The Hutsuls are an ethnographic group of Ukrainian pastoral highlanders inhabiting the Hutsul region in the Carpathian Mountains.
They lived isolated in the mountains mostly without electricity or natural gas, with the closest neighbour living on the next hill.
They have become a symbol of Ukrainian culture and national energy in the west of Ukraine much the same way the Cossacks were such a symbol for the central Ukraine.
The Hutsuls are good Christians. If church attendance is any good indication of religiosity, then we can say that the Hutsuls are still very religious - it is only the very sick, too old or too young who do not go to church regularly.
Here, at Eastern Carpathian, there are wooden churches, whose floors are covered with lizhnyky. These rugs are made of pure sheep wool by local women using a technology that dates hundreds, if not thousands of years back.
To make Hutsul liznyk is used wool from sheep that are shepherd on the slopes of the Carpathian Mountains and natural inks to colour it. Hutsuls who make liznyks work a lot.
The traditional Hutsul home craft includes decorative towels, tablecloths, rugs and coverlets are done in warm colors, with the characteristic pattern and embroidery.
