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Folk Legends as Resources for the Investigation of Hidden Treasure Places

Summary/Abstract: The hidden treasure places are the places about which people tell that there once has been or still lies a hidden treasure. The place names usually contain words related to treasures - "money", "treasure", "gold" or "silver". The cultural historical landscape of Latvia includes places like Treasure hills, Treasure waters (Silver Spring, Money Dell), Treasure pits, and Treasure stones. In order to find out the functions and the meaning of the treasure places in the cultural historical environment, Latvian folklore resources, both published and unpublished-mostly folk legends about the hidden treasures-were used for investigation. From approximately 2000 folk legends about hidden treasure there were selected only those legends in which the name of the hidden treasure place was mentioned. Usually, the name of the hidden treasure place is mentioned either in the title, in the beginning in or in the end of a legend, for example, "since that time the pond has been named a silver pond". According to the existing information of the folk legends, the localization ol hidden treasure places is possible only in some cases - the localization of a place is mostly possible only in the borders of one parish. The investigated folk legends about the hidden treasure were used as a sig nificant source of information, which helped to explain the origins of names related to the hidden treasure, as well as to identify statements about the hidden treasure place and analyse the significance of searching this treasure in the old days and nowadays.

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