Kupala Night (also Kupala's Night or just Kupala; Polish: Noc Kupały, Belarusian: Купа́лле: Kupalle, Russian: Ива́н Купа́ла: Ivan Kupala, Купала: Kupala, Ukrainian: Івана Купала: Ivana Kupala) is one of the major folk holidays in some Slavic countries. It coincides with the Christian feast of the Nativity of St. John the Baptist and the East Slavic feast of Saint John's Eve. In folk tradition, it is revered as the day of the summer solstice and was originally celebrated on the shortest night of the year, which is either on 21-22 or 23-24 of June in Czechia, Poland, Slovakia, Bulgaria (where it is called Enyovden). These dates were also adopted in Ukraine as of 2023. Following the Julian calendar, it is celebrated on the night between 6 and 7 July in Belarus, Russia, and parts of Ukraine. The name of the holiday is ultimately derived from the Proto-Slavic word *kǫpati, meaning "to bathe".
A number of activities and rituals are associated with Kupala Night, such as gathering herbs and flowers to decorate people, animals, and houses with; entering natural bodies of water and bathing or dousing oneself in it, as well as setting garlands on the water; lighting and jumping over fires; singing, dancing; and hunting witches and scaring them away. It was also believed that on this day the sun plays and other wonders of nature happen. The celebrations are held near the water, on the hills, surrounding that; chiefly, young men and women participate in these folkloric traditions. The rituals and symbolism of the holiday may point to its pre-Christian origins.
Old East Slavic: kupalija, kupaly pl.
Russian: Ivan Kupala, Ivanov denʹ, Kupala, kupala, Kupalo
dialectal: kupalni pl.; kupal'nitsa : kupalenka "bonfire in the field"; Yarilo
Ukrainian: Ivan Kupalo, Sontsekres, Kupaylo, Kupaylytsa, kupala, kupalen’ka, kupa(y)lochka
Polesia: Ivan Petrov, Ivan Petrovny
Belarusian: kupalle, Jan Kupała
Polish dialects have retained loans from East Slavic languages:
Podlachia and Lublin: kupała, kąpała, kąpałeczka
Podlachia, Lublin, Sieradz, Kalisz: kupalonecka, kopernacka, kopernocka, kupalnocka
Another Polish name for this major folk holiday is Sobótka.
In Old Czech (15th century), there is attested kupadlo "a multicolored thread with which gifts were tied, given on the occasion of Saint John's Eve; a gift given to boys by girls on the occasion of Saint John's Eve". In Slovakia, the folk kupadla "Saint John's Eve".
According to many researchers, Kupala Night is a Christianized Proto-Slavic or East Slavic celebration of the summer solstice. According to Nikolay Gal'kovskiy, "Kupala Night combined two elements: pagan and Christian." The viewpoint on the pre-Christian origin of the holiday is criticized by historian Vladimir Petrukhin and ethnographer Aleksandr Strakhov. Whereas, according to Andrzej Kempinski, "The apparent ambivalence (male-female, fire-wood, light-dark) seems to testify to the ancient origins of the holiday alleviating the contradictions of a dual society." According to Holobuts’ky and Karadobri, one of the arguments for the antiquity of the holiday is the production of fire by friction.
The name appears as early as the Old East Slavic language stage. Izmail Sreznevsky, in his Materials for the Dictionary of the Old East Slavic Language, gives the entries: kupalija "Saint John's Eve" (In Hypatian Codex under year 1262: Litva že izŭgnaša Ezdovŭ na kanunŭ i Ivanę dn:i. na samaję kupalĭję), kupalo "baptist" (no example), kupaly pl. "St. John's Day" (a mirŭ otŭ Pokrova Bogorodicy do Ivana dne do Kupalŭ, a otŭ Ivana dne za dva lětŭ). Epigraph No. 78 in The Cathedral of Holy Wisdom in Veliky Novgorod, dated to the late 11th - early 12th century, contains an inscription Na Kupalię. According to ethnographer Vera Sokolova, Kupala is a later name that appeared among Eastern Slavs when the holiday coincided with the day of John the Baptist.
According to Max Vasmer, the name (Ivan) Kupala/Kupalo is a variant of the name (John the) Baptist (cf. Ukr. Ivan Khrestytel’) and it calques the ancient Greek equivalent (Iōánnēs ho) baptistḗs. Greek baptistḗs "baptist" derives from the verb baptízō "to immerse; to wash; to bathe; to baptize, consecrate, immerse in baptismal font", which in Old East Slavic was originally rendered by the word kǫpati/kupati "to bathe", later displaced by krĭstiti "to baptise". The Proto-Slavic form of the verb is reconstructed as *kǫpati "to dip in water, to bathe".
According to Mel’nychuk, the word Kupalo itself may come from Proto-Slavic *kǫpadlo (cf. OCz. kupadlo, SCr. kùpalo, LSrb., USrb. kupadło "bathing place"), which is composed of the discussed verb *kǫpati and the suffix *-dlo. The name of the holiday is related to the fact that the first ceremonial bath was taken during Kupala Night, and the connection to John the Baptist is secondary.
From the 17th century, sources suggest that the holiday is dedicated to the deity Kupala, whom the Slavs supposedly worshipped. However, modern researchers deny the existence of such a deity.