Public laying of Yule log in Northern Kosovska Mitrovica

The subject of this paper are Public procedures among the Serbian population in Northern Kosovska Mitrovica, which the author wished to elaborate within clearly defined spacious and timely frames including the recognizable organizers and main participants. A special attention was paid to the ritual of the public laying of Yule log in the Porte of the church of Saint Dimitrije. The justification of the mentioned approach is seen in the methodological imperative to work on the description on the precisely determined events instead of generalized description of Christmas Eve and Christmas rituals based upon the lack of clear timely and spacious coordinates, so as to come to the concrete ethnographic material which could serve as eventual comparative or repeated researches of the same phenomena. The research was conducted during the Christmas Eve, and at the first day of Christmas in 2012. Empiric data were gathered by the method of observation with participation, and by making interview with the main organizers of Christmas Eve celebration, at the first place with the head of the church of Saint Dimitrije, that is by conducting a poll among citizens participants of the ritual of public laying of Yule log. The results achieved show that public gatherings on the occasion of the featuring of Christmas Eve in Northern Kosovska Mitrovica were structurized at three levels: the level of space, time and participants. The featuring of Christmas Eve among the residents of Northern Kosovska Mitrovica is linked to the church of Saint Dimitrije and its Porte. It is developed within clearly indicated time intervals, beginning with at 8 o'clock in the morning, that is, at 4 o'clock in the afternoon. Among the participants it is possible to notice organizers, or hosts, which the representatives of the Serbian Orthodox church belong to, and Municipality from the one side, and visitors, participants in the celebration made of the belongers of the Serbian Orthodox population in Northern Kosovska Mitrovica, from the other side. Furthermore, Christmas Eve rituals in the building of the church of Saint Dimitrije, as the author heard, were practiced almost completely in accordance with ecclesiastical canons, that is, as per the Orthodox ecclesiastical practice. The highlight of the public Christmas Eve's practice represents the ritual of the public laying of Yule log, which is run in the ecclesiastical Porte, and which includes elements due to which it is rather like some kind of people's merry party than strictly regulated ecclesiastical ritual. The mentioned ritual of Yule log laying is to be characteristic because of the fact it contains a stratified symbolic: the symbolic of individual and collective identification with the Orthodox religious tradition, and the symbolic of ethnical identification are being interwoven. The public laying of Yule log, and celebration of Christmas in general, the organizers of Christmas Eve celebration together with the citizens see as the event which the population of Northern Kosovska Mitrovica are identifying with as the Orthodox believers. Furthermore, they see it as the event serving for the gathering of Serbian population of Northern Kosovska Mitrovica, and at the same time, strengthening of feelings of mutual connection and unity. The mentioned symbolic is impossible to be observed independently of interethnic tensions which have been present among the citizens of the town for years, and which are being manifested through its split into two parts. Taking into account a long-term socio-political conflict between Serbs and Albanians in Kosovska Mitrovica, the ritual of Yule log laying as the symbol of religious and ethnical identification of Serbian population, it is more than evident it is being given a special importance.