Klaipėdos universitetas

Known the world over, laments are one of the oldest genres of oral ritual poetry. They are usually performed by women during rituals: funerals, weddings or leaving to join the army. Laments are works of a special kind of improvisation; they were created during the process of performance, drawing upon traditional language and motifs. The objective of this article is to open a discussion of relationships between Karelian and Lithuanian lament traditions, as representative examples of Finnic and Baltic traditions, respectively. I focus on representations of ‘belief systems’ as these are reflected through the poetic features, images and motifs of both Karelian and Lithuanian funeral laments.

This paper focuses on five stones with ancient incised images containing the symbol of a pole with a semicircle or a cross at its top. This symbol had a cosmological meaning and represented a projection of the “heavenly sphere” onto a flat surface. The strict orientation of the stones and the symbols to the north indicates a ceremonial “world axis” directed to North Star. This symbol of the “world axis” was used during funerary rituals at gravestones The Scebiaraky site is an example of Baltic sacred stones (stabas) in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone.