
the Slavic ethnographic institutes and museums in North America and
Europe which supplied the author with many texts in the original Slavic
languages. The translations from the various Slavic languages into English
were carried out by Ms Larissa Tolchinsky, whose address is: 14 Hutton
Street, Winnipeg, MB R2V 4K4, CANADA. For the
assistance of others who may be interested in researching ethnographic
and ethnobotanical matters from original sources, the author lists below
several with which he has communicated and which supplied him with relevant
texts.
 Return
to Index. |
ETHNOGRAPHIC
INSTITUTES
GERMANY
SERBIA