A Russian Carnival - Maslenitsa

Maslenitsa is one of the oldest Slavic holidays which came from paganism. The church included it into the list of its traditional celebrations. Maslenitsa is one week before the Great Fast.

Maslenitsa (it sounds like ‘butter carnival’ in Russian) got this name because people are banned from eating meat because of the Great Fast, but they are allowed to eat milk products or something like this.

It is the most fun, tastiest and most satisfying holiday in Russia. It lasts for a week. Everyone cooks something like pancakes (or crepes in France, or ‘blini’ in Russia). Young children (aged 5-7) like to ride on a horse these days, eat some milk products (blini,oladyi or something) during this week.

At the end of this ‘Maslenitsa’ week people gather somewhere to burn scarecrows which symbolise winter. It means that crowd just want to kick away the cold winter and bring (or call) spring to Russia.

So, that’s the oldest holiday in our country in which everyone takes part including people who are not religious. There are a great number of different stories and legends about Maslenitsa. If you want to get some extra information you can use the Internet!