folklore

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Oral traditions and culture of a people, expressed in legends, riddles, songs, tales, and proverbs.

The term was coined in 1846 by W J Thoms (1803–1885), but the founder of the systematic study of the subject was Jacob Grimm; see also oral literature.

The approach to folklore has varied greatly; the early alternative term ‘Popular Antiquities’ suggests that high value was originally placed on elements showing continuity with archaic traditions, giving knowledge of past events ignored by official or academic history, and providing evidence of legal and religious observances otherwise forgotten. The German scholar Max Müller (1823–1900) interpreted folklore as evidence of nature myths; James Frazer was the exponent of the comparative study of early and popular folklore as mutually explanatory; Laurence Gomme (1853–1916) adopted a historical analysis; and Bronislaw Malinowski and Alfred Radcliffe-Brown (1881–1955) examined the material as an integral element of a given living culture. Folklore overlaps with ethnography, cultural anthropology, and sociology, but their roots and theoretical concerns are not the same.

The national colours are taken from the Rusyn arms of 1848. Effective date: 28 January 1992. >>