Martisor celebration as world heritage element - honoured in Chamber's plenary session

Deputies honoured on Wednesday in a plenary sitting the spring start celebration of 'Martisor', as an element of the world heritage.

"This is the first year we honour the 'Martisor' celebration as an element of the world heritage, it is for the first time that we talk about the 'Martisor' inscribed on the UNESCO's list. I wish for our traditions to be recognised in the entire world and I consider that showing respect for Romanians' customs is for us, parliamentarians, a moral duty, that is why I would like to bring to mind that the tradition of making and wearing a white-and-red braided thread with silk tassels was transmitted to us from the Antiquity and has been associated in modern times to the 1 March day. This thread that we call Martisor is created and given as a gift by women to the members of the community who used to wear it at the beginning of spring, at the wrist, and later on pinned to the chest," President of the UNESCO Committee Ionel Palar told the Deputies' Chamber plenary sitting, in his speech on the inscription in the UNESCO cultural heritage of the cultural practices associated to 1 March.

He added that researchers consider that the Martisor, beyond its role to spread joy at the beginning of spring and as a token of affection, was also assimilated to having a protective function and also a social one, of bringing together members of the community and recognising membership to a group.

"The future sessions of the Intangible Cultural Heritage Committee will discuss the proposal to inscribe in the intangible world heritage the "Embroidered shirt" file, that we all recognise as the Romanian ie," he said.AGERPRES(RO - author: Dana Piciu, editor: Georgiana Tanasescu; EN - author: Simona Iacob, editor: Maria Voican)