Bells

The "Bells”Of Carnival in Skyros, perhaps the most interesting event of the Aegean archipelago islands, appear in other parts of Greece, especially in pastoral places Thessaly, Macedonia ("babogeroi", "logkatsaria"), but also in Chios and Naxos.

One of the rare carnival customs that has aroused the interest of JC Lawson since the first decade of the 20th century, from the British School of Athens, who considered the custom a "Bacchic or other religious orgy" or Richard Dawkins who gives as a "folk explanation" phenomenon, the delivery of the damaged insane shepherd who loaded the bells of his lost sheep. According to M. Faltaits, the events may be the echoes of the conflicts between the cattle breeders and the farmers who, after prevailing, were the first to impose their totem, the goat.

The "bells"Consist of a trio of disguises consisting of"old man“, The“corella" and the "franc”. The "old man" is the protagonist of this trinity and represents an old shepherd belted with bells. From the middle and bottom she wears a white woolen sheepskin shorts, white woven socks without soles ("trochandock socks") and leather sandals ("trochads“). On the upper part of the body, up to the waist, he wears the black sheepskin cape. On the back it provides rags or a pillow to form hump.

He hides his face with a mask ("mtsuna") of newborn goat sheepskin with two holes for the eyes. In the middle there are about fifty shepherd bells that are fastened from the shoulders and in the hand he holds the shepherd's crooked rod.

THE "old manHe proceeds with rhythmic steps, shaking his waist, so that the bells that are passed through it, give awesome sounds, but rhythmic and alternating. From time to time he stands and "shakes", and then the shaking of his body is different, as are the sounds of the bells.

"Old man" does not become anyone, because he must have a natural rum to be able to wear the weight of the uniform that exceeds 50 kg, to know the technique of steps and jumps as well as the correct movement of the waist and of the hips because from there the bells are commanded and the rhythm of the music of the bells is formed.

The cutest of the bells are the new generations, children 7-13 years old to walk in the costumes of the "old man" and try to compete with demands of the elders, but also little ones a stalia, to imitate and run - without of course the heavy dependence - behind the protagonists.