Posts
A beautiful piece of writing by my friend Ian Whitwham, on mourning his late father-in-law. From The Guardian.
A heartfelt masterpiece.
For comparison, something from my own experience:
Up in the mountains of Epirus in June we witnessed a traditional Sarakatsani miroloi (dirge or lament for the dead). Another way of dealing with grief. It was a Saturday, the "Saturday of Souls" (Psychosavato) in the Greek Orthodox Church, the day before Pentecost, or Whit Sunday.
We were out for a walk through the woods, when we approached a village cemetery. We could hear a strange keening sound, which we soon understood was the dirge of a very old Sarakatsani widow wailing her tragic miroloi, for a departed relative, or relatives.This uninhibited and continuous outpouring of pangs of deep grief and pain, as the old lady was moving round the graves and arranging the roses, came in stark waves of ancient melody. Sometimes she seemed to be talking, addressing the departed souls directly.
It was just how one imagines the sound of an ancient Greek threnody, and for some it would have called to mind descriptions of the Trojan women wailing their sore lament over the body of Hector
The Sarakatsani do not use professional or specialist mourners or miroloi wailers. The women who have lost a relative make up and sing their own threnodies, dirges and laments. It is a dying art; very few Sarakatsani (only a few very old ladies) can sing miroloi nowadays, and it is only very rarely that one actually hears such a miroloi.
G.F.Abbott ("Macedonian Folklore", 1903) gives an example from Macedonia of a mother’s lament for her only son:
“My darling child, my grief for thee where shall I cast it?
If I cast it on the mountains, the little birds will pick it,
If I cast it into the sea, the little fishes will eat it,
If I cast it on the highway, the passers-by will trample it under foot.
Oh, let me cast it into my own heart which swells with many sorrows,
Let me sit down with my pain, lay me down with my pangs,
And, when I rest my head upon my pillow, pine for sleep!”
As this commentator from Crete notes, the word "mirologia" means "words of fate", laments which are "sad to the bone".
As this commentator from Crete notes, the word "mirologia" means "words of fate", laments which are "sad to the bone".
Epirot Miroloi with flute
Miroloi from UNESCO collection
Polyphonic, from Konitsa
Graveside Lament, Southern Albania
Katina Paxinou, From "Hecabe", Euripides.
I first came across a miroloy in Leigh Fermor's literal translation of the lament for the English airman in Mani 'He shone among thousands like the sun...The whole word ran with bandages and lint to heal the captain's woe and save his life. But the young man was dead. So they joined his hands and closed his eyes and now the whole wide world is weeping;...For it was for the honour of Greece that he came. What will his mother and sisters do without him... ' I find the sense that like the dozens and rap this is extemporised makes it especially moving which is why I think P LF transcribed Eleni's lament word for word without a translator's embellishment - which he could well have done. It could be mistaken doe a second for McGonagall with its lack of scansion but instead I cry when I read it. What it must have been like in Greek and sung!
ReplyDelete