Russian epics - heroes and characters. Heroes of Russian fairy tales, epics and folklore Which of these characters is folklore?
Several classes of heterogeneous creatures, usually known from folklore and
representing either people, or clearly anthropomorphic (i.e. having the appearance of a person) figures. These are, first of all, the so-called genealogical heroes, i.e. legendary founders of cities and ancestors of tribes.
For example, in the "Tale of Bygone Years" Kiy (the legendary founder of Kyiv, quite possibly a historical figure), his brothers Shchek,
Horeb and their sister Lybid. Close to them are historical figures who acquired
obvious mythological features in the popular consciousness: the first Russian princes of Scandinavian origin, Varangian brothers Rurik, Sineus and Truvor, prince
Vladimir the Red Sun and his heroes, as well as purely folklore characters Mikula Selyaninovich, Sadko and other magical heroes of epics and
fairy tales - Gorynya, Dubynya and Usynya, Svyatogor, Volkh (Volga), etc. The characters of the last row have, however, some “demonic” overtones, especially
The Magus, conceived by Martha Vseslavyevna from a serpent, is a wise epic werewolf, whose name is associated with the Magi, sorcery, and possibly with the name of Volos (Beles).
The considered group is joined by quite snake-like opponents of heroes and heroes: Nightingale the Robber (note that Nightingale is the name of Volos read in reverse: similar sound operations have been common since Indo-European times), the filthy Idol,
common Slavic demonic character The Fire Serpent and its closest folklore “relative” - the firebird (the serpent could fly at night in the form of a fiery ball scattering sparks; it carries treasures into the house of its owner, turning into a person, seduces girls and women, causing them to dry out and skinny, etc.), as well as the extremely similar Zmey Gorynych, Zmey
Tugarin, Zmiulan, etc. From the marriage of the Fire Serpent with an earthly woman, according to mythological stories, a werewolf is born (the Fire Wolf Serpent among the Serbs,
similar to the Russian Volga), subsequently defeating his father. Let us also recall all kinds of fairy-tale characters (Baba Yaga, Kashchei the Immortal and
etc.), located at the lower levels of the mythological hierarchy.
Let us finally mention the folklore and mythological personifications of various astronomical objects: the Sun, the Month, Dennitsa, Dawn. The last one is usually
Venus (the word "zorya" in Russian dialects could mean both "dawn" and
"star") - in conspiracies had many female names, often similar in sound to the series Mara-Marena-Makrina-Markita-Mokosh. The listed luminaries were the object of worship of the pagan Slavs, at the same time representing elements of one of the mythological codes - the astral. Ideas about
they obviously correlated with ideas about certain gods.
The opposition sun - month was included in the general set, correlating with
contrasts between male and female, day and night, etc.
East Slavic demonology
Perhaps the only section of Slavic mythology accessible to direct observation and study in its living functioning,
is demonology - a set of ideas about lower mythological creatures, thought to be identical to each other, “serial”, devoid of clearly distinguished individual traits. Information about them from folklorists and
ethnographers draw from a variety of sources, primarily from their own field recordings of conversations with representatives of traditional culture and works of a special folklore genre - short stories dedicated to meetings with
evil spirits that happened to the narrator himself or someone else (in
in the first case they are called blades of grass, in the second, when talking about a third person,
There were some). They were told at long evening gatherings, at night
fire (see the wonderful story “Bezhin Meadow” from “Notes of a Hunter”
Turgenev).
Folk legends have interpreted the origin of evil spirits in different ways.
They said that evil spirits were created by the devil, who imitated God during the creation of the world;
that Adam was ashamed to show God his many children, and those hidden by him became a dark force. They said that evil spirits are “those who rebelled against
God's angels cast down from heaven to earth and into Tartarus. Who fell into the water -
turned into a waterman, into a forest - into a forest one, into a house - into a brownie of the owners. By
Another version is that the forest people are cursed people. They did not exist at the creation of the world.
When Moses led the Jews to beautiful lands, they had to cross the sea. Moses divided the sea into two parts and led the Jews through dry land, followed by the Egyptian peoples who overtook them. Moses cursed the Egyptians, and the sea flooded them, but not all of them: those who were flooded with water turned into watermen and
mermaids, and those who remained on the shore - goblin (Vladimir province). "Despite the Christian appearance of the above explanations, we have before us clear remnants of pagan faith in numerous spirits of nature, embodying all spheres of the world known to man. The fact is that the Christian Church is not at all declared all these spirits, like the pagan gods, non-existent. As the philosopher, historian and culturologist L.P. Karsavin wrote about
situation in the late Roman Empire, Christianity, "religion of martyrs and
heroes in the era of persecution... became the dominant religion and absorbed the pagan world, which outwardly and incompletely joined it.<...>It does not deny the pagan gods and demons, but, revealing their demonic nature, calls the world to
saints and angels, the God-man and the Trinity Deity, ineffable in His incomprehensible Essence." Simply put, the ancient gods were declared demons, but no one doubted their existence. And the small demons of nature
and remained completely unchanged, probably even retaining their previous names.
Based on folk stories, you can even draw up approximate “portraits”
all kinds of evil spirits that traditional people constantly encountered.
Leshy (forester, forester, leshak, etc.), for example, appeared in the images of an ordinary person; an old man picking a bast shoe in the light of the moon; relative or friend; a man of enormous stature; a man in wool, with horns; lamb,
deer, whirlwind on the road. He is the owner of the forests and lives in an impenetrable thicket.
If an echo is heard through the forest, it means the goblin is responding. He loves to lead people astray, and then claps his hands and laughs loudly.
The “moral image” of the goblin is no less variable: he can appear either as a kind and honest simpleton, or as a terrible, evil cannibal. Lesovik is not indifferent to girls and women, whom he strives to take into his home and even take as wives, especially those cursed by someone (preferably close relatives). In general, people who are cursed or cursed with the mention of the devil, when in the forest, become easy prey for the devil. On the other hand, a goblin can protect a person from predatory animals and look after a child abandoned by his parents. He punishes those who do not fulfill their religious vows, but he can visit a guy he knows on holiday or drop by
Go to the pub to drink a bucket of vodka. But in any case, contacts with him seemed dubious and dangerous, and enlisting his help
(for example, in hunting) can only be performed by performing a ritual containing anti-Christian actions (shooting in the forest in the direction of the church bell or at the Holy Gifts carried away on the cheek after communion, etc.).
Vodyanoy (vodovik, crowberry, water grandfather, etc.) - often the same black
and shaggy, like a goblin, but can be a lamb, a child, a dog,
a drake, a swan, a fish and an old man. He lives at the bottom of a deep lake or river, in a pool, under a water mill (millers were usually suspected of
relations with the water owner). At night, it happens that he crawls ashore and
scratches hair; his wife, an ugly water woman, can do the same
- (waterwort). Sacrifices of various kinds were brought to the merman - from animals
- (for example, a black pig or a stolen horse) to tobacco, which the Pomors in the Russian North threw into the water with abuse: the Old Believers believed that “tobacco and
swearing as a product of the “unclean” should have served as an offering pleasing to him." The Pomors, by the way, believed that in the sea there lived a spirit hostile to man - the "sea sotan", which interfered with fishing and destroyed fishermen.
The merman, like a goblin, is woman-loving and generally inclined to kidnap people who remain forever in his underwater crystal palaces.
The vodyaniha is partly reminiscent of a mermaid, the image of which, however, varies greatly by region. In a significant part of the northern regions they do not know such an image at all, and if they do, they imagine her as an old ugly woman with saggy breasts, reminiscent of a reckless woman and not related to
water element. The type of river or forest beauty more familiar to us,
scratching hair, bewitching men and destroying maidens, common in the South and
Central Russia, as well as in Ukraine. “Since Trinity Day,” writes T.A.
Novichkova, - they come out of the water, where they live constantly, and until autumn they walk through fields and groves, swing on the branches of spreading willows or birches,
At night they dance in circles, sing, play, and call each other. Where they ran and frolicked, bread would be born more abundantly. Playing in the water, they tangle fishing nets, damage millers' dams and millstones, and send torrential rains and storms onto the fields. Mermaids steal threads from women who fall asleep without prayer; linens spread on the grass for bleaching are hung on trees. When going into the forest, they stocked up on a preventative against mermaids - incense and wormwood. The mermaid will meet and ask: “What do you have in
hands: wormwood or parsley?" If you say "parsley", the mermaid will be happy: "Oh
you, my darling!” - and he will tickle you to death, if you say “wormwood”, he will offendedly throw: “Hide, tyn!” - and will run past.” (A typical example of the functioning of the vegetative code of the world model: wormwood (etymologically,
probably related to the verb “to burn”, i.e. "bedroom") is associated with fire,
dryness, bitterness, respectively - the “upper right” side of the world model,
therefore it protects against the mermaid associated with moisture, the feminine, the night,
those. "bottom left" side; in the Ukrainian tradition in the role of "mermaid"
The plant usually produces mint: if you name it, the mermaid ominously replies:
“This is your home!”)
“By origin, mermaids,” writes T.A. Novichkova, “are children who died unbaptized, or suicide girls, drowned women.<...>Using many examples, D.K. Zelenin in the book “Essays on Russian Mythology” (Pg., 1916,
reprint M., 1995. - A.Yu.) proved that in popular opinion mermaids are not just the souls of the dead, but the souls of those who died an unnatural death, murdered or suicides. People who have ever disappeared were also considered mermaids.
cursed by mothers or children stolen from them by evil spirits." The dead,
those who died a “not their own” death were called “hostages.” This word, as written
D.K. Zelenin, in Vyatka province. sounded “laid” and came from the ancient method of their burial: they were placed in ravines, covered with stakes,
boards, branches, as opposed to buried dead, i.e.
buried in the ground. In the XVII - XVIII centuries. they were buried in large pits with a barn on top, the so-called “poor houses”, “poor houses”, destroyed in 1771
Ekaterina P. The burial and general memorial service took place in Semik. About communication
with the pawned dead mermaids and the times of activation of the latter -
"Russian week" - will be discussed further in Chapter. 4.
Not only water mermaids are known, but also forest and field mermaids. The latter are found in rye and resemble other female demonic creatures -
noon These are tall, beautiful girls in white who wander through the fields during the harvest and punish those who reap at noon. Their male version is
Polevik (polevik) is much less attractive: “black in body, like the earth,
eyes of different colors, instead of hair - long green grass, naked, for each village there are four field workers; according to others (beliefs) - appears together
with the wind, standing, blowing, all in white, whistling. To the inhabitants of forest zones, the field grass seemed to be a little freak who could unexpectedly jump out from behind a haystack." It could also take on other images: a man on a gray horse, a man
in white. He leads, beckons a person, drives him who finds himself at the edge of the field.
Brownie (housekeeper, housekeeper, housekeeper, housekeeper, housewife, grandfather, etc.) -
home spirit, a black scary man in wool, but can also appear as a woman (his pair is a kikimora), a cat, a pig, a rat, a dog, a calf,
gray ram, bear, black hare (in connection with the belief that the brownie is the spirit of an animal placed as a construction sacrifice in the foundation of a house);
there is information about its serpentine nature.
The brownie is a useful spirit: he helps with the housework, warns of impending trouble. Strangles or pinches sleeping people; if at the same time you ask: “for good or for
hoodoo?" or "loving or not loving?" - answers, in any case - makes it clear.
A female pair of a brownie is a kikimora (however, this name could probably
have other correlations, as evidenced by the well-known epithet
"swamp"; the swamp in any case refers to the lower world of water and death).
She appeared as a tiny, ugly old woman. “This,” wrote
E.G. Kataroff, is not a particularly dangerous spirit, sitting invisible near the stove during the day, and coming out at night to play pranks and play pranks; she especially loves to play pranks
with spindle, spinning wheel, started yarn. In some places in Great Russia, the location of the kikimora is considered to be a chicken coop, where it harms chickens. But
There is a remedy against this: you need to hang rags of red tape or the neck of a broken clay washbasin under a pole, or even better, find a special stone with a natural through hole, which is called the “chicken god”. This stone is attached to the perch. Sometimes, however, good qualities are also attributed to the kikimora: it patronizes diligent and intelligent housewives.”
In Novgorod province. An interesting ritual was recorded, widespread in various forms in other regions. When moving to a new home, the householder must put a whole small amount of bread underground for the brownie and
salt and a cup of milk on it. Having prepared this, the owner goes to the old house at night in his shirt and says: “I bow to you, master, father, and
I ask you to welcome us to the new mansion: there is a warm place for you and a small treat." Without an invitation, the brownie will not go to the new place and will cry every night.
They treated their brownie quite warmly - he brought prosperity to the house. Every year on February 28, after dinner, a pot of porridge surrounded by hot coals was left here and there on a fire pit (a hole on a stove for heat). The ritual of propitiating the brownie, associated with the sacrifice of a rooster, is also known. “According to Russian legend,” wrote A.N. Afanasyev, “the brownie is furious
March 30, from early morning until midnight, until the roosters crow. At this time, he does not recognize anyone from his family, why are they afraid to approach him at night?
to the windows, and the cattle and poultry are locked up at sunset. Suddenly the brownie gets excited, the peasants say, and gets so angry that he seems ready to destroy the whole house: he kills the horses under the manger, eats the dogs, kills the cows from food, scatters all the utensils, rolls under the owner’s feet; happens with
he has such a change either because in the spring the brownie's old skin falls off, or he gets rabid (plague), or he wants to marry a witch (my italics - A.Yu.)". Someone else's brownie was considered dashing. He should defend yourself with special spells. A bear's head or the bear itself, which was led around all corners and
whose wool is used to fumigate the house. This ritual can be put in one context
with scientists' assumptions about the connection between the bear and Volos, who is probably
patronized small serpentine spirits, including brownies.
By the way, a talisman against the forest spirit is also known, based on a magical protective circle. On Holy Week, on Wednesday, before dawn, the mistress of the house ran around the house three times naked, saying: “There is an iron fence near the yard; so that no animal, no reptile, no evil man, no grandfather of the forest can get through this fence.” The choice of time for the ritual is interesting: Holy Week means not only strict fasting and prayerful concentration the day before
Easter, but also the activation of evil spirits, as if awakened to life by the symbolic repetition of the terrible events of the last week of the earthly life of Jesus Christ;
Wednesday is a “women’s” day, favorable for relations with evil spirits (as well as
For this purpose, the hostess is preferable to the owner - cf. correlation of the feminine principle in the model of the world), like Friday, are days with a negative meaning and even
in meat-eater lean; finally, the night until dawn is the final stage of the unclean revelry that began at midnight; night, moreover, was also considered
"female" time, which will be discussed in more detail in Chapter. 4.
The bathhouse spirit (bannik, bainushko) is also known, taking on very unexpected images of a passing person, an old man, a woman, a white cow,
shaggy people. Baths were generally considered unclean structures. There are no icons in them and they don’t make crosses, but they often tell fortunes. They don’t go to the bathhouse with
cross and belt, they are removed and left in the house (women do the same when washing the floors). Everything that is used for washing - basins, tubs, tubs, gangs, ladles in
baths - is considered unclean. You cannot drink water in the bathhouse or from the washstand, and
last to even rinse the dishes. Naturally, a demonic creature lived in the bathhouse. Others, like the ancient Russian Navii, could appear in
her. They probably represented the evil, hostile souls of the dead.
Their name is derived from the ancient Russian word NAV, meaning dead man and
death incarnate. This word apparently goes back to the ancient name of the funeral boat on which the dead crossed the body of water,
separating this world from the next. We see the same Indo-European root
for example, in the borrowed word "navigation" - cf. lat. navia - "barge",
"rook". The epidemic that occurred in 1092 in Polotsk was described by the chronicler as an invasion of invisible navias on horses (only horse hooves were visible),
who scoured the city and “hurt” those who dared to leave the house. The chronicler equated Navi with demons.
On Holy Thursday (aka Clean Thursday - on the eve of Easter) a bathhouse was heated for navi
and left them a meal on the floor at night. In the morning they recognized by bird tracks,
whether "guests" came. This ritual is described in the ancient Russian teaching “On Fasting”
to the ignorant on Monday of the second week." Ideas about navyas are known and
other Slavs. For example, among the Bulgarians, Navi are the bird-shaped souls of the dead.
The “evil spirits” also lived in other outbuildings (bean barn, barn barn,
Podvinnik, Rizhny, who appeared in the form of a woman with a walnut bush and a candle,
an old man, a crane or a man in white with hair down to his toes), as well as in the yard
(courtyard, often identified with the brownie). All of them had female counterparts.
The evil spirits that swarmed outside the village were led by special kings: Lesnoy,
Sea King, Water King, etc. They were usually addressed in conspiracies. The Snake King, accompanied by countless snakes, is also known to the Eastern Slavs.
whom he took to Vozdvizhenie to spend the winter in Iriy (vyrey) - a warm southern country, a paradise where birds fly away. Therefore, perhaps, in the Belarusian conspiracy the snake king is called Ir, and his queen is called Iritsa.
According to the passage given in approx. 35, the Slavs in ancient times worshiped ghouls and beregins. The first, obviously, are not those vampire ghouls that attack people and animals, which, according to legend, were the “hostages”
male dead - those who died an unnatural death, sorcerers,
suicides, children born from evil spirits or spoiled by them.
There is an assumption that the ancient "upiri" are the souls of the dead, whose bodies for some reason were not burned according to Slavic custom. Therefore, the souls did not find peace. However, this is nothing more than a hypothesis based on the supposed etymology of the word: y= is a prefix meaning negation,
named after Perun and with the word shore, the functions are unclear.
There were many ways to meet one or another evil spirits if necessary. It was quite difficult to meet and make friends, for example, with a brownie. This is what the description made in the mid-19th century says. V
Vyatka province
You must get the weeping grass (which is collected on the night of Kupala. - A.Yu.),
but not with a black root, as it usually has, but with a white one, and
hang it on your silk belt, then take winter grass obtained from three fields, tie it in a knot and tie the knot to the snake head, which should hang on the gaitan (a cord for a pectoral cross. - A.Yu.) instead of a cross; should put in one ear a scrap of goat's hair (which the brownie especially respects), and in the other - the last piece of summer wool in the order of homemade yarn, which the peasant woman throws when she finishes spinning the tow, and
which must be picked up secretly from everyone at home; then you should change your shirt for the night, i.e. on the left side, take a potter (a rag used to take a hot pot. - A.Yu.) and go to the barn at night, where, blindfolded with this potter folded in four, and closing the door behind you,
should say:
“Little homebody, homebody, the slave comes to you, carries his head low; don’t torment him in vain, but make friends with him, show yourself to him in your appearance, make friends with him.”
friendship with him and do him an easy service."
You should repeat these words until the roosters crow or until you hear a slight rustling in the barn. In the first case the evocation must be postponed until another night; in the second, grab the root of the weeping tree with one hand, and
the other by the snake's head and hold on tightly to them, no matter what the brownie does: then the last one will appear; if the caller does not have time to grab the gaitan or root or lets go of them, then the brownie, grabbing the gaitan,
he will tear it apart and whip the caller half to death with the snake's head.
This description makes us suspect the serpentine nature of the brownie: we see here a snake’s head, as well as wool, with which the charmed snake kings are associated (usually sitting on a black fleece).
To see the devil in a bathhouse, you need to go into it at night and, stepping over the threshold with one foot, throw off the cross from your neck and put your foot under your heel. Here we have before us a deliberate entry into the region bordering the antiworld, the world of the dead,
which is symbolized in the traditional model of the world by a threshold (as well as a field boundary
According to data from the Arkhangelsk province, whoever wants to see the courtyard must be the first to receive a red egg from the priest at the end of Easter Matins and
take from the church the candle with which he stood at matins. Then at night, before the roosters, take a lighted candle in one hand, and a red egg in the other, and
stand in front of the open door of the stable and say. "Uncle yard man, come to me, not green like an oak tree leaf, not blue like a river bank, come like this,
what I am, I will give you Christ's testicle." The brownie (domovoi) will come out, looking exactly like the one who cast the spell. He demands that the meeting with him be kept secret, otherwise he will drive the chatterbox to suicide or burn his hut.
Finally, anyone who wants to get along with a goblin must also perform a certain ritual of initiation into another world. The key turns out to be aspen,
conceptualized within the framework of the vegetative code of the world model as a kind of
“anti-tree” associated with the demonic and other world (cf. aspen stake driven into the grave of a witch or a “wandering” dead person, as well as legends
about how Judas hanged himself on a “bitter tree” aspen, which is why it trembles all the time). So, two aspens were required (an even number associated with the "left"
side of the world model, with the world of the dead - cf. even number of colors
brought to the deceased), and not cut down with an ax and not broken by hand
(denial of the natural order of things, i.e. the “antipath” leading to
"anti-goals" - meeting with the unclean). Therefore, anyone who wants to get along with a goblin must go into the forest, cut down a pine tree with a blunt ax (a dull ax designed for chopping wood, cutting ice or bones), but so that when it falls, it drops at least two small aspen trees. You should stand on these aspen trees,
turning to face the north, and say: “Giant forester, a slave has come to you
(name) with a bow: make friends with him. If you want, then go ahead and
Whether you like it or not" (Vyatka province).
The goblin, like the brownie, can also be seen sitting under three arranged harrows; they consist of many crosses, therefore the unclean one cannot do anything to the observer. The Arkhangelsk spell to summon a goblin is also similar to the goblin spell: “Uncle goblin, show yourself not to be a gray wolf, not a black raven, not a fire spruce, show yourself as I am.” In Totemsky district of Vologda province, as T.A. writes. Novichkova, “against the leprosy of goblin they wrote petitions to the chief forest owner on huge sheets of birch bark with charcoal,
they were nailed to trees and they did not dare touch or look at them.
Such petitions were written by those whom the goblin bypassed and led into an impenetrable thicket,
who has lost a horse or a cow in the forest."
An example of one such “petition” addressed to three kings and
written on birch bark ("anti-material", like aspen). These types of texts were written from right to left (usually only the beginning, and the rest was finished)
in triplicate, one was tied to a tree in the forest, the other was buried in
the ground, and the third was thrown into the water with a stone. The contents of the letter are as follows.
"I am writing to the king of the forest, to the queen of the forest, with her little children; to the king of the earth and
the queen of the earth, with small children; to the king of the water and the queen of the water, with small children. I inform you that the servant of God (such and such) has lost a brown
(or what) horse (or cow, or other livestock, designate with
signs). If you have it, then send it without delaying an hour, not a single minute, not a single second. And if, in my opinion, you don’t do it, I will pray for you to the Holy Great Martyr of God Yegor and Queen Alexandra.”
After this, the missing cattle must come to the owner’s yard on their own.
(Vetluga, modern Gorky region).
So, we have seen that the fate of ideas about characters at different levels of the mythological hierarchy turned out to be different. If the cults of the highest gods were destroyed by fire and sword during the Christianization of Rus', then faith and
the worship of lower, unimportant, unindividualized characters has survived almost to the present day. As a result of the synthesis, the merging of pagan and Christian ideas in the popular consciousness, the ancient gods, in a sense, changed their names,
combined with images of the most popular Christian saints. The remnants of mythological ideas about less significant characters were preserved in folklore, rituals and beliefs. The lower levels of the mythological system have undergone almost no changes. With amazing stability they absorbed Christian ideas without changing their ancient essence. To show, on the one hand, the origins and mechanisms of penetration of new ideas, and on the other, to reveal, at least in general terms, the unchanging traditional East Slavic model of the world that emerges through them is the task of the following chapters.
There are many characters in the folklore of the Russian people, there are characters that appear in one or two tales, but there are heroes that are characteristic of almost all works of the Russian people. Such heroes, as a rule, help to perform this or that action/make a decision that will greatly affect the fate of the character. As a rule, such “nomadic heroes” are:
Baba Yaga(originally Yaga Baba) is one of the most archaic, and therefore the most complex and multifaceted images of Russian folklore. The image of Baba Yaga coincides in appearance with the image of a witch (see Witch) - an unkempt, ugly, evil old woman with a long hooked nose and gray hair. But that's where the similarities end.
Immortal Koschey (Kashchei) - Always a purely negative character, quite often in an alliance with other negative characters, as a rule, the death of the villain is in the egg, the egg is in the duck, the duck is in the hare, the hare is in the eagle, and the eagle is sitting in the casket, so that the villain must die break the needle.
Baba (grandmother, old woman)- one of the kindest, most sincere images of folk poetry. A woman is never found without a grandfather (a man), this image is exclusively paired. If there is no man (grandfather), then from a strong, quick-witted, talkative, sometimes quarrelsome and stupid, but always hard-working and cheerful, she immediately turns into a bitter widow, an orphan
“Once upon a time there was a grandfather and a woman...” is a typical beginning of a Russian fairy tale.
Grandfather and woman together solve everyday, family, moral and even universal problems, truly dividing everything in half.
Goblin- a supernatural creature of Slavic legends and Russian fairy tales. This is the main owner of the forest among the Slavs, he makes sure that no one harms anyone on his farm. He treats good people well, helps them get out of the forest, but he treats not-so-good people badly: he confuses them, makes them walk in circles. The spirit's place of residence is a remote forest thicket, but sometimes also a wasteland. However, this spirit does not live in the forest all the time, but only during the warm season. “On Erofey,” the peasants believed, “the goblin part with the forest.” On this day (October 17), the spirit falls underground, where it hibernates until spring, but before wintering, the goblin goes berserk: it raises a storm, breaks trees, drives animals into their holes and goes berserk.
Kikimora(shishimmora, susemdka, mamra) is a character in Slavic-Ugric mythology, as well as one of the types of brownie. An evil spirit in the form of a dwarf or a small woman, whose head is the size of a thimble and whose body is thin as a straw. Kikimora lives in the house behind the stove and is engaged in spinning and weaving, and also plays pranks at night with the spindle and spinning wheel of the owners of the house (for example, tearing yarn). It was believed that babies who died unbaptized became kikimoras.
These heroes are, as a rule, the main ones, and are also found in every fairy tale and epic.
Characters of Slavic folklore
Witch- one of the most famous images of Slavic demonology, combining the features of a real woman and an evil spirit. The word “witch” is derived from the Old Russian “vedat” - to know. Initially, it did not have a sinister meaning (cf. witch, healer). The appearance of the witch is very unattractive, like Baba Yaga: she is an old, disheveled, often with physical disabilities (hunchbacked, lame, with an ugly nose, etc.) woman. Her magical power could be either hereditary or acquired - inherited from the spirit of a dying witch, who, before her death, managed to convey her secret knowledge.
Water(vodyanik, sea king) - the most important representative of Slavic demonology, the embodiment of water as a dangerous element, an evil and hostile spirit to people. According to popular beliefs, in appearance he resembles an old man with a swollen face and a swollen belly, entangled in mud, with webs between his fingers and toes. Sometimes he is represented with horns on his head. Mermen live in river pools, near mills, and spend the night under mill wheels.
As we can see, despite the fact that the Russian people and the Slavs are very close to each other, there are also very small differences between them, which I will describe a little below.
Characters of Latvian folklore
Witch is a Latvian-Lithuanian magical creature, usually a girl. Sometimes called Laume vai Spоnaga. In fairy tales and epics it usually harms people. In fairy tales and epics, witches have several functions. Usually they know how to fly on brooms, the most powerful of the witches are able to control natural conditions, and thus interfere with people.
Crap is a Latvian deity who commands the dark ones. In Latvian mythology, he is also the master of the underworld (the world of the dead). Previously, the devil ruled only the world of the dead, however, with the advent of Christianity he also became the ruler of hell, after which he instantly became the source of all troubles for many peoples, but in Latvian folklore he is gullible, naive and also easily defeated not only by the gods, but also ordinary people. The devil always wants to harm people, but he inevitably loses and remains a fool. Damn, he is half-man and half-animal, they usually said about him that he had the height of a man, a cow’s tail with goat’s legs and horns. It is also written in Latvian folklore that the devil helped God create the world.
Russian epics are a reflection of historical events retold by the people, and as a result, have undergone strong changes. Each hero and villain in them is most often a real-life personality, whose life or activity was taken as the basis of a character or a collective image that was very important for that time.
Heroes of epics
Ilya Muromets (Russian hero)
Glorious Russian hero and brave warrior. This is exactly how Ilya Muromets appears in the Russian epic epic. Having served Prince Vladimir faithfully, the warrior was paralyzed from birth and sat on the stove for exactly 33 years. Brave, strong and fearless, he was cured of paralysis by the elders and gave all his heroic strength to the defense of the Russian lands from the Nightingale the Robber, the invasion of the Tatar yoke and the Foul Idol.
The hero of the epics has a real prototype - Elijah of Pechersk, canonized as Ilya of Muromets. In his youth, he suffered paralysis of the limbs, and died from a spear blow to the heart.
Dobrynya Nikitich (Russian hero)
Another hero from the illustrious troika of Russian heroes. He served Prince Vladimir and carried out his personal assignments. He was the closest of all the heroes to the princely family. Strong, brave, dexterous and fearless, he swam beautifully, knew how to play the harp, knew about 12 languages and was a diplomat when deciding state affairs.
The real prototype of the glorious warrior is the governor Dobrynya, who was the uncle of the prince himself on his mother’s side.
Alyosha Popovich (Russian hero)
Alyosha Popovich is the youngest of the three heroes. He is famous not so much for his strength as for his pressure, resourcefulness and cunning. A lover of boasting about his achievements, he was guided on the right path by older heroes. He behaved in two ways towards them. Supporting and protecting the glorious troika, he falsely buried Dobrynya in order to marry his wife Nastasya.
Olesha Popovich is a brave Rostov boyar, whose name is associated with the appearance of the image of the epic hero-hero.
Sadko (Novgorod hero)
A lucky guslar from Novgorod epics. For many years he earned his daily bread by playing the harp. Having received a reward from the Tsar of the Sea, Sadko became rich and set off by sea to overseas countries with 30 ships. Along the way, his benefactor took him to him as a ransom. According to the instructions of Nicholas the Wonderworker, the guslar managed to escape from captivity.
The prototype of the hero is Sodko Sytinets, a Novgorod merchant.
Svyatogor (hero-giant)
A giant and hero with remarkable strength. Huge and powerful, born in the Mountains of the Saints. As he walked, the forests shook and the rivers overflowed. Svyatogor transferred part of his power in the writings of the Russian epic to Ilya Muromets. Soon after this he died.
There is no real prototype of the image of Svyatogor. It is a symbol of enormous primitive power, which has never been used.
Mikula Selyaninovich (plowman-hero)
The hero and the peasant who plowed the land. According to the epics, he knew Svyatogor and gave him a bag to lift full of earthly weight. According to legend, it was impossible to fight with the plowman; he was under the protection of Mother Damp Earth. His daughters are the wives of the heroes, Stavr and Dobrynya.
The image of Mikula is fictitious. The name itself is derived from Mikhail and Nikolai, common at that time.
Volga Svyatoslavich (Russian hero)
Hero-bogatyr of the most ancient epics. He possessed not only impressive strength, but also the ability to understand the language of birds, as well as to turn into any animal and turn others into them. He went on campaigns to Turkish and Indian lands, and then became their ruler.
Many scientists identify the image of Volga Svyatoslavich with Oleg the Prophet.
Nikita Kozhemyaka (Kyiv hero)
Hero of Kyiv epics. A brave hero with enormous strength. Could easily tear apart a dozen folded bull hides. He snatched the skin and meat from the angry bulls rushing towards him. He became famous for defeating the snake, freeing the princess from his captivity.
The hero owes his appearance to the myths about Perun, reduced to everyday manifestations of miraculous power.
Stavr Godinovich (Chernigov boyar)
Stavr Godinovich is a boyar from the Chernihiv region. He was known for his good playing of the harp and his strong love for his wife, whose talents he was not averse to boasting to others. In epics it does not play the main role. More famous is his wife Vasilisa Mikulishna, who rescued her husband from imprisonment in the dungeons of Vladimir Krasna Solnyshka.
There is a mention of the real Sotsk Stavr in the chronicles of 1118. He was also imprisoned in the cellars of Prince Vladimir Monomakh after the riots.
Antiheroes of epics
Nightingale the Robber (anti-hero)
An ardent opponent of Ilya Muromets and a robber who for many years robbed both foot and horsemen on the road he had built. He killed them not with a gun, but with his own whistle. In epics, he most often appears in human form with clearly expressed Turkic facial features.
It is believed that his image was taken from the Mordvich people who lived in Nizhny Novgorod. Their traditional names are the names of birds: Nightingale, Starling, etc.
Serpent Gorynych (serpent dragon)
The Dragon. A fire breather with three heads. This is the classic image of the Serpent Gorynych in Russian epics. The snake has one body, has wings, large sharp claws, and an arrow-like tail. It guards the bridge-passage to the kingdom of the dead and spews fire when it attacks. He lives in the mountains, hence the nickname “Gorynych”.
The image of the serpent is mythical. Similar ones are found in Serbian and Iranian mythology.
Idolishche Poganoe (villain)
An idol is also a hero, only from dark forces. Due to its gluttony, it has a huge shapeless body. Evil, unbaptized and not recognizing religions. He plundered cities with his army, simultaneously prohibiting alms and churches. Visited Russian lands, Turkey and Sweden.
In history, the prototype of the Idol was Khan Itlar, who carried out barbarian raids on the cities of Russian lands.
Folk heroes are a special category of persons and characters who enjoy special love and popularity among ordinary people, whose memory, as we know, provides them with immortal fame. They can be fictional, semi-legendary, as well as real historical figures, whose actions and lives become the object of folklore.
general characteristics
Folk heroes are extraordinary individuals in all respects. On the one hand, they enjoy recognition and reverence for specific merits, on the other hand, among them there are also those who did not do anything outstanding, but nevertheless entered into people's memory as bearers of certain national traits, which makes them especially recognizable. Therefore, many subconsciously perceive them as the embodiment of the spirit of a country or nation. For their exploits, they become the main characters of folklore, songs, tales, and legends for a long time. But it often happens the other way around: the works turn out to be so colorful that they go beyond the boundaries of the artistic world and begin to live an independent life as folk heroes.
Robin Hood
The identity of this person has never been established. According to the literary tradition laid down by W. Scott, this man lived in the 12th century in England, during the reign of Richard the Lionheart. However, most historians agree that he was born in the 14th century. The reason for his popularity is probably known to everyone: he took away wealth from wealthy people and gave it to the poor. According to legend, his habitat was the famous one where the hero hid with his “forest squad”.
Nothing is known for certain about his origins: according to some versions, Robin Hood was a simple peasant, while others talk about his noble roots; they even name the family to which he could belong: Huntington. In his homeland there is a whole series of ballads, songs, and legends about the noble robber. He repeatedly became the protagonist of works of fiction (“Ivanhoe”), his adventures were repeatedly filmed in different ways.
William Tell
Often folk heroes are semi-legendary personalities. Such, for example, is V. Tell, who, according to legend, was a simple peasant. He became famous for his exploits during the Austrian rule in the Swiss lands. Most likely, this man or his prototype came from the mountainous canton of Uri, whose inhabitants expressed particularly violent discontent with foreign rule. The feat of this hero is that he refused to bow to the governor’s cap, which was hung in the main square. As a test, he was ordered to shoot an apple on his own son's head. He successfully passed this test, but then admitted that if he had missed the mark, he would have killed the governor with his other hand. Subsequently, an armed confrontation began between the canton and the Austrians, as a result of which he defeated the enemy. This plot formed the basis of the opera of the same name by D. Rossini and the drama by F. Schiller.
Joan of Arc
The image of a folk hero is preserved for a long time in the memory of several generations. Often they were historical figures. Joan of Arc is certainly one of the most famous and revered heroines. She came from a simple peasant family, and during the Hundred Years' War, French troops under her command won a number of major victories. It is with her name that the memory of these distant events is associated. She was subsequently canonized.
Annexor of Siberia and commander
In our country, not only warriors, but also travelers often became characters in songs, tales, and traditions. Ermak Timofeevich, the conqueror of Siberia, is a vivid example of this. This man became famous for having developed the distant lands beyond the Urals, which earned him real fame. In fact, in the 16th century, the annexation of such a vast territory was an important stage in the formation and strengthening of a unified Russian state. His victories, successful campaigns and tragic death literally shocked his contemporaries, who passed on their love for the brave chieftain to their generation. Ermak Timofeevich is famous not only for the development, but also for the annexation of the Trans-Ural lands. The conqueror of Siberia has firmly entered the people's memory. And this is due to the fact that his travels became a real landmark event of his time.
Another historical figure who has received universal recognition is Kutuzov, a national hero who, like no one else, enjoyed the love and respect of ordinary soldiers. He very sensitively felt the mood of the Russian people during the war with Napoleon and, skillfully using it in battles, eventually led the army to victory.
Ivan Susanin
Some Russian folk heroes are also historical figures. These include a simple peasant, who, according to some assumptions, was a serf of the Shestov nobles, or a clerk on their estate, or a headman. Mikhail Fedorovich took refuge on the estate of these landowners for some time during the Time of Troubles. When the Poles came to kill him, Susanin, with the help of his son-in-law, warned the future king about the danger, and he himself led the enemies into impassable terrain, for which he suffered a terrible death from them. This man is still known to every resident of our country; his image inspired the composer M. Glinka to create the opera “A Life for the Tsar,” which still does not leave the theater stage.
Miguel Hidalgo
Folk heroes from different countries are also known outside their homelands. The Mexican Catholic priest who called on the people to fight against Spanish rule is still known in history. At the beginning of the 19th century, he raised the rebels to fight. Despite the successful actions of the revolutionaries, he was arrested and executed in 1811. Nevertheless, ten years later Mexico gained independence.
and Ulysses Grant
The first prominent political figure in the Italian struggle for independence and unification became a kind of personification of the national struggle of the people. He took part in battles against the Austrian authorities in the late 1840s, but the first stage of the uprising ended unsuccessfully. About a decade later, the confrontation resumed, and this time it ended with the unification of the scattered Italian lands into a single state.
W. Grant is known as a talented commander and leader of the Northern troops during the Civil War in the states. He was a simple peasant, received a military education, but later led volunteer rebel forces in Illinois. Volunteers from the Missouri area began to flock to him. He is known for achieving his goal at any cost, sacrificing literally everything for victory and not taking into account the possible dire consequences of defeat. This tactic paid off, which earned him enormous popularity among the Americans.
Epic heroes
These include persons who lived during the period of Ancient Rus'. First of all, these include, of course, the famous heroes, defenders of Russian outposts who defended the land from enemy invasions. The names of Ilya Muromets and his faithful comrades Dobrynya Nikitich and Alyosha Popovich are known to any schoolchild in our country. In addition to them, such a character as Nikita Kozhemyaka is also very popular. The peculiarity of the tales about him is that they show how this hero, even before his exploits, possessed heroic strength. According to the plot of the fairy tales, he saved the princess by defeating the serpent, and plowed a huge furrow on it, which went down in history under the name “Serpent Shafts.”
Faces of war
A prominent place in this series is occupied by child heroes, who at a very young age became famous for their exploits against invaders. One of them is Valya Kotik, a boy partisan, about whom every Soviet schoolchild probably knew. He was born in Ukraine and, as a schoolboy, took an active part in the First he was a messenger, and then he took part in real battles. One of the most significant actions was the blowing up of the telephone cable that connected local enemy units with Hitler's headquarters in the Polish capital. In addition, he took part in undermining enemy railway trains. He is credited with saving the partisan detachment when he gave the alarm in time, so that the fighters were able to repel the invaders. The boy was mortally wounded a year before the end of the war and was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
Child heroes entered the people's memory due to the fact that they performed feats that seemed completely inconsistent with their young age. Lenya Golikov was born in the Novgorod region. At the beginning of the war he immediately joined the partisan detachment. He became a brigade reconnaissance officer and participated in more than two dozen operations. The boy blew up enemy vehicles. One day, thanks to his actions, valuable plans for the report ended up in the hands of the partisans. He died tragically in 1943, when the detachment was surrounded, from which only six managed to escape. For his services, the young pioneer also received the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
It often happened that literary characters became popular. Of the characters in children's works, Malchish-Kibalchish should be mentioned first of all. He acted during the Civil War. His image was created by the writer A. Gaidar so successfully that he gained great popularity among the people.
But the greatest fame went to, perhaps, the character of the poem V., the folk hero, who turned out to be very convincing and believable, since the author based him on a simple Russian soldier, which explains his popularity.
The main features of mythological stories: an attitude towards authenticity; witness testimony; weakened aesthetic function; teacher function. Genre varieties: epics; happened; beliefs. Classification (according to the index of Aivazyan-Pomerantseva and Zinoviev): 1) about the spirits of nature (goblin, water, mermaids, shulikuns, middays, field creatures); 2) about the spirits of the house (brownie, bannik, ovinnik, kikimora); 3) about the devil, the snake, the damned; 4) tales about people with supernatural abilities and the dead (witch, sorcerer, dead man).
Modern mythological stories.
The relevance of mythological consciousness for modern man. Stories born in the twentieth century (about UFOs, Bigfoot, White and Black speleologist, etc.), in the light of folklore. Common features with traditional tales: story as testimony; memorial; description of the feeling of fear; installation of authenticity; emphasizing the suddenness of the meeting; evening as a time for action; a secluded place as a scene of action, etc. Portraits of characters from UFO stories and traditional mythological figures. Same functions.
Ticket 24. Legends. Types of legends. History in oral narrative.
TRADITION[ukr. - confirmation, German. - Sage, fr. and English - tradition, Greek - parádosis, in popular terminology - “pre-syulshchina”, “byl”, “byvalshchina”] - “folk tale”, more precisely those stories and memories that are not included in the circle of genres that are clearly isolated: epics, historical songs, spiritual poems, fairy tales , legends and anecdotes. P. is a term applied to works of oral creativity and, by analogy, transferred to the corresponding works of literature (monuments of ancient writing that set out unreliable events). The purpose of folk poetry is to consolidate the past in posterity, therefore in the appropriate environment it is usually treated with a certain trust (unlike, for example, fairy tales and jokes, which are not believed in). The number of folk P. is unlimited, but according to their content they can be divided into several groups: 1. P. mythical(cm.« Mythology » ). These, in addition to stories about the gods, are stories about the sky and its phenomena, about the soul and body, about the struggle of spirits, about evil spirits, about the souls of the departed, about folk saints like Frol and Laurus, Friday, etc. 2. P. naturalistic: etiological legends about the origin of plants, animals, birds, fish, objects or their properties, about fantastic animals (Phoenix bird, Firebird, Leviathan), about wonderful peoples (one-eyed people, dog heads, gogs and magogs), etc. 3. P . historical, especially numerous. These include P. geographical(about the names of localities, cities, tracts: Kyiv from Kiy, Paris from Paris, etc.), o clothing239 monuments(treasures, monasteries, burial grounds, temples, etc.), about customs(initiation rites among primitive peoples, marriage, funeral rites, etc.), about truly historical events(about the Tatars, about wars), about different historical figures(about Alexander the Great, Napoleon, Attila, Belisarius, Columbus, Joan of Arc), about genealogy nationalities or heroes (Franks from the Trojans, Danes from Odin, Rurik from Augustus, etc.), P. about minerals(for example, Herodotus talks about the wealth of the north in gold and amber off the coast of the North Sea). The class struggle captured historical legends into its whirlpool, making them either weapons of enslavement and deception of the oppressed classes (feudal legends about the Monomakh cap, the white hood, the nobility of the kings), or a focus for attracting sympathies, aspirations for liberation and a bright future among the oppressed classes (for example peasant P. about Stepan Razin, about Pugachev and other heroes of popular uprisings). The October Revolution gave rise to a number of revolutionary legends about the heroism of the civil war, about the Red partisans, about the leaders of the revolution, about communists (Baku commissars, Chapaev, Dzerzhinsky, etc.), and counter-revolutionary stories (about the birth of the devil, the Antichrist, updated icons, etc.). A large circle of P., which widely captured not only the USSR, but also the peoples of the East, was caused by the heroic personality of V. I. Lenin. Folk history, reflecting the features of industrial, everyday, social, and class relations at different stages of the past, represents a rich historical source. Stored folk P. among the general population, but there are special experts on them, people who sometimes have an enormous memory. The most storytelling folk poetry is not an end in itself, but occurs when the occasion is appropriate at gatherings, get-togethers, etc. The existence of folk poetry occurs in waves: sometimes it freezes, then under the influence of a socio-political impulse it comes to life again. There are P., wandering around the globe (about the flood, etc.), there are narrowly local P. The creative process of creating P. continues to this day. P. is rich in our ancient historical (chronicles, chronographs, paleas, etc.) and literary monuments (apocrypha, legends, stories, novels). P. serves as a rich source of plots and images of world fiction (for example, “The Divine Comedy” by Dante, “The Decameron” by Boccaccio, “A Midsummer’s Night Dream” by Shakespeare, “Faust” by Goethe, “Pan Tadeusz” by Mickiewicz, “Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka” Gogol and many others).
A genre of non-fairy tale prose with an emphasis on authenticity. Any legend is historical in its basis, but at the same time it is not identical to reality.
Two ways to create legends: generalizing memories and arranging them using ready-made plot schemes.
The legend tells about something that is universally significant and important for everyone. The plots are usually single-motive. Your own ways of depicting heroes: direct characteristics and assessments so that the image is correctly understood. The portrait was rarely depicted or was laconic.
Main cycles of legends:
1. the most ancient legends.
About the settlement of Slavic tribes, about the first Russian princes, about the construction and capture of cities. Rus''s fight against enemies. (about Belgorod jelly, about Nikita Kozhemyak)
2. legends about a just king.
Associated with the names of Peter and Ivan the Terrible
3.legends about the leaders of popular movements.
Ermak, Stepan Razin, Emelyan Pugachev
4. legends about robbers and treasures
Ticket 25. Legend: the problem of origin. Functions. Legend and folk religious beliefs.
Legend- one of the varieties non-fairy tale prose folklore. Poetic tradition about some historical event. In a figurative sense, it refers to the events of the past covered in glory, causing admiration.
Typically contains additional religious or social pathos.
Legend - approximate synonym concepts myth;epicstory about what happened in time immemorial; the main characters of the story are usually heroes in the full sense of the word, often directly involved in events gods and other supernatural forces. Events in the legend are often exaggerated, a lot is added fiction. Therefore, scientists do not consider legends to be completely reliable historical evidence, without denying, however, that most legends are based on real events. Legends were usually oral stories, often set to music; Legends were passed down from mouth to mouth, usually by wandering storytellers. Later, many legends were written down.
Legends are prose works in which events associated with the world of inanimate nature and the animal world are fantastically understood. Of people. With supernatural beings.
Main functions: explanatory and moralizing.
They existed both orally and in writing. Legend is a term from medieval writing and means in translation. from Latin: that which must be read.
Types of legends:
1. Etiological legends. Greek reason + concept. They are educational in nature. They fantastically explain the origin of the world, man, phenomena
2. religious and edifying legends. Diverse in content and form: stories about God, about angels and saints, plot interpretations of the names of saints, about holy fools, etc. Could take the form of fairy tales.
3. social-utopian
They expressed the passionate but unrealizable dream of the peasantry for a fair social system. 17th-19th century. Fictitious facts intertwined with real ones, fiction complemented reality. 3 subtype (chichers): about the golden age (the heavenly time when everything was good), about distant lands, about princes-saviors.
1. In the original meaning of the word L. - excerpts of the “lives” and “passions” of saints, read during a church service or monastic meal on days dedicated to these saints. 2. Hence - in a broader, non-ritual sense - a small religious-didactic narrative, developing in the form of a coherent plot or individual episodes a fantastic biography of persons, animals, plants, things that have become, for some reason, objects of Christian cult: the legend of the cross, L ... about aspen - Judas tree, etc. 3. With even wider usage, the term L. is also used to designate: a) works of a non-narrative nature, developing “legendary” themes - for example. dramatic miracles; b) religious and didactic narratives associated with non-Christian cults - Buddhist, Muslim, Jewish: L. about Buddha, L. about the descendants of Muhammad, Hasidic L. about tzaddikim; c) unsupported by historical documents and often fantastic stories about any historical figure or event that is completely unrelated to religious cults; for example, literature about Alexander the Great, etc. In such an expanded use of words, the term legend loses its precise literary meaning, and consideration of its use in a figurative sense goes beyond the scope of the proposed note, which establishes the specifics of the genre and the dialectics of its development on the specific historical material of feudal social literature formations Western Europe.
From the perspective of the specificity of the genre, a legend can be defined as a small genre of medieval narrative-didactic literature, pursuing the goals of direct propaganda of certain elements of the Christian cult and thereby the idea of the chosenness of the clergy, as a propaganda short story of the church.
