Folk music and folklore

Vlad Tepes was King Matthias' prisoner for 12 years indeed. The reason for that is still unknown. It wasn't a close confinement, he had access to the royal court and the king even allowed him get married. There aren't records about who he married. Some say he married Szilágyi Jusztina, the king's niece. According to another source he married the king's sister, but he didn't have a sister, so that's impossible. All we know for certain is that his wife was a member of the royal family or a noble from the royal court.

[Ärväthyyll]

Speaking of Vlad, I was in our national gallery (in Ljubljana) on Saturday and saw this painting. It's from 1963, which makes it one of the oldest portraits of him, and he's depicted here in the role of Pontius Pilate.

Knives used to be very important things for us because according to our popular belief they scare away evil spirits and protect you from misfortune. And of course it was an essential tool for common people, especially for agricultural workers who spent their whole day outdoors and needed something for preparing their lunch and doing other tasks. We used to have many famous master knifemakers in the past, unfortunately nowadays we have only a few. They even stopped teaching knifemaking at schools in the 1970s, so if somebody wants to learn it, he'll have to find a master, which is not easy. Mass production killed our knifemakers.
The tradition of carrying a knife has also disappeared for now due to urbanization and industrialization. People spend their day indoors, they use tableware and nobody believes that knives scare away evil spirits. Having a penknife is important only for those who like being outdoors. Some knife related traditions are still alive though. It is still said that a man without a penknife is not a real man or a Hungarian man never leaves home without a penknife. A knife shouldn't be given as a gift because it means hostility. If somebody gets a knife as a gift, he has to pay for it. Not much, only a coin. And the most important thing: you should never lend your knife to anybody.
As for myself I've never owned a traditional Hungarian penknife, mostly because their blades are usually quite large, so carrying them isn't legal.

Some of our traditional penknives:


Traditional Hungarian penknife for eating bacon


Typical farmer's knife, it's pretty tough


This one is almost the same and it's very popular


Shepherd's penknife


Penknife with detachable fork for sophisticated peasants


A fisherman. On his watch-chain there's a so called halbicska (fish-penknife) instead of a watch.

Similar to Finland then; I still see people carrying knives sometimes. The shepherd's penknife looks really neat.

Similar to Finland then; I still see people carrying knives sometimes. The shepherd's penknife looks really neat.

Yeah, they walk about with their puukkos. Over here people don't carry their knives openly.
The whole thing with the sharp metal stuff is from Central Asia, so Finno-Ugric peoples have it in common. And even Mongols and Tibetans.

I actually attend a folk singing club every Thursday. I just got back from there actually and am currently shitfaced off Bass ^^ Only got to sing one song tonight because we had some guests on, as we do every last Thursday of the month. But it was still fun nonetheless. I'm currently in the process of writing my third song and planning on entering into the original songwriters competition at Saltburn Folk Festival next month.

Me too attended a singing club, but they fired me.
Good luck with the competition.

They fired you? Dare I ask what for?

It was the singing club of the elementary school I attended to and the teacher, who was our leader, was too rigorous. We didn't get on well to put it mildly. Maybe being that rigorous was not bad because we won lots of singing contests, but we never had fun.

Not much folklore in America, but I used to always carry a knife. I usually worked jobs involving some sort of labor or worked in kitchens where I had to open and break down boxes of foodstuffs on a regular basis, knives just made sense. I prefer having them on the street as well since it takes time for people to draw their guns and one can usually get a good slash or two before any of that.

I don't see many knives being carried here in Thailand, I guess because the people are very friendly and always smiling. It is very difficult, or you have to be a total ass, to get any hostility from anyone. Furthermore, there are so many vendors of street food with wicked looking butcher knives everywhere. I don't think it would be a good idea to piss off the Thai people in public. It is dangerous enough dodging all the fucking motorbikes on the street. I do see knives for sale in stores, but I trust/like my American brands too much and will probably order one through Amazon or something. I will have to check any local laws about blade length though.

Shame, I nearly forgot about this thread. My next mission is to research some Thai folklore and share with everyone. I shall begin tonight. Thanks to whoever resurrected this, and cheers.