Hello all,
Today I will talk about the mens' costume from Kalatoszeg.
This is a region in western Transylvania, just east of the Apuseni Mountains. It is not recognized politically, but lies in northwestern Cluj County and southern Sălaj County, Romania. It is estimated that about 30% of the people in the region are Hungarian.
Here is a map on which I have plotted the Kalatoszegi villages.
The boys in the video are wearing a more minimalistic, modern version of the folk costume, as is common among Hungarians.
This is the westernmost of the Transylvanian Hungarian groups, and elements of their music, dance, and Folk Costume resembles that of Hungary proper, more so than other Transylvanian groups.
The men's summer costume was originally a linen large sleeved open shirt, ing.
The shirt might have white openwork, as in this example.
When appropriate, or in cooler weather the ing had cuffs, and was closer to that worn in Hungary proper.
This type of ing was generally unadorned, except in the village of Györgyfalva, Gheorghieni in Romanian, which lies in the east of this region and is somewhat transitional. There the ing is embroidered.
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Here is a video of a village dance in Györgyfalva.
The ing was sometimes made of a floral print material.
This was originally accompanied by wide linen pants called gatya. Gatya were not worn east of this region, but are common west of here. These pants are unadorned, except, again, in Györgyfalva, where the hem might be embroidered.
The gatya are usually just gathered on a drawstring, but might be pleated for special occasions. They fall to just below the boottops. For special occasions an apron might be worn with them.
You will notice that a sort of tie, or jabot, nyakravalo, is often tied around the neck. This commonly is ornamented with ribbons and rosettes.
In some villages a different neck ornament called gyolcfersing was worn.
Often no neck ornament at all was worn.
The gatya were replaced with wool pants in cooler weather or ease of movement. These are usually of a dark color.
As the young men were expected to serve in the Austro-Hungarian army, military style jodphurs became popular.
High boots are the most common footwear.
For upper body garments, highly ornamented sheepskin vests are worn. These have the same simple straight line cut as in the Carpathians.
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This is now sometimes replaced with a plain black wool vest.
A rather new innovation is the inclusion of a beaded ornament which is attached to the vest.
Men will sometimes wear the condra, a Carpathian style jacket of heavy wool, which is also worn by Romanians.
More commonly, Kalatoszegi men will wear a wool jacket called bujka. This is more fitted, and may be modestly or more elaborately ornamented. They are often dark blue, with fancy stitched buttonholes and black ornamentation.
More recently, it has become popular to do large amounts of machine topstitching on the bujka in some villages.
Here is a video showing, among other things, how to sew a bujka, specifically from the village of Mera. [in Hungarian].
In summer, straw hats are worn, in winter, often lambskin caps, but most commonly, felt hats as can be seen in these various images. They can have beaded ornaments, especially for special occasions, but more commonly tufts of bullrushes.
The most elaborate outer garment worn by men in Kalatoszeg is the Szűr. This is another garment that is more common further west in Hungary proper. It is not worn east of Kalatoszeg. It is a sort of mantle made of very heavy fulled wool. It has blind sleeves, which serve as pockets. It is always covered with elaborate ornament consisting of topstitching, felt applique, and/or embroidery. They have always been made by specialist tailors, and not everybody could afford one.
And that concludes this article.
Thank you for reading, I hope that you have found this to be interesting and informative.
Roman K.
email: rkozakand@aol.com
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