ABSTRACT
The song “Forty Pilgrims and One” belongs to what are called “religious verses” (dukhovnye stikhi) in Russian (Selivanov 1995). These verses involve a variety of lyric and narrative genres devoted to religious themes, represent a mixture of written and oral features, and were created by several groups over a period of centuries. By the time they were first recorded in the beginning of the nineteenth century, they were performed mainly by wandering pilgrims (kaliki perekhozhie). They were often blind or handicapped, in many instances were organized into professional fraternities or guilds, roamed from holy place to holy place in Russia seeking alms, and performed their songs, especially on religious holidays, at churches, monasteries, and fairs. However, in medieval Rus from the eleventh to the fourteenth centuries, religious pilgrims comprised all classes, traveled to Tsargrad (Constantinople) or the Holy Land, as a rule formed groups that chose a leader for themselves (an ataman), and may have received special dispensations from the church (Liatskii 1912: iii—liv). During their journey, they accepted rules of conduct that subjected violators to severe punishment. Religious verses were derived in particular from the Bible, apocrypha, church writings, saints’ lives, and legends.
