SEMANTIC MICROSYSTEMS IN THE FOLK CALENDAR AS A MNEMONIC TOOL (BASED ON DATA FROM THE KOSTROMA REGION)

The article is devoted to the main structural principle of the Russian folk calendar — the building of calendar semantic microsystems. The ways of forming systemic oppositions in pairs or rows of calendar names are analyzed based on the material of modern chrononymy from Kostroma region (more than 5,500 records in the field files of the Toponymic Expedition of Ural University). The author focuses on cases when chrononyms contain the same lexical component (which can be terminological, e. g. fasting eve, fast, Sunday, week, etc., or properly onomastic, e. g. Kazanskaya, Nikola, etc.) and variable element (differentiating epithet), cf.: The First Maslenitsa ‘Monday on Maslenaya week’ — The Second Maslenitsa ‘Sunday on Maslenaya week’, Spring Yegoriy ‘6.05’ — Autumn Yegoriy ‘16.11’ — Winter Yegoriy ‘9.12’, Junior babye leto (Indian summer) ‘period from 28.08 to 14.08’ — Senior babye leto (Indian summer) ‘period from 14.09 to 21.09’, Pork fasting eve ‘27.11’ — Meat fasting eve ‘Sunday before Maslenaya week’ — Egg fasting eve ‘Sunday after Trinity’ — Apple fasting eve ‘22.08’, etc. The author supposes that the creation of semantic microsystems can be considered as one of the effective mnemonic techniques. It helps the bearers of tradition to hierarchize the corresponding calendar events, to distinguish them functionally and integrate them into the annual cycle, as well as to restore the forgotten members of the oppositions using analogies with the preserved ones. It is especially significant in the recent decades, when the traditional calendar is ruined.