The “underside” of the bark, which covers the young, active, lighter and less durable layers of the tree trunk, its branches and roots, is called the bast.
A bast is a bast of deciduous trees such as linden, elm, willow.
Rough cloth for household needs, coolies, bags, outer work clothes are made from bast. Its name - matting - comes from cattail, a plant that was used to make bast.
From it, in former times, Russian villagers and low-income townspeople made bast shoes.
My bast shoes, bast bast shoes!
100 years ago, it was the most common shoes in our country. The bast also went to obnory - twisted shoelaces for tying bast shoes to the foot.
Bast shoes were cheap and short-lived. Worn out almost everyone could replace with new ones, having made them independently and very quickly.
Bast shoes were not exclusively Russian fashion. In the “braids”, others also flaunted from the bark:
- East Slavs,
- Western Slavs
- Finno-Ugric peoples
- Balts
- Swedes.
Many centuries ago, the Russian princes who defeated the Lithuanians even took tribute, including a bast. What the oak gave went to chain mail. They equipped the Russian army.
In addition, they made of bast:
- tables and chairs;
- box and tues;
- baskets and coolies.
About that line who does not knit a bast
And since this part of the tree played such an important role in the life of our ancestors, they left as a legacy to us a number of stable expressions in which the bast is mentioned. The meaning and interpretation of some of them is ^
- Every bite in a row. - A line was called a strip of bast when weaving bast shoes. And initially the expression sounded like this: not every bite in a string. This meant that not every strip of bark is suitable for weaving quality shoes. Currently, this idiomatic turn is used when even a small mistake, any minor oversight is blamed.
- Lyka does not knit. - Most people knew the art of weaving (or at least “lying” and “picking” (that is, repairing) bast shoes. And the stigma of “not knitting a bast” could only be earned by someone who could not cope with everyday, easy work. the master is clearly out of his mind or very drunk, and these are not astringent bast to this day.
Well, those who knit bast do it wisely, taste and pleasure. Lyk still remains in demand, besides ecological raw materials.