Bobbin lace by Mária Tuhárska from Senohrad
Bobbin lace by Mária Tuhárska from Senohrad
„No one knows where this art came from, or who invented it, or started it, or brought it to us. All they know is that it has been there since time immemorial.“
A. Kmeť about lace from the Senohrad area
Lace from Senohrad and surroundings
Lace from Senohrad and the surrounding villages belongs to the Hont, the so-called peasant lace. They were intended primarily for folk costumes and textiles. However, the production of miners' lace has also been documented in this area since the 17th century.
They became known to the world public in the second half of the 19th century. Among the first to mention them was Andrej Kmeť, who is the author of the scholarly article 'On embroidery and lace in Hont' (Tovaryšstvo 1, 1893). Kmeť was a Slovak polyhistorian, ethnographer and historian who worked as a chaplain in Senohrad from 1865 to 1968 and was very interested in the local dialect, folk clothing, especially embroidery and lace. He collected lace and embroidery in the area and began to promote it at various exhibitions and expositions (e.g. 1873 World Exhibition in Vienna, 1887 Exhibition of Slovak Folk Art in Martin under the auspices of Živena, 1891 Czechoslovak Exhibition in Prague, 1893 World Exhibition of Women's Work in Paris, 1895 Ethnographic Exhibition in Prague, Exhibition of Folk Art Production in Honta, 1904 World Exhibition in the USA).
Slovak lace, especially peasant lace, at the exhibition in Prague also attracted the attention of the teacher R. Bíbová and A. Smolková. In the series of books and studies they later published, lace from Hont and Senohrad had a prominent position. They state that such lace was made in the villages of Horní and Dolní Badín, Senohrad, Trpín, Kozí Vrbovok, Čabradský Vrbovok, Horné and Dolné Mladonice, Medovarce, Bzovík, Selce, Horní and Dolný Jalšovík.
It differed from other world and Slovak lace mainly in the way it was knitted. Most of the lace is knitted on a pre-drawn form (prívyk, furma, podvinok), but these were made tightly and by hand with a minimum of pins used.
Mária Tuhárska
Author Ema Marková describes narrow coloured 'freehand lace'. Freehand lace is worn on the forehead and is about 1.5 -2 cm long. It consists mainly of plait, braid, spiders' webs, eyelet and pricked weave and petals (flats). It was made with 9 -15 pairs of threads. The pattern knitted by Mária Tuhárska from Senohrad in the 1950s, mentioned by Marková, contained 'freehand lace' - 20 white and 20 coloured pieces of lace. The freehand lace was usually knitted from worsted or embroidery cotton.
In 1962, Ema Marková published a book Slovak Lace and in the case of Hontian laces, she mentions and publishes the laces of Maria Tuhárska. There are several laces depicted in the book. The author writes in a note that there were 20 white and 20 coloured laces. Some of M. Tuhárska's laces are also in the book by Géciová-Komorovská (1989). On the website where objects of Slovak cultural heritage are digitised (www.slovakiana.sk) there is a sampler of 30 laces, where it is mentioned that they are laces by M. Tuhárska. However, there are more than 20 coloured ones. At least two of the patterns are not by the same lacemaker, as evidenced by the technique of execution. Few laces have the name of the maker mentioned in the literature, so why is she mentioned so often?In the area around Senohrad, only the oldest inhabitants remember an older woman who knitted lace. You will not find her among the known natives.

Mária Tuhárska, birth name Cútová, was born 2.9.1895 in Senohrad.On 20.9.1911 at the age of 16 she married Juraj Tuhárský from the Detva area. In 1912 their daughter Anna was born. After the death of her husband in 1940, Maria took care of her sick mother. As a widow, she earned her living by bobbin making. According to memoirs, she lived rather lonely. For Dr. Emma Marková she made a sampler of 40 lace bonnets from the surroundings of Senohrad for the newly established ÚĽUV. Marková states that it was 20 white and 20 coloured laces - coffins. The laces are narrow, the narrowest is 1.2 cm and the widest 2 cm, but they are precisely knitted. Some of the laces are in the ÚĽUV depository and can be found on the website www.slovakiana.sk.
Maria died in 1973, but her legacy woven into the narrow lace has endured to this day.
Many of these patterns have been forgotten and nobody make lace according to them. I decided to draw and made them so that the work of M. Tuhárská could be continued by the next generation of lace makers.
