The gusle is a popular tool cordofono monochord, on which is stretched a rope from thirty horsehair. Gusle comes to life in the Balkans, in the Dinaric Alps, and its distribution extends into the Pannonian Plain and the places populated by Slavs, especially in areas inhabited by Serbs.
's picture a map drawn by the British, has Serbia in its period of greatest expansion at the time of Nemanidi around 1350 (*) and clearly shows the areas where the spread was gusle: Serbia, Croatia, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Russia.
tool, usually maple (**), consists of a finely carved handle and a sound box covered with animal skin . The sound of the instrument is produced by the friction of a bow on the string, made from horsehair, too. The sound of gusle accompanying folk songs. Looking
gusle del'artigianato under the artistic point of view - popular, it can be noticed that the instrument is an expression ornate, rich and generous of the creative imagination of the people. The imagination and the art of carving are expressed consistently in a variety of symbols: the dragon symbolic eagle, from historical and legendary heroes of the period up to the magnificent temples Nemanidi (***). The love that accompanies the construction of the instrument makes this, vibes even before being touched.
"the gusle is impossible to give a solo instrument as it consists of a single rope. Wealth its tone is to be found in the accompaniment to the drama that expresses the human voice; gusle arouses more emotion in his people than any other musical instrument, because it is closer to man and is intertwined with the tone of each interpreter , Zivot Pavlović says recalling the harsh winters in Serbia, after listening to the voice and the sound of the instrument of his paternal uncle.
The extraordinary originality of the instrument is its amazing ability to reach agreement with the human voice and the color of each oral reciter: the harmonious fusion sound in fact, offers a sound effect from the warm, colorful and alive, their of the human voice, accompanied by a primitive instrument, very dear to the poet. For a foreigner, the gusle, given the monotonous sound of his moaning, apparently a primitive instrument, however, for the Slav people, the gusle assumes a sacred value.
introduction of each song, the record stands up with large modulations in a woven melodic arabesque which reveal the interpretative skills of the poet-versifier (or guslar). After the introduction, the main reason the song is more dynamic and narrative, so that the poet's voice and the sound of gusle flow in a single color tone voice. The versifier turns to his instrument as the poet to his muse; it finds strength and inspiration. The rhythm of each song, sometimes accelerated further slowed down, depends solely on the talent of the narrative rhymer, he makes meaningful interpretation of the specific reasons in the epic and lyric poetry. Each verse is
decasyllabic enriched riffs and breaks, the latter especially, are not influenced musically, but are dictated by the necessity of versifier of the time needed to create new lines.
popular songs Illyrian (as defined by Nicholas Tommaseo) are divided into:
Canto opera;
Canto opera epic;
Canto epic.
lyrical folk songs are the oldest form of popular opera through which man began to express thoughts, beliefs, enthusiasms. It is likely that the popular song lyric in the beginning was associated with magic cults, rituals and deities related to the work process in the fields, the phenomena and natural elements from which man felt threatened and in which he saw supernatural powers. Through the sacrifice, the human being organized large parties and dances performed, collective rituals and chants that in time would become the melodies and rhythmic language of popular songs.
In opera-popular melodies are extremely important because the song itself is enclosed in the message containing the feelings and moods, love and pain, the joys and sorrows: everything that man holds within him and expressed to others. The lyrics accompanied only sing and dance the part of the rite. Their structure was short verses or octosyllabic decasyllabic with a pause or caesura after the fourth syllable and rhyme mandatory. The songs were sincere, full of images and patterns focusing on relations between individuals and everything to do with the social life of man. Based on the content they were divided into:
Canto mythological : are the oldest as they appear in the distant pagan times. They are enclosed in the ancestral beliefs about supernatural beings such as fairies, the cosmology of ancient man, ie his beliefs about the sun, moon, stars.
Canto ritual : also of ancient origin. Inside lie the remains of a "primordial slave communication" that reveals the common worship activities of the same people, the human interest to the agricultural sector and its consequent fear of floods, drought and natural disasters.
Canto usual : have similarities with However, the ritual songs and the latter are motivated by strong feelings, the songs belong to the usual group of songs that accompany the various sacred so they are in turn divided into: holidays, of wishes, wedding and plaintive.
Canto family : focus on family relationships, particularly love poetry of mothers for their children expressed through lullabies, even though the most common theme among this group of songs is that of 'sisters' love for their brothers.
· The love songs : are rich grounds surrounded by a language full of feelings. In the oldest love songs, nature occupies the most important place in such a way that everything takes place exclusively within the power-generating, life itself. Stressing the physical beauty, the desire of the lovers, their suffering, their dreams, challenges, ingenuity. Love is discreet and hidden, often not counted, is reduced to mere nostalgia but retains the tenacity that makes him stronger than death itself.
" The girl and the fish "
sat on the sea beach
A girl who was saying to himself:
Good God! Wider area of \u200b\u200bthe sea can
the apple never find?
In the whole wide nature
What hath wider than the plain?
What more of a fast charger
finding may perhaps human thought?
What hath the sweetest thing of honey?
What hath more expensive than my brother? A fish out of the waves
Raising his head, replied: O
little girl, far more than the sea
Vast Empire, you can catch;
And on the face of nature
larger the sea of \u200b\u200bthe plain, And find
may lay the human thought
Quick look over the steed;
A kiss is more well-sweet honey,
Dear brother of the lover more.
(from the translation of Ferdinand de Pellegrini)
Canto at work : focus on daily work and its processes. The shift of interest from one activity to another, leading the people to create songs with new reasons: hunting, harvesting, grazing and farming chores which accentuate feelings of joy, excitement and competition. The songs are the most common workplace in the form of dialogue, in which two voices are heard. Many times, the themes of these songs, are also found in love songs, because express affection for the work as a source of healthy living, therefore, the optimistic view of the perennial human existence.
The songs are lyric-epic on the border between the lyric and epic songs. They awaken full of suggestions of joy or sadness, accentuating the emotional moment through the epic description of the character. They are divided into romances and ballads:
· Romance: songs are poems that are considered, the action is not developed, why it is much closer to opera. Usually, their content is loving and dominates the mood of the characters that ranges from melancholy to joy.
· Dance : for their structure are placed between the epic songs. Most of the ballads, epic describing the circumstances related to a totally feminine. The focus of the song is usually the family idyll interrupted by a tragic event, which is why some feel the ballad as a tragic opera in which it is included at times, supernatural beings, belief in fate, curses and evil.
The epic songs are heroic and masculine. The epic comes in a distant time of war, fights and battles in which individuals are distinguished for their brave deeds, their courage, their prowess, their sense of honesty and morality. The warriors strong and brave become worthy of admiration, their names are bound to become legends for inspiration to compose new songs, odes, poems and essays.
While in the popular song lyric dominate the feelings, epic songs popular attention moves on 'event, the action, the characters and the external circumstances. In the epic songs turn out to be true heroes, fearless fighters in the name of freedom and universal justice, are the idealized expression of a people who deposited them in deep beliefs and feelings. "Poetry is the golden bowl in which, with tears distilled, serbasi human hope" (Nicholas Tommaseo). The epic
Serbs, from its appearance to date was a unique and rebellious cry against violence and slavery. It is a symbol of resistance to the oppressor, comfort for all the injustice, the desire for a better tomorrow.
The popular epic songs tell the story happened in the second half of the 100 AD in the area of \u200b\u200bthe Dinaric Alps that extend, give way to the Pannonian plains and the Kosovars.
Pursuing the logic of succession in time, we have:
° Ciclo precossovaro : covers the period of the royal dynasty of Nemanić (sometimes in Italianized Nemanidi), and the flourishing development of the feudal state and art, marked by Christianity.
° Ciclo Kosovars : its themes historical events in 1389 during the Battle of Kosovo. The songs cosovari focus on the myth of Serbian Milos Obilic courage expressed by the hero (which has some similarities with Homer's Achilles) and the myth of betrayal at the center is placed, Vuk Branković, guilty of the Serbian defeat, and as such, the symbol I Think.
"La fanciulla del Kosovo"
He got a girl in Kosovo,
stood up to time of day Sunday,
Sunday, the first light of sun;
picked up the white sleeves, picked up the white
The elbows:
on his shoulder bears white bread, two glasses
In the hands of gold
In a fresc'acqua,
In the other ruby \u200b\u200bwine
She goes on Kosovo plan,
and down the field the young woman,
dell'inclito the field count, then addressed
blood warriors.
warrior What she finds in life, with fresc'acqua
Laval,
Comfort with red wine, white bread
and refreshments.
(...)
When she heard the words,
Versa white tears from her face.
She goes to the white house
alleged by his white chest
Ah, wretched! my bad luck! If
, miserable, in a green pine m'apprendo,
It, too, as it is green, dried. (****)
Kosovka devojka Uros Predic
The girl singing on the history of the Cosovo (Kosovka Devojka in the original language Serbian) narrated by guslar-versifiers, has been an inspiration to artists who expressed themselves in various art forms. The virgin girl wanders in search of three warriors, not blood brothers but of affection. While patrolling the area to help the wounded because of the defeat " true love," says Tommaseo, " embraces all things worthy." The poor girl, informed by a dying the death of three brothers, no longer searching, he returns home. The description of the battlefield and the previous blessing of all the warriors of thirty monks, offers a glimpse of that great epic "I do not know which dialect Homeric say so much "the same ADJUDGED Nicholas Tommaseo.
° Ciclo about Marko Kraljevic : tells the inability of people to free from captivity and find the way to freedom. Thus arises the figure of a fighter whose strength is unmatched: Marko Kraljevic. He, despite being a historical figure, was idealized by the popular imagination and made invincible. Marko Kraljevic is everything he aspires to a people imprisoned. Nell'epos however, the hero is not exempt from flaws and human frailties, has in fact, daily trends disobedience, is a brawler, eats and drinks a lot. Nevertheless, its strength is in correlation with the whole. There are many songs in which he is the protagonist and hero when his strength is not only physical, but also epic, is hyperbolic.
(...)
Mark's son, single mother,
not you be my fatal wound
not want to son, to speak against wrong
Neither the father nor against uncles:
But according to the righteousness of the true God.
not want to, son, losing the soul: Better
miss thee the head,
That stain your soul.
(...)
° Ciclo postcossovaro : for those government uprisings against the Turks, after the victorious battle in Kosovo, put at the head of the Serbian people.
° Ciclo on brigandage: encompasses the period between the seventeenth and nineteenth. Heroes-giants are the stars that for some traits, embody some elements of the figure of Marko Kraljevic since, taking the side of the weak, fighting for the freedom of the people.
° Ciclo resurrection: includes the narratives of the wars of liberation from Turkish. If in the songs of ancient times the narration focused the force of his heroes, now the debate moves to the liberating spirit of unanimity and collective rebellion of the masses. The songs of this cycle does not have as a reference to the legend, but also refer to a genuine historical events. Some poets participating in the events, like the blind versifier Filip Visnjic that moved with the rebels and Serbs living in the camps along the river Drina.
During the period of expansion of the Ottoman Empire in the Balkans, to all Christians who converted to Islam were offered benefits and privileges, so it was that many Christian Serbs (especially in Bosnia) also became transmuted into the Muslim religion, the their uses and customs, including also the gusle. Through the Slavic folk instrument, the Serbs for decades Islamized sang the deeds of heroes until the Muslim tradition, unable to survive in a context different from that of natural dissolved.
Today, gusle continues to be nourished and live at his place of origin. The map shows the spread of gusle in Serbia, Croatia (Dalmatian hinterland), in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Macedonia, Bulgaria and along the River Don between Russia and Ukraine.
must noted that the constituency of the presence of gusle only in some exclusive areas, does not erase the identity of the Slavic people since the gusle, previously, has helped in the formation of an identity now imprinted in their roots. Nicholas
Tommaseo is a key hub on the reflection on the Slavic people that coagulates around a musical instrument and its popular songs. Born in Dalmatia, Tommaseo, during his youth, culturally and spiritually enriched, reaching the recognition of the slave mother and therefore a part of himself. Tommaseo was not saved, even though, in a moment of euphoria, declared himself such. The Slavic people and its traditions, however, became the center of his interests, expressed in the publication of Italian folk songs Illyrian, largely drawn from previous work of the Serb Vuk Stefanovic Karadzic was in contact with which Tommaseo. Serbia had a strong attraction on the writer who not only came to idealize it, but in his writings, he addressed what he called "sisters Serbia" (Croatia, Bosnia, Dalmatia, Montenegro) urging them to approach the cultural and policy of this splendid land located between East and West. It should be noted however, that there is no Tommaseo Orientalism: its not Serbia the Near East, but is a place familiar to him, a European country not less Dalmatian Mediterranean, Tuscany, Corsica, Greece, namely combinations of its Mediterranean. In the eyes of Nicholas Tommaseo Serbia, land of thriving poetry, the place was a genuine, uncorrupted, poised between the medieval and the contemporary, the generator of a heroic people.
The land where he lived and who has dedicated all his creativity is the expression of a classical world remained intact and a people humble but not submissive. Also in Tommaseo also, as in the Serbian culture, marks the link between history and identity. Serbia is coming back in the songs, is a country stretching to the south-east towards the South, located between the realms of Latin, Turkish and Arabic: the Serbian heroes, dealing with other peoples, they accentuate their identity.
Tommaseo writes clearly that Serbia was the model of common national identity Illyrian he speaks of the kingdom of Serbia, the Serbian lands, though in such expressions, includes numerous places including Bosnia, Herzegovina, Dalmatia. The language spoken, sung and written, from Dalmatia with Serbia, was the one who made the Slavic people singing unison. And even the Poles were Slavs and Russians.
The Serbian folk songs are intended as a common cultural heritage Illyrian. This fact serves to link the single individuals located between the regional and national, that is Serbs, Dalmatians, Bosnians, the Montenegrins. The illlirismo then, for Tommaseo, was a model of the Illyrian identity composed of multiple identities, including even the Italian Dalmatia. In the work "Iskrice" Italian version "Sparks", he reflects on the Illyrian language and the concept of Slavic nation, saying: "language is the human spirit, the spirit of nations. Where confusing language, yet the souls are confused when two dominant languages, not universal life. This duality shows two nations, somewhere foreign to one another show or a new war or old, obvious or latent. And where no units lacks strength. ". It is the language, therefore, one of the elements of unity, but not all.
The commonality of songs also an expression of one people, is in the common worship of Marko Kraljevic spread from the Dalmatian coast to the Pannonian Plain, in eastern Serbia, Bulgaria, Macedonia. Marko Kraljevic is the son of one of the kings of Macedonia is a historical figure, however weak its representation is far from reality as it is an expression of the desire to be of Slavic people. He embodies the strengths and weaknesses of the people, intemperate in eating and drinking, has an mixture of the wild and the gentle, frank, proud, religious belief in God and family, is brave and chaste.
gusle And today?
There is no doubt that the folk songs accompanied by traditional gusle hold a value worthy of attention and fundamental in the construction of European civilization.
Like yesterday, today the gusle, especially in rural areas, is limited to the family. Modernity, however, has meant that more in the tradition irrompesse in mass society and become, riattualizzatata as a common heritage, part of the events of the evening and the festivities of the city. There are also schools where the use of the instrument is improved since often, learn to play within the home by the elders of the family or neighbors. What's guslar-versifier, not a job, and he plays without a commercial purpose, only for the sake of tradition. The elite of intellectuals
ongoing relationship with the oral tradition that is popular with the result of creativity, even gusle fact, is the subject of interesting research and insights into the world.
In 1934 a Harvard professor named Milman Parry, using the phonograph, technological marvel of the '30s, recorded in the Balkans, 13,000 different performances of the various performance guslar.
In fact, Professor Parry's goal was to focus his research orality of the Homeric poems. Before 1934, the two famous poems of Homer, the Iliad and Odyssey, were studied only in writing. The studies of Professor Parry has allowed the approach of civilization to the possibility of hearing the air of ancient times and to a deeper understanding of the songs.
Harvard professor Homer could not record live so after a long search, found between the Dinaric Alps of the Balkans, just the same, and this enabled his successor, Albert Lord, to make another comparison and bring Homer to his more complete revival.
In "The Cambridge Companion to Homer" Robert Fowler writes: " There is no doubt that the studies of Professor Milman Parry of observation guslar - versifiers South Slavs, have enabled us to reconstruct the nature of the traditional poetic performance period Homer . From this it follows that: • There
difference between oral and written literary culture: the poetry narrated preserves the particularity of being closer to the art theater since the text is not fixed, so every performance is different though made by the same guslar - versifier;
· The custom of repeating ways is typical of the narrator, his unique, authentic artistic expression
· The literature told is unusual because it conforms to the tradition, it changes and is made according to actual historical events and the public.
So this is all that we have unconsciously provided guslar - versifiers symbolize for us the bridge to Homer, that is, the way to the knowledge of ancient civilizations.
NOTE:
(*) Under the dynasty of the Serbian empire Nemanidi reaches its maximum: the emperor Stefan, nicknamed Dusch (from Serbian "duscan" ie "Soul") for the pious alms which he did, he married the daughter of the Prince of Bulgaria. In 1340 he conquered Macedonia (former Yugoslav territory inhabited by people), Thessaly, and most of Albania. His vast empire looked on three seas: the Adriatic, the Ionian and the Aegean.
(**) It is no coincidence that the instrument is made of maple wood. The maple is in fact the symbol of Serbian religion before Christianity.
(***) Nemanidi I am the founder of the royal family of the Serbian state in 1100. One of the members of the royal dynasty is St. Sava, one of the most popular saints in the Orthodox world.
(****) Date the great importance of the girl singing on Kosovo, this deserves to be reproduced here in full:
Uroš Predic, guslar (1882). Folk Museum in Belgrade 
Kosovka devojka Uros Predic 
