A traditional practice involves braided willow branches and plum brandy
Easter in Europe has always been tied up with spring rituals related to fertility and birth. Bunnies are among the most prolific animals, and eggs of course hatch into new life.
The Czech Republic has an odd and now controversial tradition with roots lost in time. But people who grew up with it don’t consider it strange.
The practice is symbolically whipping women on the backside on Easter Monday, which is called Červené pondělí, meaning Red Monday. Easter Monday has long been a national holiday, while Good Friday only became a holiday in 2016. Easter itself is called Velikonoce.
Women have several ways of opting out, depending on the specifics of where they live, so consent is now an important part of the tradition.
The whip is called a pomlázka, from the word “pomladit” meaning to make younger.
It is most common in Moravia, the eastern part of the Czech Republic, and in more rural areas. In cities in Bohemia, the western part, the braided whip mostly serves as a decoration. They are common items at pop-up Easter markets in Prague and other cities.
“I don’t mind. It is for health. It is to ensure you have a healthy baby,” Nikola, a young woman who grew up near the Moravian city of Olomouc, said.
Maybe in very small villages, women might put on a traditional embroidered dress, called a kroje, but Nikola said she has never actually seen one worn on Easter Monday.
Women stay home with chocolates, decorated eggs and homemade plum brandy, or slivovice, to give to the visiting men.
Traditionally, the boys should sing or recite a nursery-rhyme type verse relating to eggs and spring themes like bountifulness and fertility. The verses vary seemingly from town to town. All the ones Nikola found on the internet as examples didn’t have the words “exactly right” while others were “just plain wrong.”
After the man sings the verse, the young woman turns around and the man takes a few whacks at her backside with the whip. “You just turn around and stand like normal. Sometimes it hurts. Usually not. A few boys hit really hard because they are into it, and it is the one day a year they can hit a girl,” Nikola said.
After the whipping, the woman gives the man a chocolate or a decorated Easter egg. Older men, who visit their friends and whip their friends’ wives, will also get a shot of slivovice.
The eggs can be quite elaborate. Nikola’s family would color them naturally with juice from red cabbage and scratch designs on them with a sewing needle. People often now use commercial dyes or even stickers. “Natural colors are more traditional,” Nikola said. “My grandmother would decorate the eggs for us. She worked in a factory painting flowers on glasses, and she was good at it.” The decorated eggs are called Velikonoční kraslice.
People can start to visit as early as 8 am, and it should be over by 1 pm. “Five in the afternoon is too late. It’s done. It is for the morning,” Nikola said.
But young women don’t brag to each other about the number of visitors to show off their popularity. “Nobody does this,” Nikola said.
In some parts of Moravia, women can throw water on men to prevent being whipped. “I don’t know the rules for this, though. It is a different part of Moravia. We didn’t do that in my town,” she said.
In other areas, giving a chocolate or shot of slivovice at the door can be a polite way of refusing entry to the man, thus preventing the whipping.
In some places, women can whip men on leap years.
Many areas, women and girls who don’t want to participate simply stay home on Easter Monday morning and turn away all unwanted visitors.
Another tradition is less controversial, but serves the same purpose of chasing away the last vestiges of winter.
The rattling then extends into White Saturday, or Bílá sobota, when those with the rattles, primarily boys, are finally offered a few coins to make them stop.
This is usually for little boys who are too young to participate in the whipping ritual.
And while chocolate Easter bunnies and marshmallow chicks have made big inroads into popular culture, the traditional Easter treat is a frosted cake in the shape of a sitting lamb, made from a special baking mold used only once a year. The frosting can be a sugar glaze or chocolate.
An article by Baba Studio with Raymond Johnston. Copyright Baba Studio, all rights reserved. Please contact us if you would like to syndicate or otherwise use this article.