No Maslenitsa week in the last century Moscow was complete without a bear performance. Such performances were quite p[popular among all strata of the population living in big cities, small towns and in villages. Some centuries ago such performances were considered sinful and were condemned. Still, in spite of all bans and reprisals, the bear performances survived and continued to sport peasants, boyars, ordinary craftsmen, children and adults and even tsars. From time immemorial tamers with their bears used to go from town to town giving performances and earned good money that way. Thus in 1570 when Ivan the Terrible was going to marry Marpha Sobakina he sent a special messenger to Novgorod and ordered him to bring the buffoons with tame bears to the wedding. People associated a bear with a leshy (wood-goblin), the pagan god VELES, therefore bear was believed to possess the magical healing power. The peasants considered a bear to be stronger than the Devil and to be able to chase away the evil. If a bear dances near a house and walks round it, this house is insured against a fire. This attitude transpired into the tendency of nicknames that a bear actor was given - these nicknames were sometimes humorous but they were always given with some sort of respect. Tamed bears amused the public playing either girls before mirrors putting their make-up, or women baking pancakes. The all-time companion of an actor bear was a "bearded goat" - a boy dressed in a sack of canvas with the headgear in the form of a goat's head with horns on it. A wooden tongue was often tabbed to the head and made a hell of a noise when it was clapping. The "goat" danced round the bear actor teasing him and picking him with the wooden tongue. The bear went berserk, roared and pranced around his tamer, which meant he was dancing. When this awkward dance was over, a tamer put a hat into the bear's paws and the bear walked through the audience and people threw money into the hat. Quite often a tamer and his bear actor were treated to vodka. When drunk enough, a tamer proposed "wrestling round" to his bear. More often then not such "rounds" ended deplorably for a tamer. On the whole, the Bear's Comedy consisted of three distinct parts, which could be performed in any succession - a bear's dance with a "goat", a bear's performance accompanied by tricks and jokes of a tamer, a wrestle of a tamer or a "goat" with a bear. The wrestle of a man with a bear as a demonstration of strength, knack and valour was especially popular among folks. Such shows were arranged to sport not only the nobility, but common folks too as both tsars' servants specially hired for this purpose and amateurs came out to fight with a bear. Since a bear was the main character of the show, he had the attention of the entire audience. As soon as the animal stood up on his hind legs, people involuntarily began to compare bear with themselves and different types of people. Suddenly it turned out that the bear's moves, appearance, clumsiness and incoherent "conversation" (gnarls and roars) are the traits characteristic to the people who are not very clever, clumsy, good-humored, sometimes dopey and usually luckless.
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