Shadows of a Forgotten World

The village of Bibury is located in the Cotswolds  —  a region in south-central England famous for its Cotswold stone (a type of limestone) and historic, charming villages. Along with the stone cottages, another feature of this region is its dry stone walls. While the oldest example of such a wall in the Cotswolds dates to about 2000 BC, most of the ones around today are from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. In the second half of the twenthieth century, these walls started to become redundant as the fields were being used more for growing crops rather than for raising livestock. Long streches of stone wall cannot be without gates or stiles. Walking around the fields of Bibury, I came across many stone stiles, and one wooden one.

Stiles, or perelazy in Ukrainian, are structures that provide people with a way to easily pass over a fence while at the same time preventing farm animals from passing through. Stiles are found in the countryside around the world and come in all kinds of forms. In the Carpathians, they are typically made of wood, and even in just one village I came across several different types. Perelazy from the beautiful Hustul village of Kryvorivnia Perelazy have even found their way into Ukrainian folklore: there are dozens of folk songs that feature perelazy in their texts. Ой не світи, місяченьку та й на той перелаз  (Oh, moon, don't shine on that perelaz) In fact, you can even karaoke sing about perelazy ! Перелаз, мій перелаз (Perelaz, my perelaz)