SEMANTICS OF SPRUCE IN LATVIAN FOLK SONGSIN THE CONTEXT OF MARRIAGE

Abstract

The rite of passage phenomenon is reducible to every culture and society in the world, as every individual and community experiences a change in their social status during their lifetime. In Latvian folklore, characters of nature, especially trees, participate in rites of passage. Article Semantics of spruce in Latvian folk songs in the context of marriage is an interdisciplinary study, which uses theories and approaches from folkloristics and anthropology. It focuses on the marriage ritual, one of the rites of passage. The task of this thesis is to research the semantic meaning of the spruce tree as a character of nature in Latvian folk songs in the context of marriage. Although there is research on the semantics of spruce tree in Latvian folklore, in folk songs (Pēteris Šmits (1869–1938) Latviešu mītoloģija (1926), Beatrise Reidzāne Latviešu tautasdziesmu semantika. Dabas tēli tautasdziesmās (2015), Janīna Kursīte Dainu kodekss (2018), etc.), the semantics of the spruce tree in context of rites of marriage and their conduct has not been particularly studied.
It is concluded that the semantic quality of spruce tree in Latvian folk songs in the context of rites of passage, especially marriage, can be treated as a metaform for human life. This means that both linguistically and conceptually, the spruce tree in Latvian folklore has anthropomorphic qualities that strengthen the relationship between human and nature, as well as the idea that human is part of nature.