"A Knot for Death," "the mortal things," "the deathly bundle" — this collection goes by many names. The old folk prepare clothes for their death so that even "in the other world," they will be no worse than others, so that among the deceased, their own Dzyady (ancestors) will recognize them.
We asked Nina Mikhadyuk (84), Alexandra Stasyuk (93), and Anastasia Mikhadyuk (81) what they keep in their knots for death — and learned a great deal about life.

The First Knot

The Second Knot

Nina Borisovna Mikhadyuk, 84 years old. She lives in the village of Selets in the Osipovichi district of the Mogilev region, where she was born. She began setting aside clothes for her death at the age of 70, when she fell ill with cancer. She says that her peers pass down the tradition of gathering a "death bundle" from one another.
— "You go visit someone, and they'll tell you their bundle is all gathered and waiting. And so I think: well, what about me? Let it be. I have no children, and when it's ready, they will come, and they'll open it, and dress me in exactly what I want."
Nina Mikhadyuk's eyesight is poor — a result of radiation therapy, but the cancer was stopped, along with other serious illnesses in her life.
— "How long does one live? Who knows. They say there's no one above God. You know, I never in my life thought I'd live to such an age, having been through so much sickness. I had no hope!"

Nina Mikhadyuk's mother died young, at 44, after giving birth to eight children: seven sons and a daughter. She didn't prepare any clothes for her death — after the war, there was barely enough for the living. For his wife's burial dress, her husband managed to find some cotton print fabric.
— "People brought what they could, they sewed it in a hurry," sighs Nina Mikhadyuk. "I was 13 or 14 then. As my mother was dying, she lamented to my aunts that she hadn't had time to teach me anything. If only my mommy could rise up and see how much I've embroidered, all the things I have!"
Nina Borisovna's house is white with embroidered napkins, towels with lace, and pillow covers, which in the village of Selets are called "pokryshki". Her nephew, who lives with her, helps her keep the house in order, as she has no children of her own.

Nina Mikhadyuk keeps her death clothes in a bag, and the bag in a wardrobe. The skirt and blouse from her final ensemble hang neatly among other outfits on hangers. She boasts about her blouses, chuckling ironically:

— "My brother used to say: 'You have as many outfits as Catherine the Great!'"

She is reluctant to show the headscarf for her death, because she wants to buy a white shawl instead.

— "If I can't get one, then it will be the headscarf."

Besides the headscarf, two more cloths are prepared: one will go under her feet, the second on the pillow.

The white blouse was brought for Nina Borisovna from Poland by her goddaughter back in the 1980s. Nina Borisovna decided to set it aside for her death. She wore it once: to a relative's anniversary celebration.

— "The death clothes should be worn at least once or twice in your lifetime."
Nina Mikhadyuk asked her niece to buy the skirt for her "mortal bundle" when she traveled to Odessa. She asked for a black one, with monochrome flowers. She is very pleased with her niece's choice.

— "I haven't worn the skirt yet. I'm planning to."
There are also shoes. A traveling merchant was selling goods around the village of Selets — she bought them from him about six years ago.
Besides her "death shoes," Nina Mikhadyuk has another pair for performing in her ensemble "Vyaselle" (The Wedding), and a pair of white boots for traveling to concerts.
— "And this here is my rushnyk (ritual towel) 'for the path' — it's to be laid in the coffin. 'For the path' because you are departing on your own path and will remain there. When you lay it out, the edges should hang over the sides of the coffin — it looks beautiful! My mother wove this towel, and I embroidered it with cross-stitch. And I crocheted the lace for this little rushnyk myself."
Long underwear, tights, an extra nightgown — Nina Mikhadyuk can't explain why, but since it's the custom, she must have them, just in case. The ritual set even includes towels for the crosses on the graves: her own and her husband's, next to whom she will be buried.

They also say the deceased needs a small handkerchief in their hands, with money tucked inside.

— "And sometimes they toss small change right onto the coffin. But the priest says it's not necessary," Nina Borisovna shrugs.

"Sometimes, when you listen to people, you get scared. But then you think about it — and well, maybe dying isn't so very scary after all."

Nina Mikhadyuk recalls that she used to have "absolutely everything" for her death, even a church shroud with angels. She "gave away" the shroud for a young goddaughter who died in a car crash.

So that her niece wouldn't get confused by the wardrobe items, Nina Borisovna showed her the collection.

— "She came over, and I said: 'Look, Lenochka. This one, and this one, and this one — are for death.' I put everything together, but the dress and the blouse are hanging up, she knows."

Nina Mikhadyuk remembers the favorite outfit of her life — her wedding dress. A photograph remains, it's black and white, but after so many years, the woman remembers the colors perfectly.

The dress was of a fine, light pink fabric. The wreath was wax, with white flowers and green leaves. Such wreaths were worn by orphan brides; other girls had red and pink flowers.

— "I borrowed the veil from another village. A girl had been to Germany and brought it back — and all of us who were getting married borrowed it from her."

For twenty-seven years, Nina Mikhadyuk has been singing in an ensemble, and for even longer, at home.

— "I've been singing my whole life. Sometimes I feel so sad, but when I sing, I forget everything. I sing in the garden, and I used to sing while embroidering. You know, people used to sing all sorts of songs, but they didn't even acknowledge the ritual, authentic ones. And look now: we were just in Minsk, and now we have to go to Mogilev, I have no strength left," she laughs. "The director of our ensemble already called me, she said: 'Nina Borisovna, take care of yourself, we need you.'"

One after another, Nina Mikhadyuk begins to sing the songs she remembered from her mother, who in turn learned them from her stepmother.

— "Only God knows what will come after. As for sinning — I have not sinned. With words, maybe, I have sinned more than with deeds. That's how it is."

Alexandra Ivanovna Stasyuk, 93 years old. She lives in the town of Osipovichi and was born in the village of Veshki, Brest region, to the family of an Orthodox priest. She began setting aside clothes for her death around the age of 80.
— "And how could one not? Every person, when they reach old age, must prepare their death clothes. Otherwise, a person dies, and then the children, the grandchildren, will have to run around, searching somewhere, buying things. Everything should be ready."
Alexandra Stasyuk's bag with her "death clothes" is kept in her bedroom, on the bottom shelf of a wardrobe. The hostess laments that it’s not yet in order and immediately sets aside a few blouses she has already grown to dislike. Tastes change.

Her children are scattered across the world, but Alexandra Ivanovna lives in Osipovichi — she still has the strength. An active local pensioner named Lyudmila helps her around the house.

Alexandra Ivanovna speaks Russian with a slight Polish accent. In her childhood, she attended a Polish school when part of Belarus was under Polish rule. After the German occupation, she lived in Brest, where she completed stenography courses and enrolled in a music school. But she got married and left for the north with her husband. She gave birth to three children, then returned to Belarus and worked as a nurse.

— "My father, Ivan, was buried in his priest's vestments. My mother was buried in something simple."

The blouse for her death is black with a floral pattern. It was sent to Alexandra Stasyuk as a gift from the sanatorium where she had worked as a nurse. Alexandra Ivanovna liked the blouse and decided to put it away for her death. Now, however, she has her doubts — they say you should have something lighter in the coffin.

While looking through the wardrobe, it turns out the floral blouse is Italian-made. Alexandra Ivanovna hadn't noticed this fact before, but she smiles:

— "Oh, Italy! How I regret that I'm not in Italy. In Kobrin, during the war, there was a camp — the Germans had brought Italians there. When everyone was liberated, I met an Italian man — his name was Fausto Milessi. A very good young man, handsome, kind. He was from General Badoglio's Italian resistance army. He invited me to Italy, said his parents had a house in the mountains. But I wasn't in love with anyone. And now I often remember him and say: what a fool I was!"

In Alexandra Stasyuk's "death set" is a black pleated skirt. The woman no longer remembers where it came from.

— "Perhaps the children brought it. My daughter lives in Kislovodsk, you see, and my son is in Israel. The skirt is beautiful, pleated. I'm too old to wear something like this in life, but for death — it's fine," Alexandra Ivanovna laughs. "You know, I've even been to Israel! I swam in the Dead Sea. You just lie there as if on a sofa, you don't sink."
The shoes are light-colored.

— "It seems these will do just fine," Alexandra Ivanovna says succinctly.

There is no headscarf in the set. The woman admits that at first, she decided her children would buy one. But now she's changed her mind: she must do it herself.
In the bag, there is also tulle, which is traditionally placed on the coffin. Alexandra Ivanovna has changed her mind about this as well.

— "Now in the church, they sell different ones, with patterns, with Jesus Christ, with angels. I'll exchange it for a new one. The same goes for the sheet. When I was putting this bundle together, they didn't sell such beautiful things as they do now."

Alexandra Ivanovna believes in God; when she has the strength, she goes to church, but she cannot say she was very religious while growing up.

— "My father was a priest; he prayed every morning and evening. But I only studied at home, in the village school, for the first three grades, and then I walked to Zhabinka. Later, I studied at a trade school in Pinsk. I was always separated from my parents. And what a man my father was: a musician, he conducted an archiepiscopal choir in Warsaw before the revolution."

Alexandra Ivanovna recalls her father's parish in the village of Zborsk, Osipovichi district. The Church of Cosmas and Damian, where he served, burned down in the 1960s. The woman erected a memorial cross on the site of the fire.

Alexandra Stasyuk remembers how her priest father would travel around the parish to administer the last rites to people before their death.

— "It used to be that if a person was very ill, they would send for the priest. The dying person had to be confessed, given communion, and prayed over. I remember my father would hang a vessel around his neck, it was called a daronositsa (pyx). In it, he carried grape wine and a piece of a small loaf."

Alexandra Ivanovna examines old photographs through a magnifying glass. Here she is, about twenty years old, with an instrument.

She still loves to sing.

— "Whatever you like: Russian, Polish, Ukrainian songs. I can sing 'Zorku Veneru' — in which language would you like it?"
Alexandra Stasyuk reads Polish writers. One of her favorites is Henryk Sienkiewicz. She is less fond of poets, but she quotes Adam Mickiewicz's poem "Pan Tadeusz" by heart in Polish.

— "Litwo, Ojczyzno moja! Ty jesteś jak zdrowie; Ile cię trzeba cenić, ten tylko się dowie, Kto cię stracił." (Translation: Lithuania, my Fatherland! You are like health; How much one should prize you, only he will know, Who has lost you).

Cheerful and witty, Alexandra Ivanovna can make a joke about a Catholic priest or a Jewish man. But only in the company of family. She worries that she can't say such things on the record.
She recalls how she took up floristry back in the Soviet years. She would dry flowers, trying to preserve their natural appearance and beauty.

— "It was a pleasure to work with flowers. The chamomile came out looking alive, the jasmine — as if alive, the pansies — as if alive. I would take them to Minsk, to the GUM department store; foreigners would buy them. I sold them, earned money, and put it in a savings account — and during Perestroika, it all vanished."

— "How must one live to have a long life?"

— "You must be honest," says Alexandra Stasyuk. "I could say that you must live by God's commandments — do not kill, do not steal, honor your father and your mother. But the youth won't listen to talk about the commandments, will they? I can also say: do not judge. But that is not easy. Even I might judge someone, it happens, if a person does something wrong. It is difficult: they do not love you, but you must love them."

Anastasia Andreevna Mikhadyuk, 81 years old. From the village of Selets, Osipovichi district; she was born here. She began gathering clothes for her death more than ten years ago and keeps them in a headscarf tied into a knot. The items in the knot are layered with sprigs of wormwood — to keep the moths away.

— "I think, maybe I'll die — they'll dress me. I even tell my girls how it should be done. But whether they'll do it or not — who knows. If only one could get up afterwards and see if they did it right," she laughs.

First, Anastasia Mikhadyuk brings a tall stack of new towels out of the wardrobe. After her death, these will be gifts for those who will help: wash the deceased, bury her, prepare the memorial dinner. That is the custom. Then the woman gets her knotted bundle.

When Anastasia Andreevna's mother was dying, she was dressed in her wedding clothes beneath her blouse and skirt.

Anastasia Andreevna has no wedding clothes.

The headscarf for Anastasia Andreevna was bought by her niece, Katerina.

In the set, just like with the first woman, her fellow villager, there is an extra nightgown and towels for the cross. There is a church ribbon with prayers on it — it is used as a belt for the deceased.

Anastasia Andreevna sewed the blouses herself on a sewing machine that her father, a carpenter, had converted from a hand-crank to a foot-pedal model.

— "I sewed the cotton-print blouses myself. You need that kind of material — so that it's lightweight. So that it burns quickly, because every person goes through fire after death — that's what the priest from Starye Dorogi said. In those years, everyone wore cotton print, but now they don't pay attention to what they put on."

— "This blouse is for the top, and this one — for underneath. My Aunt Marfa also used to wear two blouses. If I die in the summer, I'll be in these blouses, but in winter — well, I have a warm blouse in the wardrobe, for on top. In those years, everyone wore cotton print, but now they don't pay attention to what they put on. I see it: they dressed Sputnichikha so warmly, and Volya Tatyanina, they wrapped her up so warmly too! But I'll tell my girls: no, no."

The skirt for her death is lightweight. Anastasia Mikhadyuk says she bought it from some gypsies; she wore it for a while and then decided to leave it for her death.

— "There are shoes," says Anastasia Andreevna, showing the exact same pair of shoes as her fellow villager Nina Borisovna.

The woman has thoughtfully placed a pair of tights inside the shoes.

— "And this here is the rushnyk (ritual towel) for the coffin, 'for the path'. A woman died in Krayi (the name of a village near Selets), and they didn't lay out a rushnyk for her. So she appeared in dreams, saying: 'I want to go home so badly — and I can't find the road.' So when someone else died, they placed her rushnyk in their coffin, and only then did she stop appearing in their dreams."

The rushnyk on which Anastasia Mikhadyuk will one day depart on her final journey was woven by her grandmother, her father's mother. Anastasia received it long ago, as a gift for her beautiful embroidery.

"I told my nieces: don't get me any little pillows. I made two pillowcases myself, I'll stuff them with hay, like they used to do. The proper way. But whether they'll do it or not, who knows."

Anastasia Andreevna finished four years of school. Or rather, she never quite finished: she was too scared to go and take the final exams.

— "I could solve the arithmetic problems, but with the written ones — I was hopeless! I didn't go to the exams because I thought: I won't pass. They tried to persuade me — I didn't go. Instead, I went to weed the flax, and to pull it, and to reap. There was so much to do."

There are almost no photos of her as a young woman, Anastasia Mikhadyuk says. She did, however, show one

— "I used to hang the rushnyk on the icons, and now I'll take it for my path."

She married at thirty; the couple never had children. Her husband died thirteen years ago.

— "This is the fourteenth year I've been living alone. My nieces take me to Minsk for the winter. It's warm there and the toilet is inside. But — it's boring! By the eighth of March, I'm already saying: 'Take me home.' Oh, it's completely different at home! My girls will come to visit me for Radonitsa — they are good girls."

Anastasia Andreevna says that when she goes to bed, she whispers prayers at night. During the day, she whispers charms — she knows many of them: for the evil eye, for fright, for various ailments.

— "Old Nastasya taught me to whisper the charms, and Paraska too. I gave the young ones my written-down notebook. They copied it all out, and took pictures of it, and thanked me for it. Here, girls, I said, take it, or I'll die soon, and you can heal someone, or something," Anastasia Mikhadyuk explains.

— "If you could live your life over again, what would you do differently?"

— "Oh, God hasn't yet created a world where you can live life over again!"

"There will be a time, they say, when the dead will rise and meet the living. For a minute, or for however long... And such a small part of humanity will remain on earth that those people will live without growing old."

— "One day, my niece and I are sitting in Minsk, and I say: 'Katya, I've lived my life, but I've never been on an airplane and never been to the circus.' She says: 'I won't put you on an airplane, but I will take you to the circus.' They bought a ticket, called a taxi, and we went."

Anastasia Andreevna spreads her arms wide, remembering the huge auditorium surrounding the arena:

— "When I looked! I thought: what is that black thing over there? But it was people, people! And the circus was huge, so huge! All the seats were taken! And so much light there! Lightbulbs! Everywhere in the city the lights are on, but in our village — there are three lightbulbs and they begrudge even lighting those on the street."

Anastasia Mikhadyuk doesn't venture a guess as to whether she will be scared after death or not. But she is certain that today's young generation will live to see new times.

— "There will be a time, they say, when just as people once flocked to the city, they will crawl back from the city to the village. Whether it will be in forty years, or in ten. The land lies empty — which means this land must be occupied."

Текст : Снежана Инанец
Фото Дмитрий Брушко