Bohach: The Belarusian Harvest Feast of the Rye Basket and the Candle

Bohach (Багач) is the Belarusian harvest feast, named from bohaty, "rich". Where Adam Bahdanovich saw it, it fell on the Nativity of the Mother of God: 8 September in the old Julian calendar, 21 September today. At its centre was a bast basket of rye with a wax candle. It was carried from house to house, then kept for a whole year under the icons.

Bahdanovich believed his account was the first description of Bohach in print. It is in Grunwald's English edition of Remnants of the Ancient Worldview among Belarusians, the book's first English translation. He counted Bohach among the old festivals of the sun, the autumn partner of the midsummer fires described in our article on Kupala Night.

When is Bohach?

Bohach belongs to the Nativity of the Mother of God, which the Julian (Old Style) calendar of Bahdanovich's day put on 8 September. That calendar now runs 13 days behind ours, so the Orthodox feast falls on 21 September. The next is Tuesday 21 September 2027.

In Ihumen district, Bahdanovich writes, the feast was simply called bohach, and its church name was "almost unknown to the people". Elsewhere in Belarus it was the Lesser Most Pure, Malaya Prachistaya, to set it apart from the Dormition. He saw Bohach in many villages of Ihumen district, mainly in Paharelaye volost, and notes that it was also kept in Vaukavysk district, Hrodna province.

The date could move. Bohach was kept on other feasts near the autumn equinox too. If a village church or chapel was dedicated to a saint whose feast fell at that time, the Bohach celebration moved to that day.

What does "bohach" mean?

The word comes from bohaty, rich. The season explains the name:

For the farmer this is the happiest time of the year, a time of relative plenty, when even the poor man has bread on the table, while at the rich men’s “the ricks sit broad like princes, their heads held high.”

Bahdanovich points out a difference from Russian, where the same word means a rich man. A Belarusian would say bohatyr or bohaty for that. In Belarusian, bohach named only the feast and the basket of grain with its candle, though the basket was not called bohach everywhere. Another name for it was bohattse, wealth: the same word villagers used for the hearth fire on days when no one would lend it.

How was Bohach kept?

The bohach itself was a lubka, a bast basket, filled with rye, with a wax candle set in it. For a year it stood in the corner of honour under the icons, in the house of whichever householder's turn it was. On the feast day it went round the whole village:

1. The candle is lit, and a priest sings a prayer service, first in the house where the bohach stands.
2. The householder, walking behind the priest, carries the bohach to the next homestead.
3. Its owners come out to meet them. In the yard they have set a table with a white cloth and baskets of rye, wheat, barley or other grain.
4. The bohach is placed on the table among the grain, and a short prayer service is sung.
5. Everyone is invited inside for refreshments, and the bohach is set in the corner of honour.

So it went from house to house. The grain that greeted the bohach went to the parish clergy. Meanwhile all the livestock had been driven to the far end of the village. When every homestead had been visited, the bohach was carried round the herd. Then it went to the house of the householder whose turn came next, and stayed there for a year.

People believe it brings wealth and happiness to the house.

Where did the Bohach rye come from?

Villages did this in two ways. In some, the rye and wax were collected from the whole village. They were replaced only when the bohach had been round every house, or when the candle had burned down. In others, the householder whose turn it was renewed the rye and the candle every year.

He threshed the new rye from the first sheaf of the harvest, the zazhinochny sheaf. That sheaf, like the wreath made at the end of the harvest, was honoured all over Belarus. Every householder brought it home and stood it in the corner of honour, even where Bohach was not kept at all. The old Bohach rye was then mixed with ordinary rye and sown as seed.

Making the candle was a feast of its own, with a shared supper for everyone taking part. They sang special songs much like those of dozhinki, the festival at the end of the harvest.

Was Bohach a feast of the sun?

Bahdanovich thought so. He saw in the bohach a trace of a pre-Christian farming god, a form of Dazhbog, the sun god and god of plenty. The Primary Chronicle lists Dazhbog among Prince Vladimir's gods. The grain stands for prosperity, the candle for light. Together, he asks, are they not an ancient image of the sun as the patron of farming?

The date pointed the same way. Bohach falls close to the autumn equinox, and Bahdanovich found that it completed a cycle:

If Kaliady was dedicated to the winter sun, Maslenitsa and velikodni to the spring sun and Kupalle to the summer sun, then the lack of a festival for the autumn sun would be incomprehensible

He also noted what all these sun festivals share. They are kept "all together, as one company", in a crowd, unlike Dziady, which each family keeps on its own. Bohach fits: the whole village walks with the basket.

The harvest in Nobleman Zavalnia

Jan Barszczewski's Nobleman Zavalnia is told in the winter of 1816–17, so its harvest is remembered or hoped for, never gathered. In the werewolf's tale, the narrator remembers an August when the rye stood golden:

She was reaping grain in her field. Beside her, a small boy lay asleep on the sheaves.

At the Christmas Eve supper, guests draw straws from under the tablecloth and search the hay for grains of rye, wheat or other cereals: to find one is a sign of a bountiful harvest. On New Year's Eve a neighbour, Latyshevich, reads the snow for the summer's crops. The werewolf's own story is told in our article on the werewolf of Zavalnia.

What did Belarusians eat at harvest time?

The Belarusian Cookbook puts grain at the centre. Rye grew more reliably than wheat in the cold, wet climate, which made sour rye bread a staple. Kasha, the cookbook says, symbolised abundance, fertility and growth, and was the main dish at autumn harvest celebrations. Autumn was also the season for homemade sauerkraut, which many households still make, often alongside pickled tomatoes and cucumbers.

For the Bohach table itself the sources give no menu. Bahdanovich records only refreshments in each house and a shared supper for the candle-making. A loaf of rye bread and a pot of kasha would be true to both books.