Ritual_of_Rusalii_dsinanipaper.pdf

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Spirit Possession and Exorcism in Serbia - the Ritual of "Rusalje"

Danijel Sinani

Abstract: The paper is dealing with the ritual of "rusalje as a manifestation of aspirit possession phenomena. By its expressive elements, this ritual representsthe unique appearance in the traditional culture of Serbs, involving for more than100 women at the same time in the ritual drama and including mediumship,sorcery and clairvoyance. It is argued that for the categories of oppressed anddeprived people this ritual represents the channel to exert mystical pressure upon

their superiors, but also one of the few channels available to them for gainingsome vertical social mobility. In its most developed forms the ritual becomes thechannel for making special kind of career becoming the ritual official in thecommunity. This paper is also concerned with the processes of inheritance andtransmission of ritual roles in the "rusalje" ritual. Its rapid expansion andadoption in the neighboring regions are interpreted, followed by an analysis ofthe reasons and circumstances of the decline in the rituals significance and thedisappearance of its most characteristic form.Key words: rusalje, ritual, spirit possession, exorcism, mediums, sorcery, career,ritual officials, vertical social mobility.

The Rusalje ritual is one of the most exotic and most dramatic examples ofritual practice in the traditional culture of Serbia. This ritual marked its

culmination in the first half of the 20th

century, only to stop taking place in itsmost developed form on the public scene during the eighties. The ritual drewgreat attention of national and foreign authors of different profile, and numerousstudies and rich ethnographic material about it were published.1 The Rusaljeritual took place in a wider region of Eastern Serbia, but its epicentre was in thevillage of Duboka located in the north-east part of Serbia, in the region ofHomolje Mountains. The ritual took place during the movable feast the descentof the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles, or the Holy Trinity, which is celebrated inDuboka as a village saints day. The central part of the event is falling into tranceof a great number of ritual participants and the exorcist ritual that follows 2.Exorcism is performed by a specially formed exorcist group composed of threekings and three queens who evict demons from Rusalje being in the state ofritual ecstasy with music, dance, song and specific ritual actions. The ways trance


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Danijel Sinani_________________________________________________________________

is manifested differ significantly from one case to another, but most often itresults in a certain form of communication with the ''otherworldly''. The ritualgathered a great number of interested people who tried to get in touch with theworld of the dead. During the trance trance-women (padalice) shake on theground, with their jaws clenched and their eyelids strongly closed down - theywriggle'', scream, cry, ''flail'' their arms, stamp their feet, gesticulate with theirfaces. Some trance-women clench their fists jerkily, they beat themselves, thumptheir chests with their fists, tear up their clothes, punch and kick around, makemoves with their hands as if protecting themselves from someone, some of themcross themselves, kiss their hands, whisper, communicate with thesupernatural. Some of them foam at the mouth, they try to run away, they bite

their shirts, try to bite, break their fingers, spit on the present, and hit theirhusbands. Having returned from trance they mostly claim not to remember whathad happened to them during the attack.

Rusaljes ecstasy is considered by the people to be a state of illness which is,in different interpretations, thought to be the result of demonic creatures enteringthe body of a possessed person or of another spiritualized entity extruding thesoul of the possessed. These entities are conceptualised sometimes as souls ofancestors, sometimes as good spirits sent by God, and sometimes as the verydivine beings. It is believed that demons can enter a human body self-initiatively,most often through mouth, and not through the state of a provoked trance or in amanner that would remind of the shaman initiation.

Rich ethnographic material clearly shows that women are a category ofpersons mostly subject to the possession attacks, so it is them who most often

participate in the Rusalje ritual. Beside women, a possibility of men falling intotrance is also mentioned, but much less, and there is also information on childrenof different age that were believed to be possessed and that they needed to be

provided with the ritual of exorcism.When we talk about women as the category most subject to possession

attacks, one should bear in mind, above all, the fact that women in Eastern Serbiaspend their life in the patriarchal environment where power lies on the side ofmen. Most living aspects in this type of social community create conditions fornumerous frustrations, feeling of subordination and marginalisation with female

population. Along with this basic fact of them being subject to men in almost alldomains of life, moments of exclusion from all organisational activities and key

positions in the official dogma are also important in this case OrthodoxChristianity, as well as exclusion from economic-political flows and decision-making systems, except for the earning. For all that, it should be born in mindthat the region in which the ritual had developed is located in a severe area of the


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Spirit Possession and Exorcism in Serbia-the Ritual of Rusalje_________________________________________________________________

tangle of mounting chains where the main economic activity is cattle breedingand perhaps agriculture where possible, and according to the testimony of oursources people here spend ''an atrociously difficult life'.3Woman is expected tofulfil her reproductive function and to perform hard work related with both thehouse and the entire household. According to the information from the sources,men are often absent from their homes, morality is at a low level, and marital andfamily conflicts are frequent, so the community breaks easily.Female participantsin the Rusalje ritual are predominantly married women, and it can be easilyobserved that many started falling in trance immediately after the act of marriage.Arriving to a new environment upon marriage, woman, who was in a subordinate

position in relation to the male members of the household in her own home, is

now faced with the fact that her desires, aspirations and behaviour have to besubordinated not only to men who are completely new persons to her, but also toother women from the house she had married into. The position of deprivation issignificantly dramatised in such circumstances. Taking into account the fact thatin this area the so called juvenile marriage is a regular phenomenon, and thatsome girls come to their new family of her husbands who was selected by anagreement between the two families at the age of twelve of thirteen, thefrustration factors reach their culmination. One very frequent piece ofinformation is the fact that many of the married women falling into trance are

barren. All this, with the previously described living conditions which all womenfrom this region spend their whole lives in, creates sufficient basis for variousfrustrations to occur. Common denominators of all the described cases aresubordination, deprivation and marginalisation.4

However, as it can be seen from the sources, manners of manifestation of thestate of trance during the ritual differ from one group of women to another. Theinterviewees themselves who attended the execution of the Rusalje ritual tendedto differentiate two groups of ''trance-women'' those who are prophetesses andthose who are not.

''Trance-women'' that communicate with the otherworldly, foretell and thenassume the title of sorceresses, are predominantly women of middle andadvanced age, 40 to 60 years old. They have the most dramatic and the mostserious attacks during the state of ecstasy, which is the one that lasts longest.They are the ones who are hardest to retrieve from this state, and the doctors are

prevented from approaching and examining them. These persons are mostly theonly ones who fall into trance in their family or, perhaps older women from theirfamily (mostly mothers) used to fall into trance before them.

On the other hand, persons whose attacks are manifested in a lighter way arenot considered sorceresses, and in their ecstasy they are most frequently sad,


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Danijel Sinani_________________________________________________________________

tired, complaining of pain and weakness and they often cry. Besides them, otherfemale family members from different generations frequently fall into trance(mothers, sisters, aunts, etc.). Attacks in this category of women can also bestrong and dramatic, with manifestations similar to those of the first category. Butthere is an important difference in these cases there is no explicit contact withthe otherworldly whatsoever. This group usually includes younger persons of 20to 30 years of age. Surely, the observed regularities should not be understoodexclusively, for they also include existence of different examples and overlappingof certain elements. However, another, perhaps the largest group of womenfalling into trance is observed in the descriptive material, and their behaviour can

be positioned between the two types previously described. In their trance, they

make contact with the world of the dead and during the possession attack theyhave the role of a medium. Their attacks can be mild, so they whistle or ''hum atune'', whisper in their talks to the dead, or they can be manifested verystrongly, even with the expression of substantial aggression towards themselvesor the surroundings. In that case communication with the world of the dead startswhen Rusalja calms down and interested people start gathering around her tryingto get answers to the questions of their interest. Gathered people usually want toobtain information from Rusalja about their deceased how are they doing in theother world, if there is something they lack or something else they could do tomake their afterlife easier. People try to use these opportunities to send thingsto the deceased they think the deceased need, which are given to the trance-woman so that she would symbolically hand these things over to the souls of thedead, or she uses them for exchange of information and an attempt to talk with

the dear deceased persons. Frequent case is that Rusalje of this kind transferinformation from the world of the dead self-initiatively, which are intended forthe members of her family or gathered, interested people, and sometimes suchinformation also contains views that propagate holding on to the traditionallyestablished forms of behaviour, particularly in the sphere of relations towards thedeceased.

Hence, it can be concluded that we can basically differentiate two types ofRusalje trance-women those who did not (or have not yet) achieve(d) certainlevel of professionalization, and those who became professionals due tocircumstances in which they were recognised as possessed. The first are usually

possessed by demonic, mythical beings, while the second type of trance-womenin the role of possessing agents comes across the souls of ancestors, good spiritssent by God all the way to the beings from celestial hierarchy, even Goditself.


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In a wider sense, however, the group of professionalized trance-women doesnot represent a unique category but more the whole scale of different personswho assumed a major or minor number of roles and functions, relying on themanifestations of possession taking place in the Rusalje ritual. It is formed of

persons providing different types of services from communication with deadrelatives and ancestors, to establishment of a communication bridge with theotherworldly and making contacts with the dead possible for other persons not

belonging to the immediate family, through persons who foretell and preachreligious/moral/ethical contents during their state of ecstasy, and persons that inlife, based on the possession phenomenon and outside the cycle of spiritual feast,assume the role of leading religious ritual functionaries in their community thus

making a specific career. The latter renew their authority by falling into ecstasyfor other big feasts as well the higher the number of possession attacks thehigher the status of the person basing her capacities on them; bigger powers areattributed to such person, which, again, brings more clients and a more importantrole and status not only in her own community, but also in a broader socialcommunity.

So, it can be said that the first category of Rusalje trance-women includespersons from the social margine, primarily women who feel any form ofdeprivation and suffer certain frustrations, either of emotional or sexual nature, orthose resulting from pressures of the obligations brought to women by daily lifein the patriarchal type of community, or expectations imposed to them by thecommunity that they cannot fulfil (barren women, marriage), or personal and

professional failure of accomplishment, exclusion from the religious life, main

decision making streams, etc. In this case, by reaching out to possession andtaking part in the Rusalje ritual, women will point to their position, express theirrevolt, speak and behave in a manner that would be otherwise impossible inregular circumstances. At the same time, at least for that particular day, they willattract attention of their fellow beings and receive appropriate care and specialtreatment.5 But their social status will not change with these attacks of

possession. They are usually possessed by demonic entities. However,manifestations of possession and conditions of this category of persons canfurther move in two basic directions: the first direction would lead to healingi.e. stopping falling into ecstasy once the conditions for that are met (the sourceof frustration disappears), and the other direction is orientation towards certainlevel of professionalization, depending on personal ambitions and abilities, andalso on public readiness to accept such developments. This process is conditioned

by the increase of morality and authority of possessing entities.6


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The second category of Rusalje is formed of persons who have already usedtheir attacks of possession to achieve certain level of professionalization andengagement in the community. In these cases women are most often possessed bythe souls of the dead, relatives or distant ancestors. They enable communicationwith the souls of the dead and insight into the afterlife. In return, they receivegifts that are symbolically dedicated to the souls of the deceased. Increase of thesocial status of these persons, if any, is not significant and is reduced to thefeeling of respect or awe shown to them by the other members of the community.Their role is related exclusively with the Rusalje ritual and outside the system ofspiritual feasts they return to their regular activities. Their ecstasy originates inone of the above mentioned categories of deprivation, and their further role in the

Rusalje ritual can also take two directions towards healing and ceasing to takepart in the Rusalje ritual, or towards further professionalization and building acareer that will be based on repeated and nourished attacks of possession.

The third category is formed of highly professionalized persons who becomepossessed by agents of a higher rank. In some cases it is again about the souls ofancestors, but most often these are the creatures of divine provenance. These

persons change their social status to a great extent, their role in the communitydoes not end with the manifestation of possession i.e. falling into trance duringspiritual ceremonies. These persons, known among the people by different names(mainly sorceresses or church persons - crkvarke), offer a wide range ofservices to their clients - from communication with the dead to healing services,through fortune telling. In some cases, these persons are also advocates and

propagators of religious/moral/ethic principles important for the cultural-

cognitive reproduction of the community, so they assume the role of a religious-ritual functionary. Bearing in mind the fact that in Duboka, for instance, churchdid not exist in the period when the Rusalje ritual took place at full strength,meaning that the presence of the official religion was almost unperceivable, theneed for functionaries of this kind was highly marked. Persons whosemanifestations of possession result in this sequence of events, usually abandontheir regular activities, and they earn substantial part of their income (money andgifts) based on the services offered to the interested clientele. Hence, change and

progress in economic aspects of life of the persons in question are evident. On theother hand, their social status grows in the community they live in according tothe importance of the role they assume which may culminate with the role ofone of the principal religious functionaries in the community. Stopping

participating in the Rusalje ritual, in this case, is actually the end of one entirelyspecific career.


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Quite obviously, many of the women taking part in this ritual seek a ventthis way or a compensation mechanism for their numerous frustrating conditionsthey live under. This way they give vent to their feelings by publically expressingtheir frustration through a socially accepted idiom or they make pressure on theirenvironment, men above all, to pay attention to their condition and to give themmore importance in these moments and to be more interested in them. However,expression of dissatisfaction, satisfaction of frustrations or revolt against thegender monopolizing the positions of power are not the only things present in theRusalje ritual; there is another, very specific tendency of a certain number of

persons to find a channel through which to achieve vertical social passing throughfor themselves, for their better life and a higher position, independently from the

relations with the remaining part of the community.7

What is important for this paper is that one category of persons, thanks totheir own abilities and aspirations, manages to influence the public by usingmanifestations of possession attacks and also to provide for themselves asignificant progress in the social status including the aspects related to the

personal reputation they enjoy, as well as economic aspects. This wayparticipation in the Rusalje ritual becomes a socially desirable form of behaviour,and the question of progressing on the social scale is the question of a successful

professionalization of the abilities the person claims to acquire through thepossession attacks. Those persons who have not professionalized their possessionattacks, in case they are not given attention from their fellow men and the properritual is not performed, they have an additional mechanism that can relieve themto a certain extent from the pressures of the community they live in; it is,

therefore, believed that women for whom the exorcist wheel dance has not beenperformed, or those who fall into trance outside the stage where the Rusalje ritualtakes place, will become ill, tired or, generally, incapable to work during a certain

period of time covering between seven days and the whole year. In such cases, itis possible to engage other therapeutic means, so these persons are taken to asorceress for healing or to treatments in monasteries.

If left unsatisfied with the treatment guaranteed to the possessed personsduring the Rusalje ritual, and if having capabilities and tendencies to further

progress in the ritual life of the community, the possessed person will startclaiming in time to be possessed by entities of a higher rank and initiate

professionalization of the condition originally seen as illness caused by thedemonic creatures attacks. These efforts are frequently supported by herrelatives, which is indicated by the information from the sources saying thatRusalja often communicates with them during her ecstasy and that they giveinstructions to one another regarding development of the state they are in.


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Relatives are also those who do not allow a more detailed review of trance-women, which could lead to their unmasking, if the attacks of trance are feigned.

Likewise, the sources testify that in cases happening in the Rusalja ritualpossession is not considered to be voluntary which is one of the basicassumptions for it to be publically accepted and culturally evaluated.8 In thatsense, there are numerous claims that women do not want to fall into tranceduring spiritual feasts, that they went to see a sorceress or a priest to help themget free from this illness, but in practice such attempts seldom result in successand getting out of the circle of Rusalja ritual participants. The level of achieved

professionalization of Rusalja is also important in these cases. Highlyprofessionalized persons say that nothing can free them from the possession

attacks, and some have even claimed that it was given to them by God.Regarding participation of men in the role of those falling into trance duringspiritual feasts although there are stories of men also falling into trance (only asmaller number of them) only one specific example of a male being possessedduring spiritual feasts can be found in the entire descriptive material. This is a

person who had a physical deficiency in both legs by birth.9It is quite clear thatthis physically disturbed person was not able to fulfil his male role in the

patriarchal community to the full extent and to fairly participate in a competitionfor positions with other male members. In that sense, subordination, deprivationand marginalisation are totally expected, an as a favourable alternative idiom for

progress in the status, the one actually used in the community as the channel forsocial passing through was accepted participation in the Rusalje ritual.

When we talk about children falling into trance, the entire ethnographic

material gives explicitly only five cases recorded by doctors. In all of thementioned examples, real conditions of weakness or specific diseases werediagnosed. Parents of these children insisted on performing an exorcist ritualwithout paying attention to doctors advice, and that can be understood in twoways: they either believe in possession as the cause of the disease, for whichexorcism is required, or they try to initiate their children into the order ofchronically possessed participants of the Rusalje ritual which, again, is aboutthe preference of such form of behaviour.


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1Notes:

See, e.g: V. Suboti, Rusalje u Srbiji ili padalice u selu Dubokoj u Zvidu. Tri predavanja, Kongres srpskih lekara iprirodnjaka u Beogradu, Beograd, 1905; V. Meduri, Kraljice.Prosvetni pregled, br 2 i 3, Novi Sad, 1925; M. Dragi,Rusalje kao funkcionalna neuroza masa. Socijalno medicinski pregled, Knjiga 8, Sveska 4, Beograd, 1936, pp. 201 206; R. Kazimirovi, Tajanstvene pojave u naem narodu i kremansko proroanstvo, Beograd, 1940; G. A. Kppers, Ro-salienfest und Trancetnze in Duboka. Zeitschrift fr Ethnologie, 79, Braunschweig, 1954, pp. 212 224; V. Jakovljevi,Preiveli oblici orgijastikog vida arhainih rusalskih obreda homoljske rusalije, padalice. Etnoloki pregled, br. 2,

Beograd, 1960, pp. 8 14; D. Bandi, amanistika komponenta rusaljskog rituala. Etnoloki pregled, br. 15, Beograd,1978, pp. 21 35.2 Two doctors who did a separate research of trance in Rusaljes from Duboka in the first half of the 20 th century examinedaround two hundred participants falling into trance during only one single cycle of feasts; See: Suboti, indicated piece;Dragi, indicated piece.3 Suboti, p. 78.4 Also see: I. M. Lewis, Spirit Possession and Deprivation Cults.Man, New Series, Vol. 1. No. 3, Sep., 1966, pp. 307-329;R. Gomm, Bargaining from Weakness: Spirit Possession on the South Kenya Coast.Man, New Series, Vol. 10, No. 4,Dec., 1975, pp. 530-543; D. N. Gellner, Priests, Healers, Mediums and Witches: The Context of Possession in theKathmandu Valley, Nepal. Man, New series, Vol. 29, No. 1, Mar., 1994, pp. 27-48.5 Also see: Lewis, op.cit.6 Also see: Lewis, op.cit.; Gellner, op.cit.7 See: D. Sinani, Opsednutost i egzorcizam u Srbiji, SGC, Beograd, 20078 About cultural evaluation of the possession phenomenon, see: I. M. Lewis,Ecstatic Religion An Anthropology Studies ofSpirit Possession and Shamanism, Routledge, London, 2003.9 Suboti, p. 89.

Bibliography:

Bandi, D., amanistika komponenta rusaljskog rituala.Etnoloki pregled, br. 15, Beograd, 1978, pp. 21 35.Dragi, M., Rusalje kao funkcionalna neuroza masa. Socijalno medicinski pregled, Knjiga 8, Sveska 4, Beograd, 1936,

pp. 201 206.Gellner, D. N., Priests, Healers, Mediums and Witches: The Context of Possession in the Kathmandu Valley, Nepal. Man,

New series, Vol. 29, No. 1, Mar., 1994, pp. 27-48.

Gomm, R., Bargaining from Weakness: Spirit Possession on the South Kenya Coast. Man, New Series, Vol. 10, No. 4,Dec., 1975, pp. 530-543.Jakovljevi, V., Preiveli oblici orgijastikog vida arhainih rusalskih obreda homoljske rusalije, padalice. Etnoloki

pregled, br. 2, Beograd, 1960, pp. 8 14. Kazimirovi, R., Tajanstvene pojave u naem narodu i kremansko proroanstvo.Beograd, 1940.Kppers, G. A., Rosalienfest und Trancetnze in Duboka. Zeitschrift fr Ethnologie, 79, Braunschweig, 1954, pp. 212 224.Lewis, I. M., Spirit Possession and Deprivation Cults.Man, New Series, Vol. 1. No. 3, Sep., 1966, pp. 307-329.Lewis, I. M.,Ecstatic Religion An Anthropology Studies of Spirit Possession and Shamanism. Routledge, London, 2003.Meduri, V., Kraljice.Prosvetni pregled, br 2 i 3, Novi Sad, 1925.Sinani, D., Opsednutost i egzorcizam u Srbiji. SGC, Beograd, 2007.Suboti, V.,Rusalje u Srbiji ili padalice u selu Dubokoju Zvidu. Tri predavanja. Kongres srpskih lekara i prirodnjaka u Beogradu, Beograd, 1905.

Danijel Sinani is Assistant Professor at the Department of Ethnology and Anthropology, Faculty of Philosophy, Universityof Belgrade. He is interested in topics such as: folk religion, demonology, magic, myth, ritual and new religions

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