Background: A.J. is a 65-year-old woman who was born and raised in Poprad, Slovakia. She relocated to the United States from Slovakia 20 years ago, while her son was attending University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. A.J. holds a degree in child development and since coming to the United States has worked as a nanny. She is married to her lifelong sweetheart and has one son and three grandchildren. She often talks about her home and family in Slovakia – about the beautiful mountains and the culture. Although she is now a US citizen, she incorporates many Slovak traditions into everyday life, and enjoys telling stories about her family and her family traditions.
Main piece:
A.J.: So with the cows, owner were protecting about which all your animals like cow they make hole to the horn and put inside rosary – protect them because witch was scary from “saint” stuff and they have like blessing water – they always take some branches – nice young branches from tree and they like make cross with this sand water in the stable – protect this stable from witch. And when sometimes happen like a animal’s broke horn and they lost this rosary when they no more protect. Yeah. And this happen in my Dad family, they animal broke leg cause they were on the field and more cows together and they start fighting and they broke the horn off that had the rosary in it and until they come home they broke leg and this cow die on the field. This was like true story what Dad told me. He was very sad but they said this was like witches in the religion. The witches broke the horn which was this protection – the rosary. They were out and no more this cow was protect they when she was walking then on the way she broke leg and they cannot fix this time and she died.
Q: So when do witches come?
A.J.: All the time they were. Witches come all the time.
Q: Could you see the witches?
A.J.: They think this was like one lady but they were not sure but once this was happen they saw in stable frog and Grandpa take this pitch fork and he was stick this frog and this frog was like make sound like a hurt people – when you hurt somebody they was making sound and was hopping away and next day or couple days later he saw one lady she was hurt – she was like some wound from this – like it was from the pitch fork – she was the frog and they said this is the witch
Q: How can you tell who’s a witch?
A.J.: You cannot tell but always something happened when this lady was around.
Q: Just one lady in your village?
A.J.: Not my village, my Dad village.
Q: There was only one?
A.J. They know about this only one lady but maybe is more.
Q: Do you know what she looked like?
A.J.: She was a regular lady but she had power what she can make bad stuff.
Q: And how did you know that she was the witch? Did she go up to people and say something like “I’m going to curse you” or something like that?
A.J.: No, no, no, no when she was walking around, there always something bad happened to you. But she was just choosing people. Not all people make something bad but some, some people what she doesn’t like maybe.
Q: Is there a way to get rid of the witches’ curses?
A.J.: People usually with the “saint” stuff protect their self – like blessing water, praying, um carrying rosary with you, just maybe like that.
Performance Context: A rosary would typically be put into an ox’s horn in rural farms of Slovakia to protect the ox from being hurt by the witch’s magic.
My Thoughts: I think it is interesting how a rosary, a strong symbol of Christianity, would protect against the evil magic of witches, who are typically known to be part of a pagan religion. Christianity and Roman Catholicism is the most prominent religion in Slovakia. It is possible that the rosary’s ability to protect the oxen symbolizes the importance of Christianity in Slovakian culture, and the idea that Christianity is able to protect against all evil of the world, including witches’ magic.