Про “Babushka”

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Статья на английском. От rina-grant

Nativity stories like the three wise men tales don’t belong in Russian oral lore. Unlike Catholicism which indeed created quite a few beautiful legends based on the Nativity story, Russian Christians never used Nativity as folk tale material. For Christianity-based Russian folk tales, the most common plot lines are those based on lives of saints, when various miraculous events typical of hagiography are woven into a folk tale’s plot.

Also, by the mid-19th century, wide folklore research studies in Russia had recorded more or less every version of every folk tale known to the Russians. In 1855, leading folklorist Alexander Afanasiev published his eight-volume collection of 600 Russian folk and fairy tales (Brothers Grimm’s complete collection contained only 211 stories). While A. Afanasiev’s collection boasts dozens of popular tales Russian kids still love and know by heart, the story of Babushka is just not in it.