UDK 39(497.472+497.571):821.163.6.09
Špela Ledinek Lozej, Nataša Rogelja
Inštitut za slovensko narodopisje ZRC SAZU, Raziskovalna postaja Nova Gorica, Inštitut za slovensko izseljenstvo in migracije ZRC SAZU, Ljubljana
ŠAVRINKA, ŠAVRINI IN ŠAVRINIJA V ETNOGRAFIJI IN LITERATURI
Prispevek temelji na etnografski terenski raziskavi delovnih migracij v Istri ter na analizi izbranih literarnih prispevkov, ki neposredno ali posredno interpretirajo Šavrinke, Šavrine in Šavrinijo ter so imeli ključno vlogo pri šavrinizaciji severnoistrskega podeželja. Današnje razumevanje Šavrinije namreč izhaja iz polpretekle literarne produkcije, osredotočene na istrske preprodajalke z jajci - Šavrinke, etnografski podatki pa razkrivajo odtenke prekrivanja, prepletanja in razhajanja med stvarnimi preprodajalkami in literarnimi upodobitvami Ša-vrink ter opozarjajo na pomen materialnih okoliščin pri oblikovanju literarnih in regionalnih simbolov.
Ključne besede: šavrinizacija, identitetni procesi, delovne migracije, žensko delo, Istra
1 Uvod
Procesa oblikovanja istovetenja s Šavrinkami in Šavrinijo konec 20. stoletja ter li-terarizacije Šavrinke sta vzajemno prepletena. Zato ne preseneča dejstvo, da se večina razlag regionalizacije in nacionalizacije Istre ter oblikovanja šavrinske identitete osredotoča predvsem na analizo literarne, deloma pa tudi širše umetnostne upodobitve Šavrink in Šavrinije (Baskar 2002a, 2002b; Brumen 2000; Mihelj 2006; Urbanc 2011). Lik Šavrinke je namreč navdihoval in pritegoval pozornost umetnikov, pou-stvarjalcev in zbirateljev ljudskega blaga, kar je razvidno od Šavrinskihpesmi Alojza Kocjančiča (1962) dalje, predvsem pa ob izidu romanov, novel in pripovedi Marjana Tomšiča ob koncu osemdesetih let 20. stoletja (Tomšič 1983; 1986; 1990; 1993). V manjšem obsegu so se razlage oblikovanja šavrinske istovetnosti posvečale stvarnim okoliščinam in življenjem posameznikov, ki so imeli pomembno vlogo pri oblikovanju literarnih, likovnih in folklornih podob Šavrinke (Ledinek in Rogelja 2000).
Pričujoči prispevek proces oblikovanja literarne podobe in šavrinske identitete osvetljuje z nasprotne strani, iz perspektive etnografije,1 konkretnih materialnih
1 Raba besede etnografija se v sodobni antropološki in etnološki literaturi navezuje tako na nabor podatkov, zbranih ob kvalitativni terenski raziskavi, kot na specifično metodo oz. na skupek specifičnih kvalitativnih metod; v prvi vrsti opazovanje z udeležbo, izvedeno s strani raziskovalke/raziskovalca, in vzpostavljanje dialoga z opazovanimi akterji v obliki strukturiranih, polstrukturiranih ali nestrukturiranih intervjujev. (za več o etnografiji glej Hammersley in Atkinson 1995). Etnografija pričujočega prispevka je bila zbrana v obdobju med 1994 in 1996, in sicer na podlagi pogovorov z (nekdanjimi) istrskimi trgovkami in njihovimi sorodniki iz Boršta, Dola, Gračišča in Kubeda, njihovimi odjemalci v Istri, v Kaldirju in na Vrhovščini, v pogovorih s pisateljem Marjanom Tomšičem, kiparjem Jožetom Pohlenom, predstavnico kul-turno-umetniškega društva Šavrini inu anka Šavrinke Marijo Knez, predstavnico društva Šavrinske pupe en ragaconi Rožano Koštial ter na podlagi stvarne izkušnje pešačenja po krožni trgovski poti med Gračiščem, Vrhovščino nad Buzetom in Trstom med 14. in 18. julijem 1995.
okoliščin in življenj posameznikov. Izhajajoč na eni strani iz etnografije delovnih migracij v Istri v prejšnjem stoletju, vpetih in pogojenih s fizičnogeografskimi značilnostmi območja in družbenozgodovinskimi okoliščinami, ter na drugi strani iz pregleda izbrane literarne, pa tudi likovne in folkloristične produkcije, ki neposredno ali posredno interpretira Šavrinke, Šavrine in Šavrinijo, se prispevek v prvem koraku osredotoča na življenjsko zgodbo delovne migrantke z območja severovzhodne Istre, ki se je v prejšnjem stoletju ukvarjala s preprodajo med osrednjo Istro in Trstom. Na podlagi konkretne življenjske zgodbe istrske preprodajalke bo v drugem koraku predstavljen preplet prizorišča oz. materialnih okoliščin, interakcij posameznikov v teh okoliščinah ter nastajajočih podob, ki so prispevale k šavrinizaciji istrskega podeželja. Analiza se naslanja na prispevek Milesa Richardsona z naslovom Being-in-the-market Versus Being-in-the-Plaza: Material Culture and the Construction of Social Reality in Spanish America (2003), v katerem je postavljena metodološka podlaga za koncept (po)telešenega2 prostora. Avtor je v razlagi prostorjenja trga in tržnice izhajal iz predpostavke, da je biti-v-prostoru oz. biti-tam obenem fizično-prostorsko in tudi kulturno dejstvo (Low in Lawrence Züniga 2003: 5). Proces, v katerem materialne okoliščine določajo situacijo in kako le-ta povratno vpliva na materialne okoliščine, je Miles Richardson predstavil na podlagi treh komponent: 1) preliminarna definicija oz. materialne okoliščine prizorišča; 2) interakcija, ki se dogaja na prizorišču; in 3) podobe, ki se oblikujejo na podlagi materialnih okoliščin in interakcij ter dopolnijo preliminarno definicijo z novim občutenjem in umeva-njem prostora (Richardson 2003: 76). V zadnji stopnji sicer vzajemnega procesa postane prizorišče upodobitev nastajajoče situacije ali, drugače povedano, družbena situacija postane fizično umeščena (Richardson 2003:85).3 Vzajemno medsebojno razmerje med prizoriščem, družbenimi interakcijami in podobami, bo v prispevku predstavljeno na osnovi fizičnogeografskega orisa ter gospodarske in politične umestitve trgovske poti med Istro in Trstom, družbenih interakcij in nastajajočih podob na in ob trgovski poti skozi 20. stoletje, upoštevaje obujanje spominov in literarno produkcijo.
2 Življenjska zgodba Marije France iz Gračišča4
Marija Franca je bila rojena 5. februarja 1907 v Gračišču. Otroštvo z osmimi soro-jenci je preživela pod skupno streho s starimi starši, družinami treh očetovih bratov ter samskim stricem. Osnovno šolo je obiskovala deloma v slovenskem in deloma v italijanskem jeziku. Jeseni je na poti v šolo spotoma nabirala kostanj. Z denarjem, ki so ga dobili ob prodaji, so starši kupili otrokom obleko in obutev za zimo. Vsakokrat, ko so peljali kostanj v Trst, so vzeli enega od otrok s seboj. Marija je preštevala dneve in noči, kdaj bo prvič na vrsti. (Franca 1992) Po koncu prve svetovne vojne je pričela
2	Ang. embodied space. Gre za prostor, (raz)umljen na podlagi tvorne telesne izkušnje. Podrobneje prim. Low in Lawrence Züniga (2003: 3) in tudi Muršič (2006: 48-54).
3	Primerljivo je razmerje med materialnimi okoliščinami oz. prizoriščem ter družbenimi praksami in interakcijami povzel Matej Vranješ (Vranješ 2008: 111).
4	Kadar ni navedeno drugače, so navedki iz intervjujev z Marijo Franco, ki so bili vodeni v okviru terenske raziskave med letoma 1994 in 1996.
sama služiti kruh. S štirinajstimi leti jo je skupaj s starejšo sestro v Istro pospremil oče. Marija je trgovala z ljudmi na Vrhovščini, v vaseh nad Buzetom.
Hrvaški Istrani so nas brez izjeme lepo sprejemali. Bili so dobri in gostoljubni, še posebej z nami začetnicami. Nudili so nam hrano in prenočišče. Če ni bilo drugega, smo spale na seniku. Presrečne smo bile, da smo tudi me našle svoje ljudi. Od takrat naprej smo hodile vsak teden po istih vaseh. [...] Mi nismo znali, da smo iz Šavrinije. [...] So nam rekli Šavrinke, ma tudi po imenih. So imeli obzir. Kadar so klicali otroci mater, pač naj pride domov, je prišla Šavrinka, so me vprašali: »Kaj čemo rečt, je prišla Šavrinka?« So se bali, da bi se užalila.
Marija se je leta 1927 omožila z Jožefom Franca iz sosednje hiše, kamor se je že prej poročila njena starejša sestra Ana. Z Jožefom sta imela štiri otroke: Marijo, Ivana, Jolando in Cvetka. Jožef je delal na domači kmetiji in hodil na žurnade k večjim kmetom, Marija pa je hodila v Istro. S primožitvijo v družino Franca je Marija postala snaha Jožefove mame, Ivane Franca, ki je bila ena prvih gračiških preprodajalk, ki so hodile trgovat v osrednjo Istro. Marija in njena sestra Ana sta izmenično zbirali jajca, piščance, mesnine in žganje, jih tovorili in preprodajali v Trstu ter si pomagali pri varstvu otrok.
Med drugo svetovno vojno je Marija ovdovela. Ker je imela v lasti nekaj zemlje, ni dobivala nakaznic in siceršnje državne socialne podpore, zato je kljub novonasta-lim okoliščinam z mejami, predpisi in carinami spet začela trgovati. S posebnim dovoljenjem je lahko občasno prečkala mejo med Cono A in Cono B ter spotoma nesla preko novonastale meje preprodajalske artikle. Postala je kontrabantarka, čeprav se njeno delo ni bistveno spremenilo. Leta 1947 je bila obtožena sodelovanja pri tihotapljenju ljudi prek meje in za sedem mesecev je bila zaprta v puljskem zaporu. Po letu 1947 je še vedno občasno preprodajala med Vrhovščino in Trstom. Z avtobusom se je peljala do Buzeta in nadaljevala peš do vasi okoli Vrha. Na tržaških razprodajah, v magazinih in na Ponte Rosu je nakupila majice, kavbojke, spodnje perilo, blago, posodo in vse to odnesla v kraje, kjer je pred desetletji petrolej in sukanec menjala za jajca. S trgovanjem je nadaljevala do svojega osemdesetega leta. Priložnostno je Istrane obiskovala do konca življenja. Razen sester v Gračišču ni imela prijateljev. Te je našla med učitelji in učenci bližnje gračiške šole. Časa je imela dovolj in zanimanje za Šavrinke jo je zabavalo. Marija je umrla na sveto Ano leta 1996 in je pokopana na kubejskem pokopališču. (Ledinek in Rogelja 2000: 21-35)
3 (So)ustvarjanje šavrinske identitete: Preplet prizorišča, interakcij in (literarnih) podob
3.1 Prizorišče ali trgovska pot Marije Franca na fizičnogeografski, družbenogospodarski in politični karti
Vas Gračišče se nahaja na severovzhodnem, višje ležečem območju Istre na 300 m nadmorske višine. Od Trsta je oddaljena 23 km, od Buzeta pa 27 km. Pred Bu-zetom, ki leži na 40 m nadmorske višine, zavije nekdanja Marijina trgovska pot na
stransko cesto, ki se vzpenja proti Vrhovščini. Enourni vzpon vodi mimo Maruškov, Jagodičja in Marčeve njive ter doseže vršno plan pri zaselku Čelo. Pot se nadaljuje po danes asfaltirani cesti do vasi Sveti Donat in proti zaselku Vrh, ki leži na 380 m nadmorske višine. Od tod vodijo poti proti okoliškim vasem Dol, Dobrovo, Klarici, Potoki, Medveje, Marčineško polje, Marčinegla, Paladini, Ščulci, Barušici, Luskici, Senj, Sovinjak in Sovinjaško polje, ki ležijo na ramenih, spuščajočih se od središčnega Vrha. Krožna pot po zaselkih Vrhovščine je dolga približno 25 km. Pot iz Grači-šča proti Trstu vodi mimo Kubeda, se spusti proti Rižani, preči reko pri Mostičju in se zatem vzpenja proti Črnemu Kalu. Pred Črnim Kalom se spusti proti osapski vali ter vodi mimo Gabrovice in Ospa po ravni cesti proti nekdanjemu maloobmejnemu prehodu med Jugoslavijo in Italijo. Na italijanski strani se vzpne do Mačkovelj, od koder je že moč videti Trst s tržaško rafinerijo v ospredju. Od tod se spusti proti središču mesta, do ulic Tesi, Molino Vento in Bosco, kjer so bili v prvi polovici 20. stoletja hlevi za tovorno živino, ter dalje do nekdanjega maloprodajnega mesta na Garibaldijevem trgu s stebrom, na katerem je pozlačen kip Matere Božje.
Celotna krožna pot (od Gračišča do Vrhovščine in nazaj ter do Trsta in nazaj) je dolga 125 km. Marija Franca je v obdobju med letoma 1920 in 1940 navedeno pot prepešačila enkrat tedensko v treh ali štirih dnevih. V primerjavi z opisano trgovsko potjo so bile poti škedenjskih krušaric ali mlekaric iz koprskega zaledja bolj urbane in bistveno krajše.
3.2 Interakcije ob trgovski poti
Marija Franca je v 20. in 30. letih 20. stoletja sama ali skupaj z drugimi preprodajalkami iz Gračišča in bližnjega Kubeda enkrat tedensko navsezgodaj krenila proti osrednji Istri. Pred Buzetom so se preprodajalke razšle glede na mikrolokacijo stalnih strank. Na razpotjih so pustile signade, dogovorjena znamenja, s katerimi so ena drugi sporočile, v katero smer so šle. Preprodajalke so imele namreč stalne in zanesljive dobavitelje in odjemalce ter ustaljene poti. V vas so prihajale na dogovorjeni dan in ob dogovorjeni uri, ne glede na vremenske in siceršnje okoliščine. Stalne stranke so starejše sorodnice in znanke prepuščale mlajšim oz. so se v primeru času nosečnosti, varstva otrok in bolezni nadomeščale pri odjemu in dobavi strankam. Ker so bile stranke na Vrhovščini pogosto še revnejše kot preprodajalke, so robo večkrat pustile ljudem na up, ti pa so jo postopoma odplačevali z jajci. V krajih nad Bu-zetom so stranke trgovkam nudile hrano, pijačo in prenočišče. Poleg trgovske mreže se je tako vzpostavila tudi mreža zaupanja in pomoči. Preprodajalke so v osrednji Istri prespale eno ali dve noči, se navsezgodaj zjutraj odpravile proti domu ter se ob določeni uri sešle na dogovorjenem mestu pri Buzetu ali Motovunu.
V Trst so se preprodajalke iz Gračišča in Kubeda odpravile okoli polnoči, večkrat še isti večer, da so lahko do petih zjutraj dospele v mesto. Sestale so se na koncu vasi in skupaj nadaljevale pot proti Kubedu in Rižani. Prvi del je bil namenjen molitvi, zatem pa so pele, klepetale, opravljale, si pripovedovale šale, se smejale in dremale. V skupini trgovk so se tako na osnovi skupnih izkušenj hoje in trgovanja izoblikovale medsebojne podporne vezi. Pred vstopom v Trst so preprodajalke pregledali mestni tržni inšpektorji, da niso imele prepovedanega blaga, kot je bilo na primer žganje.
Osle so pustile pri lastnikih hlevov, s katerimi je veljalo biti v dobrem odnosu, saj so jim ti posredovali informacije o prodajnih mestih in zaposlitvah. Nekatere so jajca in drugo robo prodale mlekaricam, ki so jih skupaj z mlekom raznašale po meščanskih gospodinjstvih, druge so imele stalne odjemalce, pekarne in trgovine, kjer so lahko prodale večjo količino naenkrat, tretje so prodajale na drobno na različnih trgih in tržnicah. Ko so prodale jajca in nakupile, kar so jim naročile stranke in kar so potrebovali doma, so se pred odhodom včasih ustavile še v betoli, gostilni s cenejšo hrano. Iz Trsta so domačim, ki so jih nestrpno pričakovali, prinesle priboljške, otrokom krušno pecivo, moškim pa tobak in papir za cigarete. S preprodajo jajc in nekaterih drugih artiklov med kraji okoli Buzeta in Motovuna ter Trstom in drugimi obalnimi mesti so se gračiške preprodajalke ukvarjale do druge svetovne vojne, ko je v povezavo med Trstom in Istro zarezala meja, sprva med cono A in B Julijske krajine, od leta 1947 do 1954 med Jugoslavijo in Conama A in B Svobodnega tržaškega ozemlja ter od leta 1954 med Italijo in Jugoslavijo. Marija Franca je po letu 1954 v tržaških magacinih nakupovala spodnje perilo, kavbojke, majice in jih sama ali s pomočjo v Trstu živečih družinskih članov pretihotapila preko jugoslovansko-italijanske državne meje. Pogosto je na pot vzela tudi hčer in pozneje vnukinjo, nikoli pa sinov in vnukov.
V	70. in 80. letih 20. stoletja preprodaja ni bila več ključna za preživetje, marveč je bila habitualizirana ekonomska in socialna praksa posameznic, ki je omogočala tako dodatni zaslužek kot tudi vzdrževanje poznanstev in obujanje spominov na življenje v prvi polovici 20. stoletja, med drugim tudi na prekupčevanje med istrskimi vasmi in obalnimi mesti. Obujanje spominov na obdobje preprodaje jajc in vzdrževanje socialnih stikov z ljudmi v osrednji Istri se je preko občasnih obiskov nadaljevalo tudi v zadnja desetletja 20. stoletja. Pri Mariji Franca so slednje še okrepili pogovori z učitelji gračiške šole, ki so imeli pri njej v najemu sobo, predvsem srečanje in sobi-vanje z učiteljem in s pisateljem Marjanom Tomšičem. Sprva je spomine na čas prve polovice 20. stoletja pripovedovala, pozneje pa jih je na podbudo Marjana Tomšiča zapisala v treh zvezkih Šavrinskih zgodb (Franca 1990; 1992; 1995). Sočasno je Marjan Tomšič izdal romana Šavrinke (1986) in Zrno od frmentona (1993), novele Olive in sol (1983) in Kažuni (1990) ter druga leposlovna dela, v katera je med drugim vtkal Marijine spomine. Plodno sobivanje med ovdovelo (nekdanjo) preprodajalko ter pisateljem je porodilo širši val zanimanja za (pol)pretekle potovke, med drugim je v Gračišču in bližnjih krajih pričelo delovati kulturno-umetniško društvo Šavrinke inu anka Šavrini, ki je v uprizoritvah prepletalo in poustvarjalo tako stvarne dogodke iz spominov Marije Franca in nekaterih drugih preprodajalk kot tudi prigode iz Tomšičeve literature.
3.3 Podobe
V	prvi polovici 20. stoletja sta se med sovaščani oblikovali dve podobi trgovk. Prva podoba preprodajalke je bila podoba delovne, pogumne, fizično utrjene in neutrudne ženske, ki je zaslužna za preživetje in za priboljške pri hiši. Preprodajalke so bile zato zaželene neveste. Ženske, ki niso hodile v Istro, so jih občudovale, hčere in nečakinje pa so se poleg priboljškov veselile tudi občasnih odhodov v Istro ali
Trst, kamor so jih s seboj jemale starejše sorodnice. Prenašanje obrti, predajanje in izmenjavanje pri strankah predvsem po ženski liniji, med taščami in snahami, tetami in nečakinjami, med sestrami in svakinjami ter skupno tovorjenje prodajnih artiklov so krepili vezi med ženskami trgovkami,opolnomočili ženske in ustvarjali pozitivno žensko (samo)podobo. Druga podoba je bila podoba prav tako močne, samostojne, razgledane, izkušene in komunikacijsko vešče ženske, ki dnevno odhaja od doma sama v istrsko divjino in v tržaški blišč. Medtem ko je bila prva zaželena nevesta,se je druga gibala že na meji legitimnega. Etnografija tako priča, da so nekateri možje svojim ženam prepovedali, da bi hodile od doma preprodajat.
Tudi v interakciji z Istrani iz osrednje Istre sta se oblikovali dve podobi preprodajalke, ki so jih prav stranke v osrednji Istri (po)imenovale Šavrinke, ker naj bi bile, kot so povedali, iz Šavrinije. Šavrinke so bile po eni strani prebrisane trgovke, ki so »trdo glihale in pošteno plačale«, ter same, brez spremstva moža hodile po svetu. Etnografski podatki kažejo tudi na nedvoumno negativne konotacije, povezane s poimenovanjem Šavrinka in Šavrini. Na drugi strani so taiste Šavrinke prinašale iz Trsta različne artikle in informacije, pogosto so jim pustile blago tudi na up in je tako, kot je povedala Marija Franca, ena revščina podpirala drugo.
Orisane podobe preprodajalke oz. Šavrinke so bile osnova, na kateri so v drugi polovici 20. stoletja pisatelji, likovniki in drugi poustvarjalci, zbiratelji ljudskega blaga in pozneje pevske, kulturne in folklorne skupine oblikovali lik Šavrinke. Pri tem so poudarili tiste elemente, ki jih je narekovala osebna naklonjenosti in siceršnje družbene okoliščine; trpljenje (Kocjančič 1962), samostojnost, prefinjenost, pogum in eroticizem (Tomšič 1986), mogočnost in kariatidnost v upodobitvah kiparja in slikarja Jožeta Pohlena ter prebrisanost oz. tako imenovano furbavost, izpostavljeno v uprizoritvah lokalnih kulturno-umetniških društev.
Alojz Kocjančič5 je v pesmih Kubejskim Šavrinkam in Materi, objavljenih v zbirki Šavrinske pesmi, Šavrinke opisal kot matere, ki se žrtvujejo za svoje otroke (Kocjančič 1962). Sabina Mihelj je ugotovila, da je metafora Šavrinke pri tem rabljena kot figura nacionalne/regionalne zgodovine oz. kot njena antiteza. Tako kakor nudi metafora družine prikladno razvojno pripoved za nacionalno zgodovino, dejansko pa je izpraznjena zgodovinskega pomena in ločena od vzvodov moči, tako je tudi lik matere izenačen z Istro (prim. pesem Istra - mati), pesnik pa je njen sin. (Mihelj 2006: 372) Enačenje Šavrinke, Istranke in matere je razberljivo tudi iz poimenovanja mogočnega kipa v Hrastovljah, delo kiparja in slikarja Jožeta Pohlena, ki se je ob slovesni postavitvi leta 1990 imenoval Istranka in je bil v času terenske raziskave avtoric prispevka v ljudski govorici že poimenovan za Šavrinko. Poudarjanje materinskega elementa pri Alojzu Kocjančiču ni slučajno, saj se je njegova mati res ukvarjala s preprodajo med Kubedom, osrednjo Istro in Trstom. S preprodajo v severovzhodnem in višje ležečem delu Istre se namreč niso ukvarjala zgolj dekleta pred možitvijo oz. vdove (Brumen2 000; Ravnik 1996: 82-83), marveč tudi poročene ženske, ki so s pomočjo sorodnic usklajevale intimno družinsko življenje s pridobitno dejavnostjo. Pisatelj Marjan Tomšič je poleg materinske in ženstvene podobe Šavrinke poudaril tudi njeno avtonomnost in aktivno vlogo v (javnem) življenju (Tomšič 1986). V na-
5 Poimenovanje Šavrinke vstopi v književnost prav z Alojzom Kocjančičem leta 1962 (prim. Baskar 2002).
sprotju s splošnim prepričanjem in ugotovitvami nekaterih raziskovalcev, ki so moške in ženske družbene vloge delili po analogiji aktivno-pasivno oz. javno-zasebno,6 je v literaturi Marjana Tomšiča Šavrinka izpostavljena kot samozadostna, samostojna in aktivna posameznica, katere pridobitna vloga nikakor ni bila zanemarljiva (Ledinek in Rogelja 2000: 90; Mihelj 2006: 371-372). Vzporedno z Marjanom Tomšičem sta poleg Marije France Šavrinke in Šavrinijo omenjala še Rafael Vidali v pesniški zbirki Cubejske žrjavce (1989) in Edelman Jurinčič v zbirki proze Istrani (1991). Vse tri omenjene pisce lahko štejemo za Tomšičeve »učence«, ki so skupaj dopolnjevali in gradili lik Šavrinke, kakršen se je začel utrjevati ob koncu 20. stoletja.7 Zdi se, da je bila prav literarizirana podoba Šavrinke v 80. in 90. letih prejšnjega stoletja, v času razpada Jugoslavije, primerna in dovolj mikavna podoba za šavrini-zacijo Istre oz. iznajdbo šavrinske identitete (Baskar 2002a), ki se je bolj kot za nacionalno razločevanje slovenskih od hrvaških Istranov (Brumen 2000) ali istrskega podeželja od obalnih mest (Baskar 2002a: 130) v 21. stoletje ohranila in utrdila v iskanju lokalnih tipičnosti, avtentičnosti in fasaderstva (ORBA?Li 2000), za potrebe turizma in s turizmom povezanih prireditev (MacCannell 1976; 1992).
4 Zaključek
Nekateri raziskovalci šavrinizacije Istre se nagibajo k tezi, da je geografska in poklicna redukcija Šavrink na jajčarice iz jugovzhodnega kota Istre predvsem posledica učinka književnikov in likovnih umetnikov, ki so oblikovali mikavno podobo Šavrinke, ki je prerasla v simbol, na katerega se je oprl proces iznajdbe šavrinske identitete konec 90. let 20. stoletja. Bojan Baskar sicer meni, da pri kubejsko-gračišč-ko-hrastoveljski redefiniciji Šavrink ne gre za čisto literarno oz. fikcijsko invencijo (Baskar 2002a: 127), vendar se njegova razlaga opira na analizo literarne in geografske produkcije. Etnografija priča, da so bile za tovrstno redukcijo poleg literarne produkcije ključne neposredne materialne okoliščine, saj so se preprodajalke, ki so hodile v osrednjo Istro in v določenem obdobju res trgovale predvsem z jajci (pozneje tudi z drugimi artikli), prav tam srečevale s specifično rabo etničnega poimenovanja Šavrini. Za razliko od mlekaric, krušaric in drugih (pre)prodajalk, ki niso zbirale blaga v osrednji Istri, ampak so bile vezane le na obalna mesta, so imele potovke iz Gračišča, Kubeda in okoliških vasi stik s prebivalci osrednje Istre, ki so jih imenovali Šavrinke, ker so bile, kot so pravili, iz Šavrinije. Dolgotrajna in naporna hoja - v opisanem primeru trgovke Marije Franca po 125 km dolgi krožni poti med Istro in Trstom - je bila stvarno dejstvo, na katerem je bila osnovana podoba o pogumnih, trpečih in herojskih Šavrinkah. Medtem ko pri Aloisu Spinčicu, avtorju zapisa o
6	Na večpomenskost in problematičnost tovrstnih dihotomij, priljubljenih v strukturalističnih razlagah pomena, je opozorila že Lidia Sciama. Na osnovi terenskega dela v Italiji in ponovnega branja etnografij, v katerih je bila izpostavljena opozicija med zasebnim in javnim, je v prispevku The Problem of Privacy in Mediterranean Anthropology postavila tovrstne opozicije pod vprašaj (Sciama 1997: 90-104).
7	Čeprav so dela navedenih umetnikov najbolj glasno odmevala, so Šavrini in Šavrinke omenjeni v delih nekaterih zbirateljev ljudskega blaga in literatov že pred popularizacijo v 80. in 90. letih. Zbirateljica Nadja Rojac Orfano je na pobudo Milka Matičetovega in Pavla Merkuja popisovala šavrinsko ljudsko izročilo v Gažonu in okolici ter v Trstu (Rojac Orfano 1977: 200-211).
Šavrinki v 9. zvezku Avstro-Ogrske monarhije v besedi in sliki (Spinčič 1891: 215), in pri Simonu Rutarju, avtorju knjige Samosvoje mesto Trst in mejna grofija Istra (Rutar 1896: 175), konec 19. stoletja mobilnost in posredništvo med Istro in Trstom nista bila izpostavljena, se zdi, da sta bili za oblikovanje istovetenjske podobe v drugi polovici 20. stoletja prav mobilnost s pešhojo in stik s strankami v osrednji Istri ključni prvini lika Šavrinke.
Potrebno je izpostaviti, da v procesu oblikovanja lika Šavrinke posamezniki niso bili zgolj pasivni prejemniki podob, ampak so imeli (in imajo) aktivno vlogo v oblikovanju le-teh. Proces regionalizacije ni zgolj invencija, odkrivanje, prebujanje oz. reapropriacija identitete (Baskar 2002a: 115) v smislu promocije oz. popularizacije šavrinske identitete s strani lokalnih in zunanjih umetniško-kulturnih promotorjev ter specifičnih političnih okoliščin v 90. letih 20. stoletja (Brumen 2000), ampak deluje proces šavrinizacije obojestransko, tako »od zgoraj«, kot »od spodaj«; skozi materialne okoliščine in prizorišča ter interakcije posameznikov na prizorišču. Šavrinska identiteta se je oblikovala skozi interakcije oz. aktivnosti posameznikov; konkretno skozi preprodajo, tihotapljenje, pešačenje in poznavanje poti med Istro in Trstom, pripovedovanje, spominjanje ter šele zatem skozi zapisovanje pripovedi in spominov. Identifikacije so namreč fluidne in spremenljive (Drummond 1980) ter se (re)organizirajo glede na spremenljiva, pogosto kaotična razmerja med materialnimi okoliščinami, interakcijami in podobami. Proces regionalizacije in nacionalizacije v Istri ter oblikovanje podobe Šavrinke pri tem ni izjema.8 Šavrinizacija dela Istre, je bila, kot je zapisal Borut Brumen, v 90. letih 20. stoletja proces slovenizacije oz. nacionalizacije novopečene slovenske Istre (Brumen 2002: 404), pozneje pa je bila bolj v povezavi z afirmacijo podeželske identitete v opoziciji z obalnimi mesti (Baskar 2002a: 130). Dandanes se zdi, da gre proces šavrinizacije v smeri fasaderstva9 turistične ponudbe ter da je nacionalno in ruralno-urbano razločevanje zasenčeno z romantiziranimi podobami stvarnih materialnih okoliščin iz življenja preprodajalk. Šavrini in Šavrinija so pri tem vnovič potisnjeni v ozadje, izstopa predvsem Šavrin-ka, tokrat v vlogi avtentičnega lika. Nedavno je Turistična razvojna agencija Autentica iz Kopra v sodelovanju s pisateljem Marjanom Tomšičem oblikovala poseben izletniški program »po poteh Šavrink«, kjer se je, kot pravi avtor članka v Primorskih novicah, »na poseben način poklonila liku Šavrinke« (31. 3. 2011, 65/66, 9). V obalnih mestih Slovenije je moč kupiti skulpture glinenih Šavrink, lutke Šavrinke ter razglednice s fotomontažo prizora z nekdanje trgovske poti, ki sicer navajajo, da je Šavrinka lik iz specifičnega podeželskega okolja severovzhodne Istre, obenem in bolj izrazito pa delujejo kot nadregionalna10 podoba nostalgičnega iskanja izgubljenega časa in avtentičnega življenja, značilnega za mitično rekonstrukcijo občutja tradici-
8	Proces regionalizacije je pri tem zgolj korak v procesu oblikovanja regionalne identitete, ki ustvarja teritorialne meje, simbole in inštitucije (Urbanc 2008). Medtem ko je na simbolni ravni oblikovanje regionalne identitete doseglo zrelost, pri raz/zamejevanju in zlasti na institucionalni ravni slovenski del Istre še ni dosegel stopnje stabilne regije(Urbanc 2007).
9	Fasaderstvo imenuje process ohranjanja podobe, ki se prilagaja turističnemu imaginariju, Aylin Orbajlí (2000).
10	Primerljive podobe podeželskih žensk je moč najti tudi v drugih turističnih središčih; npr. podobe žensk iz Provanse v obliki turističnih kipcev, razglednic ali lutk, lik kamnite ženske s košaro na glavi v Bujah ipd.
je, izkoreninjene zavoljo globalizacije (Selwyn 1996: 2). Gre za iskanje avtentičnosti, kot jo je, aplicirano na turistično situacijo, teoretiziral ameriški sociolog Dean MacCannell (1976; 1992)11 ali zgolj za igranje s podobami v postmodernem svetu, kot je turistične spektakle opisal John Urry (1990).
Če sklenemo povedano in pripeljemo Šavrinko s »prizorišča na prizorišče«; s prizorišča severovzhodnega višjega dela Istre, ki je bilo prizorišče preprodaje in interakcij, do prizorišča obujanja spominov in novih interakcij, ki je sicer še vedno umeščeno v severovzhodni višji del Istre in ga obenem že presega, vidimo, da je prizorišče, ki je bilo prej zgolj preliminarno definirano, postalo spričo interakcije med specifičnimi posamezniki, kulturniki in turističnimi akterji popolna ekspozi-cija tega, kar se je dogajalo (preprodaja), oz. tega, kar se dogaja (proces šavrinizaci-je, fasaderstvo in iskanje avtentičnosti). Tako lahko na turističnem izletu po poteh Šavrink okusimo »merendo nekdanjih Šavrink«, obiskovalcu se dogodi srečanje z domačinko, ki invocira preprodajalko z jajci. Na razglednicah lahko pokukamo v prizor iz življenja Šavrink ter naposled v stvarno krajino, kjer omenimo lito-punktirano impozantno hrastoveljsko Šavrinko. Z besedami Milesa Richardsona: materialne okoliščine postanejo iz implicitne preliminarne definicije eksplicitne in dopolnjene, družbena situacija pa postane fizično umeščena (Richardson 2003: 85) bodisi v obliki kamnite ali (za)igrane Šavrinke. Pri tem literarna produkcija za oblikovanje simbolnih podob in kolektivnega subjekta (Accati 2001: 134-135) ni zgolj (iz)rabila polpreteklega življenja trgovk oz. Šavrink, ampak so tudi posamezne trgovke, v našem primeru Marija Franca, (iz)rabile priložnost upovedovanja svoje zgodbe, individuacije in vstopanja v zgodovino kot posameznice. In tudi ni literarna produkcija oblikovala zgolj šavrinskih identifikacij oz. istovetenja, marveč je (pre)oblikovala tudi krajino in siceršnje materialne okoliščine istrskega podeželja.
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UDK 39(497.472+497.571):821.163.6.09
Špela Ledinek Lozej, Nataša Rogelja
ZRC SAZU Institute of Slovene Ethnology, Research Station Nova Gorica, ZRC SAZU Slovene Migration Institute, Ljubljana
THE ŠAVRINKA, ŠAVRIN, AND ŠAVRINIJA IN ETHNOGRAPHY AND LITERATURE
The paper is based on ethnographic fieldwork of migrant workers in Istria and an analysis of selected works of literature which directly or indirectly interpret the phenomenon of Šavrinkas, Šavrins and Šavrinija, and which played a crucial role in the »Šavrinization« of the northeastern Istrian countryside. Our current understanding of Šavrinija arises from semi-recent literary production which focuses on female egg sellers, or Šavrinkas, while the ethnographic data reveal shades of overlapping, interweaving and separation among the numerous pedlars and the literary depictions of Šavrinkas, and emphasise the importance of material culture in the formation of literary and regional symbols.
Key words: Šavrinization, processes of identity formation, labor migration, female labor, Istria
1 Introduction
The process of identity formation of the Šavrinka and Šavrinija at the end of the twentieth century and the literarization of the Šavrinka are mutually interconnected. Therefore it is no surprise that the majority of the explanations of the regionalization and nationalization of Istria and the formation of Šavrinian identity focus primarily on the analysis of literary, and to some extent other artistic depictions of the Šavrinka and Šavrinija (Baskar 2002a, 2002b; Brumen 2000; Mihelj 2006; Urbanc 2011). The figure of the Šavrinka (i.e., »woman from Šavrinija«) inspired and attracted the attention of artists, salvagers, and collectors of folk materials, as can be seen starting with Alojz Kocjančič's Šavrinske pesmi [Šavrinian poems 1962], and particularly with the publication Marjan Tomšič's novels, novellas, and stories at the end of the 1980s (Tomšič 1983, 1986, 1990, 1993). Explanations of the formation of Šavrinian identity have focused to a lesser extent on the material culture and lives of the individuals who played important roles in creating the literary, artistic, and folkloristic images of the Šavrinka (Ledinek and Rogelja 2000).
This article looks at the process of the formation of the literary image and Šavrinian identity from the opposite direction, through the focal point of ethnography,1 the
1 The use of the word ethnography in modern anthropological and ethnological literature is associated with both the selection of data collected through careful fieldwork and a specific method or series of specific methods, first and foremost participant observation carried out by the researcher, and the establishment of a dialogue with the observed subjects in the form of structured, semi-structured or unstructured interviews (for more on ethnography see Hammersley and Atkinson 1995). The ethnographic research for this article was done between 1994 and 1996, based on conversations with (former) Istrian pedlars and their relatives from Boršt, Dol, Gračišče and Kubed, and their customers in Istria, Kaldir and Vrhovščina, and
particular material culture, and lives of individuals. Based, on the one hand, on the ethnography of worker migrations in Istria in the previous century, which were embedded in and conditioned by the physical and geographical characteristics of the area and socio-historical circumstances, and on the other on a review of selected literature, as well as artistic and folkloristic production which directly or indirectly interprets the Savrinka, Savrins, and Savrinija, the paper first focuses on the life stories of female migrant workers from northeastern Istria who were engaged in trade between central Istria and Trst (Trieste) in the twentieth century. Using the actual life stories of Istrian female pedlars as a basis, the second part presents the complex of settings or material culture, the interactions of individuals within these settings, and the emerging images that contributed to the »Savrinization« of the Istrian countryside. The analysis borrows from Miles Richardson's article Being-in-the-Market versus Being-in-the-Plaza: Material Culture and the Construction of Social Reality in Spanish America (2003), which presents a methodological basis for the concept of embodied space.2 The author's premise in explaining the embodied market and plaza is that "being-in-the-world" is both a material-spatial and a cultural fact (Low and Lawrence Zuniga 2003: 5). Richardson presents the process through which material culture determines a situation and how a situation reflexively affects material culture as having three components: 1) the initial definition of the material culture in a setting; 2) the interactions which occur within that setting; and 3) the images formed on the basis of the material culture and interactions and which complement the initial definition through a new sense and understanding of place (Richardson 2003: 76). In the final stage of this otherwise mutual process, the setting becomes the depiction of the emerging situation, or in other words, the social situation becomes physically expressed (Richardson 2003: 85).3 The mutual relationship between the settings, social interactions and images will be presented below on the basis of the geographical layout and the economic and political situation of the trade routes between Istria and Trst, the social interactions and emerging images on and alongside the trade routes through the twentieth century, including the awakening of memories and literary production.
2 The Life Story of Marija Franca of Gracisce4
Marija Franca was born on 5 February 1907 in Gracisce. She and her eight brothers and sisters grew up in a house with their grandparents, the families of three of
conversations with the writer Marjan Tomšič, the sculptor Jože Pohlen, a representative of the Šavrini inu anka Šavrinke cultural-artistic society, Marija Knez, and a representative of the Šavrinske pupe en ragaconi society, Rožana Koštial; and the personal experience of walking the circular trade route through Gračišče, Vrhovščina nad Buzetom, and Trieste from 14 to 18 July 1995.
2	Embodied space is a space that is understood or conceptualized on the basis of or through actual bodily experience. For more detail, see Low and Lawrence Zuniga (2003: 3) and Muršič (2006: 48-54).
3	Matej Vranješ conducted a comparable study of the relationship between material culture or settings and social praxis and interactions (2008: 111).
4	Unless otherwise stated, the excerpts are from interviews with Marija Franca, conducted as part of fieldwork between 1994 and 1996.
their father's brothers, and a bachelor uncle. Her elementary schooling was part in Slovene and part in Italian. During the autumn she would gather chestnuts on her way to school. Her parents would use the money earned from selling them to buy their children clothes and shoes for the winter. Every time they brought their chestnuts to Trst, they brought one of their children with them. Marija would count the days and nights until it was her turn (Franca 1992). At the end of the WW I she began earning her own keep. When she was fourteen, her father accompanied her and her older sister to Istria. Marija traded with people in the Vrhovščina region, in the villages above Buzet.
The Croatian Istrians received us graciously without exception. They were kind and hospitable, especially with us beginners. They offered us food and accommodations. If there was nowhere else, we slept in the hay barn. We were overjoyed that we too had found our own people. From then on we went to the same villages every week. [...] We didn't know that we were from »Šavrinija«. [...] They called us Šavrinkas, but they also used our names. They were respectful. When the children's mother would call and say that they had to come home, because a Šavrinka had come, they asked me: »What can we say, a Šavrinka has come?« They were afraid that I would be offended.
In 1927 Marija married Jožef Franca, from a neighboring house that her older sister Ana had already married into. She had four children with Jožef: Marija, Ivan, Jolanda, and Cvetko. Jožef worked on the family farm and worked as a day-laborer on larger farms, while Marija went to Istria. By marrying into the Franca family, Marija became the daughter-in-law of Jožef's mother, Ivana Franca, who was one of the first female pedlars from Gračišče to trade in central Istria. Marija and her sister Ana would take turns collecting eggs, chickens, meats and spirits, taking them to Trst to sell them, and helping to care for the children.
Marija was widowed during WW II. Since she owned some land, she did not receive any vouchers or other state social support, so despite the new circumstances regarding the borders, regulations and customs, she began to trade again. With a special permit she was occasionally able to cross the border between Zone A and Zone B, carrying goods for sale across the newly drawn borders. During the night she became a kontrabantarka (contraband carrier, or smuggler), though her work wasn't significantly different. In 1947 she was accused of participating in smuggling people across the border and spent seven months in prison in Pula. After 1947 she occasionally continued to sell goods between Vrhovščina and Trst. She rode the bus to Buzet and continued on foot to the villages around Vrh. At sales and shops in Trst and on the Ponte Rosso she purchased t-shirts, jeans, undergarments, cloth, and dishes, and brought it all to the places where decades earlier she had traded eggs for kerosene and thread. She continued to trade until she was eighty. When she had the chance she visited with people from Istria for the rest of her life. Except for her sister in Gračišče she had no friends. She found them in the teachers and students at the school in Gračišče. She had a lot of time and loved to talk about Šavrinkas. Marija died on St. Ann's day in 1996. She is buried at the cemetery in Kubed. (Ledinek and Rogelja 2000: 21-35)
3 The (Co)generation of the Šavrinian Identity: A Complex of Settings, Interactions and (Literary) Images
3.1	The Setting: Marija Franca's Trade Route on the Geographic, SocioEconomic and Political Map
The village of Gračišče is located in the northeastern, higher-lying part of Istria at an elevation of 300 meters above sea level. It is twenty-three kilometers from Trst, and twenty-seven kilometers from Buzet. Towards Buzet, which lies at forty meters above sea level, Marija's former trade route follows a winding side road that climbs towards Vrhovščina. The one-hour climb passes by the Maruški, Jagodičje and Marčeva njiva and reaches the summit plateau at the settlement of Čelo. The route continues along the now-paved road to the village of Sveti Donat and towards the settlement of Vrh (which means 'peak' or 'summit'), 380 meters above sea level. From there it leads towards the surrounding villages of Dol, Dobrovo, Klarici, Potoki, Medveje, Marčineško polje, Marčinegla, Paladini, Ščulci, Barušici, Luskici, Senj, Sovinjak and Sovinjaško polje, which lie on the ridges leading down from the central village of Vrh. The circular route through the settlements of Vrhovščina is around 25 kilometers long. The route from Gračišče towards Trst leads through Kubed, drops down towards Rižana, crosses the river at Mostičje and then climbs up towards Črni Kal. Before Črni Kal it drops into the Osp Valley and leads past Gabrovica and Osp along the level road towards the former small border crossing between Yugoslavia and Italy. On the Italian side it climbs up to Mačkovelje (It. Caresana), from where you can see Trst with the refinery in the foreground. From there it leads down towards the centre of town, to Tesi, Molino Vento and Bosco streets, where in the first half of the twentieth century there were barns for livestock in transit, and further on to the former retail area on Garibaldi Square with its statue of Our Lady atop a column.
The entire circular route, from Gračišče to Vrhovščina and back and to Trst and back, is 125 km (77 miles) long. Between 1920 and 1940, Marija Franca walked this route once a week in three or four days. In comparison, the routes of the female bread sellers from Škedenj and the milkmaids from the Koper hinterland were more urban and much shorter than Marija's route.
3.2	Interactions along the Trade Route
Once a week during the 1920s and 1930s Marija, either by herself or together with other female pedlars from Gračišče and nearby Kubed, headed for central Istria in the early morning. Near Buzet the pedlars would separate to visit their steady customers. At the crossroads they left signade, agreed upon signals with which they told each other which direction they had gone. The pedlars had steady and reliable suppliers and customers, and established routes. They came to the villages on the agreed day and at the agreed time, regardless of the weather and other conditions. The older relatives and friends would pass their steady customers down to younger ones, or would stand in for them if they were pregnant, caring for children or sick. Since the
customers in Vrhovščina were often even poorer than the pedlars, they frequently gave their customers goods on credit, which they gradually paid off with eggs. In the villages above Buzet the customers gave the pedlars food, drinks and accommodations. In this way a network of trust and assistance was formed in addition to the trade network. The pedlars spent a night or two in central Istria and left for home first thing in the morning, stopping off at the prearranged time in Buzet or Motovun.
The pedlars from Gračišče and Kubed left for Trst around midnight, often the same night, in order to reach the town by five in the morning. They rendezvoused at the edge of the village and continued on together towards Kubed and Rižana. The first part was dedicated to prayer, after which they sang, chatted, did business, told each other jokes, laughed, and napped. On the basis of their shared experiences and trading, bonds of support formed among the pedlars. Before arriving in Trst they were inspected by the city inspectors to make sure they were not carrying any contraband, such as spirits. They left their donkeys with the owners of the barns, with whom it paid to have good relations, since they could give them information about sales locations and employment. Some of them sold eggs and other goods to the milkmaids, who delivered milk to the bourgeois households, while others had steady customers, bakeries, and shops where they could sell larger quantities; and a third group sold at retail in various squares and markets. When they had sold the eggs their customers had ordered and bought the things they needed at home, before leaving they occasionally met in a betola, an inn which offered cheap fare. From Trst they brought their eagerly waiting families various treats: cookies for the children, and tobacco and cigarette papers for the men. The pedlars of Gračišče sold eggs and various other items in the towns around Buzet and Motovun and in Trst and other coastal communities until WW II, when the border cut off the route between Trst and Istria, first between Zone A and Zone B of the Julian March, from 1947 to 1954 between Yugoslavia and Zones A and B of the Free Territory of Trst, and from 1954 on between Italy and Yugoslavia. After 1954 Marija Franca bought undergarments, jeans and t-shirts in the shops in Trst, and smuggled them across the Yugoslav-Italian border, either by herself or with the help of family members living in Trst. She often brought her daughter and later her niece with her, but never her sons or nephews.
In the 1970s and 1980s trading was no longer necessary for survival, but was a habitual economic and social practice of individuals, which allowed them to make some extra income as well as maintaining an awareness and rekindling memories of life in the first half of the twentieth century, among other things of trading between Istrian villages and the coastal towns. Awakening memories of the period of egg sellers and maintaining social contacts with the people of central Istria continued in the last decades of the twentieth century through occasional visits. At Marija Franca's house this was further strengthened by conversations with teachers from the school in Gračišče, who rented a room from her, and particularly meeting and living with teacher and writer Marjan Tomšič. At first she told stories about the first half of the twentieth century, and later, encouraged by Tomšič, she recorded them in three notebooks entitled Šavrinske zgodbe [Šavrinian Stories] (Franca 1990; 1992; 1995). At the same time Tomšič published the novels Šavrinke [Šavrinian women 1986] and Zrno od frmen-tona [Grain of corn 1993], the novells Olive in sol [Olives and salt 1983] and Kažuni
(1990) (kazuni are traditional Istrian stone houses) as well as other literary works into which he weaved Marija's memories. The fruitful cohabitation between the widowed (former) tradeswoman and the writer led to a wider wave of interest in the travelling saleswomen of the recent past, including the establishing of the Savrini inu anka Savrinke (Savrinian men and also Savrinian women) cultural-artistic society, which began operating in Gracisce and the nearby villages and which incorporated and recreated in its performances both actual events from Marija Franca's and various other pedlars' memories and stories from Tomsic's literature, thus blurring the line between the material image of the pedlars and the literary image of Savrinkas.
3.3 Images
In the first half of the twentieth century, two images of pedlars were formed among the villagers. The first was of a hard-working, courageous, physically tough, and tireless woman, who was responsible for the survival of and for contributing to the household. Pedlars were therefore sought after as brides, women who did not go to Istria envied them, while their daughters and nieces (in addition to the treats they brought) also enjoyed the occasional visits to Istria or Trst when their older relatives took them along. Transferring the business, handing over and exchanging customers primarily along the female lines, between mothers-in-law and daughters-in-law, aunts and nieces, sisters and sisters-in-law, and finally every week everyone helping at least partly to transport the sales items, strengthened the bonds among the pedlars, empowered the women and created a positive feminine (self)image. The other image was similarly an image of a strong, independent, worldly, experienced woman with excellent communications skills, who left the house every day and headed into the Istrian wilderness and the bright lights of Trst. While the first was a sought after bride, the second skirted the edge of legitimacy. The ethnography thus records that some men forbade their wives from leaving the house to trade.
Interactions with the people of central Istria also led to the formation of two images of these pedlars, who their customers in central Istria in fact called or labelled »Savrinkas«, since they were supposed to be, as they stated, from »Savrinija«. »Savrinkas« were on one hand clever pedlars who, they say, »haggled hard and paid fairly«, and walked about by themselves, without being accompanied by their husbands. The ethnographic data also indicate unambiguously negative connotations associated with the labels Savrinka and Savrin.5 On the other hand the same Savrinkas brought all sorts of items and information from Trst, and often gave them goods on credit, and thereby, as Marija Franca stated, one impoverished group supported another.
These images of the pedlars or Savrinkas were the basis upon which writers, artists, and other creative people; collectors of folk crafts, and later also singers, cultural and folklore groups created the figure of the Savrinka in the second half of the twentieth century. They emphasised the elements dictated by their personal inclinations and individual social circumstances—suffering (Kocjancic 1962), independence,
5 See the life story of Marija Franca above.
refinement, courage, and eroticism (Tomšič 1986), the greatness and caryatid-like qualities in the depictions of sculptor and painter Jože Pohlen and the resourcefulness emphasised in the performances of the local cultural-artistic societies.
Alojz Kocjančič6 in his poems »Kubejskim Šavrinkam« [To the Šavrinkas of Kubed] and »Materi« [To mother], published in his collection Šavrinske pesmi described Šavrinkas as mothers who sacrifice themselves for their children. Sabina Mihelj established that the metaphor of a Šavrinka is used in this sense as a figure of national/regional history or as its antithesis. Similarly to the way that the metaphor of the family offers a convenient developmental story for Slovenian national history, but is in fact devoid of historical significance and removed from the levers of power, the figure of the mother is equated with Istria (cf. the poem »Istra - mati« [Istria -mother]), and the poet is her son (Mihelj 2006: 372). The equating of Šavrinkas, Istrian women, and mothers can also be seen in the name of the imposing statue in Hrastovlje, the work of sculptor and painter Jože Pohlen, which upon its ceremonious installation in 1990 was called Istranka (Istrian woman), but was already referred to by the locals as Šavrinka during the time we were doing our fieldwork. Kocjančič's emphasis of the motherly element is no coincidence, as his mother actually was involved in trading between Kubed, central Istria, and Trst. The point is that it was not just not-yet-wed girls and widows who were involved in trading in the higher-lying northeastern parts of Istria (Brumen 2000; Ravnik 1996: 82-83), but also married women, who with the help of their female relatives balanced their intimate family lives with their profitable activities. The writer Marjan Tomšič, in addition to the motherly and wifely images of Šavrinkas, also emphasised their autonomy and active role in (public) life (Tomšič 1986). Contrary to the general beliefs and findings of various researchers who divided male and female roles along active/passive and/ or public/private lines,7 in Tomšič's writings Šavrinkas are presented as self-reliant, independent, and active individuals whose role as breadwinners was never negligible (Ledinek and Rogelja 2000: 90; Mihelj 2006: 371-372). In parallel with Tomšič, in addition to Marija France, Šavrinkas, and Šavrinija are also mentioned by Rafael Vidali in his collection of poems Cubejske žrjavce [Coals of Kubed 1989] and Edel-man Jurinčič in his prose collection Istrani [Istrians 1991]. All three of these writers are considered Tomšič's students, who collectively fleshed out and constructed the figure of the Šavrinka as it began to be consolidated towards the end of the twentieth century.8 It seems that the »literarized« image of Šavrinkas in the 1980s and 1990s, during the time of the fall of Yugoslavia, was an apposite and sufficiently attrac-
6	Kocjančič's use of the term Šavrinka in 1962 marked its first appearance in literature (Baskar 2002).
7	Lidia Sciama has already noted the ambiguity and difficulty of such dichotomies, which are popular in structuralist analyses. On the basis of fieldwork conducted in Italy and a rereading of ethnography in which the opposition between private and public was examined, she explores such oppositions in The Problem of Privacy in Mediterranean Anthropology (Sciama 1997: 90-104).
8	Although the work of these artists was the most widely noted, Šavrins and Šavrinkas are mentioned in the work of various collectors of folk goods and literati even before their popularization in the nineteen-eighties and nineties. At the initiative of ethnologists Milko Matičetov and Pavel Merku, collector Nadja Rojac Orfano wrote about the Šavrinian folk tradition in Gažon and its vicinity and in Trst (Rojac Orfano 1977: 200-211).
tive image for the Savrinization of Istria and the discovery of the Savrinian identity (Baskar 2002a), which more than the national division of Slovene from Croatian Istrians (Brumen 2000) or the Istrian countryside from the coastal towns (Baskar 2002a: 130) was preserved and consolidated in the twenty-first century in searching for local specialities, authenticity and fasadism (Orba?u 2000) for the needs of tourism and tourism-related events (MacCannell 1976, 1992).
4 Conclusion
Some researchers of the Savrinization of Istria lean towards the thesis that the geographical and political reduction of Savrinkas to egg-sellers from the southeastern part of Istria is primarily the result of the effect of the writers and artists who created an attractive image of Savrinkas, which grew into a symbol that became the basis for initiating the process of the discovery of the Savrinian identity at the end of the twentieth century. Bojan Baskar, for instance, believes that the Kubed-Gracisce-Hrastovlje redefinition of Savrinkas is not a purely literary or fictional invention (Baskar 2002a: 127), despite the fact that his explanation is based on an analysis of literary and geographic production. The ethnography attests that in addition to literary production, the actual material culture was also crucial to such reduction, as the pedlars who worked in central Istria and in a certain period actually did trade primarily in eggs (as well as other items at that time and later), encountered the specific use of the ethnic label »Savrini« (Savrinians) at that very location. In contrast with the milkmaids, bread sellers, and other (re)sellers, who did not collect their goods in central Istria but were tied solely to the coastal towns, the travelling saleswomen from Gracisce, Kubed, and the surrounding villages had contacts with the inhabitants of central Istria, who called them Savrinkas because, as they said, they were from »Savrinija«. The long and arduous journey on foot - in the case of Marija Franca over a 125-kilometer long circular route between Istria and Trst—was a material fact on which the image of the courageous, long-suffering and heroic Savrinka was based. While Alois Spincic, the author of an entry on Savrinkas in volume 9 of Avstro-Ogrske monarhije v besedi in sliki [The Austro-Hungarian Empire in words and pictures 1891: 215], and Simon Rutar, the author of the book Samosvoje mesto Trst in mejna grofija Istra [The independent city of Trst and the border county of Istria 1896: 175], did not emphasise mobility and trade between Istria and Trst at the end of the nineteenth century, it seems that mobility on foot and contacts with customers in central Istria were precisely the crucial elements in the formation of the image of Savrinkas in the second half of the twentieth century.
It should also be emphasised that in the process of the formation of the figure of the Savrinka, individuals were not merely passive receivers of the images but also played (and play) an active role in their formation. The process of regionalization is therefore not merely the invention or discovery, awakening or reappropriation of identity (Baskar 2002a: 115), in the sense of the promotion or popularization of the Savrinian identity by local and external artistic/cultural promoters and the specific political circumstances in the 1990s (Brumen 2000); the process of Savrinization operates bilaterally, both »from above« and »from below«—through the material culture and
settings and the interactions of individuals within the settings. The Šavrinian identity was formed through the interactions or activities of individuals—specifically through trade, smuggling, walking, and knowledge of the routes between Istria and Trst, storytelling, recollections and only later through recording the stories and memories. Identifications are fluid and changeable (Drummond 1980) and are (re)organized with respect to the changeable, often chaotic relationships between material culture, interactions and images. The process of regionalization and nationalization in Istria and the formation of the image of Šavrinkas is no exception.9 The Šavrinization of a part of Istria in the 1990s was, as Borut Brumen wrote, a process of the Sloveniza-tion or nationalization of the newly created Slovene Istria (Brumen 2002: 404), and later it was more connected with the affirmation of the identity of the countryside as opposed to the coastal towns (Baskar 2002a: 130). Today it seems that the process of Šavrinization is tending towards the fasadism10 of tourist attractions and that the national and rural/urban distinctions are being overshadowed by romanticized images of the material culture of the lives of the pedlars. Šavrins and Šavrinija are thus once again forced into the background, while Šavrinkas come to the foreground, this time in the role of an authentic figure. The Autentica Tourism Development Agency of Koper in cooperation with writer Marjan Tomšič has recently created a special programme of excursions »following the routes of the Šavrinkas«, which, according to the author of an article in the Primorske novice, »pays respect to the figure of the Šavrinka in a special way« (Primorske novice, 31 March 2011, 65/66: 9). In the coastal towns of Slovenia you can buy ceramic sculptures of Šavrinkas, Šavrinka dolls, and postcards with a photo collage of scenes from a former trade route, all suggesting that the Šavrinka is a figure from the specific country environment of northeastern Istria, but at the same time and more explicitly works as a supra-regional11 image of the nostalgic search for a lost era and an authentic life characteristic of the mythical reconstruction of the sense of tradition uprooted by globalization (Selwyn 1996: 2). It speaks to a search for authenticity, which was theorized with respect to tourism by American sociologist Dean MacCannell (1976; 1992)12 or simply playing with images in the postmodern world, as John Urry (1990) described spectacles for tourists.
So let us summarize the above and accompany a Šavrinka from »setting to setting«—from the setting of higher-lying northeastern Istria, the setting of trade and interactions, to the setting of the awakening of memories and new interactions, which is still located in the northeastern part of Istria but is at the same time already
9	The process of regionalization is here merely a step in the process of the formation of the regional identity, which forms territorial borders, symbols and institutions (Urbanc 2008). While on the symbolic level the formation of the regional identity has reached maturity, in terms of demarcation and in particular on the institutional level the Slovene part of Istria has not yet achieved the level of a stable region (Urbanc 2007).
10	Fasadism describes the process of preserving an image which conforms to the tourist imagination (OrbajlI 2000).
11	Similar images of country women can be found in other tourism centres; e.g. the images of women from Provence in the form of souvenir statuettes, postcards or puppets, the figure of the stone woman with a basket on her head in Buje etc.
12	MacCannell's tourist goes on holiday by cognitively constructing or reconstructing structures which modernity is destroying (MacCannell 1976, 1992).
transcended. A setting which was previously only preliminarily defined became in the presence of interactions between specific individuals, cultural actors and proponents of tourism a perfect exposition of what had happened (trading) or what is happening (the process of Šavrinization, fasadism and the search for authenticity). Thus on a tour along the trade routes of the Šavrinkas you can sample the »merenda (It. - snack) of the Šavrinkas«, visitors can meet a local woman who plays the part of an egg seller—i.e., a Šavrinka, on postcards we can peek into scenes from the lives of Šavrinkas, and finally, view the imposing lithopuncture statue of the Šavrinka in Hrastovlje. Or, as Miles Richardson wrote, the final step in the process of incorporating the setting into the ongoing situation is the objectification of the sense of the situation upon the setting so that the setting becomes a material image of emerging situation (Richardson 2003: 85), either in the form of stone or portrayed Šavrinkas. Here the literary production is not merely the utilization of the lives of the pedlars (Šavrinkas) in order to form symbolic images and a collective subject (Accati 2001: 134-35), but also allowed the individual pedlars, in our case Marija Franca, to take advantage of the opportunity to tell their stories and individuate themselves, and thus enter history as individuals. Furthermore, the literary production not only created Šavrinian identity, but also (re)shaped the landscape and the overall material culture of the Istrian countryside.
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