The vertep is a traditional Ukrainian Christmas theatre that combines puppet or live drama, music, singing, and ritual. Known in Ukraine since the late 16th century, it flourished in the Baroque era (17th–18th centuries) among wandering clerks and students. The classical vertep had a two-tiered box-“house”: above, the biblical story of the Nativity was played out; below, folk-life comic scenes.
The musical component of the vertep is the koliadky, shchedrivky, kanty, and songs that accompanied the action. The vertep carried Christmas joy through homes and squares, uniting a lofty spiritual drama with folk humour and satire. Forbidden and almost lost in the Soviet era, today the vertep is being actively revived as a vivid tradition of the Ukrainian Christmas — a living form of folk musical theatre over 400 years old.
