Looking through my archives, I find materials with unpublished information. More precisely, I voiced the information as it became available on “woodpecker research” sites, where, as usual, it was read and forgotten. Now I would like to highlight it especially, in a separate material, as answers to questions about the Mansi of Vizhay residents Vladimir Androsov and Sergei Vinnichenko, who have long communicated and been friends with the local Mansi of the Bakhtiyarov, Kurikov, Anyamov, etc. family.

There were rumors among the people that Mansi had been killed, rumors that were quickly neutralized by the spread of other rumors - about the so-called fireballs. And now many people continue to believe in mysterious fireballs, not taking into account the fact that witnesses of those years, the flights of balls in our time, thanks to television and the Internet, were identified as the launches and separation of stages of ballistic missiles. A. Rakitin explained these balls as flare bombs of NATO guards. What can we say if investigator Ivanov himself tried to explain the failure of the investigation by the machinations of fireballs, and most importantly, the party leadership. Unfortunately, even now fireballs continue to fly in the heads of many comrades.

Whether the local northern peoples of Mansi and Khanty were involved in the death of the group, the investigation answered: “no.” But reading the documents of the Criminal Case, you notice how frivolously and even frivolously the version of Mansi’s involvement was worked out. It was as if they were checking the Mansi families living near the place where the dead boys were found. It is noteworthy that this was the first version put forward by the investigation. Nominated, worked for a month and suddenly left, despite many contradictions in the answers of witnesses and suspects. Whether the Mansi were actually involved in the death of the group is unknown, since there is no evidence. Just as there is no evidence for other numerous versions. But I’m sure (and not only me), the Mansi knew why the Dyatlov group died. And this knowledge was dangerous for those who knew.

MANSI is one of my favorite topics.

The topic is quite complicated and even difficult, the finished material lay around for a long time, something kept stopping it from being published. And when I made up my mind, and the text was agreed upon with V. Androsov, strange events happened to me personally, which clergy identified as the result of the intervention of an occult force. I tried my best to finalize the material, I am talking about this so that others will know that it is not safe to intrude into the dark spheres of paganism. Especially when you try to draw analogies in Mansi’s involvement in the death of Igor Dyatlov’s group. In this publication I present all the pros and cons of this version. I present all the random (and maybe non-random) coincidences with the facts reflected in the Criminal Case.

Reading a lot about the Mansi, you somehow become imbued with the history of this people, you feel sorry for the Mansi, they live somehow absurdly, they have been exploited for centuries, soldered, deceived, they gradually disappear, assimilate, Mansi women are beautiful, men also meet nothing if they don’t drink themselves to death . Looking at old photographs of the Mansi, you notice their calm, stern and wary look, with a certain amount of sadness. It is not surprising that grievances accumulate and accumulate and then spill out and, as usual, not necessarily on the offenders.

Vizhay residents Vladimir Androsov and Sergey Vinnichenko answered my questions about their Mansi friends.

I express my deep gratitude to Vladimir Androsov for consultations and unique photographs from his personal archive, to Vladimir Askinadzi for editing photographs, to Dmitry Levanov for providing materials about V. Maltsev, as well as to those readers who forced me to collect material and insisted on finishing the work and its publications. The work also used information from the book by V.M. Kulemzin “About the Khanty shamans” and other studies.

It is interesting that earlier Russian travelers called Mansi and Khanty in one word - Ostyaks, and some of them divided these peoples into Leplin Ostyaks (Mansi) and Ob Ostyaks (Khanty), for example, scientists of the expedition of E. Hoffmann, 1847-1850. Mansi and Khanty were also called by a common word - Ob Ugrians. Then the name Voguls began to be applied to the Mansi. It is a plausible guess that the word Vogul came to the Russians from the Zyryans, who call them Vogul or Logul, i.e. “despicable, evil, hateful” (Korikov L. Sosvinsky and Lyapinsky Voguls of the Berezovsky District, 1898).

Ugras, Ostyaks, Khanty - three names of the same people. The most accurate is the latter, which contains the ancient self-name kantah, khante, which means both “people” and “man”. IN Soviet time it became the official name of the ethnic group, but in foreign scientific literature the former name - Ostyaks - is still used to this day. The origin of the last word has different explanations, and one of them traces the term to the self-name as-yah “Ob people”. Yugra is the Komi-Zyryan and Russian name for the ancestors of the Khanty and the closely related Mansi, who were formerly called Voguls. It has been known from written sources since the 11th century, but by the 17th century. disappears from them, only to be reborn two centuries later in scientific literature. In the 19th century It was established that the closest relatives of the Khanty and Mansi in language are Hungarians, and the concept of “Ugric languages ​​and peoples” arose. The Khanty and Mansi, in contrast to the Hungarians, began to be called “Ob Ugrians”. The term “Yugra” has some kind of attractive force for the modern Khanty and Mansiysk intelligentsia; it becomes a symbol of its own language and culture. (V. M. KULEMZIN N. V. LUKINA) But the Voguls themselves asked to be called Mansi.

Therefore, “Mansi, Mansi, Mansi”...

And the Khanty, of course.

In the photo: Mansi of the Kurikov family. From the archive of V. Androsov.

In the photo: Nyarki. Photo by V. Androsov, house of Albina Aleksandrovna Bakhtiyarova.

Mansi have always loved military uniforms. For example, Miron Bakhtiyarov always wore a jacket. But the shoes are only my own. On skis, only nyarki, on reindeer boots. This is the tradition and life of Mansi.

M.P.:- Here I found a description of Mansi’s shoes:

“We are walking with the Mansi hunter Ursuy along the bank of the Pelym River. Ursui is short, broad-shouldered. He has a sparse beard, his eyes are slightly slanted, dark. He is dressed in the taiga style: on his feet are soft shoes made of leggings, and his overcoat boots are crosswise tied with rawhide belts. The padded jacket is belted with a homemade bandolier made of elk skin, on the head is an old hat with a net to protect against midges. On the hip is a long knife in a wooden hollow sheath." (Magazine "Science and Life", 60s)

And here is a photo of Mansi on skis. What kind of strings do they have around their legs at the bottom? And what is the object that is behind Stepan Kurikov?

Look at the nyanki, they are lined with overcoat cloth on top. The cloth is wrapped like the hem of a coat, an overcoat, or like bast shoes, remember, on strings, and you wrap the strings (laces). And the snow doesn't get into your shoes. Nyarki dress in cloth stockings made from an overcoat. The stockings are tied with a string to the Mansi's belt. Nyarks are worn both in winter and in summer. Dry long grass is placed inside, which grows in abundance along the banks of rivers. When it gets wet, it is replaced with a new one. The Mansi always used to have an armful of this grass tied to their yurt. It is about 40 cm long. It is folded in half and folded into nyarkki.

M.P.:- Women's shoes were strictly separated from men's and children's, especially insoles for shoes, which were considered the most “filthy.” What width and length could this overcoat cloth be? The fact is that under a cedar they found the following thing:

“Personally, I saw how a dark-colored cloth belt with lanyards at the ends was discovered under this cedar. I didn’t know who this item belonged to. The length of this item is about 80 cm, the width is about 10 cm, it looks like a belt or strap that The Mansi are pulling the load, but this object is not suitable for use instead of a strap, since it is fragile." (Interrogation protocol of B. Slobtsov)

What it is? Could it have belonged to Mansi?

V.A.:- No. The cloth is sewn to the skin of the duck and has approximately dimensions of 35x20.

35 cm around the perimeter of the nest and 20 cm in height.

And the stockings are on the hunters in your picture. In the museum, the narks are without an overcoat rim; they are not sewn on.

M.P.:- And how are these stockings attached to Mansi’s belt with a string, if they are 20 cm high?

V.A.:- Stockings, I repeat, are sewn from overcoat cloth. They are the same as women's stockings, they are worn right up to the groin and then tied to a belt (belt). And they are already wearing nyankas, like in the photo, take a closer look.

And already on the overcoat stockings, they tie the overcoat top with a string. And the ducklings will not fall, and the snow will not fall.

V.A.:- I told you, and you can see in the photo, strips of overcoat cloth are sewn to the nyarks, tied with laces, that’s all. He expressed it in his own way, as best he could. So that the snow doesn't get into the nyanki, and the nyanki don't get off their feet. He is not a great researcher, this is his only publication about the Mansi people. Maybe at home near the yurts, they walked like that, put on their trousers and that’s it, there was nowhere else to go, and if they went hunting or to the taiga, then they only dressed like that, trousers, stockings, and nyarkas.

M.P.: I am looking for a trace of that same mysterious “belt with lanyards” near the cedar that B. Slobtsov spoke about, which is why I am asking in such detail.

About Konstantin Sheshkin.

Witness in the Dyatlov group's case. He hunted with the Mansi Anyamovs in the places where the group died. Shaman. Princely family. 1768 - salary of landownership charters to princes Sheshkin and Taishin. Alexander Stesin in his work “Forest People” writes that “in his youth Sheshkin served in the troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, then was imprisoned for murder. It seems that he really remembers a lot, but most of what he tells aliens with such enthusiasm is fiction. The truth You can’t tell strangers, but for a long time there weren’t any of your own left.”

Other ethnographers say that K. Sheshkin served seven years for murder, as if he was attacked by three people in the taiga, he killed one in defense, for which he was imprisoned. It is unknown who the attackers were and why they attacked Mansi. Strange story. Maybe their shamanic affairs, or drunken Mansi fought among themselves. They also say that Sheshkin beat his wife.

V.A.:- You asked me about K. Sheshkin. I found something out about him. His brother, Pyotr Efimovich, lived in Lombovozh in the North. Sosva. His house was a real ethnographic museum. Various sabers, idols, objects of traditional Mansi life, etc. When he died, the key to the house was with relatives there in Lombovozh. However, the direct heir was Konstantin Sheshkin, who lived in the village of Burmantovo (24 km from us along the river). And when the arriving ethnographic group found out about this, they went to Burmantovo. There they met with Konstantin, apparently they “hit it” properly, and he agreed to transfer to the Museum of the Cultural History of the Peoples of Siberia all the objects stored in his brother’s house.

"In the village council, the deed of sale was properly drawn up, and a couple of days later the door of Sheshkin’s house opened in front of us. And among many other cult things, which we will talk about yet, we saw a red rider on a white horse. A toy that lived an unusual life, as an image the omnipresent God of Mansi." (Mir-susne-hum).

“Two years ago, having decided to show this work to scientists, Roman Anyamov took his precious notebook with a collection of katpos to Tyumen. The scientists became interested. The notebook was taken to “look”, after which it was placed in the museum. Meanwhile, the collector was hoping for something completely different: “ I thought now we’ll work together and study catposes. Nobody knows them better than me, now the Mansi all write in Russian... Well, okay, they didn’t want to put them together, yes, well, at least return the signs to me, copy them for yourself and return them..." The signs were not returned. When we arrived In Treskolye, Uncle Roma began restoring his collection from memory." (A. Stesin, "Forest People")

In the photo: Mir-Susne-Khum (Man surveying the world) and his braids, ten braids. And 9 coins tied in a scarf. Photo from the modern Mansi sanctuary on Lozva, from the archive of V. Androsov.

Mir-susne-khum - this character of the Mansi pantheon was borrowed by the ancestors of the Mansi and Khanty from Iranian mythology - stable, centuries-old contacts of the Ugrians with Iran (during their residence in the steppes of Southern Siberia) did not pass without a trace. The Ugrians borrowed not only the image of Mithra, but also an ideology that was transformed in the religious consciousness of the Mansi and Khanty.

In the III-VII centuries. in Iran, during the reign of the Sassanid dynasty, for the coronation of the Shahinshah - “king of kings” - they produced large silver dishes depicting the king hunting lions, tigers, rams, gazelles, bears, etc. Most of the surviving dishes were found in the 19th century. in the Urals (at the sites of Mansi sanctuaries). In the summer of 2001, a silver Sasanian dish with the image of King Yezdegerd I and two zebu bulls was discovered among the Syn Khanty.

At the end of the 19th century. N.L. Gondatti wrote that according to Mansi ideas, “Mir-susne-khum always has a bottle of vodka in his right hand and a snuff box in his left.”

Mir-susne-khum played the role of the giver of the shamanic gift and at the same time was the main figure whom the shaman called upon during the ritual process. The central place was given to Mir-susne-khum and at the bear festival of the Mansi, which demonstrated his superiority over the main deity of the Ural pantheon - the Bear. (Gemuev I.N., Baulo A.V. Mansi sanctuaries of the upper reaches of the Northern Sosva. Novosibirsk, 1999.)

And after baptism in the 18th century, the Mansi pantheon was replenished with Christ, who was identified with the hero Mir-Susne-Khum, “the man who surveys the world,” and the Mother of God, who was considered one of the wives of the supreme god Numi-Torum. On Easter (“Paskin’s Day”), each icon here is treated to bread and vodka. (A. Stesin, “Forest People”.)

Let's remember this guy Mir-Susne-Khum. In the future, he will appear more than once in my story and, perhaps, played a major role in the death of the group. But more on this later, in the second part of the article.

Mansi, as they were pagans, remain pagans to this day.

“Stepan Nikolaevich Anyamov is the only Orthodox Mansi of Ushma. At home there is an exemplary order of an ensign-commercialist-Old Believer. Everything in one person. There is a guitar on the wall, a nook for prayers is fenced off - there, among the beautiful icons, lamps smoke.” (I. Abramov, Life and death of the Lozvinsky Mansi, 2010)

In the photo: This cross is from Prokopiy Timofeevich Bakhtiyarov, great-grandfather of Miron and Pyotr Bakhtiyarov. Located in one of the Mansi sanctuaries on Lozva. Photo by V. Androsov, the Mansi themselves showed him the “treasures” from this sanctuary.

M.P.:- Vladimir, what can you say about the number 9 in Mansi mythology? Here is an excerpt from E. Buyanov’s message about A. Slepukhin’s lecture, which he once attended:

“To my question, does the number “9” have any meaning? died...), Alexey said that the numbers 4 and 7 have a “positive meaning” for Mansi, but the number 9 has a negative meaning. This is connected with the legends about “9 Mansi who drowned in the “flood”, “9 dead Red Army soldiers”, and now about “9 dead tourists”....

V.A.:- The number 9 does not mean anything to the Mansi. No matter how much literature I have read, this number does not come up anywhere. But 7, yes, this is a sacred number, occurs all the time.

M.P.:- I also looked in the literature about the number 9 in Mansi mythology, but I never found anything. Apart from everyday episodes of life: E. Romadeeva mentions that the Mansi in a special way commemorated a deceased woman on the 9th day, and a deceased man on the 11th. K.F. Karjalainen (1927) said that the shaman’s clothing (skin for ritual) of the Khanty sometimes has 9 multi-colored pieces of fabric on the lining, which symbolize 9 animals that the Khanty hunted. This skin also served as a sacrificial blanket. I also came across a mention of the number 9 in an article about the erotic cults of the Mansi, and symbolizes the number 9 as the copulation of a man and a woman (five souls of a man and four souls of a woman).

The number 9 is found among the Nenets (Samoyeds), in the description of the tambourine and the ritual costume of the shaman. “Their tambourine had an oval shape, wider at the top, with four resonators called the horns and ears of the mother-beast of the shaman, who was represented in the form of a creature similar to a mammoth. On inside The shells under the “ears” and “horns” were reinforced three times with 9 hollow rattles made of tin. They were hung loosely on wire brackets so that they could move freely along it and ring. On top of the shell the tambourine was covered with a twisted bowstring of a crossbow. Nine bells or bells were strung three times onto the ropes that were used to attach the handle in the form of a cross to the shell.

In carrying out the rituals, he must be assisted by “seven innocent girls and nine innocent boys”...

The number 9 as the number of strings is found among the Mansi and Khanty and in a musical instrument: Tor, torop-yuh has a bird-like appearance and is called in Russian “swan”, “goose”, “crane”. This is an arched harp with a body and neck made of solid wood; at the end of the neck, a bird's or sometimes a horse's head is carved. From 9 to 13 strings are stretched in the corner space between the body and the neck.

That is, the number 9 does not carry any negative emanations among the Khanty and Mansi. BUT all Internet links about the number 9 point to publications about Igor Dyatlov’s group. That is, as I understand it, all the terrible stories about the number 9 among the Mansi are inventions of modern “researchers” and journalists?

V.A.:- It turns out that way!

M.P.:- Tell us about the Bakhtiyarovs, please, what kind of yurt all the tourists passed through when they went to the Prayer Stone?

V.A.:- Other Bakhtiyarovs lived there, not those who lived on Pelym and near Suevat-Paul. There were a lot of them there. And on the Kul river, and the Anchug river, and on M. Toshemka and on the river. Vap suck. It is now only Prokopiy Bakhtiyarov with his son Sergei who lives in Kimung-chupa-pavil on Vap-sos and that’s all.

M.P.:- Where have all the Bakhtiyarovs gone? There were a lot of them.

V.A.:- Where? They left for the next world.

In the photo: Tynschan (tynzyan), reindeer harness, rope for tying the load on a sled, made of horse hair, very durable and does not rot. From the archive of V. Androsov.

V.A.: You see, even Mansi sometimes change the name. Ostroumov N.G. in the book "Vogul-Mansi. 1904" he is called Tunchang. The Mansi used to say “tynsyak” to me. In V.N. Chernetsov’s dictionary it sounds like this: tynzyan. This is a type of lasso for catching deer. But it’s shaping up very interestingly, it’s hard to miss. After a couple of throws, you will definitely catch the deer by the horns.

Tynzian (or mauta) is a belt lasso no more than 30 meters long. Each shepherd weaves tynzan himself, cutting thin strips of deer skin in a circle. Throwing a Tynzyan at a distance is the first exam for a young reindeer herder, throwing for accuracy is already an exam for a matriculation certificate

The cross-section of the tynzian is arbitrary. At the front end, the tynzian has a knuckle - a sarmik with two holes - small and large, through which the tynzian is inserted and thereby a loop is formed. Tynzian must be made of leather (the use of artificial tynzian is prohibited).

Sergey Vinnichenko answers:- Yes, this is a harness! If you take a closer look, it looks like there is harness, long rawhide straps, like strings.

Vladimir Androsov answers:- Yes, reindeer harness. And the horsehair rope, which was once knitted by Alexandra Vasilievna, was intended for tying the load on the sled. This Tynzian belongs to Alexandra Vasilyevna Anyamova. And on the Tynzyan there is a single object made of bone, on it is the ancestral tamga of the Tasmanov family. But not the Bakhtiyarovs. Why the Tasmanovs, it’s none of my business. And how did he get to them? Maybe they gave it as a gift. Previously, the owner put his tamga on almost all household items. Tynzyans are all made the same way and you can’t tell by looking which one is in front of you. And that’s why they put up a tamga. In the photo, there is also a tamga and on Sun-kvali-luvyt, there is also a tamga of the owner. (Dictionary: Sun-narta, kvali-harness, luvyt-bones.)

M. Kovalsky, from the Report of the Expedition of E. Hoffmann " Northern Urals and Pai Hoi Coast Range," Volume 1, 1853.

Vladimir Androsov: This was hung for drying hay in rainy summers.

As A. Rakitin noted, the guys are next to crosses. And this is symbolic, meaning death on the cross.

Sergey Vinnichenko:- Maya, in your article about Gudkov the children in the photo are small, they look like Miron. Who took the photo, whose children are these?

In the photo: Varvara Kuzmovna Bakhtiyarova with her children Miron and Albina.

M.P.:- Photos from 1956 taken by MSU students when they were walking to Otorten, passing by Chistop, photographing the Mansi settlement. The Bakhtiyarovs lived there. Was Bakhtiyarov Nikolai? This name is mentioned in B. Gudkov’s diary, that in the area of ​​\u200b\u200bthat hut their group met Mansi Nikolai.

S.V.:- Bakhtiyarov Nikolai is Takhtinsky, Anchugovsky, but the Bakhtiyarovs themselves did not recognize him, he was an alien, they say he was Ignatov, but he called himself Bakhtiyarov, they called him an impostor.

There is only one such yurt on Malaya Toshemka. The children in the photo are somewhere from 4 years old, but at the end of the 90s they were 35 years old. Curious who they are? Either they died young, or it is Misha, but he is considered “Sotovsky”... Again, Mishka is younger! Logically, then, it turns out that this is Myron himself? But he himself was the first to be built there. Miron was born in Mal.Toshemka in 1946.

I discussed this photo with Miron's daughter, Tamara Mironovna.

I mistook Miron for Prokop because of their childhood similarity. Prokop is Miron’s son; early on, when he was still a boy, they were left without parents.

I initially considered the photo to be from the Ushmin region. But after clarification, there was only one Mansi village near Chistop - but this is a completely different route, in no way coinciding with Dyatlov’s. And according to the assurances, according to the year of the Moscow student tourists, and according to the year of Miron’s birth, everything fits. So, in the photo are Miron and his sister Albina.

Vladimir Androsov says:

Bakhtiyarov Alexander Prokopievich and his brother Timofey lived between the Sev. Toshemka river and the river. Vizhay. Along the river Vap suck. Their children are my friends. Varvara Kuzmovna Bakhtiyarova herself killed eight bears. In 1961, Varvara Kuzmovna’s husband, Alexander Prokopievich Bakhtiyarov, took his own life for a banal reason: they didn’t serve him any beer, and he decided to do something bad to everyone by hanging himself.

In the photo: Alexander Prokopyevich Bakhtiyarov.

And it happened like this: in the Urals the deer were sick, and Miron with his sister Albina and Varvara Kuzmovna and ex-fiance Galina’s sisters, Sergei Savelyevich Bakhtiyarov (his parents lived on the Anchuga River), went to visit the deer for about two weeks. In the Urals (that is, in the mountains, on the ridge, while we were walking. The locals call the ridge and surrounding mountains the Urals) they baked bread, and it didn’t turn out well, everything turned out unsuccessfully. When they were going to the Urals, they lit a fire, and then a frog jumped into the fire and burned. All this indicated that there would be some kind of misfortune. Then brother Peter came to the Urals to the place where the Bakhtiyarovs were grazing deer and said that his father had hanged himself. Before the day when their father hanged himself, the children were playing, dousing themselves with water, and fooling around. Someone in the taiga shouted in a man’s voice five times, which means a man will die, and if the voice shouted four times, it means a woman will die. Yelled "Is", spirit. After the death of her husband and father, they could not live on Khovr-Yankylm, and Varvara Kuzmovna Bakhtiyarova with her sons Miron and Peter, daughter Albina moved to live on the river. Malaya Toshemka (Pupy-unly-ya), translated as “by the river where the gods sit.” “Pupy” in translation means idols (gods), “unly” (sat). According to Mansi customs, living on the M. Toshemka River was not allowed, but against all odds, Peter built a yurt on the bank of Malaya Toshemka, at the crossroads of many “salin-lekh” (deer roads), among magnificent tall pines.

Bakhtiyarov Miron Aleksandrovich met his wife Lisa in the Urals, on Tump-Kapai, Lisa and her grandfather were herding deer not far from the pastures of our reindeer herders. She was born in Suevat Paula; her father died in 1987. Her mother died early and she was raised by her grandmother Agapya. Lisa was considered a rich bride, Miron married Lisa in 1970 and they began to live on Malaya Toshemka. They built their own yurt not far from Peter’s yurt. Peter, I don’t know why, but he called this yurt “a filthy yurt.”

It was difficult for Varvara Kuzmovna to feed her family alone. The mother did not allow her daughter Albina to go to boarding school on Polunochny, repeating that there was no father who would help feed the family. But despite her mother’s prohibitions, Albina studied in the village of Polunochnoye at a boarding school for four years, from 1965 to 1968, completed four classes and went back to live on Malaya Toshemka with her mother and brothers. She didn't study anymore.

In the photo: Anyamov Andrey Alekseevich. Lived in Suivat-pavil. Participant in the search for Dyatlov's group.

V.A.: Anyamov Andrey Alekseevich, his eyebrows are such that you can’t confuse them, no one else has Mansi, I’ve never seen such eyebrows. Thick, black.

Sergey Vinnichenko answers: Kolya Pelikov from Keraskolye did not speak Russian until he came of age, did not go to school, he was raised and raised by his grandfather, the shaman of the family. And I remember their appearance in Vizhay very well, then we met on the Ushma-Vizhay road. Nikolai’s grandfather, who never mastered the Russian language until his last days, walked and died on the way not far from the container shop in the forest. (“I know this for certain from Nikolai Timofeevich’s grandson,” added V. Androsov.) I went fishing with Nikolai, and he fitted me with my first kitten skis.

In the photo: Nikolai Yakimovich Bakhtiyarov. Witness in the Dyatlov group's case.

V. Androsov:

I want to tell you about one incident that happened in this region in 1960. One old Mansi, his name was Nikolai Nikolaevich Bakhtiyarov, he had no children, he lived alone in the upper reaches of the Anchug River, a tributary of the Vizhay River, together with Nikolai Yakimovich, the father of Daria Nikolaevna Bakhtiyarova, he went hunting in the M. Toshemka area, the place is here excellent, cedar, pine forest, there was always a lot of game and animals, and he stayed in Pyotr Bakhtiyarov’s yurt, complaining that he couldn’t kill a sable and the dog was good, but couldn’t kill. Peter will go hunting with his dog, kill a sable, Miron will go hunting and will also return with a sable. And when Nikolai Nikolaevich goes, he always returns empty. The dog was very good, he took sable, bear, and elk. Then Nikolai Nikolaevich decided to go to Chistop for the night, climbed the mountain, lit a fire, drank tea and fell asleep, and he dreamed of seven menkvas with bows and arrows aimed at him. He woke up in the morning, cooked porridge, appeased the spirits, and read a prayer (poik) addressed to the spirits. And after this prayer and appeasing the spirits, Nikolai Nikolaevich began to hunt well and never came to the yurt without killed sables. How he appeased the spirits on Chistop!

In the photo: a Mansi yurt and two Mansi women with tourists in 1959. Route Vizhay-Krasnovishersk.

M.P.:- Vladimir, where does this rarity come from? July 1959! Six months have passed since the death of the Dyatlovites, and new students are walking through the Bakhtiyarovs’ yurt. Who did you find this photo from?

V.A.:- At the Kurikovs'. There is an inscription on the back of the photo. Group leader Zablatsky Yuri. Leningrad Pedagogical Institute. 07/12/1959

This is one of the Bakhtiyarovs. The route ran along the Vizhay River. Perhaps this is Yalpyn-ya-pavil, in the upper reaches of the Vizhay River. The students were on a hike, took a photo and then sent this photo to Mansi. Nowadays they rarely write, but before they still wrote and sent photos, and that’s good.

M.P.:- Vladimir, what stories did you have about Chistop, it’s true that there was some kind of anomaly there, and even the soldiers went crazy. Or is this just a make-believe? Did the Mansi tell you anything strange about Chistop?

V.A.:- Maya, the soldiers didn’t go crazy, only one soldier got lost.

M.P.:- And in 1959, were there any military buildings or some kind of military posts on Chistop?

V.A.:- There were no military installations there in those years (1959). I walked the entire ridge in 1971 and there was nothing there yet either. The military appeared on Chistop in the mid-70s. And the Mansi communicated with the military, because... In winter they sometimes grazed deer along Chistop. They said that when the air defenses were there, deer sometimes came up.

For many kilometers between Bolshaya and Malaya Toshemka there was a continuous pine forest, pure pine forest, without any other plantings. This place is located southwest of the southern end of the Sisup (Chistop) ridge. According to legend, after the flood, a small unflooded piece of land remained on the mountain; Sisup is translated as “the cry of a child.” The main peak of Mount Sisup received the curious Mansi name Nyavrn - lyunchi - syakhl -ala. Ala is a peak, Syahl is a hill, a mountain, Lyunchi is roaring, Nyavrn is a child. Those. "The top of the mountain where the child cried." Around the Sisup ridge, at different times many Mansi women and children were lost, but they were never found. Apparently there is some kind of geopathogenic zone here. The southern part of the Sisup ridge ends with the Camel Hill. And below is the “Sharp” hill, the Mansi name is Luv - Syakvur (Horse Tit). This place is not good, so the Mansi think, Sisup lives there - ovyl - menkvoyka (The Old Man is the devil of the end of Sisup). In the yurt on Malaya Toshemka, children were not allowed to sing songs in the evenings, laugh loudly, or play, but during the day they were allowed to shout, sing, and laugh.

In the mythology of the Mansi people there is a mythical forest spirit, Menkv, he is three or more meters tall, covered with hair, that they live like people, have wives and children, sleep on bear skins. They have enormous physical strength; when he walks through the taiga, the noise of his steps can be heard from afar, trees creak and break, and the wind howls.

The Menkvas, according to the Mansi, lived on the southern side of Chistipa (Sisup), at the mouth of the Targur-sos river (pine forest), the right tributary of the Bolshaya Toshemka river, in the vicinity of the village of Turgur-sos, and only women and children really disappeared there. Varvara Kuzmovna was told about this. Toshemka is translated as “the river on which the Gods sit.”

M.P.:- Some menkvas, “uchchi”, are considered cannibals by the Mansi. Children and women of the Mansi disappeared, they, of course, did not report to the police, they disappeared, well, they disappeared. Maybe Bigfoot stole it? If the police had started looking, they would have found at least something. And so only legends come - children disappear... And again then a legend was invented. There was no flooded space left, like for a child to cry. There are too many floods in Mansi legends.

V.A.:- These are not legends, but reality. At the beginning of the twentieth century and at the end of the nineteenth, the Mansi lived there, and their children, girls, and women constantly disappeared. This is true. The Mansi themselves told me this. What kind of police were in the nineteenth century? The village of Burmantovo was accidentally discovered only in one thousand nine hundred and seven. Old Believers from Pechora built it.

M.P.:- Look, please, is this Keraskolye? How far is it from Second Northern?

V.A.:- Yes, this is Treskolye. Or Keras-kolyn-ya-pavel, as the Mansi call it.

Sergey Vinnichenko:- Keraskolya is not visible from the shore of Lozva, but there are 300 meters to the water on the opposite side, a little lower.

M.P.:- How far is Keraskolye from Second Northern?

S.V.:- Directly - it’s nonsense, there’s a crossing on the road, the road through Second Northern to Ushma, within 1000 meters. From the Second Northern, from Keraskolya the trail is straight for about 1000 m, and below Fedchik there is a mowing, 2-3 km above the Second, it’s closer along the road, but there is also a trail. I mainly traveled there by car, and in a snowstorm in winter. And he carried timber from beyond Keraskolya. (I didn’t rummage along the river in those parts, I have other lands, but on Auspiya I did a lot). Second Northern - the Mansi used to live there, they have a cemetery there.

M.P.:- Interesting about the cemetery near the Second Northern. Is it far from the village? When did it appear, was it new, or was it still in the old days, in the 50s?

S.V.:- I am a person of a later generation, I have no predilections for burials, I spoke on the phone today with a fellow Ushmin resident, and he told me that this cemetery was a long time ago, even before the formation of Keraskolya. At first the Mansi lived there, and they had a cemetery there. Pashin V.I. I lived on Second Northern, I’ll talk to him. He knows about that region and Ushma like no one else. Pashin Vladimir Ivanovich, yes, the same descendant of the forester Ivan Pashin, and in the past the head of Ushma.

Alexandra Vasilyevna and Liza and Mishka Pelikov and Sveta, Liza’s daughter, now live and live on Treskolya. More or less a residential house for Kolya Anyamov, but he only visits it, but lives in Ushma, a new Mansi village has become there. Albina’s house is collapsing, she lives permanently on Ushma. Alexandra Vasilyevna seems to have two houses, but they don’t live in one, she’s doing something of her own with him.

Miron, like Albina, lived on Malaya Toshemka for a short time; the other Bakhtiyarovs pushed them out of there. The deer were grazed on the town of Tumpyang, there through the Small Path. A deer trail went through Lokhyn-ya to Keraskolye.

According to Albinka, whose maiden name was Bakhtiyarov, they were kicked out of there, Mirona and the children. There, at their former camp, there are solid old clearings. Miron moved to the edge of the swamp, near Lake Manensky, now called the Mironovsky swamp, but the forestry department came and stuck a quarter post right on the hut. The clearing has been marked. And Miron, who did not live long after, had to move to Treskolye. And the Anyamovs themselves are refugees from the Soviets, from Tapsuya, Khanty-Mansiysk Okrug. They came here to save the deer, negotiated with the Bakhtiyarovs (Alexandra Vasilievna Anyamova lived with them, was the wife of Pavel Kirillovich Bakhtiyarov, who lived on Pelym and died of tuberculosis), hid the deer behind the Prayer Stone. And then they began to inhabit Keraskolye (in Russian translation Treskolye). The Bakhtiyarovs were not fierce, but businesslike. Miron also had deer, and conditions were needed to graze them, you had to stand for the territory, you had to fight, and that’s how you survived.

Albina is a good person, she knows and can do a lot of things, for example, she can definitely make a towel, but they, the Mansi, all have their own quirks and jokes.

From the Report of N. Sorokin “Journey to the Voguls”, 1873

V.A.:- Mansi, they had toothbrushes even in the 60s. In the old Suevat-pavil, in 1963, in the yurt of Gavriil Nikolaevich Kurikov, two toothbrushes lay on a shelf. And Vasily Nikolaevich Kurikov had a mirror, a washbasin, posters about the 1905 revolution hanging on the walls, a first aid kit and a toothbrush. Wow, how!!!

M.P.:- But N. Sorokin reports that in 1872, the Mansi, or as he calls them, the Voguls, chewed larch resin (sulfur) instead of toothpastes, they greatly respected this tree, he writes.

In the photo: The same chuval, a Mansi stove, is made of clay and thin rods.

The main advantage of CHUVALA is the presence of a pipe that removes smoke from the living space. Actually, the chuval consists of one wide pipe. For it, they used a hollow tree and placed rods coated with clay in a circle. At the bottom of the pipe there is a mouth where the fire is lit and the boiler is hung on the crossbar. There is a riddle about the chuval: “A red fox is running inside a rotten tree.”

“The chuval is somewhat reminiscent of a fireplace. Imagine a rifle barrel without a bolt. The barrel-pipe is made of vine twigs and coated with clay. Firewood is placed vertically in the widened, half-open part of the barrel. Warmth and light! A cauldron of food or tea is hung right there.” (M. Vladimirov, To the country of Yugoria.)

From the Report of N. Sorokin “Journey to the Voguls”, 1873

With such a stove design, heat could not be kept in the yurt if the fire was not constantly maintained. Before going to bed, the hut was heated hotly, people went to bed, covering themselves with skins, the fire gradually died out, smoke and heat came out through the open chimney upward, and during the night the yurt cooled completely. The Dyatlovites used the same stove heating system. The Dyatlov group did not assign people on duty to monitor the stove all night and keep the tent warm. Everyone got up together, and those on duty prepared breakfast, while others woke up and did not want to get out of the heated camp bed. Compared to V. Karelin’s group, the latter had night watches, the stove was heated all night, the attendants monitored the drying of clothes, looked after the fire, wrote diaries, mended clothes...

M.P.:- Why do they call Mansi Keras-kol?

V.A.:- Because below the camp along the river there is a cave in the rock called the “whale’s” mouth. So they called it Keras-kolyn-ya pavyl (a village near a cliff along the river). The rock is very close to the village, well, a little more than a kilometer. There are no legends about it, just an ordinary rock. Keraskolie appeared in 1961.

Here it is, the Whale's Mouth!

M.P.:- Did the Dyatlov group go through the Mouth of the Whale? For some reason it’s not on the negatives of their field films.

V.A.:- The rock is located along the route, yes, Dyatlov’s group passed it, but in the evening, when it was already dark. This rock is located in the following sequence: 41st - Ushma - Whale's Mouth - Second Northern.

And in 1965, Grigory Kurikov’s hunting territory was there, and they decided to settle in a new place and build their own yurt. The yurt was built on the site where the Mansi hunter from Suevat-pavil, Nikolai Stepanovich Kurikov, the son of Stepan Kurikov, used to hunt, there was already a hunting hut there, these were his hunting grounds and they called this settlement Keras-kolyn-ya-pavil (Treskolye).

In the photo: Keras-kolyn-ya-pavil. Yurt of Nikolai Vasilyevich Anyamov. From the archive of V. Androsov.

In the 70s, Nikolai Vasilyevich Anyamov, a good hunter, an experienced man, knew the taiga better than anyone else, and why? Yes, he was born in the upper reaches of Lozva in 1928 in Aktyl-tollich-pavil, then moved to live in the upper reaches of Vizhay (Yalping-ya-pavil), Sui-vat-pavil, "10", 2nd Northern and only in the early 60s x settled in a new place and named the village. Keras-kolyn-ya pavyl (Treskolye). He lived in all corners of our region and knew well all the places, paths, manes, swamps, rivers, etc. And he said that in the upper reaches of Lozva, exactly in the same places where the tourists died, he saw a large hairy monster, above any bear, he was very scared and warned all the Mansi not to go in that direction. Most likely it was Bigfoot. Nikolai Vasilyevich killed more than forty bears in his life and could distinguish a bear from some previously invisible “monster”. This is guys, the naked truth, what happened, happened. I visited the taiga with him many times and I could learn a lot from him, but Mansi, as a rule, do not talk about their “exploits”; they need to pour some wine, and then you can hear a lot, this is also, unfortunately, a fact.

Nikolai Stepanovich Kurikov, while hunting, somewhere in 1961-1962, mistook his friend, Prokopiy Vasilyevich Anyamov, brother of Nikolai Vasilyevich Anyamov (he was carrying skis on his shoulder), for a moose, and accidentally killed him. He killed and then hid in this hut. And Nikolai Vasilyevich Anyamov persuaded Nikolai Stepanovich Kurikov to surrender to the authorities and himself defended him, proving that the shot was accidental and not intentional. Nikolai Kurikov was the son of Stepan Nikolaevich Kurikov’s first wife.

In the photo: Kurikov Stepan Nikolaevich and his son, Kurikov Nikolai Stepanovich. Suivat-pawl. From the archive of V. Androsov.

M.P.:- There was also information from V. Korotaev, an investigator at the prosecutor’s office, that Stepan Kurikov himself brought his son Nikolai to the police and handed him over to the authorities. What is his fate, did he survive in prison?

V.A.:- He was given a suspended sentence of one year with a permanent police record. The grandson of Stepan Kurikov followed in the footsteps of his father and also killed a policeman in Vizhai. They also gave me a year of probation, just like my father.

M.P.:- How so? Stepan Kurikov, a leader in production, a deputy, a favorite of the authorities, is also a shaman, and his son and grandson are murderers.

V.A.:- Yes, that's it.

M.P.:- Which constantly surprises me. So these supposed hunting accidents. When sharp-eyed Mansi mistake something for a moose. That's for the bear. Then for what kind of beast of his fellow tribesmen. Isn’t settling scores with offenders happening under the guise of “misidentifying himself, mistaking him for a moose”... In the spirit of the Mansi, dealing with offenders secretly, from behind the bushes. I remember many cases of such Mansi hunting “mistakes”, and recently I witnessed how two people met on the Internet and made claims against each other about the fact that their ancestors were killed as a result of such “mistakes” - they supposedly accepted one or the other , each other for moose.

An ordinary Mansi grave. Mansi, as a rule, do not bury their dead in the ground, but place them in this coffin-shaped building. This is a building with three or four logs. An inverted sledge is placed on top, this indicates that the deceased owned reindeer, his sledge is left to him for the afterlife.

Sometimes there may be empty bottles of vodka and alcohol lying on the grave. The more bottles, the more respected and loved the deceased was, the more relatives and friends remember him. Bottles and funeral utensils are not taken from the cemetery. Photo from the personal archive of V. Androsov.

“Wake up was usually held in the summer. According to the Mansi, the dead are awake at night and sleep during the day. When people came to the cemetery, they took out the lid of the hole and knocked it on the corner of the grave (this meant: “wake up, hear, loved ones have come”).” (Z.P. Sokolova, about the funeral rites of the Mansi, 1980)

The bread is covered with a mug and everything stays like that until the next wake.

(Note: this is in contrast to the Russian custom of openly leaving funeral food on graves, for everyone who passes by the grave and wants to remember the deceased, for birds, etc. The Mansi directly leave food only for the deceased! And there is no pampering in the form of hospitality for you here. )

After visiting the cemetery and commemorating the grave, the window in the grave is tightly closed with such a wooden beam. Photo from the personal archive of V. Androsov.

The path leads to the cemetery, and after leaving the cemetery a stick is placed across it. Now you can safely go home. None of the dead will haunt you. After all the funeral troubles, each of the relatives, leaving the cemetery, called his soul with him: “Ishorem yuva.” According to the ideas of the Mansi and Khanty, every living person had his own invisible double, called “is, iskhor”. It is believed that the soul of a deceased person is capable of independently moving behind living people if it is not interfered with,

“We are going back to the village. There is a stick across the path at the exit from the cemetery. The Mansi woman accompanying us picked it up, waited until we all passed, and put the stick down again: “Lie here, but don’t go with us,” she said in side of the cemetery for the deceased, blocking their entrance to the world of the living." (E.A.Lysenko. Treskolye//Ural Pathfinder, ? 1/2005)

When you leave the cemetery, you must also leave a mark.

M.P.:- Sergey, can you tell me what this design means? Was it built by the Mansi, or did someone decide to stylize the building as a Mansi? Why are there elk antlers there, why is the trochee left behind? What are these short birch poles?

(Note: I would also like to note that this photograph will appear further, in the second part of the work, since it depicts one of the evidence that a sacrifice took place in this place.)

S.V.:- So these are elk antlers, a parking lot, a place for shooting a sorp elk, they could have caught it before the snow, the trochee looks like it’s standing, leaning against its elbows, the antlers are heavy and you can’t just carry it away. The horns processed for a trophy had to be taken away; they cannot be left on the ground; mice and squirrels will knock them out. In fact, according to Mansi traditions, it was not customary to leave elk, even bare bones, on bare ground, he is a sacred beast for them, even the remains of bones were piled on platforms similar to storage sheds, stumps and trees. In the old days, the Mansi chased elk for weeks, tracks were once rare, and they took everything out on deer. When cutting in any way, trees are cut as a material at hand; birch is like the basis of mountains and swamps. Birch bark does not last long in the air; three years are rotten, but the material used for the products is strong; sledges were made from birch. These poles could have been used for drying meat, or rather they were. I'm familiar with this process. It’s a purely taiga principle and how to set firewood, it doesn’t get damp from the ground, it doesn’t get covered in snow, and in general, who knows what it might be useful for, the law of survival is rationality. Among the aborigines, many of the basics of life are automatic.

In winter, by November, the elk's antlers themselves begin to fall off, so the prey is early, but not spring-summer, I understand this, the bone is slightly faded in the sun, but not much. The birches are fairly freshly cut, but before the snow, winter is in its early stages. Mansi leaves little, he just puts it down, he is the master of the taiga. This is visible and clear that they were not thrown, but laid down, and if you didn’t put them there, then don’t touch them, that was the law of the taiga. There’s a lot of stuff lying around the taiga, but you can’t carry it all home like an ant. Although you can end up leaving it as a thank you for good luck, it’s not necessary. Whoever has something lying around is not the owner. In the summer, the reindeer are grazed in the mountains, in the winter they are driven, herded to the dwelling, then the optional load can be hooked; the shepherds have plenty of deer antlers. Why burden yourself with unnecessary burdens, and if you need it as a trophy, they can take it. The chorea could have a tamga identifying the owner, and that he put it there for a reason. Choreas, they are easily updated. There is no alternative, they don’t sacrifice an elk, if only a deer.

Yes, this is some kind of swamp, it is either the end of October - the beginning of November at the time of snowfall and quick twilight, or a winter with little snow and a windy month of February. The characteristically familiar can be seen in the contours of the area. Horace, if it was him, could have played any role as a replacement for the staff. That elk were hunted here is a fact, but how and with whom they were taken out is the question, they could have been drunk, or overloaded, or with someone else, all sorts of things can happen. But what the photographer was doing there at that time, that’s the question, where and how he was moving. And in this way they cut off the horns, take out the brains and boil the head, eat it as a delicacy, only men eat it, it is sacred, women were not supposed to eat it.

I also cut down the horns. You can't beat them with your head. This hunting practice is familiar to me; the poles, as a rule, are taken from birch, out of consideration for practicality. When cutting a carcass, the meat is laid out on them, or then dried. They were collected in a pile as a visual landmark, so that those who came could see who would be sent after them. I talked to one Mansi: elk antlers have nothing to do with rituals. Yes, I’ve never heard of it, but I would have known.

M.P.:- This structure was photographed at the end of February - beginning of March 1959 by search engines on Kholat Chakhle, when they were looking for the missing Dyatlov group. Then she quickly somehow disappeared; none of the former search engine students living today remembers her or has seen her at all. I think that it was quickly dismantled by order of the authorities so that it would not attract the attention of civilians and would not cause them unnecessary thoughts regarding Mansi.

S.V.:- It’s clear, but the soil is very bare, weathered, the photo is old, the background angle is unclear, taking into account the fact that in the foothills there was three meters of snow, huts were piled up under the ridge, I think you can judge the state of the winds, but in a serious wind it’s not so , that at night, but also during the day, when the wind is choking and the eyes are obscured, visibility is limited, without known landmarks there is trouble, it is very easy for someone poorly dressed and at low atmospheric temperature (and in the wind it will increase significantly and blow to the bones) it is very easy to bend over. It will be a bit far from there to the Mansi’s dwelling, the one who hunted considered it impractical for himself to rub the horns, so they left it until an opportune opportunity, they could have just left it in the end. There is no intentional subtext in this design. The places there are good for hunting, people still hunt there today. And moose cross mountains from Europe to Asia and back. And since the beast walks, it means he can live, the beast, he senses a dangerous anomaly well.

This is what I was saying about the anomaly, because after the Dyatlov group there was a stir and people began to attribute all kinds of mysticism to this place. The Sambindalovs, Kurikovs, Anyamovs, Pelikovs, Bakhtiyarovs herded their reindeer into one herd in the spring, negotiated and appointed shepherds, because this was a more profitable practice of reindeer husbandry - the larger the herd, the easier it was to graze, the herd was herded up to a thousand heads.

Such a herd and one experienced person could get caught for a short time, but in the example with thirty deer it will sometimes be more difficult to manage, it is more restless and dexterous, it easily gets lost and you need to run a lot more after it. When the deer are herded, the shepherds try to beat the savages for meat, but they often circle around. Well, the moose is beaten accordingly.

Vladimir Androsov says:- A trochee is a wooden stick 3 m high, 3-5 cm in diameter. I already wrote to you about elk antlers, this is a sacred place, it’s hard to say who exactly. But most likely some old Mansi. Not public, not for everyone, but personal, during the period when reindeer are grazed in the Urals. The old Mansi always prayed separately in times of need. You see the place on the ridge, the Mansi reindeer herder made it for himself. The Urals, a place blown by winds and not permanent, is visited during the period when deer are in the Urals. There are no logs, or they are not visible and the fire pit is not visible, but it is possible that the old Mansi simply did not light it, there was little firewood and it had to be brought. Or he could come up with a fire made from dry birch branches. In short, this is my opinion. And, if you ask the young Mansi, they didn’t know this and are unlikely to understand the purpose of this figure made of birch stakes and horns. They now do not delve into the lifestyle of their parents and are AT ALL not interested in the past. I have met many times with indifferent and ignorant Mansi, they have become Russified.

M.P.:- Here is a photo of a real tent, how the Mansi put it up. Compare it with this Mansi design with elk antlers, it’s funny to call it a chum.

Answered by Vladimir Androsov- The fact is that Mansi skis do not leave a bump between the skis, because... they are wide. And here the tubercle is clearly visible between the two skis. Mansi skis leave a wide trail, without a bump, a flat area. The group did this on narrow skis, without any doubt. Of course, we can assume that the Mansi passed first, and then the tourists followed their ski tracks. But this is already guesswork. As for the ski track, the skiers, Russians, perhaps together, with backpacks, walked east from the Urals, tired, most likely, the ski track was uneven. The group had not passed through yet, there were no traces of ski poles, they were walking along the old Mansi road, about 5 years ago the Mansi were drinking tea in this place, perhaps there was some shelter nearby, not visible under the snow. They walked along an old ski track covered with snow, because... We didn’t fall into the snow too much. Why did you walk without poles? Either they lost their sticks, or something, some factor made them move faster.

Sergey Vinnichenko answers:- What can I say about the ski track, the ski track is quite fresh, frosty, and at the solstice it is clearly several hours old, in the morning at most, but at -30 it can take up to one and a half, at most two days it will remain quite fresh, there is little snow in the forest, the course is sloppy, with side-sliding drifts, a channel-like edge is noticeable, but there is no clear bottom roll in the wake. And the Mansi kittens have a flat edge with double rolling, a clear ski track with an even and smooth bottom rolling - more than one person, the ski track is even and smooth. It looks more like someone is walking ahead, trampling the trail along the old ski track, as is customary among tourists, the first one goes light. This is definitely a ski track made by narrow skis, it is clear that the passage is repeated, and the track is broken, after skis 15-16 cm wide, 2 people passed, the track is flat and sliding and on deeper snow. Even the trail of those escaping on the Mansi wide kisovs would have been different.

M.P.:- Sergey, you said that you are doing big things on Auspiya. Tell me, how are pine cones obtained? Do they hit with a so-called hammer - a stab? Is it possible to break a cedar branch of 8-10 cm if one or two or three people pull themselves up on it? Or stand on top of her?

S.V.:- Cedar is the most fragile coniferous tree, branches break easily, in the cold they lose elasticity, become more brittle, brittle, hanging and swinging in weight is elementary, the tops break easily, the lower branches are usually dry, almost any branch on cedar will easily break.

The cone is mined in different ways, depending on how and if you can’t wait until the season. It falls and is already being collected from the ground.

Those who climb cedars know the risk of this activity, but these are mainly children, they take the early milk cone to eat, do not store it for a long time and do not store it for future use, mass collection is suppressed. Greater injury due to broken tops and branches that fly all the way to the ground. I went through a stage when I was a child. They are impatient or limited in time, but the nut is hot, the end of August. In September, it falls off on its own, and this is the moment of the main harvest of the ripe harvest, and they no longer beat or climb. It’s easy to break a branch; cedar trees are very fragile, unlike other trees. I understood what they were talking about, I saw the cedar in the photo, there was zero doubt, they broke it themselves, lightly.

A log is the tree trunk itself, and a branch is a branch, the lower ones are dry, they are broken off for fires. And branches from a more powerful cedar break, but foothill and swampy cedars are weaker than pine forests. If you pull on the end of the branch, the lever turns out and breaks thicker, it’s just that cedar does not need to be associated with other species, cedar is a weak tree when it comes to force.

In the photo: Circular cutting of bark on a tree. This is how the Mansi cook dry firewood in their camps in the taiga. From the archive of V. Androsov.

Mansi is cut into a circle of wood and it dries out, and when firewood is needed, please, here it is. Near yurts, hunting huts, it is easy and accessible. And always dry firewood.

M.P.:- Vladimir, how many foresters were there in the Vizhaysky forestry? I only know Pashin, Kuznetsov, Mokhov, and Rempel himself. Who else could have worked there in 1959? Did the Mansi work as foresters? For example, Grigory Kurikov, in the photo he always wears a forester’s cap. It is strange that forester Rempel had never been to the Kholat-Syakhl area, as he reported in the interrogation report.

V.A.:- Grigory Kurikov worked as a forester for 18 years, basically, many Mansi worked as foresters. We respected the foresters. All foresters had a common "site". This is the Vizhayskoye forestry, the largest in the Ivdel region. Nobody divided the forestry into rounds. This is taiga, not a city. Fomin Ivan Ivanovich, Burmantov Gerasim Tikhonovich, and his brother Yevsey worked as foresters. Fomin was called to the front, but on the way the train was bombed and he was discharged, his jaw was broken. His wife Natalya is the sister of Gerasim Tikhonovich Burmantov.

During the war, Pavel Terentyevich Mokhov and Gerasim Tikhonovich Burmantov were not taken to the front; they panned gold for the state.

They washed especially diligently on the river. Daryevka. The Len-log stream flows into Daryevka, Mikhail Lukich of Novosiletsky had a mowing there, and we somehow helped him remove the hay. There are only continuous pits there.

Rempel was a forester, a German, and he had nothing to do there on Kholat Syakhyl. The forest was not felled there and there was no need to allocate plots, so he was never there.

M.P.:- Newcomers to the topic come and the first thing they do is begin to suspect forester Rempel of his involvement in the death of the group. I myself have not escaped this. Therefore, I would like to cite once again the information about him sent to me by his granddaughter Maria.

About IVAN DMITRIEVICH REMPELA:

Before the war, he lived with his whole family in a village in the Arkadaksky district of the Saratov region, worked as a teacher and a salesman in a store. In 1937 he was imprisoned, and until the end of the war he was in camps in Vizhay, working in the 2nd Northern and Vizhay. His wife and children were deported to Siberia at the beginning of the war. In 1946, Rempel brought them to Vizhay. They lived in Vizhai until 1965. In 1965-1966 began to move to the Moscow region in Murom. Rempel bought a house there. In 1969 I.D. Rempel and his entire large family moved to Tsimlyansk, Rostov region. Many Germans from Vizhay and Ivdel then moved to Tsimlyansk. I.D. Rempel died in 1981 and was buried in Tsimlyansk.

In the photo: Forester I.D. Rempel and his wife (forester). From the archive of Maria Metzler-Shubina.

M. Metzler: “Grandfather and grandmother in the hayfield. Grandfather loved to joke and tease! Very good photo!”

The fact that the forester had a stern character is also mentioned in the camping diary of V. Yakimenko’s group for 1963. When a group of former UPI students went on a hike to install a memorial plaque at the site of the death of the Dyatlov group. Yuri Yudin also took part in that campaign. Here is an entry from the diary of that group:

"07/23/63. ... It's great to fly in a helicopter! For some reason, the pilot dropped us off near several abandoned camps, and besides, we heard all sorts of terrible stories from the soldiers about escapes of prisoners. Finally we arrived in Vizhay, settled on an island in the middle of the Vizhay River. It began rain. We set up a tent, lit a fire...

We cooked delicious cabbage soup with sour cream, ate in the tent because it was raining heavily, and ran out of there as if after a bathhouse. “Firemen” came to visit and seduced us into going to bed with the forester. But the “forester” greeted us at the threshold with abuse: “So tell me, whose are you? And why, why are you coming here?” And only thanks to Yudin’s humble speeches, the “forester” moved away and even suggested that Ninka and I sleep on a bed with a feather bed. Much to her surprise and misunderstanding, we refused.

T. Yakimenko."

Vladimir Androsov says:- Rempel, as a forester familiar with the neighborhoods, advised us to go along the quarterly clearings. Apparently he did not know about the Mansi deer trail, or did not attach importance to it, but it should be noted that in old maps, almost all Mansi trails were marked. In the forestry department he had a forest map with blocks and using them he showed tourists what he believed was the best way to get to Otorten.

I have lost the maps of the 50s, if you want to study them, then you need to take these maps from the Ivdel forestry enterprise.

Settlers from Pechora crossed the Ural Mountains and founded our village in the late 30s. They crossed the ridge, people of the same surnames - Pashins, Sobyanins, Kuznetsovs, Chagins, these are the old-timers of our region. The Sobyanins lived before, Nyrovsky district, Ust-Uninsky s/s. Shaitanovka village, Ivan Foteevich Pashin lived in the same village. They say about the mayor of Moscow Sobyanin that he is from Nyaksimvol, his ancestors came from Pechora.

M.P.:- The village of Shaitanovka is a fairly famous place in local history. In the second half of the 16th century, Tryfon Vyatsky, a monk of the Pyskorsky monastery, set up his monastery here. The place was reputed to be “terrible” for local Voguls. They considered the rock the abode of evil spirits and avoided it. But Tryphon lived on the mountain for a long time, and nothing happened to him. The Voguls asked: “Why don’t evil spirits touch you?” “I believe in the God Jesus Christ, and he is stronger than all spirits. And he gives me special strength,” answered Tryphon. After Tryphon, the place of his monastery remained sacred for the Mansi for a long time, but pagan rituals were performed here, since Christianity did not take root. A little over a hundred years later, the Russian settlement of Shaitanovka arose near the monastery of Tryphon.

The Turkic peoples who came to these lands - the Tatars - did not recognize the Mansi religion, and their sanctuaries were considered the habitat of sorcerers-shaitans. (IN Turkic languages the word "shaitan" means "evil spirit, devil, devil, sorcerer"). Therefore, those places where, according to the Tatars, evil spirits could live, they called: Shaitan-mountain, Shaitan-river or swamp. The Mansi adopted the word “shaitan” into their language meaning “sacred, sorcerer, shaman.” (R. Kashin, "Ural Pathfinder", No. 9, 2002)

V.A.:- Vanya Bely - that’s what they called the forester Pashin in Vizhai, he was all gray, he turned gray early. I went to Ivan Foteevich for cow's milk, and when we met, he always told me about hunting, hunted animals, sables, and of course my eyes were completely open, such scenes, taiga, smoke from a fire, sable in the taiga, etc., what else do you need? boy, he just fascinated me with the taiga. He said that in the snow they simply caught up with the elk and cut its throat, saving cartridges. On that side of the ridge (western) there is much more snow than on the eastern slope. Once my friend and I were hunting on the Niols River, it flows into the river. Visher, we woke up at night, there was knee-deep snow and we had to give up hunting and go to our upper reaches of B. Toshemka, we crossed the ridge, and on our side there was only one centimeter of snow, that’s the difference in the snow cover. Once he told how he and Sarapion Demidovich Sobyanin were hunting in Matveevskaya Parma, the dogs took a sable, “we, hovering, got it, we are sitting, drinking tea by the fire, happy, and the dog is hovering, running back and forth along the tree trunk, we got up, soaring, and got another sable, we were sitting drinking tea, and the dog, soaring, ran again, we got up and got another sable, and so it was, soaring.” The fact is that in February the sables are in rut, two males ran after the female and both went into the hollow of the tree after the female. When the dogs picked up the trail and brought the hunters, they had no idea that there were three sables; I didn’t have that in a sable hunt; one in a hollow was in order.

His friend and contact, as Ivan Foteevich said, was Sarapion Demidovich Sobyanin. They lived on Pecher, but constantly hunted on the eastern slope of the ridge, as Ivan Foteevich said, there were a lot of martens there, and sable was mainly on the eastern slope. And in February, on skis, pulling sleds, they crossed the ridge and hunted in the “Matveevskaya” Parma. This place is from the river. Aktyl and up to the river Auspii. There were a couple of huts. The sleds were long and narrow, just the width of the ski tracks. It is very convenient to carry food rather than carry it on your shoulders in “crumbs”.

The settlers were led at different times through the Urals. Sarapion Demidovich Sobyanin and Pashin Ivan Foteevich. They carried children on their shoulders in knapsacks, paivas, they drove cattle in front of them, they carried belongings, various things, it got to the point that many had to cross the Urals several times, they could not carry everything away at once, but there was good. Everything will be useful in the new place. They even carried sandy white sandy wheels with a thickness of about 10 cm and a diameter of 50 cm. His weight was about 25-30 kg. The circles stood in special troughs, water was poured at the bottom, the circle was rotated by hand and it was good to sharpen both a knife and an ax on it, it was fine-grained, I have never seen anything like it anywhere else, only in Vizhai, in particular at Evsei Petrovich, as his name was (Bes Petrovich).

Many have already forgotten our old-timers, the Burmantov Gerasim Tikhonovich, the Afonasyevs, who also came from the other side of the Urals before the war. Pashin Ivan Foteevich had three sisters: Pashina Tatyana Foteevna, Agafya Foteevna, Matryona Foteevna, the mother of my friend, Leonid Vasilyevich Plotnikov. Everyone came from beyond the Urals. My grandmother, Matryona Ivanovna, often met with Matryona Foteevna, conversations, conversations, 100 grams at the table, a normal phenomenon.

Many of the “woodpecker experts” claim that it was not Ivan Pashin who was the first to find the two dead, but allegedly other search engines. But sitting on a bench near the house of Chagin Yegor, Ivan Foteevich told me that he was the first to discover the tent of the dead, it was filled with snow, of course, the snow is blown away from the top, but if you put some kind of obstacle, the same tent, then the snow will accumulate first on that one side where the prevailing winds blow, and then it will cross to the other side of the tent. And thus a large snowdrift will appear. That's what happened. Pashin Ivan found it only because, as he said, there was a small red flag on the tent. This fact, in my opinion, does not appear anywhere. They just don’t know or someone benefits from belittling the dignity of I.F. Pashin.

Well, how is it, like an old man, that he understands that he knows about these places. Fool, he knows everything, but is silent, no one asks him and he won’t trust this secret to everyone. In this very place, along this very deer road (salin-lekh), he brought many from Pechora to live in our region on the eastern slope of the Urals.

So, the first dead, a girl and a guy by the cedar tree, were also found by Ivani Foteevich, as he told me, one of them was holding a piece of birch bark, and the other was holding matches, they were squatting, half naked, in that position they froze. I simply forgot who was holding the matches and who was holding the birch bark, but I don’t think it matters, logically, a man should light the matches, I think that’s what happened, a man with matches, a girl with birch bark. The “Woodpeckers” changed everything, there was no place for I.F. Pashin. in this story. They found everything, the tent and the first dead, but not Ivan Foteevich; they took all the laurels for themselves. I believe the stories of I.F. Pashin. and only he and only he could find the first missing people.

Back in the early 60s, he told me about the search. He walked across the ridge along this very deer path many times, and all the residents of Burmantovo also came at one time along this same path and they knew that the saddle itself had to be crossed very carefully, without looking around. This place is anomalous, you and I have not yet learned to wander in the past, as well as in the future, we cannot look in and see the death of tourists and what they died from, we can only guess from the facts known to us. Pashin and Sarapion, friends, contacts, hunted together in our taiga for many years. Both Pashin and Sarapion Sobyanin knew this path well.

But that time Sarapion led the “women” to Pechera. In 1960, residents of the village of Vizhay and 1st Northern, in the old fashioned way, about 9 people, mostly women with a ten-year-old boy, went to the other side of the ridge, to their native side, many had relatives there, to visit them, it was a common thing, They rode on motorboats to the Auspiya River, and there they were led along the path by Sobyanin Sarapion Demidovich. When approaching the place where the tourists died, some kind of colored fog fell on them, thick as jelly... what color exactly? He said it was greyish...

Everyone was scared and scared, but grandfather Sarapion said: “Women, everyone gathered in a circle, covered themselves with clothes and didn’t look around, sit quietly, without unnecessary movements,” he sat down separately and covered his head with a cloak. This was not a surprise to him; he had already encountered this and knew what to do. The boy stuck his hand out from under his cloak, the hand disappeared, he got scared and cried a lot, his mother barely calmed him down, it was so scary. This fog was as if alive, it felt like someone was controlling it.

But that was not all, suddenly the stone scattering shook slightly, as if during an earthquake, everyone froze in place, even the boy stopped crying from fear. But Sarapion Demidovich began to reassure the women: “Women, calm down, now everything will pass,” since he had to encounter this phenomenon more than once. After 15-20 minutes the earthquake stopped, the fog cleared and the sun came out. The women quickly gathered their belongings, the child in their arms, and ran without looking back from this place towards Pechera. But not everyone made it back. The boy and his mother had to travel by train to Ivdel, and then by car to Vizhay. His mother was afraid for him, what if something similar happened on the road across the ridge again? And she went by train, and the boy didn’t want to experience such fears anymore.

There was such a hunter from the village. Burmantovo, Loginov Ilyich, he constantly hunted there in the 70s from the “state industrial enterprise”, and earlier I.F. Pashin hunted in these very places. and his friend Sarapion Sobyanin and nicknamed his residence this way - “Ilyich’s Base”. There was a nice house, a bathhouse, a house for “newcomers,” and a large clearing. And on the other side of Lozva in the 19th century there lived the Mansi Ukladovs, a village called Sadnak-pavyl (a village near seven larches), when our locals drove by, they always said, they passed or were on the “seven larch tree”. And so he took the tourists to the base, drank tea with them and went back to Vizhay. Approaching the river. Auspii, I saw two people who jumped out from the path that goes to the pass, eyes like saucers, horror on their faces. “Stop, stop,” they shout. He stopped, they quickly jumped into the car, “drive, drive.” When they had driven a little and they felt safe, they began to tell the following. When we climbed the pass, and this was in the summer at the end of June, during the same period, also in June, and the “women” were walking across the ridge, the ground suddenly shook under them, the feeling was not pleasant, fear, horror, young people, what to take from them , but anyone in their place could have been scared. Panic seized them and they, abandoning their belongings, ran down the path to the road. When they were driving along the road to Vizhay, they could not calm down, interrupting each other, talking about this incomprehensible phenomenon. It seems like the mountains are old, there have never been earthquakes, and suddenly? There is something to think about. And is everything so smooth in the “Kingdom of Denmark”.

It can be assumed that the dead tourists also experienced this phenomenon themselves and, in a panic, undressed, correctly, when a scattering of stones begins to shake under your feet, they rushed as fast as they could in different directions. Panic killed many. I always say everything, if you suddenly get lost and don’t know which way to go, sit down and sit in one place for a day, two, three, they will look for you and find you, and if you rushed with crazy eyes, that’s it, you’re finished, you disappeared only from your own FEAR, the person himself drives himself into a corner and dies, precisely from fear. I went for berries and mushrooms, even for an hour or two, but you always have matches, a bandage, a compass in your encephalitis jacket, matches. This is a guarantee that you will get back to the car or road, river, place from where you started. You went into the forest, off the road, looked at the compass in which direction you thought you were going, and naturally you returned back according to the compass. Everyone, both women and men, regardless of age, must learn to use a compass. There is nothing complicated, you need to value your life and appreciate it.

M.P.:- Vladimir, interesting stories. I also remembered the story of V.N. Gamatina, the widow of the pilot Patrushev, about the legend that circulated among the Mansi about Mount Kholat-Syakhyl: “... this mountain, on which according to legend God lives, is passed down from generation to generation, from old people to children, so you can count on the fact that this not only existed under Soviet rule, but also existed far before the revolution - a legend that supposedly God lives there, who, when angry, makes some sounds and smokes a pipe.."

The sounds may well be the so-called shaking of the mountain, which Judge G. Novokreshchenov mentioned when he put forward his version of the death of the group, and the smoke from the pipe could be that unknown fog.

It is interesting that in the 19th century there were stories about a certain fog suddenly descending from the mountains (K. Nosilov, Among the Voguls):

Regarding the sounds, there is evidence from modern tourists who have visited Kholat Chakhla: “The places around the pass are eerie. The wind howls in the stone outcrops, and nearby rises the gloomy dome of Solat-Syakhla - the Mountains of the Dead. This Mansi name was given long before the tragic night in 1959.. A well-known expert on the toponymy of the Urals, A. Matveev, who repeatedly climbed the mountain, wrote: “... I must admit that there is no more severe and gloomy mountain in this part of the Northern Urals...” The rocks on the Dyatlov Pass are like parts of an ominous musical instrument. , create strange sound effects - the noise of a car engine, the roar of a waterfall, and finally, an incomprehensible vibrating sound that spreads anxiety." (N. Rundkvist, HUNDRED DAYS IN THE URAL, expedition 1991) Mount Kholat Chakhl, according to some sources, also has the meaning “thunder” - it can be sounds and shaking of the mountain, and “cloud” - and this is the same mysterious fog, when "God smokes a pipe." One thing is clear: the Mansi are familiar with this phenomenon on Kholat-Chakhla. That's why they didn't really like going there. And even now, except for curious tourists and enthusiastic “woodpecker experts,” few people would want to trudge through the taiga to those lands.

And it’s the Mansi who make “the lightest boat in the world.”

In the photo: Mansi is carrying a dead bear cub in a boat. From the archive of V. Androsov.

The origin of some surnames is interesting: Anyamov comes from the word “anyam” - beautiful, elegant; Pakin is the one who has cones, Sambindalov is from “sampintal” (blind), Tasmanov is arrogant. Each clan has its own katpos (clan sign). Katpos are placed on the borders of hunting grounds, on houses - in general, “they mark everything that is theirs.”

Alexey Bakhtiyarov plays the sankvyltap. Local Casanova. He was married several times, and each time unsuccessfully. Either the wife died, or they had to get a divorce. Photo from the archive of V. Androsov.

Sankvyltap is a five-string harp with a resonator box, which is hollowed out from a cedar trunk. The strings are made from deer intestines. While playing, the musician winds a string around his finger, to which a “yikne-khum” (“dancing man”) doll is tied.

Mansi trees are divided into two types, deciduous and coniferous. Deciduous trees are Russian because they “grow and multiply quickly,” and coniferous trees (cedars) are Mansi because they “grow slowly, like heroes.”

“When enemies killed our heroes, the heroes became watching over spirits...” says one of the Mansi legend songs. (A. Stesin, “Forest People”.)

In the photo: Sui-vat-pawl. On the left are Grigory Nikolaevich Kurikov and Yakov Kuzmich Sambindalov, brother of Varvara Kuzmovna Bakhtiyarova.

Yakov Kuzmich Sambindalov could and did do shamanism. There will be a mention of him below in the book by Viktor Maltsev. Grigory Kurikov also practiced shamanism, like his brother, Stepan Kurikov. From the archive of V. Androsov.

"Stepan and Grigory Kurikov, two brothers, were the first to master Sui-vat-pavil in the early 40s. In 1942, Mansi, Stepan Nikolaevich Kurikov, was elected foreman of the hunting brigade. At the end of the hunting season, the brigade was awarded the Red Banner of the Executive Committee. Until the end of the war, the banner remained with Stepan Kurikov's brigade. He personally fulfilled his obligations for the extraction of furs by 200%.

He was awarded the medal "For Valiant Labor in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945." Awarded by order of the Minister of Procurement with the badge "Excellence in Hunting". He was repeatedly nominated as a candidate for deputy of the Ivdel City Council in the Burmantovsky electoral district.

In Sui-vat-pavil, Stepan Nikolaevich is a respected person. In 1950 he was elected to the City Council. For example, during the hunting season until February 1, he obtained and handed over to the state: 200 squirrel skins, 11 sables, killed three bears in the fall and was nominated for a bonus. Completed the task 113%.

His brother Grigory Nikolaevich Kurikov, born in 1907, a hunter, was nominated by a meeting of citizens of the village of Burmantovo, a candidate for the Ivdelsky city. The Council in 1959." (From the local press, 1959)

In the photo: Drawing of Mansi. Shamans and hunters. From the archive of V. Androsov.

About shamans - Soviet leaders:

“But it’s melancholy, and there’s a lot of funny stuff. For example, the deputy chairman of the advanced collective farm named after Lenin is a shaman, a real, militant, practicing one! It is he who “connects with the masses” and, having read the appropriate spells over them, mobilizes them to carry out the next events, such as concluding a social agreement on exceeding the fur procurement plan." (from a letter from exiled Ariadna Efron to Boris Pasternak, Turukhansk region, 1955)

I immediately remembered Yu.E. Yudin, how suddenly his leg hurt during a hike and he had to return home, since he could not go any further. Alexander Velm explains this fact by saying that the shaman saw a sick tourist in the group and separated him from the healthy ones; the sick were not needed for the sacrifice. Therefore, the shaman sent him home, making Yuri Yudin’s leg hurt.

V.A.:- About the shaman - this is a collective story, the author could have exaggerated when talking about Victor. Don’t pay attention to what’s wrong with Yudin’s leg, it’s just rubbed or cold, he’s overworked, it happens, or maybe his intuition was right, I think that it, and the leg is just a saying, I felt that this was not his route, but I didn’t want to admit it, That's what I said about the leg.

I knew Viktor Maltsev well, we met on Vizhai in the early 70s, he came to see me many times, we went to different places together. He's already dead. But I must admit, I have his letters. He gave me his diary-book of 60 pages, written in small, neat handwriting, I can’t find it, I have to rummage through everything. A. Slepukhin was already interested in these letters and the diary. The fact is that V. Maltsev found a language with Mansi with the help of vodka, but mostly, and then at the second, third meeting they believed him, he easily gained confidence in them. I read Anyamov Roman’s letter to him: “you milked me dry,” etc. I have it.

M.P.:- Why did Victor leave you his notes and letters? Were you afraid that they would disappear somewhere else?

V.A.:- I still don’t understand it myself. Why did he trust me? I knew from Mansi that they were my friends, etc. He left a whole story written in small handwriting. Now I’ll write down a little from his letter for you. “I walked without a gun, with one Finnish woman. There was a lot of cargo, during the hike I “lost” 16 kg of my weight (it’s not scary, in the previous winter I gained a lot of weight). I didn’t just walk hundreds of kilometers, I saw a lot. I wrote down a whole a platoon of idols. And a couple of buckets of sweat is a good price for that." And his map is drawn where he walked along the ridge. I started from Pechera from Ust-Uls and ended the campaign in Yany-Pavil. I marked all the Mansi sites, etc. Now I’m looking at it. My wife says, well, I didn’t find the manuscript, so that means God wants it, but I’ll try to find it with God's help. And he didn’t care about the case with the Dyatlov group, both old and young knew about it, only to us locals it seems that this was an ordinary case, that’s all, and Viktor Maltsev studied Mansi. Here is another letter: “And in the spring I also received one absurd letter from N., full of absurd statements and outright suspicion of divulging their religious secrets.” .... “And how you said something offensive to me, concluding with the words “you will use me and throw me away like a squeezed lemon.” And if you lose me, you will lose everything, access to such secrets and mysteries that others have never dreamed of..."

M.P.:- Did you know Vladimir Hoffman? Did he disappear without a trace from Khoi-Ekva in the late 80s? Here is what some Orenburg travelers write about him: “Hoffmann was a man who served several years in a colony in Ushma and intended to settle in these parts after his liberation. They say that before he disappeared, he walked alone in the taiga for several years, hunting fur-bearing animals, dug pits and looked for gold. Hoffman seriously believed that the Golden Woman existed in reality and was a multi-ton ingot of pure gold."

V.A.:- Vladimir Hoffman was my good friend and he did not die near Khoi-Ekva, he had never been there and did not even hunt nearby. We had to hunt together, I knew him very well. He and I drank a lot of vodka and took sables. And I suspect at whose hands he died. His body was never found!

M.P.:- What kind of mountain is Khoi-Ekva?

V.A.:- B. Munkacsi wrote about her in 1888-1889. The main saint. Goddess of the forest, Forest Deity. A. Reguli also designated this massif as Khoi-Ekva. Our Mansi speak as I told you the translation: and “Stop, woman!” and "Woman Queen" (Patron Saint). Everyone defines it in their own way. There is no consensus. Some say that this is the Nenets name Khoy, etc. The Slinkins and Matveevs tell whomever they turn to. One is one thing, the other is another. Whoever likes it, writes it that way. But Munkácsy researched these names when the old people were still alive, and I think that his translation is the most correct and correct. And as for Ekva, I’ll keep quiet. I was not at the top of the mountain; there was no need to climb there. I know the foothills, I walked there. There is a lot of Golden Root growing there.

Sergey Vinnichenko tells, the view of a local resident regarding the death of I. Dyatlov’s group:- Take a history textbook and look at the map of trade routes, 14th century, and you will understand that the main route of Ancient Rus' through this region was Pechora-Lozva. Vizhay was founded by settlers from the Komi, they drove cattle from there, and carried grain crops and belongings. Between Pechora and Lozva at the source there was a drag (figuratively a road), it also goes to Nyaksimvol. It is worth reading a book published in some fifty years (55-59) by the Ural publication “Pathfinder”, called “Winter in the Urals”, in order to have a somewhat detailed and objective idea of ​​\u200b\u200btourism of those years, and about the possible vicissitudes in hiking. For example, in winter, if it started to snow for weeks at a time, they didn’t stick their noses out of the tents, they burned the butts of their guns and spare skis. As far as I remember, the last route in the book is dated 1959, and does not refer to Dyatlov’s campaign.

I will say this as a person who has lived quite a significant part of his life in the forest and wintered there somehow from “A” to “Z.” I can quite competently assure you that if someone had walked in the snow in that place and even before the group, even on skis, there would have been traces and it would have been impossible to cover up the extra ones. The group of trail experimenters did not take into account the nuances. In winter, with good wind and loose snow, tracks in open areas are literally instantly covered within half an hour, they may become invisible, but they do not disappear! They may not be observed throughout the winter and beyond, but at the moment when the snow begins to weather, and the snow does not necessarily have to melt, it evaporates, erodes, and is blown away by the wind, of course, and then the traces float out onto surface and remain for a very long time, disappearing with the last snow, only with experience and observation can people know this. And from the nature of the tracks it is clear that no one was chasing people. That’s why the investigation didn’t bother much.

The most that happened was a brawl within the group itself. No one doubted before and no one doubts now that the death and tragedy of those people was natural and logical in conjunction with a natural phenomenon. Of course, knowledge remains outside the brackets - meanings regarding the behavior of the participants in the campaign among themselves, but this is already particular. If we talk about the brawl, then two days before the death, the group celebrated a birthday, and if there was alcohol, then who knows what? And the group, as it turned out, is dissimilar.

The fact that the version of Mansi’s murder was being worked out only indicates that the investigation was conducted impartially. In St. Petersburg, someone described the tragedy of a reservoir avalanche and there are videos on the Internet. Mansi are not aggressors by nature, but emotional, wayward people. According to their faith, they are not allowed to kill the beast, but they came up with an excuse that it was not they who were doing it, but a Russian gun. By the nature of their character, they are somewhat cowardly people - in terms of fist fights, in a drunken stupor they can be aggressive, there is a surge of emotions, but this depends on the individual, on the character, and the cowardice of the Mansi is due to natural caution and self-preservation. The Mansi are not capable of killing nine people in an open place and thus, practically with their hands, and if this happened, then there were already legends among the people. Mansi is capable of killing only on the sly and always with the use of “weapons”; according to the Mansi version, in this situation they could only shoot (and bury), but this did not happen. Mansi always made contact with strangers, the people are friendly, sociable and respect the right person, but there is no blood connection in connection with the Dyatlov group!!! A tourist is not a hunter, and the Mansi often conflict only with hunters, and then only on private occasions.

M.P.: But for ritual ceremonies and sacrifices, the Mansi used only bows and arrows. Arcana. Knife. And no firearms. And the crossbows they placed on elk and in order to protect their secret sanctuaries had such power that the fired arrows pierced the chest of elk and deer. I'm not talking about people.

In the photo: Drawing of Mansi. Hunters and shaman. From the archive of V. Androsov.

V.A.:- Do you know how the Mansi live in the outback?

"Lozva is a small locality, consisting of two or three residential buildings with some buildings. Of which stood out in size were the barn and the “store” with all kinds of food products and things necessary for the workers who large number are driven here in winter to transport and load iron ore into barges. In the summer, sleep reigns here; the store manager and the company accountant remain. And not a large number of servants. Only a small smoke from the chimney indicates the presence of human life here. But from time to time the Voguls come here for vodka. And then life is seething and noisy here again, but ugly life, forcing the observer to turn away. Soon after my arrival, as expected, the Voguls appeared in the boats. They brought fish and deer skins here so that, having previously converted them into money, they could indulge in their favorite pleasure - drunkenness. These operations are carried out so quickly that you can hardly see the visiting Voguls in a sober state. It is difficult to convey the feeling of disgust caused in me by the invasion here of a bunch of people of a tribe I had never seen before, which I considered to be tropical savages. The whole appearance and clothing, first of all, testified to dirt, beyond any fear. The noise, the dancing, especially the roar of old and drunken women, dressed in carelessly put on shirts, disgusting almost to match the physiognomy, red, festering, bloodshot eyes, open mouths, with threads of dripping saliva - this is a sight that was difficult for me, an unaccustomed person, to endure. .."

M.P.:-Who are you quoting?

V.A.:- Fedorov E.S., 1884. But you won't find this work anywhere. It is not on the Internet, I photographed it at the Fedorov Museum. Do you think this is in the past? No, and this happens nowadays.

(Note: Evgraf Stepanovich Fedorov was born in Orenburg in 1853, died in Petrograd in 1919. Shortly before his death, Fedorov was elected a member of the Russian Academy of Sciences. He conducted the first deep and thorough geological studies of the Northern Urals. The Northern Urals were explored by him for about 250 km in the basins of the Lozva, Vishera and Pechora rivers, he outlined his observations in “Geological Research in the Northern Urals,” published in 1889, 1890 and 1897. For decades, this work contained the best summary material on the geology of the region. a map of the Lozva River basin, the upper part of the Vishera and adjacent parts of the Northern Urals on a scale of 5 versts in 1 inch, Fedorov expressed thoughts about Quaternary glaciation in the Urals and, in particular, noted that the southernmost point of distribution of glacial boulders on the eastern slope of the Northern Urals is the region. At the confluence of the Auspiya River with Lozva, Fedorov also attracted the attention of the local mining administration to deposits of other minerals, such as iron ores, gold, and brown coal. The result of research by E.S. Fedorov and his assistant, the young geologist V.V. Nikitin, published a monograph entitled “The Bogoslovsky Mining District. Description of its topography, mineralogy, geology and ore deposits” (1901). A unique map of the district was also compiled, consisting of 197 sheets.)

Here is what a member of E. Hoffmann’s expedition writes about the Voguls, 1850:

M.P.:- Give Mansi a drink and tell him to kill him. Will he kill?

V.A.:- No, this shouldn’t happen, only drinking is on my mind.

M.P.:- Lozva or village. Lozvinsky?

V.A.:- The village of Lozva, it still exists about 28 km from Ivdel. to the north, along the road going to Vizhay and Burmantovo. And the Lozvinskaya pier was there. From our road, to the right, as you drive away from Polunochnoye for 1.5 km. This is the village of Lozva, it is alone.

M.P.:- Oh, that’s where, according to V. Korotaev, the investigators and party leaders drank during the investigation. It’s clear, the Midnight police station is nearby, L. Chudinov is the chief. He also questioned witnesses. What is noteworthy is that all the interrogations of L. Chudinov in the case contain strangeness and contradictions. Maybe the village of Lozva is to blame?

In the photo: Vasily Sambindalov with his wife Anna. Kholat -Syahl.

V.A.:- Sambindalov Vasily, had a lot of deer, 300-400 heads. Hanged himself in a detention center in Sverdlovsk. I couldn’t stand these cramped cells and confinement. Mansi are freedom-loving people and for them prison is the end of life. Moreover, he killed a man.

M.P.:- How did it happen that he killed? After all, judging by the stories, the Mansi are a kind people.

V.A.:- I know several cases when Mansi violated friendliness and killed. Yes, the Mansi are not evil people, simple, good-natured, open. Anything can happen in life. But in relation to friends, these are loyal people.

Traveler and researcher of Mansi life K.D. Nosilov speaks of this people as follows: “Strange people, strange life, strange beliefs.”

And a modern researcher admits: “To be honest, we can say with confidence that the Mansi world is both a real cauldron of passions and a tangle of connections.”

Why did the investigation somehow too quickly abandon the version of the involvement of the local population in the death of the Dyatlov group? Several interrogation reports in which the Mansi unanimously inform the investigation: we know nothing, saw nothing, were not there, did not participate, were not a member and in general, we have nothing to do with it. And this is said by hunters, from whose watchful eyes no one and nothing can hide in the taiga, people who, at the very time when the students died, were close to the scene of the tragedy. The investigation, in all likelihood, by order from above, did not particularly focus on this issue, and the Kurikovs themselves and the rest of the Mansi families subsequently unanimously rejected the words of their fellow tribesman: they knew nothing about any Ostyaks. The Mansi even renounced their faith, denying that they continue to believe in spirits and perform cults!

It looks strange that people who grew up and live in the taiga, who know it well, who know how to see traces of animals and people that a city investigator will pass by and not notice, this time saw or heard nothing. I can't believe it. The Mansi always keep an eye on strangers in the taiga who find themselves on their ancestral territory. And the rumor that several groups of tourists were in the taiga at once spread through all the nearby Mansi camps. All the travelers of previous years were amazed at how the news spread among Mansi. In the hiking reports and memoirs of tourists known to us, such seemingly random encounters with Mansi were described. This suggests that the Mansi were watching the strangers. And the Dyatlovites generally walked along the fresh Mansi ski track leading to the pass. But in the diaries of the Dyatlovites there is no mention of a meeting with Mansi, which is very, very strange. Was there such a meeting, did they talk about it in their diaries, there is a dictionary of Mansi words, but there are no records about the meeting with Mansi. But according to the recollections of witnesses, the Mansi somewhere warned the group not to go to those places. Somewhere they had to meet the Mansi in the Mansi region! I fully admit that the pages about the meeting with Mansi were removed from the notebooks. After all, the guys could simply describe in their diaries the warnings and threats of the Mansi, and some kind of alarming aftertaste left after the meeting. But the meeting might not have happened if we follow the version of ritual murder. They led the group, but did not come into contact with it. And the group itself went where it was impossible to go, went through places where no stranger had ever gone before. To be fair, it is worth noting that perhaps the Mansi did tell something to the investigation, because their fragmentary stories have survived to this day: “they killed the spirits,” “they killed the Ostyaks,” “it wasn’t us who killed,” “we told them not to go there.” . But such stories were not included in the Criminal Case.

Which local residents were sure that the Dyatlov group was killed by the Khanty or Mansi? The first secretary of the Ivdel city party committee I.S. Prodanov, the pilot Karpushin, the police of the surrounding cities... A special place is occupied by the first secretary of the Ivdel city committee of the CPSU I.S. PRODANOV, a Bulgarian by nationality. He, the owner of the area, guessed what was going on there, so he immediately pointed to Mansi. But apparently, subsequently, he received orders not to develop this version. Go to the version “The girl came out of the tent to go to the toilet, got scared of something, ran downstairs and got lost. Hearing her scream, they ran out to look and also got lost,” in general, “everyone was frozen.” And when the “balls”, that is, rockets, flew apart, what kind of Mansi are they? They were somehow immediately forgotten about, and now the investigation had to bring evidence from search engines and the military about flying balloons to the UD, well, all this is top secret.

And you can’t prove that the Mansi are involved. Maybe they are not involved, I don’t argue. However, better version There are no spies yet. And another important fact: the search for the Dyatlov group was led by Major General M.N. Shishkarev, the head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Sverdlovsk region, tacitly says that it was the criminal version that was seriously considered. Murder.

Note: Shishkarev Mikhail Nikolaevich, (b. 1900, Moscow - d. 1963, Sverdlovsk, major general, honored worker of the NKVD, order bearer, in state security since 1922.)

How did State Security General M.N. Shishkarev suddenly find himself as the head of the police department - the Ministry of Internal Affairs for the Sverdlovsk region, if there were always hostile relations between the police and the KGB officers, and the appointment to the post of head of the police department was still considered a demotion for the state security general, explained Alexey Rakitin in his book "Dyatlov Pass. Death on the Trail" this phenomenon is illustrated by the biography of another person - Lieutenant General Ivan Tkachenko, Authorized Person of the USSR Government for Control of the Regime of a Special Object, namely Plant No. 817, Chelyabinsk-44, "Mayak" ", where the participant of the campaign G. Krivonischenko worked.

Journalist G. Grigoriev wrote in the first days of March 1959: “The city is filled with rumors about the deaths of students. The wives of officers who were there on the wanted list came to the head of the commission. They begged the leaders to write letters to their husbands and send them with a helicopter to make sure. that the husbands are alive. Wherever I stay - in the dining room, in the hotel, on the street, in the store - I can hear people talking about it everywhere. Now I hear a loud voice in the corridor: “Someone killed them.” Woe? They found Belgians in Antarctica, but they can’t do it here.”

While reading literature about the Mansi, I noticed that among the northern peoples almost every mountain is considered sacred, almost every mountain is associated with the legend of the flood, almost every Mansi mountain is forbidden to go to, no matter the mountain, “don’t go there.”

“In the distance, the wooded dome of Mount Manya-Tump was silhouetted. The old Mansi, nodding his head in her direction, said:

A long time ago it was impossible to walk the mountain... I became wary.

Whoever walks will get sick for a long time and die...

What was it?

Old people say - there stood the navels, Sorni Ekva, Golden Baba...

The old man fell silent. It seemed to me that there was a mysterious silence in the taiga. For some reason, the crackling of branches in the fire intensified. I glanced sideways at the black silhouette of Mount Manya-Tump. A slight chill involuntarily ran through my body.

Old Mansi continued:

It was scary close to the mountain. Baba screamed loudly...

How did you scream?

And now they go to the mountain?

Those who were young went. He said there was nothing at all...

Let's go there, Pyotr Efimovich!

No, my don't go there. There will be sin. I don't want to die...

I understood that it was difficult to persuade the old man. Age-old superstition prevents him from overcoming fear." (M. Zaplatin, "On the disappeared deity of the Voguls.")

To Chistopka? Ay, don't go! Ay, thin mountain!" (M. Vladimirov, To the country of Yugoria.)

The Mansi had many mountains near which people died or fell from.

The Mansi even commit suicide by falling from the mountain. I read about this before in different sources, but it’s a pity that I didn’t save the quotes; so far only one has been found, from the book of the Khanty writer Yuvan Shestalov “The Secret of Sorni Nai”:

“And yet, one day the goddess was stolen. Semka, a Vogul from the neighboring yurts, one winter, putting on homemade skis, said that he was going to hunt for beavers. After a long time making his way through the windfalls, Semka came to Yamnel-paul to the shaman’s dwelling. He waited. , when the old man came out and kidnapped Baba. A couple of days later, the shaman, not himself, showed up in Orontur-Paul at night. He raised up the surrounding Voguls, they got on their skis and went to look for the loss.

We followed the tracks straight to Semka’s yurt. There was no seed there. In the spring, when the snow melted, the body of the unfortunate man was found at the foot of the hill. It was clear that before he died, Semka had been starving for a long time. The Voguls guessed that some force was driving him in circles through the forests. Even dying of hunger, he could not find his way home. He died a strange death. Something made the guy climb a high hill and throw himself down."

Is this what the Mansi had in mind when they spread rumors that tourists were falling from the mountain? That is, the tourists themselves died, through their own fault. Or maybe the spirits were punishing for doing something contrary to the spirits.

Yes, no matter the place, there is a monument to the dead, no matter the mountain, you cannot climb it.

I would like to add information to the version of the “exposure” of the myths about the death of the nine Mansi, about the floods and other rumors, where they came from and how they gave the names of the area.

In 1847, 1848, 1850s, scientists of the Imperial Geographical Society explored the Northern Urals: mining engineer, colonel and professor of mineralogy and geology at St. Petersburg University Ernst Hoffman, master, astronomer Marian Kovalsky and mining engineer Major Nikifor Strazhevsky, naturalist and amateur artist Fedor Brant, known for his journey through Siberia on the expedition of A. Middendorf in 1842-1845; topographers V. G. Bragin and D. F. Yuryev; paramedic from Cherdyn Chigirinsky... Thanks to them, a significant northern part of Russia was studied, a map was compiled covering the territory from the city of Cherdyn in the south to the coast of Baydaratskaya Bay and Pai-Khoi in the north.

The detachment visited a number of high mountains (Landhusep (Otorten), Yalpingnyer (Prayer Stone), Isherim), determining their heights and coordinates (A detailed “Strazhevsky’s Diary” about the route through the Urals of his detachment was attached to the second volume of the expedition’s works).

Due to an anthrax epizootic, a trip to the Northern Urals in 1849 turned out to be impossible; it was possible to carry it out only in 1850.

(By the way, the anthrax epidemic broke out in the very center of Sverdlovsk in 1979, due to the fault of the local administration and security agencies. But the Soviet government tried to hide this fact and did not bother to protect the people. There were casualties among the civilian population. She wrote to me about this incident in a letter Elena Kolevatova, she was among those who fell ill, but recovered.)

The results of the expedition are presented in a two-volume work by Hoffmann and Kovalsky, as well as in the work of topographer Yuryev.

“All the time the thermometer showed +2, the deer began to fall heavily during bad weather. The major ordered to move the herd from place to place so that healthy ones around the fallen deer would not become infected. But this did not help, around the missing deer lying around everywhere, and even the already butchered ones, the calves lie or run around, looking for the mothers. Or the latter are near their calves and soon the infected ones themselves immediately fall. Only to drive the herd, which had been lying in place for about an hour, to another place, 5-6 deer will not rise for the first time. The Ostyaks and Samoyeds not only removed the skins, but also greedily ate meat. Anticipating the strong contagiousness of this, we forbade them not only to eat meat, but also to cut up dead deer, but they could not resist doing this furtively or at night. his own, reasoning “where has it been heard of a person dying from a deer disease?” Even when two Samoyeds became very ill, and this could not stop them. they are accustomed to do this in ordinary cases of minor deaths of deer from hoof pain and other non-malignant diseases. It is disgusting and at the same time pathetic to look at the greed with which they, moving from one fallen deer to another, eat the parts they like. And their women sit for whole days behind the butchered deer, like animals, doing their usual work, pulling out the veins for thread with their teeth, and without any disgust, not knowing when the deer died.... The superstitious Ostyaks and Samoyeds reasoned in their own way that “this Surely such a place is already lost, here in this very place the tent stood. In disgust of further disaster, they said that “We must certainly slaughter a healthy white deer as a sacrifice to God. Then fumigate the herd with its wool.”

We were just waiting for the weather to calm down a little so we could move on from this truly lost place. It rained heavily at night. In the morning, the shepherds told us that “there are few living deer left, if you don’t believe me, look for yourself.” And indeed, at night there was a terrible death of deer. The Ostyaks themselves, in the tents, also almost half died, or were severely ill. The epidemic moved quite quickly from south to north, towards us, and it is remarkable that as it approached the North, it acted much weaker and slower, as can be seen from the following information.... Approaching closer and closer to the indicated plagues, the Ostyaks began to discern that The herd that delighted them from afar was a motionless field of reindeer corpses. All hopes disappeared, they realized that the ulcer was raging here too, and probably to a strong extent, that the Ostyaks had already stopped skinning. ....In the area, strewn everywhere with dead deer, more than two thousand, they said that the air was heavy, that it was unbearable to walk against the wind. The Ostyaks did not even know how many people were still alive to the south of them in the Urals, because without deer they no longer had any communication with each other. Their mortality rate was high, if not half, then at least a third of them died from ulcers.

In people, a sign of infection was a sore on the face, and soon the face began to swell. For those who were already destined to become a victim of an ulcer, the head swelled to such an extent that the place of the eyes, nose, etc. was not visible. As the tumor spread lower to the throat and chest, the person immediately died in severe suffocation. The Ostyaks themselves contributed to the spread of infection between people with their ignorant, wild and selfless life, eating dead deer. Old men, accompanied by small children, armed with their primitive flints, walked around the neighborhood and shot sick deer, tore skins from dead and killed animals, despite the negligible value of these skins at that time. Small children had to drag these skins to the tents, where they were hung in the sun. The plagues turned out to be surrounded by a whole town of substitutions with drying skins. All these skins will be tanned and subsequently distributed to different parts of our North. What is surprising after this in private horse cases throughout Pechora right up to the Pechora-Kama portage. Two or three years before, such an epidemic raged in the mountains of the upper reaches of Patek that the herds grazing here died to the last head."

A deer pestilence occurred in the upper reaches of the Pechora, Lozva, and Vishera. On the Podcherem River, it is 120-150 km above Lozva. And this is also the Northern Urals.

The epidemic spread from south to north. Yes, in the life of the Mansi there were many epidemics in the Urals. It is spreading quickly, you can read this in the diary of Nikifor Strazhevsky. And on Kholat-Syakhla, among other things, many deer died. The place where reindeer die is what this name rather means, including, of course, the reindeer herders themselves. And after the death of the group, they began to talk about the curse of the place, as the place of Mansi’s death, having come up with a myth about the number 9, which in fact in Mansi mythology does not carry any sacred meaning, neither negative nor positive. Both the Khanty and the Mansi have the word death different sound for humans and the rest of the animal and plant world. Khals “to die, to die* - about the animal and plant world; ampal khals “the dog has died”, torn khals “the grass has withered, died.” The Khanty word khals is not used in relation to a person. The Son Khanty, speaking about deceased opponents, about outsiders , not relatives, used the word: Hala (hola) “dead”, “dead”.

"Question: Under these specific conditions, was it possible for someone to approach the tent without leaving any traces; in particular, do the Mansi leave traces?

Answer: If the Mansi approached there on their skis, then there would be no traces left. Their skis leave no marks. The slope above the tent is bare.

Question: Do you admit the idea of ​​a Mansi attack on the group?

Answer: I do not allow this thought. For many years I do not know of a single case of Mansi attacking people. Due to the nature of my service, I had to meet Mansi all the time in a variety of conditions, I had to talk with them about issues of hunting and life. They always answer willingly, the people are hospitable. They cooperate with us and help detain escaped prisoners. They do not show hostility towards us. I don’t know which and when the Mansi celebrate religious holidays, but in the region I have not heard about the presence of sacred places near Mount “1079.”

She also asked a question about the version of Mansi involvement to former search engine student S.A. Tipikin: “Did they talk about the version of the murder of the group by the local population - the Mansi people or some Ostyaks?”

Reply S.A. Tipikina: “Before the start of the search expedition, the UPI trade union committee held a briefing for the participants (conducted by Maslennikov). It was immediately said that little was known about the Otorten region; none of the Sverdlovsk tourists had been there. Then the conversation turned to the remote forest tracts and swamps where people die even animals, about the Mansi and their religious rituals, about the dangers from prisoners. We were warned that these were most likely myths, but we should be careful and careful."

Vadim CHERNOBROV cited in one of his publications the words of search participant V. Karelin (“Phantom” No. 8, 2003, Ancient gods demand victims.”): “In the first days of the investigation, Ivanov said only one thing: “The students did not die a natural death, This is murder." We kept telling him about “balls of fire.” But he was adamant. Therefore, I tried to get this idea into the protocols. And he achieved this.

About 10 days after the start of the investigation, Ivanov was recalled to Sverdlovsk, and then sent to Moscow for several days. And so, when he returned, we did not recognize him. This was a completely different investigator, who no longer said anything about the murder or the “balls”. And he often began to advise us one thing: “Use your tongues less...” V. Karelin was referring to the protocol of his interrogation dated April 15, 1959, where he voiced the idea that was instilled in him by the investigator: “... in principle, Dyatlov’s group could have been frightened only an armed group of people of at least 10 people, although no evidence of the presence of strangers was found at the scene."

“Crime fans repeat the opinion of Vladislav Karelin, a participant in the search for the missing group, recorded in the protocol, that only an armed group of at least ten people could have scared the Dyatlovites so much, to the point of panicked flight. We met with Vladislav Georgievich more than once. He recalls, that this recording appeared as a result of persistent leading questions from investigator L. Ivanov, who at the beginning of the investigation was developing a version of revenge on local Mansi tourists for invading their sacred places. The version was soon discarded as absurd, but the phrase remained..." (R. Pechurkina, The Mystery of the Mountain Pass.)

I would like to object to the respected Rimma Pechurkina. Not crime buffs, but people who view the death of the Dyatlov group as a crime, as a murder.

In contrast to the “space”, “rocket” and other versions popular among the technical intelligentsia, navigator G.A. Karpushin, who is participating in the search for the missing group, has his own version about the death of Dyatlov’s group.

“I have flown in those places before,” he told an AiF-Ural correspondent, “on the basis of this my version was formed. The fact is that I have repeatedly heard from local hunters about the existence of idols in these places.

I heard that in the forest, in hidden places, there were wooden figures that the Voguls (Mansi) worshiped, made offerings in the form of furs, money, and smeared their lips with bear fat. The destruction of these temples entailed death. I still remember the incident that happened in the area of ​​Mount Narodnaya - geographically it is close to those places. There, geologists were developing rock crystal. Workers - unconvoyed prisoners - helped them in this. One day, four of these prisoners plundered one of these idols. The Voguls shot them all.

And in the area of ​​the Dyatlov Pass there is a small mountain - the Khoi-Ekva volcano. There in August 1949, while surveying the area from the air, we noticed simply a huge number of Mansi on reindeer sleds who had come here from the surrounding villages. Remembering the stories that I heard earlier, I assume that this is where the pagan temple is located.

Apparently, the Mansi, seeing that the tourists had gotten close enough to the sacred places, decided to scare them. After the students left the tent in panic, the rest was done by the cold and the fractures the guys received while they were running down the mountain in panic..." (Alexander ARKHIPOV "AiF-Ural"? 2,3, 2004)

In Maslennikov’s recently appeared notebook there is a mysterious entry:

But this is a brick in the so-called version of the opening of the case “February 6,” “the day when nothing happened,” as A. Rakitin said. The evidence of which is the interrogation protocol of the head of the Vizhay communications center V. Popov.

The traces of narrow skis are “white men” who passed by, not Mansi and not local Russians, but urban strangers.

From somewhere Maslennikov learned the exact date and noted in his notebook the testimony of an unknown person, in all likelihood, Mansi A.A. Anyamov, who saw these traces. And maybe even the shaman K. Sheshkin himself. The Mansi walked in that area from the end of January to the end of February. We saw footprints on February 6th. They saw and did not follow the tracks, do you know who passed there in a remote uninhabited place? Amazing lack of curiosity on the part of Mansi. V. Korotaev mentioned what the Mansi said during interrogations: “WE DID NOT KILL.” The Mansi knew that a murder had been committed and probably had their own thoughts about who killed. But they told the investigation that on February 6-7 they were in the area of ​​the tragedy and noticed traces of “narrow skis”. It’s not even the fact that traces of narrow skis have been preserved that is important, but the fact that the Mansi were in the area of ​​the tragedy on February 6th.

“Shamanizing is harder than cutting down a forest,” one shaman told a young ethnographer. This is not a gift, but a heavy burden. The ritual itself is similar to a hysterical attack. And based on the Christian worldview, shamanism is a person’s obsession, illness, connection with demonic forces. It’s scary to imagine what demons can do. Speaking about the shamans of the Mansi and Khanty, it should be noted that shamans are divided into several types and are named in accordance with their “specialization”. For example, knight is a sorcerer, tarten-hoy is a sage, a fortuneteller, sem-voyan-ho is a contemplator... Shamanism among the Mansi and Khanty retained the features of family shamanism. We know this from the shamans from the Kurikov family. Little is known about the shamans of the Anyamov family, but there was nepotism there too. Sheshkins and Sambindalovs too. The Bakhtiyarovs, I think, did not escape shamans in their family, but nothing is known about them at all. Also, each head of the family performed the duties of a certain family shaman when performing household cults. In a word, everyone could do shamanism. They differed only in specialization and personal shamanic “power”. Z.P. Sokolova gives information about three groups of Mansi shamans: potrtan-pupas or valtakhten-pupas - shamanists with a musical instrument; koipynnyayt - shamans with a tambourine; penge-hum - fortune tellers with an axe.

Mansi and Khanty believe that every object, plant, tree has a certain spirit within it. The fly agaric mushroom therefore helps the shaman enter with spirits and has a stupefying effect, because the fly agaric itself contains the intoxicating spirit. The shaman -pankal-hu (pankal means fly agaric) soaked the fly agaric in warm water and drank the infusion, which had a hypnotic and intoxicating effect. Those present gathered and listened to what the shaman said in a dream; it was believed that in this way he was divining.

The main forest spirit is called Wont-lung and influences the results of fishing. If you had a dream in the forest, it was believed that Wont-lung was thinking in you. In the habitat of the forest spirit, near the most noticeable tree, for the spirit lives in it, the hunters must place a few coins or a handkerchief. (I remember the cedar tree where coins and handkerchiefs were found). The spirits of harmless animals, fish and birds are considered neutral to humans, and therefore are often not personified. But the Anyamov family, for example, has its own patron spirit who lives in the pike. The spirit of the pike is translated as Sart-khuring-aki. The Khanty do not consider pike a fish because they believe that it is possessed by another spirit, the main aquatic one, Ves. “They sacrificed a rooster to him. And when there was no rooster, they said we should steal a Russian baby and sacrifice it.” Uncle Roma looked at us expectantly. “Well, that was a long time ago, they don’t do that now.” (A. Stesin. "Forest People")

Such a spirit also lived in the forest - a child who died early, sometimes he took the form of a bear cub. The spirit appeared to those who were soon to die. They were very afraid to see him.

Many spirits in the forest live in a cedar tree, the top of which diverges into seven branches. Or in some other tree that differs from the rest in something unusual. If you harm such a tree, the spirit can take revenge on the offender. Such a tree must be appeased and gifts given to it.

If a caught lizard left its tail in the hands of a person, it was believed that the spirit of the lizard transmitted some kind of disease to the person. In this case, they resorted to a certain shaman. If the shaman could not drive out this disease, then the person had to go to the cemetery and lie down among the graves of relatives, pretending to be dead. Then the evil spirit will come out of the person, deeming everyone dead

Somewhere in the sky lived the main god of all spirits, Torum. He appeared in the form of an ancient gray-haired old man. Torum created the earth, nature, people and all living things. Having created man and nature, he himself withdrew from observation and entrusted the monitoring of his creations to numerous spirits, the creation of which he had nothing to do with. There is a document from the Tobolsk Consistory for 1778, when the Khan was brought to trial for neglectful treatment of icons. In his justification, the Khan replied that a raven flew to him and said that one God was unable to give him prey, different spirits must be worshiped.

An interesting belief existed among the Khanty. It was believed that the elk was very curious about musical sounds and came close to the source of the sound, so they hunted the elk with a tambourine. And at the sacred cedar, each beginning fisherman left the sacred hammer he had made, the end of the hammer was made in the form of an elk’s head. It was believed that the spirit hammered in the stakes of the locks placed on the river at night. The elk skin was placed near an inclined tree as a sacrifice to the forest spirit.

The constellation Ursa Major was called Los by the Khanty. According to legend, Torum created an eight-legged elk; hunters could not catch up with him. Then Torum's son cut off four legs of the elk so that the people could catch up with the elk.

If same-sex twins were born, then one of them had to die, because at birth they were given one “lil” - a soul. If opposite-sex twins were born, then they could live with one soul between them.

Some Khanty had the custom of making cuts on the clothes of the deceased precisely at the ends of the sleeves and trousers, showing the deceased that the lil soul came and will not return, don’t bother us, you died and it’s good, don’t come back. The attitude towards the dead was twofold: they were feared, but they also showed care and respect for them. A dead person who had not yet been buried was considered dangerous. The dead man's hands and feet were tied to prevent him from walking. And they untied it just before the burial. The Khanty sometimes wrapped the dead in deer or elk skins.

"The shaman needs a magic drum. Ordinary speech does not reach the ears of the gods." How to make a shaman's tambourine. The future shaman asked one of the oldest men to make a tambourine (if those around him recognized his right to be a shaman. And it was also believed that otherworldly spirits themselves choose who to be a shaman and indicate this to people. In a dream, a deceased shaman appeared to the candidate and ordered “Start shamanizing!” And along with the shaman, a cloud of different spirits appeared and forced the chosen one to practice shamanism. Well, the transfer of the shamanic gift by inheritance in one family). The designated one had to go alone into the forest, find the right tree - cedar, spruce or larch, whose upper branches would resemble the shape of deer antlers. At the level of his height, he had to cut the branch for the shell of the tambourine. It was advisable to take a branch from the east side, but it is also possible from the south and north. In no case from the West. Because there are evil spirits in the west. This tree, after the branch was taken from it, was considered sacred and was supposed to continue to grow. If a branch cracked, the future shaman was informed that it was too early for him to be a shaman, he must wait another year before making a tambourine.

"The shaman needs a magic drum. Ordinary speech does not reach the ears of the gods." When the tambourine was made, a three-day celebration of its “revival” took place. At the festival, everyone could take a tambourine and play it, this was welcomed. Sometimes the holiday was not organized and the new tambourine was given to the shaman on the day of his first ritual. Kamlanie is a shaman's frantic dancing and singing to a tambourine, the roar of all the shaman's iron pendants. It is believed that communication with spirits occurs in two ways: either the spirits move into the shaman’s body or his tambourine, or the shaman’s soul is carried away on a journey to the spirits, and then to Torum himself. If the tambourine failed, a new one was made. The shaman took the old tambourine into the forest and hung it on a tree of his choice. All pendants were removed from the tambourine and transferred to a new tambourine. When the shaman died, his tambourine was also hung on a chosen tree in the forest. And under the influence of the wind he could make certain sounds for a long time. In general, the tambourine was not considered a sacred object; it was easily sold to strangers. The shamans also played the dombra. To enter into communication with the spirit, the shaman ate a dried fly agaric and began to bang on a heated tambourine. If pendants were torn off the shaman’s clothes during a ritual, it was believed that one of those present would die. A dog barking during a ritual was also considered a bad sign. The Ostyak dog is a special animal; they did not tell secrets in front of it; they believed that it understood everything. Of particular importance in shamanic ritual was the snake - the spirit assistant of the shaman. Some shamans had the upper part of their clothing (skin or cloak) hung with many strands of various sizes, which symbolized snakes.

If the shaman was not thanked for his services with gifts, then it was believed that his shamanic power would disappear. Some Khanty gave the shaman several coins, according to the number of spirits under his control. If a shaman deceived people, he himself soon fell ill, it was believed among the Khanty. Great shamans sometimes did not take gifts, but sucked warm blood during sacrifices. Sometimes the shamans themselves determined the payment due to them. They asked to perform a blood sacrifice (as researchers say, to slaughter a deer or a horse. But I doubt that the matter was limited only to animals. I came across a mention that once a child was appointed to the role of the victim). When the shaman had a presentiment of his death, he would go into the forest to die secretly. The rest were buried in a regular cemetery. Although in the case of burials of shamans, the rituals and methods of burial were different at all times, both among the Mansi and the Khanty.

Long hair (braids) was considered one of the signs of beauty for both women and men. And they decorated them with braids. It is no coincidence that almost all Khanty and Mansi deities have braids. Hair was not only a symbol of beauty, but also the focus of a person’s spiritual strength; in Ugric culture there are a number of prohibitions related to hair. Nowadays Mansi do not wear braids. But there are descriptions about braids. A “siv-syokh” oblique decoration, a strip of dark fabric approximately 9 cm wide, the length varies, with pendants and garters sewn on the ends. This decoration is for women, but shamans often used elements of women’s clothing in their cults. I couldn't find his picture. But I left it as a note to compare with the same belt with lanyards (tassel lanyards or wicker decorations) that B. Slobtsov saw near the cedar. I also came across a mention in the literature that in one of the shaman’s chests, among various shamanic things, there was a checkered handkerchief and, again, a cloth belt 81 cm long with a lanyard at the end. When they opened the lanyard, they found river pebbles in it. Shamans used such pebbles in rituals if they found them in the entrails of a hunted elk.

Excerpts from the memoirs of Viktor Maltsev

In the photo: Shchkhran-oyki knife. The blade is made from one half of a pair of scissors. From the archive of V. Androsov.

Among the Khanty and Mansi, there was a ban on leaving imprints of one’s body in the snow, or stabbing one’s shadow with sharp objects, since a shadow and a print are parts of one’s appearance and body. It is known that any part is connected with the whole, therefore, if the imprint melts in the spring, the body itself will become ill or completely disappear. The investigation “did not find any traces of strangers on the slope.” Mansi know how not to leave their traces. Skis and objects leave traces, but not Mansi.

It is noteworthy that previously some Khanty were very negative about photography. It was believed that the soul of the person himself passes into photography.

About traces of blood. Where could she have gone? One chronicle source reports that the Obdorsk prince Gyndin ordered his brother to deal with the enemy: “Where you see the Lyapin prince Semyon, and raise him on spears, and do not drop his blood on the floor, then put him to death.” . Why the Ostyaks demanded not to shed blood, I have not yet found out. I assume that bloody clothes were burned in the fire. It was also possible to melt bloody snow. And during the sacrifices not a single drop of blood should have been spilled on the ground! The blood from the sacrificial animal was sucked out while it was still coming from the body of the half-dead animal, and cups were placed to collect the blood.

The Ostyaks were accustomed to respecting other people's property; therefore, theft and deception among them are extremely rare. (Dunin-Gorkavich A.A.) Voronezh historian D. Baranov also noted this feature of the Ostyaks and Voguls, led by spiritual leaders - shamans, namely, “they did not take anything, because they did not use anything that came from the Russian civilization, abandoning their “fruits.” There is another version of why not a single thing was taken from the tent: the mountain was considered a refuge of spirits; what was on the mountain, namely the tent and the things in it, belonged to the spirits. No one from Mansi would have taken anything from them. didn't dare.

"...Meanings." Have you heard of this phenomenon? An ancient way of shamans to influence mass consciousness. When “measuring,” people lose control over their actions, are prone to collective suicide, do not feel pain, are able to read other people’s thoughts, predict the future and, most importantly, can cause natural disasters - storms, hurricanes, thunderstorms, the appearance of giant ball lightning in winter. (A. Petrushin, "Kazym Madonna")

I should note that, despite numerous ethnographic expeditions and studies, little is known about the cult holidays of the Mansi, and nothing is known at all about many cults, especially those in which human sacrifices were used. The Mansi tried not to tell even their friends about them. This is their secret. And sometimes we hear vague and fragmentary stories about this or that fact.

A little about the erotic side of Ostyak life.

“In the culture of every nation there are concepts of both beauty and sexual modesty. In the Khanty environment, concealment of any physiological act was considered necessary. Women usually carefully concealed the onset of pregnancy, and often even the husband did not know about the woman’s position before she needed “tekhalna” omsas" ("sit in a nest") - go to a house for a woman in labor. There were also special women's and men's toilets. Early travelers were perplexed by the fact that Ostyak women in the presence of men could freely breastfeed, while a woman's face and head were constantly covered. G. Startsev noted that a woman who does not cover her face shows an unkind attitude towards a man, harbors hostility towards him, from which he faces death. "was so strong that it led to oddities. One of these moments is described by 3. P. Sokolova: an old woman of 60-70 years old, having met her son-in-law and not having a headscarf with her, covered her head and face with the hem of her dress, although she was wearing underwear did not have.

A man cannot show his reproductive organ to the Sun and Fire - female deities. A man does not bathe, does not go to the bathhouse or to the toilet with his father-in-law and his wife’s older brothers. The male genital organ is called “Mun”, corresponds to the active principle, to denote which in everyday speech the Khanty use the term “plow” (“partridge”), associating the movements of the male genital organ with the rapid take-off of the bird; A woman’s genitals are associated with a container, a limited space that carries a threat, and are called “potlam hot” - “black house”, associated with the “black” house (chum), which serves for shamanic rituals. Sexual intercourse among the Khanty is called “nun lel” yakhl” - “the female genital organ eats, walks”; coitus is called similarly among the Mansi: “tai Khatei” - “they eat each other.” The correlation of copulation with food intake is most likely connected with the fact that both acts are aimed at the continuation of life: without food, a person’s death occurs, without “feeding” the woman’s sexual organ, reproduction does not occur. The similarity is also in the fact that just as the food eaten becomes part of the person himself, so in the sexual act a woman. becomes part of a man. During copulation, the number of souls becomes equal to nine (five male souls plus four female ones); nine is a number meaning completeness, when the male and female principles are interpreted as complementary rather than conflicting. In general, the courtship ritual was. is quite developed, and matchmaking itself among the Mansi was called “ne hai talannekhtsum” - “I will run around the girl.”

For each married couple, a canopy was pulled up at night, which had a high semantic status. The canopy (“ho-shap”) contributed to the creation of the individual world of the married couple; brought to a wedding, it accompanied the man and woman throughout their lives. At night, he limited the world of the spouses from the world of the large family. M. Shatilov mentions a case when newlyweds were divorced on the grounds that the husband had violated marital fidelity or, as the Ostyaks put it, “violated someone else’s canopy.”

However, there are also moments when violation of established sexual norms becomes an obligatory component of the general ritual. This is most clearly manifested in traditional bear dances. During the festival, attitudes of sexual modesty are abolished - here not only the act of copulation between deities or forest spirits is imitated, but also the sexual abilities of those present are freely discussed. Before the start of dancing, it was considered a mandatory ritual to sprinkle water or sprinkle snow on all participants. Traditionally present among the attributes of deities who come to dances, the staff ("suv") constantly turns into a phallus when playing scenes. The inversion of sexuality is also traditional for this holiday - men play female roles, while dressing up men in women's clothing is widespread." (E.V. Perevalova. Erotica in Khanty culture.)

I note that I myself sacred rite Eating bear meat at the festival is strictly observed so that the killed bear is reborn again. And there is another reason for the spread and preservation of the ritual of the bear holiday in our days: the variety of food - because ordinary everyday fish and poultry are replaced during the holiday with rare, delicious bear meat.

The wood grouse is the guardian of sleep in the beliefs of the Khanty and Mansi.

Photo by V. Androsov.

Having said about the research into the Dyatlov tragedy that it is almost hopeless to find and prove the cause of the death of the group, I personally proceed from my feelings and impressions. In the existing narrow circle of “criminologists,” we continue to assert that a murder occurred in the group. But who killed - here our opinions differ. The most difficult thing in this dark case is that all the loose ends have been tidied up, the traces have been trampled, the investigation did not particularly intend to find out the reasons for the death of the group, following the path of least resistance, even hiding and falsifying evidence, this must be honestly admitted. And they were under pressure from higher authorities. In general, there is no point in completely relying on the Criminal Case known to us, no matter how much they convince us otherwise. This Criminal Case should be taken into account as a preserved document of the era, hiding traces of evidence and facts carefully hidden by the investigator, but now and then suddenly emerging.

I am not so self-confident as to insist on the version of ritual murder. It might not have been ritual. Mansi might not have been killed. But I would also like to note that the statement “they couldn’t kill Mansi” has no basis. Police investigator G. Lesnykh said this well: there is no such evidence for the investigation that “this man could not have killed!” (Prosecutor's cases. Part one. Interview with police investigator Georgy Lesnykh). Students who passed through the Mansi yurts were almost always greeted and seen off kindly. What can students know about Mansi if they are only passers-by? What can the Ivdel Vohra know about the Mansi if their relations with the Mansi are limited to the capture of escaped prisoners, whom the Mansi often mercilessly froze so that the prisoners do not escape. Or they killed them outright. The Mansi do not reveal their secrets to outsiders. They would rather unanimously deny that they know nothing. Or they will pretend to see nothing and hear nothing.

“It seems that hospitality is characteristic of all residents of these places, both Russians and Mansi. As one of my acquaintances, who happened to live with the Evens, said, in the north a man is more like a brother to a man than a wolf; a guest is always sincerely welcome. Which in no way cancels the extreme wariness and constant reticence, a clear division into friends and foes: they treat you to what God sent, they give you the last, but at the same time they are ready to grab a gun at any moment." (A. Stesin, “Forest People”.)

In the meantime, I continue to consider the question “Could Mansi have been killed?”

They could! And I can show this with facts, using materials from a criminal case and ethnographic research. There are many of these facts, much more than the missile version, the avalanche, the cleanup, the involvement of the military, moose, deer, yeti and other alien intelligence. I will even say that there are no facts at all for all the above versions. But there is a version of Mansi’s involvement. You just need to be able to see them.

To be continued.

In the second half of the twentieth century, several large finds of bronze items from the Middle Ages were made in the active sanctuaries of the Khanty and Mansi [Gemuev, Molodin, Sagalayev, 1984; Gemuev, Sagalaev, 1986; Tylikova, Baulo, 2001]. The findings, on the one hand, allowed researchers to see the ways of using ancient attributes in the modern religious and ritual practice of the indigenous peoples of Western Siberia, on the other hand, they brought greater clarity to the question of the original functional purpose that their creators assigned to bronze anthropo- and zoomorphic images.

This article is devoted to the introduction into scientific circulation of a number of medieval bronze and silver artifacts discovered during ethnographic expeditions in recent years to the Lower Ob region (Berezovsky, Beloyarsky and Shuryshkarsky districts of the Tyumen region).
Home sanctuaries of the Ob Ugrians

Due to the fact that ancient bronze and silver items were preserved as part of the attributes of the home sanctuaries of the Khanty and Mansi, a few words should be said about the latter. Principles for placing “holy” things in certain places the houses were examined in detail by I.N. Gemuev using the example of the northern group of Mansi. In accordance with the three-member structure of the universe, the family’s home was divided into three spheres in the vertical plane. The attic of the house was a place of highest sacred significance, symbolizing the region of the Upper World. Images of family patron spirits and other items of religious paraphernalia were placed here near the pediment, which was like a continuation of the mule - the wall opposite the entrance to the dwelling. Before the appearance of the attic in the Mansi dwelling, a sacred function was performed by special “spirit shelves” adjacent to the mule. The space around the mule, inside and outside the house, was forbidden for women. Outside, a pole was dug in front of the mule for tying the sacrificial animal. Even earlier, the cult place was located outside the house, at some distance from it, opposite the south side - the mule. The disappearance of religious places of this kind was associated with the emergence of large settlements, leading to the concentration of people (often of a different nationality) and domestic animals in the villages. As a result, the “pure land” suitable for the habitation of gods and spirits disappeared. They began to create a “clean place” artificially, using the ceiling and attic space for this. The status of the attic was determined by the fact that a woman, as an “unclean” creature, was forbidden to be there. The man in the attic, the habitat of the gods and spirits, was only allowed to perform propitiatory rituals (feeding, dressing and re-dressing the spirits, adding new gifts to their existing “riches,” etc.). Thus, in the vertical plane, three zones are distinguished in the Mansi home - the upper (the attic and the corresponding “holy” shelf), the living human space and the area of ​​the lower world (under the floor) [Gemuev, 1990, p. 13 - 20].

The above constructions fully apply to the dwellings of the northern (in our case: Berezovsky, Synsky and Lower Ob) Khanty. Currently they are Russian-built log huts. Only in a number of villages (Yukhan-Kurt, Malaya Ob River; Vytvozhgort, Synya River; Vershina Voykara, Voykar River) there are still a few uninhabited (“ancient”) houses in which there are no ceilings and bunks are placed along the walls. In this case, the “holy” chests are located on the rear upper bunks. In modern homes, family fetishes are kept in two places at once. The first is located in the living room, where in the right (less often, left) corner at a height of approx. 1.5 m from the floor is done so-called. “holy” shelf. On it, covered with a curtain, there are small chests or suitcases, birch bark boxes and even glass jars containing family paraphernalia and images of patron spirits. This sacred half of the house is called mule tahi, and the butt for spirits is ate punta from [Lapina, 1998, p. 103, 105]. The second place for storing ritual paraphernalia is the attic. Things that belonged to previous generations of the house's inhabitants accumulate here. Chests, boxes and suitcases are placed on a plank platform against the back wall. The skins of sacrificed animals are hung on the crossbars that cross the premises. Only in holidays and during rituals, men have the right to remove sacred relics. In another situation, touching them entails punishment from higher powers - a person may be wounded in the hand or left without fingers [Ibid., p. 20, 70].

It should be noted that the manufacture of the “holy” chest (box) was accompanied by a rather complex procedure. The need to begin this work was often determined by the shaman during the ritual process. If it was not possible to purchase a factory chest, then the box was made by a man - the owner of the house. He also whittled the arrow, which was placed on top of the lid. The first attributes for storage inside the chest (sacrificial blankets, robes for bear dances and patron spirits, gifts to the gods) were prepared by an elderly woman. If there were no skilled people in the village, they were brought from neighboring places: An ordinary person would not even get jail time for this. If you don’t know how, if you do it crookedly, then it will be bad both in the house and for your children, they may die (E.D. Moldanova, p. Vanzevat). When the box was “finished,” a sacrifice was made. Scarves, a robe, and blankets were placed on the back of a horse or deer, and the box itself was placed on top of everything. Before the animal was slaughtered, the box was removed. Later he stood on the street next to the place where the table was set. After the sacrifice, the box was taken into the house and placed in the “holy” corner.

The Berezovsky Khanty have a fairly strong tradition when a “holy” chest or suitcase contains gifts presented to only one patron spirit - Ai-as-iki “Malaya Ob to the old man”, Em-vozh-iki “The Holy City to the old man”, “the village god ”, etc. Among our closest neighbors - the northern Mansi - gifts to the gods were often placed in a common chest.

The culmination of the functioning of the home sanctuary is a sacrifice to propitiate the gods and patron spirits, during which they pray for the granting of well-being to family members. The owners of the house take out robes and scarves from the suitcases and chests standing in the “holy” corner, hang them on nails driven under the ceiling beams; they stay here for three days. The sacrifice traditionally takes place at the back of the house, where a small pillar is erected. However, recently in a number of villages the animal is more often tied to a hole drilled in the log of the corner crown. Thus, it is specifically emphasized that the animal is sacrificed for the well-being of the people living in this house.

While the prayer is being read, some scarves or robes are placed on the animal’s back; they ask God to accept the sacrifice, save them from trouble, and preserve their children and grandchildren. Suitcases or chests with “holy” things are placed on small wooden sleds and the lid is opened. A glass of vodka and (after cutting the carcass and cooking) large cups of meat are placed nearby. In addition, sacrificial food is placed in front of the chests in the attic and inside the house on the “holy” shelf. The newly presented scarves after the sacrifice hang at home for two days, after which they are taken to a chest in the attic.
Treasure finds

In the home sanctuaries of the Khanty and Mansi, examples of ancient bronze casting and silver production - figurines of people and animals - often serve as cult attributes. However, their presence among modern things is sometimes unexpected for the researcher. It is not always possible to find out how they appeared in a given dwelling, what circumstances accompanied such an unusual find. The reason for the lack of information among the owners is largely due to tradition. The fact is that things accumulated in home sanctuaries over many generations, while the son could see the attributes of his father only after his death. Most often, people continued to place new gifts to their patron spirits on top of the previous ones, without being interested in what was at the bottom of the chest. The generally accepted rule also played a role: “Do not take (do not take out) what was not meant for you.” Therefore, the discovery of samples of ancient foundry often turns out to be equally unexpected both for the ethnographer and for the owner of the sanctuary who is present. Fortunately, another part of the bronze and silver figurines still continues to play a role in ritual practice and therefore information about its discovery in the past is preserved. Most often, ancient bronze was found in coastal landslides or on the sites of ancient settlements, in different stories These events date back to the end of the 18th century and the second half of the 19th century. and by the 1930s. The last date is obviously associated with the period when the Soviet government waged an active struggle against local religious cults and, in particular, against shamanism. Some people hid “holy” attributes in the taiga or in a swamp, while others (very soon) found them there.

The attitude towards such finds was determined by the belief that they were once made by legendary heroic ancestors. Traveled through Western Siberia at the end of the 19th century. Finnish scientist W.T. Sirelius recorded a message from his informant from Vasyugan that “the Ostyaks used to make iron themselves, i.e. brass... The tools for making were allegedly taken away from them by the king... According to the old man's stories, on the banks of the river. Koimegan found objects made of brass made by old unbaptized Ostyaks, namely a horse, hollow inside, with four legs... When someone found something like this, he threw it away, because they were afraid that the finder would die if he brought these objects home” [Sirelius, 2001, p. 107].

The Mansi had a different attitude towards the fate of the finds, as described in a number of stories recorded by A. Kannisto at the beginning of the 20th century. Thus, on Northern Sosva, a treasure (hidden treasure) was recognized by a burning fire, and one was supposed to jump into this fire. If an old watchman was sitting by the fire, he had to be knocked out of his place with a blow from left to right, then the fire would go out, the old man would fall to the ground, and at the same time the lid of the treasure would open. You could only take a handful of money, but you couldn’t return empty-handed. The rest of the money was taken the next day. After this, a sacrifice was made: part of the meat was eaten at the place of discovery, and the rest was taken home. The bones were collected in the skin of a sacrificial animal and placed in the pit where the treasure was found. In the village of Shaitanskaya, the treasure was buried to the depth of a seven-foot reindeer leash. A “money ladder” led to it; near the treasure there were golden chairs and a copper cauldron filled to the brim with money and military armor. To get the treasure, it was necessary to make a human sacrifice - a girl of 7 - 8 years old or a boy. They cut off the tip of their finger, pricked their lower leg with a needle, and let them run; bloody trails led to the treasure. Another treasure was discovered near the Toboldin yurts (lower reaches of Northern Sosva). One day an old man and an old woman saw a burning fire. It almost went out when the old woman began to hit it with an ax. The old man broke a hooked birch tree, and the two of them pulled out a copper cauldron full of money. When they again came to the place to sacrifice the calf, the hole in the ground closed. Soon the old man and the old woman died. Another location of the treasure was known near the Rezimovs' yurts. To raise treasures to the surface of the earth, it was necessary to sacrifice a mottled cow, then you could get as much money as the animal’s skin could hold. On Verkhnyaya Lozva, two hunters were walking along the river bank, the leg of one of them fell into the ground. When the hunter pulled out his leg, he saw many chests in the hole that had formed; two goblin stood on both edges of the hole. Raising the treasure required a human sacrifice. On Nizhnyaya Lozva, a person, a white horse or a dog was sacrificed for this purpose.

Stories about the discovery of treasures also exist among modern Khanty. Quite characteristic is the legend of the Syn Khanty “Money Girl Cape”:

They say it was a very, very long time ago. A husband and wife lived and they had an only, beloved daughter, they saved up wealth for her, but the girl fell ill and died. The parents greatly mourned their daughter and decided to give everything they had saved to their daughter: they poured a full shirt of coins and placed the body of their deceased daughter in the coffin. They did it secretly so that no one would see. The girl was buried on a cape on the right bank of the Nes-Yugan River. Years passed, the forest grew more than once, it was cut down, and it grew again... Over time, the wooden tombstone collapsed, the boards rotted, and soon there were no traces left, only a small clearing overgrown with grass. People began to notice that on this cape in the clearing, if you jump, you hear a sound reminiscent of the clinking of coins. Many were looking for hidden treasures, but only on special days did the earth open its doors to a kind and non-greedy person, a girl came out and gave the person gold and silver coins. Since then, this cape has been called Okhan evi nel tai “Cape of the Money Girl” (Record by E.I. Tylikova from A.I. Konkina, Ovgort village).

Among the Syn Khanty, when a treasure was found, they sacrificed a deer, and part of the animal’s blood was poured into the place of the treasure. The great-grandmother of one of the informants once found a treasure in the ground. But then they became greedy, did not make a sacrifice, and the treasure was sold to different hands, almost everything was lost. Found - “sent from above” - things were considered family property, they moved into the category of “holy” things, they could not be placed with the deceased in the grave or sold. This explains the preservation of ancient bronze and silver items for decades in Khanty families.
Description of finds

1. Figurine of a rider on a horse (Fig. 1). Bronze, casting. Taiga Ob region, VIII - X centuries. Dimensions 5.5 x 5 cm. The rider sits on the horse sideways, with his face and legs facing the viewer. With his left hand he holds the horse's bridle, shown by a chain of round, raised tubercles. The helmet is made in a similar way, and the belt is made with a relief strip. The face is round, the eyes and mouth are wide open. The horse figurine is located on a special platform. The product bears traces of later modification: the horse's ears have been carefully sawed out. The horseman was discovered in 1990 in the village of Turvat-Paul in the upper reaches of Northern Sosva. On the back (sacred) side of the residential building there was a shelf on which there was a suitcase with images of the three family patron spirits. Inside the “head” of one of them, indicated by a knot of several scarves, the rider was tied [Gemuev, Baulo, 1999, p. 18]. Mansi wrote about a similar case of the use of ancient artifacts in ritual practice in the 1930s. V.N. Chernetsov: “...in Nerga, an old man once went with nets, and one net caught a bronze figurine of a man on a horse. He decided that it was Vit khon pyg (son of the Water King - Author), took her and made her a household idol” [Sources.., 1987, p. 242].
You should pay attention to the left side of the figure: at first glance, right hand The rider lies on the animal's croup. But in this case, it is not clear why the horse’s four legs are followed by two more “supports”? The bronze figurine is made accurately enough to be considered a casting defect. It is possible that the author shows a killed fox, which the hunter carries on the croup of a horse - then what could be mistaken for a hand is most likely a fox’s head. It is known that the Ob Ugrians had a tradition of depicting Mir-susne-khuma ( youngest son the supreme god Numi-Torum, a cultural hero) on a horse whose croup is covered with fox skin [Prytkova, 1949, p. 378]. In this case, we can say that the bronze figurine of a horseman reflects the ideas of the ancient inhabitants of Western Siberia about the appearance and “equipment” of Mir-susne-khum.

2. Bronze anthropomorphic figurine (“leader”). Taiga Ob region, VIII - X centuries. Cast in a flat one-sided mold. Dimensions 6.7 x 2 (top) and 3.2 (bottom) cm. There is a bowl in the hands, brought together at the waist. The shoulders of the arms are covered with wide plates. The head is elongated, the forehead, eye sockets and nose protrude above the plane of the face, giving the impression of wearing a mask. The head is covered with a headdress, braids (with tassels at the ends) of which descend from both sides. There is a hryvnia around the neck. The “leader” is dressed in a long shirt, from under which two-fingered limbs are visible. The figure is flanked on both sides by narrow strips of metal. On the reverse side of the product, near the head, there is a loop for hanging (Fig. 2, a). Discovered in 2000 in the village of Anzhigort (Malaya Ob River). In the attic of the house, in a “holy” chest, there was a figure of a female patron spirit. Its core was the indicated figurine, “dressed” in a small swinging fur coat made of white deer fur. 10 - 12 large scarves were thrown over the fur coat, tied with several woolen belts. The robe was complemented by miniature mittens with stylized images of bears - a rather unusual detail of costume for a deity (Fig. 2, b). Obviously, the found bronze figurine was identified by its new owner as an image of the legendary hero-ancestor and continued its “service” as a patron ancestor. The somewhat unexpected change of gender in this case can be explained either by the braids of the “leader”, which could mislead the Khanta fisherman, or by the fact that over time the figurine ceased to be visible to its owners under a numerous layer of scarves and the once sexless spirit began to be perceived as a female figure .
Rice. 2a: Khanty patron spirit: a - the core of the image is a bronze “leader”
3. Bronze hollow figurine of a bear (Fig. 3, a). Dimensions 6.5 x 4 cm. Cast in a double-sided mold with a core, polished. The bear stands on a flat, grooved base; the upper back and front legs are decorated with pseudo-twisted edging; the torso is decorated with relief ridges. There is a hole on the back. Found in 1998 in the village of Tugiany (Ob River). It was located in the house inside a “holy” chest in a bundle of several long narrow ribbons of light material. In the mythology of the Ob Ugrians, the bear (of the Holy City of the Old Man) was one of the largest deities; the Vezhakar yurts on the Ob were considered his place of residence. Almost any three-dimensional image a bear, be it a Russian toy or even a glass wine bottle in the shape of an animal, was perceived by the Khanty and Mansi as the appearance of this patron spirit and became part of the cult paraphernalia. Traveling through Siberia to Beijing at the end of the 17th century. Envoy I. Ides described a case when the Ostyaks came to their ship and saw a bear - a toy with a winding mechanism. When she was brought in, the Ostyaks performed the usual rituals for believers and asked to sell the bear in order to make him a “shaitan” [Ides, Brand, 1967, p. 94]. Often the first forest berries were presented to such figures as a gift, because bear is a berry picker.
4 - 5. Images of bears (Yasunt village, Lyapin river, materials 1999). The first bronze figurine is cast in a double-sided mold with a core, polished and consists of two bears (Fig. 3, b). Size 7 x 4.3 cm. The larger figure, apparently representing a bear, stands on a flat base, which is made in the form of a figurine of a bear cub, facing its mother. The bear has opened her mouth and is licking the cub's face with her tongue. Both figures are decorated with relief ridges, the back of the bear is cut off. There is a hole in the bear's back.
The second bear figurine is bronze, hollow inside (Fig. 3, c). Dimensions 6.5 x 4 cm. The bear stands on a flat, grooved base; from the front paws to the head the base is bent in an arc. The bear's torso is decorated with relief ridges. Hind legs merge with the lower back. There is a hole on the back.

These figurines were kept as part of “holy” things in a chest in the attic of the house. The red ribbon lying under the lid was tied at the ends and in the middle in three knots. The first contained silver coins from the mid-19th - early 20th centuries, the second - a figurine of a bear, copper and silver coins issued in 1870 - 1932, the third - a double figurine with 10 kopecks attached. coin issued in 1813

All of the bear figurines described above are based on similar finds in Western Siberia [Zykov et al., 1994, p. 95] can be dated to the X - XII centuries.

6. Zoomorphic piercing. Cast from bronze in a double-sided mold with a core, polished (Fig. 3, d). Dimensions 4.6 x 3.7 cm. Before us, most likely, is the figure of a bear tearing prey with its teeth. There is a hole on the back of the animal. The lower part of the item is broken off; in the broken area there are three protrusions, which can be interpreted as fragments of the head and paws of the figure of an unknown animal. One can, however, assume that these protrusions served as a bridge to the main part of the handle of a knife or staff, and the bear figure was its pommel. Similar examples of bronze casting were found in a number of burial grounds in Western Siberia and date back to the 8th - 11th centuries. [Zykov et al., 1994, p. 91].
Pronizka was discovered in the Khanty village of Yukhan-kurt (Malaya Ob River; materials 1999). Tied in a cloth ribbon, it was kept as part of offerings to family patron spirits.

7. Bronze figurine of a goat standing on a horizontal base (Fig. 4). Taiga Ob region, IX - XI centuries. Dimensions 6.6 x 4.5 cm. Cast (with defects) in a double-sided volumetric mold with a core. The lower part of the belly on the reverse side is decorated with a strip of pearls. There are holes between the horns and on the back. The figurine was hung in a bundle of fox skins in the attic of one of the houses in the village of Yamgort (Synya district; materials 2001). The Ob Ugrians sacrificed fox skins to patron spirits of various ranks; in this case, the gift was increased due to an unusual and ancient find.
8. Bronze pendant (Muzhi village, Malaya Ob river, materials 2001). Prikamye, XIII - XIV centuries. Dimensions 8.2 x 9.7 cm (Fig. 5). The base of the pendant in the form of matched horse heads is made by casting into a flat one-sided mold and polished. The “heads” have round holes, in the lower part there are five holes into which three- and five-link chains with clawed pendants are inserted (one has been lost in recent years). Similar pendants are widely known from finds in the Kama region [Oborin, Chagin, 1988, p. 143]. It was found as part of a treasure, and is currently used as a part of a men's hunting belt.
9. Image of a goose (Fig. 6). It was kept at the bottom of a “holy” chest in the village of Ovolyngort (Synya district; materials from 2000). Cast from white bronze in a three-dimensional double-sided mold with a core. Taiga Ob region, X - XII centuries. Dimensions 10.5 x 9 cm, width at the bottom 2.2 cm. This is one of the largest volumetric products of medieval West Siberian casting. The sprue is broken. A number of lines are modified with a knife. The sides of the body are decorated with two pseudo-twisted cords and two relief ridges. There is a hole in the back. Ears, a large wide flat beak are shown, the eye is surrounded by a deep groove. The beak and chest of the bird are connected by a grooved column. The goose's chest is made in the form of a wide bird's beak, which, coupled with the nearby “eye,” suggests the presence of a second image in one figure. In this case, the grooved column could mean the crest of a bird.
The massiveness of the goose figurine perhaps emphasizes the special significance of this animal in the mythological ideas of the ancient population of Western Siberia. By the time the Russian people arrived in Siberia, the Copper Goose was one of the three most revered idols by the local population: “The Goose, their idolized idol, was sculptured from copper in the likeness of a goose; have a nasty home in the Belogorsky yurts during the great roar of the Oba” [Novitsky, 1941, p. 60]. It is well known that one of the appearances of the largest deity of the region, the Heavenly Horseman Mir-susne-khum/Muv-verty-khu, was a bird-goose hypostasis. During the troubled period, in moments of danger, the hero took the form of a goose and flew away, “this explains the images of geese made of gold, silver or other metal so often found among sacred objects” [Gondatti, 1888, p. 18 - 19].

10 - 11. Two figurines of birds (collections 2001). Cast from silver in one double-sided volumetric mold with a core, the surface is polished (Fig. 7, a). Dimensions 4.5 x 2.8 cm. The bird stands on a semicircular base connecting the beak and paws, part of the base is decorated with pearls. The wings and tail are cut into ridges, the eyes are surrounded by a deep groove. There is a tube molded on the back. The lower part of the back is conveyed by oblique ridges. The manes and tails of horse figurines of the 9th - 12th centuries were decorated in a similar way. from the village of Ovgort [Treasures of the Ob region, 1996, p. 69]. A similar figurine of a bird from the Ishvar yurts on the Malaya Ob was published by V.N. Chernetsov [Chernetsov, 1957, Table. XVIII, 6]. The items described were found in the late 1930s. in the village of Yamgort (Synya river) as part of a treasure that included a silver rhyton [Baulo, Marshak, 2001] and about 20 bronze figurines (including several horses). In recent years, the housewife (Poslovy settlement, Malaya Ob river) kept the “birds” in a bag for storing sewing supplies (tutchan).
12. Bronze figurine of a bird. Dimensions 3.6 x 3 cm (Fig. 7, b). Cast in a double-sided mold with a core, polished. The eyes are outlined with a deep groove, the wings and feathers are conveyed by ridges. There are holes on the back and in the legs (for hanging). Similar hollow piercings of the 6th - 8th centuries. known from finds in the Perm region [Oborin, Chagin, 1988, p. 73]. Found as part of a treasure. It was kept in a storehouse in a birch bark box among women’s “holy” things (Vershina Voykar village, Voykar river, materials 2001).
13. Silver figurine of a bird - “eagle” (Ovgort village, Synya river, materials 2001). Dimensions 7.8 x 3.2 cm. Cast in a three-dimensional double-sided mold with a core, the surface is polished. A through hollow tube, in the middle of which there is a figurine of a bird, has swellings with three holes at both ends. The tube is decorated with an imitation of a twisted edging with a number of convex rectangles between the turns. The claws of the bird's paws are designed in the form of a ring, the wings and tail are cut with rollers, and in the center of the wings there is an ornament of pearls. The closest analogy (larger) is a bronze piercing with a bird figure of the 9th - 12th centuries, also found in the village of Ovgort [Treasures of the Ob region, 1996, p. 68]. The discovery of three silver bird figurines (Nos. 10, 11, 13) among numerous bronze items of Western Siberian medieval casting is quite unusual. There are a few known silver plaques belonging to the ancient cultures of the Lower Ob region [Treasures of the Ob region, 1996, p. 78 - 79]. Perhaps products from the “sacred” metal were cast for representatives of the already established local nobility.
“Eagle” was found as part of a treasure: in the second half of the 19th century. the great-great-grandmother of the current owner of the figurine was traveling with her husband on a boat along the river. Son from one village to another. We made a stop along the way, went ashore and noticed something flashing in the grass. They dug up the ground and found a treasure: several copper cauldrons, a silver dish, an “eagle”, a noisy pendant (see below, No. 15). In recent years, the figurine has been used as a part (amulet) of a man’s hunting belt: it was passed on to the son from his father’s belt and will be passed on by inheritance in the future (Fig. 8). The belt is usually stored on a “holy” shelf in the entryway of the house (in this case, local tradition prohibits storing an item found as part of a treasure inside the living space - “outside the house”). The special attitude towards the figurine stems, among other things, from the fact that the patron ancestor of this family appears in the form of a bird (cuckoo).

14 - 15. Bronze pendants. Found in two different hoards. The first is in the form of a bird, dimensions 2.3 x 2.5 cm (Fig. 9, a). Cast in a double-sided mold with a core, polished. Decorated with rollers. A similar “duck” from the 13th - 14th centuries. was found at the Saigatinsky I sanctuary [Zykov et al., 1994, p. 97, No. 144]. The second is a noisy suspension, its dimensions are 4.5 x 3 cm (Fig. 9, b). The shield is cast in a one-sided subtriangular shape, there are three round holes in the lower part for threading, and one in the upper part for fastening. Similar pendants were widespread in Western Siberia in the second half of the 1st millennium AD. [Cm. eg: Chernetsov, 1957, Table. XXVIII, 1 - 5, 8]. The described specimens are used in modern practice as decorations and amulets on women’s bags for storing sewing supplies (Vytvozhgort village, Synya river; materials 2001).
16. Bronze anthropo-zoomorphic figure (Vershina Voykara village, collected in 2001). Dimensions 17.2 x 2.1 cm. Cast in a flat one-sided mold, the sprue is not removed (Fig. 10). Similar finds are very few in number and date back to the last quarter of the 1st millennium BC. [Zykov et al., 1994, p. 131] or the second half of the 1st millennium BC - the first quarter of the 1st millennium AD [History of Northern Civilization, 2001, Catalog No. 22, 24].
The shape of the object is a narrow figurine of a fish with highlighted fins and a tail. At the same time, central image- an elongated anthropomorphic face in a helmet, the long nose, eyes, mouth and edges of the headdress are shown as ridges. Of course, before us is the image of a “fish hero” or, most likely, the Water King, known in Ob-Ugric mythology under the name Vit-khon, the master of water spaces, rivers and lakes. River mouths, rocky rifts and deep pools were associated in the religious consciousness of the Mansi and Khanty with the formidable Vit-khon and his daughter Vit-khon-Agi. Sacrifices to the Water King were made on steep river banks, near great depths [Gemuev, Sagalaev, 1986, p. 101 - 103]. The described figurine was kept in a “holy” storehouse destroyed by time, representing the core of the image of the patron spirit, who was “dressed” in several belted robes (at the time of the discovery they had practically rotted). Silver and copper coins dating from 1752 to 1801 were discovered between the robes; It was most likely at this time that the figure was found and turned into a family patron.

17. Bronze zoomorphic figure (Ovolyngort settlement, Synya river, materials 2000). Taiga Ob region, VIII - X centuries. Dimensions 10 x 2 cm. Made using flat casting technique. It is an elongated figure of an animal (fish?) with a large head and a short tail (Fig. 11). The back along the spinal column is decorated with pearl edging, the sides are grooved. In Mansi mythology, characters are known who combined in their appearance the features of real animals and fantastic creatures (for example, a horned pike). These include mysterious inhabitants of the water depths who do not have their own names. Most often they are called kul “devil” or yalpyng-ui “sacred beast”. The latter was described in a number of places as an animal with a long, rounded body, a pointed head and a crest on the back [Gemuev, Sagalaev, 1986, p. 103]. Perhaps, in this bronze figurine, the ancient Siberian master expressed his idea of ​​​​one of the unusual river inhabitants. Found long after the time of its manufacture, the yalpyng-ui was easily identified and, together with a piece of cloth presented to it, was placed among the “holy” attributes in the cult barn. Subsequently, he was approached with requests for assistance in fishing and protection from accidents on the water.
18. Bronze handle of a knife (village Anzhigort, materials 2000). Dimensions 10 x 3.5 x 1.5 cm. Cast in a double-sided mold with a core, polished (Fig. 12). The sleeve is faceted, in the middle there is a relief ridge, followed by an elongated petal with a rounding in the upper part with “pearls”, bounded by two pseudo-twisted edges. A fragment of an iron blade covered with rust was preserved in the sleeve. The decor of the handle is completed by a figurine of a bird. Similar products made in the Taiga Ob region in the 9th - 12th centuries are repeatedly described in the literature [Zykov et al., 1994, pp. 91, 104; Treasures of the Ob region, 1996, p. 59 - 63, Tylikova, Baulo, 2001, p. 132, etc.]. Ritual knives and daggers with handles decorated with images of animals and birds were most likely used in ancient times by priests when slaughtering a sacrificial animal. Found many years later in landslides of river banks or on the sites of old settlements, they were perceived as weapons of legendary heroes and, as such, became part of cult paraphernalia. The described knife handle lay at the bottom of the “holy” chest in the attic of the house.
19. Buckle with the image of a goat’s head and two fur-bearing animals on the sides (village of Yamgort, materials 2001). Bronze, casting (Fig. 13). Dimensions 9 x 4.5 x 1.5 cm. The product with a fixed receiver is cast in a single-sided mold, the outer side is polished. The scutellum, significantly bent along its long axis, is surrounded on three sides by a pseudo-twisted edging. The ornamentation on most of the receiver frame has been erased. Similar buckles with images of various animals were made in Western Siberia in the 8th - 13th centuries. [Chernetsov, 1957, p. 207 - 208; Finno-Ugrians and Balts.., 1987, p. 319, 339; Zykov et al., 1994, p. 135 - 136, etc.]. The buckle from Yamgort was an investment in the “head” of the patron spirit, which was “kept” in a “holy” chest in the attic of the house. On holidays, the family deity was treated by bringing pieces of fish or meat to his “face.” In this regard, the front side of the buckle is covered with a significant layer of fat.
20. Cast copper plaque (Khorier village, Synya river, materials from 2000). Diameter 5.7 cm. The front side is decorated with three concentric circles, the back is smooth. In ancient times, a seven-headed monster was engraved on it, standing above the figure of an unknown animal (Fig. 14); the remaining space is repeatedly shaded (traces of numerous magical rituals). In Ust-Poluy (second half of the 1st millennium AD), several similar bronze disc-shaped plaques (4-5 cm in diameter) were found, decorated with concentric circles, on the reverse side of which there are engraved anthropo- and zoomorphic images [Chernetsov, 1953, p. . 135 - 137]. Two holes were punched in the edges of the plaque from Khorier; a thread was passed through one, fastening the item to the sacrificial scarf. It was kept as a gift to the deity in a cult barn at the village sanctuary.
Conclusion

Findings by the Ob Ugrians of samples of ancient bronze casting and silver production, as we see, have occurred frequently in the last two hundred to three hundred years. They were perceived either as material evidence of the existence of the legendary heroes of their ancestors, or as an abstract message from above, a sign of good luck and special favor towards man on the part of the heavenly forces. In any case, their further fate was connected with family sacred attributes. One part of the metal products settled at the bottom of the “holy” chests and, with the change of generations, found itself beyond the attention of people, the other, directly or indirectly (through the figures of patron spirits), still continues to play an important role in the ritual and ceremonial practice of the Khanty and Mansi. Depending on many circumstances (the method of discovery, the nature of the image, etc.), the specific fate of archaeological artifacts developed differently. They began to be revered as images of deities (horseman, “leader”, bears, goose, “hero-fish”, yalpyng-ui) or their attributes (knife handle), used as amulets on men’s hunting belts and women’s sewing bags (silver “ eagle”, birds, ridge and noise pendants), with their help they increased the price of the victim (zoomorphic piercing, figurine of a goat, copper plaque). This phenomenon indicates the presence of many points of contact between two cultures - archaeological and ethnic - on the same territory.

Bibliography:

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On my first visit to the Khanty-Mansi Okrug back in 2009, I was very surprised when I learned in the Nefteyugansk museum that despite the entire oil boom, somewhere on the taiga rivers the Khanty and Mansi continue to lead their traditional life and have not yet forgotten the ancient kinship and idols in sacred barns. In the east of the district it’s hard to believe this - there are no villages there, only sparkling new cities and torches of deposits. But then I firmly decided that if I ever returned to Yugoria, I would definitely try to get to the Khanty villages and sanctuaries, although somewhere I somehow understood that it would not be easy: it’s not even the inaccessibility of such places, but their closedness from the uninitiated. The west of the Khanty-Mansiysk Okrug is generally different from the east - there are no large deposits below the mouth of the Irtysh, but there are many villages and the whole old town of Berezovo, shown. It was near him that I decided to look, and a cunning combination of calls and letters eventually brought Konstantin and me nord_ursus to Yuhangort - the sacred center of the ancestral lands of the Khanty Novyukhov family, lost in the Ob channels.

I talked about the historical life and architecture of the Khanty in a post about. Here we will talk about the spiritual world of their traditional faith and about modern life, with photographs both “from the ground” and from museums. But in general, in Ugra you don’t have to be a Khanty, Mansi, Nenets or Komi to believe in spirits, without whose help this trip obviously would not have been a success.

Disclaimer!
Since part of the post is devoted, in fact, privacy at home, where I, moreover, asked for it myself, I warn you: I will rub off all offensive comments about its owners and their way of life without talking. If something in my text sounds ambiguous and offensive, please point it out to me and I will try to correct it.

After walking around Berezov for half a day, we returned to the hotel to get our things and took a taxi to the boat station. A big, solid driver with high cheekbones and slanted eyes good-naturedly asked where we were from, and I told him who we were and where we were going. The taxi driver smiled: “Oh, Yuhangort... I know, of course. Read the last name!” - He points to the badge stuck in the corner of the windshield, and I understand that one of those same Novyukhovs is taking us. From time immemorial, the Ugra people had an extensive system of clans, which in ancient times were grouped into two phratries - “trees” from the two original clans, within which marriages were undesirable. In the old days, each clan had its own tamga (symbol), its own lands and patron spirits, but the villages were not tribal: here the clan was not like a steppe or taiga tribe, but like a European surname. I don’t know exactly which of these traditions has survived to this day (), but as you can see, the Khanty do not forget their kinship even now. At the boat station, Fyodor Nikiforovich (the name has been changed, for the same reason the face in the photo is retouched) met us on a motor boat, and, having given us brand new orange life jackets (now this is strict!), he took us down the river.

In general, I must immediately clarify that the ideas of the average person from big city about the indigenous peoples of Siberia, at least Western Siberia, are somewhat outdated: the Khanty are civilized people, and at first glance their life is almost no different from the life of Russians in remote Siberian villages: the same fishermen, hunters and workers, teachers and doctors, officials and bosses. Even their appearance is very diverse: some, fair and blue-eyed, cannot be distinguished from Russians in a crowd, others have completely Asian faces - slanted eyes, black hair. I didn’t really hear the Khanty language - they spoke Russian among themselves in front of us, but with a very characteristic soft accent. In general, anyone who hopes to meet “natives” here is mistaken: the Khanty are the same Siberians, unhurried and reasonable in the Finno-Ugric way, and their ancient faith- the matter is non-public and even secret.
We pass the abandoned village of Ingisoim, from which a bald bank remains:

There are no year-round roads in these parts, even from Berezov they have not been able to start building a highway to the Ob region for many years now, and there is no talk of roads to these villages even in the plans. Therefore, a motor boat here is much more important than a car, especially since the river is not only a road, but also a field, and every self-respecting village has its own entrepreneur, to whom the locals hand over the caught fish for sale in the city - according to Fedor, this is quite possible to live on . But most of all I was impressed by how easily the locals navigate the Ob floodplain with its labyrinths of channels - most of our path looked something like the one in the frame below, and from Berezov on Sosva to the village of Tegi on the Ob we drove almost in a straight line, only a couple once per hour of travel, leaving the main channel:

I generally like the attitude towards spirits in Greater Yugoria - even among the pagan Nenets, even among the baptized Komi since the 14th century: spirits are a given, like weather, animals or people: a force to be reckoned with, sometimes friendly, sometimes hostile, but more often - capable of being both this and that, depending on how a person treats her. Motherland The Ugra is literally permeated with spirits, and among them there are both real gods (numo, humo, “iki” - “old man” and “anki” - “mother”) with names, appearance and history, and the spirits themselves (tonkha, lunki) - nameless and incorporeal personifications of elements, actions and situations. The gods are superior beings: the demiurge Torum, the universal mother Kaltash, the “watcher of the world” the Heavenly horseman Mir Susne-khumo, the spirit of diseases Kyn-iki (Black Old Man), the goddess of war and the sender of wounds Taren and others. Behind the “universal gods” come the “local”: the owners of places and phenomena (for example, As-iki, who lives at the mouth of the Ob, guiding fish up the river, or Emvosh-iki, the owner of the main Khanty sanctuary in Vezhkari). They made sacrifices to the gods, and only in special cases were they animals, more often - gifts made with their own hands and left in a sacred place, such as robes and a deer figurine in the frame above. For example, the Heavenly Horseman is supposed to donate red skins (foxes, squirrels, otters) and round metal plates; The black old man is given black fabrics, furs, clothes, and the fiery Nai Anki is given red; Chokhryn-oyki were presented with knives, and the “earthen” Mykh anki were presented with metal cauldrons that were buried in the ground. It was not customary to donate boats, sleighs and other means of transportation - it was like giving a healthy person a crutch...

5a. Berezovo.

It is impressive how many of the general and local spirits were highly specialized: for example, Parekh, the spirit of the Pyrgin yurts (villages), gives good luck when choosing dogs and damages the legs of prey to make it easier to catch up with it, so they donate skis and wooden figurines of dogs to him. There are spirits that bring the beast under fire; there are spirits that drive prey into a trap; there are some that impair coordination and thus cause injury or (this is Taren’s part) push to suicide. Many spirits in legends became famous as heroes or heroes, becoming eternal guardians of a place or cause. Behind the “spirits of place” in the hierarchy were the patrons of the family or clan, and finally - personal patrons with whom people communicated on equal terms, to the point that a spirit that was not helping well could be expelled, and its image thrown out or burned. Each spirit, whether a universal deity or a personal patron, had many assistants and incarnations, most often in the form of animals. And it seems to me that in the taiga and on huge rivers, when your luck depends on many conditions, it’s hard not to rely on the spirit: the spirit will urge the beast on, lead you to its path, bring you under fire, and then (if it has angered it somewhere) give you the beast should go to the lands of a neighboring clan, where outsiders can hunt only if they are on the verge of starvation. The frame below shows hunting and fishing amulets:

I described some of the Ugra rituals in a post about Torum Maa - for example, the Bear Festival or everything connected with the “house of women in labor.” And here pay attention to the casket - we will not see such things in museums, and to the toy horse - in the old days, when other civilizations rarely came into contact with the world of the Ugra people, things from outside often became their cult attributes, be it dishes and statues from Iran and Byzantium, imported to Siberia or Russian toys and figurines.

Which of these traditions is alive now is a question not for a traveler like me, but for an ethnographic expedition, but some have definitely disappeared, and some are definitely alive. What is lucky about the Ugra heritage is that in the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug it is really actively studied and popularized: no Evenks or even Nenets can boast of so many museums (including scansen), publicly available resources, and national elements. “Distant relatives” - the Hungarians - also played a huge role here: for example, Eva Schmidt, who made her first expeditions to the Ob in the early 1980s, and eventually mastered numerous Khanty dialects to perfection, collected enormous material and remained to live in Khanty-Mansiysk, where and died (according to rumors, she shot herself) in 2002: where we were going, she was known and loved. In general, you can learn a lot about the Khanty religion in theory... and very little in practice.

The boat engine roars when turning. We leave the channel for a few minutes into the bed of the Northern Sosva and immediately dive into another channel, going around the arrow of the Sosva and the Ob. At the turn is the village of Pugory, above which rise unusually powerful power transmission towers, which were brought here quite recently. A little earlier, a geological team worked in the taiga for several seasons - perhaps Big Oil will soon burst in here too. The locals, frankly, are not happy about this: they have nothing from oil production, but the oil workers will certainly block old paths and channels, cut down the forest, scare away animals with the noise of their machines, poison fish with leaks, and what’s more, start a fire... in a word , they destroy the environment in which the Khanty are accustomed to living. As old as the world: indigenous people against large industrial companies. In Yamal, among the Nenets with their deer trails, this is even more serious.

A little more meandering in the channels - and here they are, Tags! A village on the Ob River, the last one in the Khanty-Mansiysk Okrug. In addition to the “new” Tags, there are also Old Tags and Ancient Tags without permanent residents, and the latter, most likely, were not the original ones. We moor to the shore, walk a kilometer to the village administration, and we are assigned for the night to a boarding school that is empty in the summer: in the morning the “Meteor” Berezovo-Salekhard will pass through Tegi, on which we will travel further, so I will talk about Tegi in the next part.

In the meantime, we get into the boat again and go into the endless channels.
The Novyukhovs are an old surname, one of the most common among the Khanty: for example, the district administration has its own Novyukhovs, but those to whom I went did not seem to be familiar with them. In the book to which I have already referred, different Novyukhovs are mentioned in almost every old volost, but at least in the old days the community "sir" ("people of one god", it could be several surnames) and "rat" (" people of one hearth"), and as I understand it, Yuhangort was the center of precisely the latter. In addition to the Novyukhovs, another clan of the Nettins lived there, its last remaining representative there, who became blind in old age, is still remembered by the current inhabitants of Yuhangort. Now there is only one family left there - Alexander Konstantinovich with his wife Svetlana and children, guardians of the sanctuary, but no longer shamans - the last shaman in these parts was their grandmother. In the 1960s-90s, Yuhangort was firmly held by war veteran Konstantin Vasilyevich, but with his death the general economy went wrong, and people - he had many children - dispersed in all directions.

The inhabitants of Yuhangort in the past - this is how life has changed here in the last half century:

10. color photograph - of the same Eva Schmidt.

And now, in some unimaginable spiral, we approach Yuhangort. "Gort" or "kurt" is a small village, in our words a "farm", essentially a lonely yard among the swamps. The most remote place I have ever been in my adult life - surrounded by deserted forests and swamps, from where there is no land road and the nearest villages are 15-20 kilometers away. There are few everyday details that indicate that this is not an ethnographic museum, but a real house. They are already waiting for us on the shore, and the first thing we do when we land is throw a “white” coin into the tall grass (so that the children don’t find it):

Alexander Konstantinovich Novyukhov, keeper of family shrines. I don’t know exactly how old he is, but in 1985-87 he served as a conscript at Baikonur. We are not the first journalists or scientists in his house and probably not the last, but it was sometimes difficult to talk with him - too different trains of thoughts, too different associations, and I think he did not understand all my questions, and I did not understand all his answers.

We immediately go to the Old House - this is a traditional winter dwelling, a smoke hut, grown into the ground from old age. They once lived in it, but then they built a Russian hut (also not new), and this is a place for celebrations, meetings and meals. Having entered there, we also throw a white coin between the floor boards:

People once slept on the bunks along the edges - men on the right, women on the left, and parents in the middle. We brought gifts, and the Novyukhovs set the table with what they had - it was hot-smoked peled, jam from several types of berries and chaga drink, which tasted between tea and kvass. The fish and jam turned out to be by far the best thing I've ever eaten, so I even bought their leftovers after the meal from the owners and took them to the ship.

But please note that in the frame above, our gifts are standing next to chests and colored scarves - there is something like a “red corner”, and before you start the meal, you need to treat the spirits. I wrote down the name of the patroness of the Ainor-imi clan by ear and perhaps with a mistake, but if I made a mistake, then it’s necessary and the name of the goddess should not be published on the Internet.

Alexander shows us photographs of his ancestors, and Svetlana shows us the things she makes. She is half Nenets, and she has an unusual fate: her grandfather was a Khant from these places, but due to dispossession he left with his family to the north and settled in one of the Nenets villages on the southern bank of the mouth of the giant Ob. His son had already married a Nenets, hid his origins in every possible way, and Svetlana grew up, not suspecting anything, and only wondered why the teacher at school refused to teach her the Nenets language. Finally, after graduation, she began to demand an answer from the teacher, and she was dumbfounded: “Yes, because you are Khantyk, why do you need to know Nenets?!” As a result, Svetlana returned to the homeland of her ancestors, where she married Alexander Novyukhov.

Here I will make a lyrical digression about the folk crafts of the Khanty. I remember most of all the products made from birch bark (nowadays the craftswomen from the Vakh River are most famous for them), for example, boxes (yingl) and tuesa (payup):

18. Berezovo.

Or tutchan - bags made of reindeer suede, fur and metal jewelry, and kornevatik - a wicker box made of cedar root or bird cherry vine. But whatever it is - a bag, a box, embroidery or metal - Ugra ornaments cannot be confused with anything:

19. Berezovo.

Some of Svetlana’s products are also in museums, and Yuhangort himself would be drawn to a living museum. Pay attention to the wooden loop in the center on the wall of the hut - this is a botalo, a block for deer, although reindeer herding has long ceased in these parts.

The Novyukhovs generally take care of old things, be it a spear:

Or nars-yukh, “playing tree”, “Ugra lyre” - the most characteristic musical instrument of the Khanty. In the background is the interior of the hut:

Other musical instruments - torp-sapple-yuh ("swan", "crane" or "Ugra harp") - I have only seen in museums, but I have never heard what they sound like.

Right behind the house there is a swamp where waders are looking for something:

Behind the swamp is a grove, and next to it are these unique Ugra storage sheds on four legs:

Quite everyday and often old things are stored in them and under them - for example, wooden sledges:

But Alexander and I went up to a special storehouse, where we spent, in general, most of the time in Yuhangort:

This is something like a cemetery (although there is also a real cemetery somewhere among the ducts). Numerous things of ancestors are stored in these chests and caskets:

Novyukhov even opened a couple of caskets - those he found himself, but showed us only secular things - photographs, awards... And then, slightly embarrassed, but firmly explained that “I can’t show you more!” And it was clear from his eyes that he wouldn’t mind, but it’s impossible.

They say that one of the rules of an ethnographer is never to insist, but I broke it: there were only a few hours left, we had come a long way and had done preliminary reconnaissance, so for at least another hour I tried to come in from one side or the other: politely, kindly , with respect, with a promise not to touch or take pictures... but Alexander is really a Guardian, and I think that even if you give him vodka, he won’t give up his shrines. “Scientists and journalists came to me and asked, but I didn’t show it to anyone... It’s forbidden for us, we can’t show this to strangers...” The most that I was able to see were the caskets themselves and the blankets in which the things were wrapped.

Finally, I turned on the rotating screen on the camera, and with the words “Are there such things?” showed Alexander a frame from the museum. The effect turned out to be stronger than I expected: Alexander began to shake, he somehow wilted and bent down, and a special sparkle appeared in his eyes. Alexander just asked in a trembling voice: “Is this somewhere like this? You can’t display such things in public...”. I began to reassure him that this was a museum, that they were probably not real, but copies for tourists. Honestly speaking, I can’t believe that he never visited museums (especially since his wife even gave some of her things to museums); rather, it was the proximity of such photographs to the real sacred things of his ancestors that worked. And he confirmed that yes, there really are such things there - intravital figurines are wooden, and posthumous ones are lead.

30. Berezovo.

In the frame above there are numerous offerings to the spirits, an almost identical casket in cross-section (in the lower corner), a figurine of the family patron spirit (on the left) and at the top “itterm” - the receptacle for the soul of the deceased (as written in the museum). Here are also from the same place figures of spirits in and without robes, and the third one from the left (No. 13) especially stands out - if everyone else in both frames is “family”, then this is the keeper of the village:

31. Berezovo.

With them are many other things, possibly found in the same caskets - also awards, jewelry, rings. For example, in the frame above, a plaque with an ornament to the left of the village spirit is nothing more than an archer’s finger guard, protecting against the blow of a bowstring... needed back in the late 19th century. Or the women's forehead plates, the upper one from Mansi, the other two from Khanty - it is clearly felt that they were inspired by the very silver of the Bukharians, and were made delicately, beautifully....

31a. Berezovo.

Most of all, Alexander Konstantinovich was in awe of the grove, which we had difficulty even just approaching and looking through the fence. But a little earlier, Alexander’s good-natured and worldly brother came up to us and said that we could photograph it from afar - in the grove there is what Yuhangort continues to stand for - the Sacred Barn, large and impregnable.

The sacred barns and storage sheds that stood in the grove behind the village are the ancient temples of Ugra. They kept holy things, offerings to the gods, shamanic attributes, but most importantly, the spirits themselves lived and their tonkha idols stood. This is what could be hiding in this barn - a single frame from that same Museum of the Ob River in Nefteyugansk.

They say that in this Sacred Barn there are five idols, four sabers and a bundle of five arrows, and all this is covered by an arshin - a sacred blanket with coins woven into the corners. Not having the opportunity to see it myself, I will show things from the Sacred Barns from museums. The bedspreads could be, for example, like the one here in the background - with the figures of the Heavenly Horseman:

33. Berezovo.

Or other animals in which higher spirits could be embodied. And underneath them there really could have been an ancient saber:

34. Berezovo.

However, the sacrificial blanket could have been like that. On the same museum display case are stencils and patterns:

35. Berezovo.

And old weapons could be relics, a shaman’s fortune-telling tool, and a talisman to scare away evil spirits:

Shamans (chirtaku or eltaku) were not the only people who communicated with spirits - the storytellers “manty ku”, the performers of the epic “arykhta ku”, the dreamers-foretellers “ulom verta ku”, the magicians and predictors of the trade “nyukulta ku”, the performers of rituals are also known healers "isylta ku" to the lower world. In principle, the role of the shaman among the Ugra people was lower than among the Evenks or Altaians - according to one version, this tradition had not yet fully developed before the arrival of the Russians (coming, moreover, not from other taiga peoples, but from the Great Steppe), and according to another - on the contrary, it had already begun to decline: in rituals and communication with spirits, the shaman was the main one, the leader, but not the only one. The attribute of a shaman that distinguished him from others was, of course, a tambourine and a special robe. On the left frame, where the sacred tree is also a tumran, a local version of the harp:

37. Berezovo HM

They say that now there are no Khanty shamans left (or maybe we just shouldn’t know about this), but their spirits posthumously became patrons of places and clans:

We went to Tegi with mixed feelings. On the one hand, we didn’t see what we were going for. On the other hand, all this is in museums, but you won’t see the sacred sparkle in the curator’s eyes in a museum.

I even believed in the legend of the Golden Woman - a sculpture of a warlike goddess from somewhere in India or fragments of the ancient world could well have come here with Bukhara merchants, including as a gift (after all, the Bukharans tried to colonize Siberia), and the Mansi, a people compared to the Khanty more tough and cunning, they may well be hiding it in forests and swamps to this day.

Already at dusk, in the rain, we arrived at the Khanty cemetery in a grove on the outskirts of Teg, because I had long noticed that the specifics of almost any people can be seen precisely on their graves. Wooden tombstones and high embankments under the birches looked mysterious and reserved:

And among them there were quite a few graves like this - a wooden tombstone, almost like a sarcophagus, with a bucket or pot with the bottom up. I still haven’t figured out what the purpose of the buckets is, and even the encyclopedia “Ugoria,” although it devotes two whole articles to graves (and a third about funeral rites), knows nothing about it. But it says that this is a house with a window, so perhaps the window is simply covered with a bucket?

Not so long ago, they say, the deceased were buried in boats “folded” in half, and all his things that would be useful in the next world were placed in the grave. There are, of course, a lot of obelisks and crosses here, with a mysterious appearance reminiscent of either graveyards or secret Old Believer cemeteries of the Kerzhe region. Quote from there:
We walk along the steep bank of the Ob. Pitlyarsky Sor, as I already said, is a very fishing place. And in the old days there was a serious struggle for its control. It was on this mountain that there was a battle between the Khanty and the Mansi. And to this day this is a cursed place for the Khanty. Old people do not advise climbing there. "Can the Russians?" - we asked. “It’s possible,” they answered us. I must say, Gennady[Hartaganov, Khanty artist from Salekhard] was interested in our ascent. He had never been to the top of this mountain and he was certainly interested in finding out what was so terrible there. (...) We found ourselves on a small area, bounded on one side by the Ob cliff, and on the other by a deep ravine, at the bottom of which a stream flows. After descending, a mammoth tusk was discovered in a deep windfall. I would never have thought it was a tusk. Half buried and overgrown with moss, it was indistinguishable from tree trunks. and Khanty-Mansiysk from the water.
Khanty-Mansiysk.
.
.
. Walk through the center.
.
Along the Ob.
on Meteor.
.
Trip to the shrines of the Khanty.
Tags - Salekhard on "Meteor".
Salekhard.
Ob Bay.

There are several versions. According to one of them, widely roaming the wilds of the Internet, in the language of the aborigines of the Ural North, the first word “man” meant “small”, but “si” can mean “people”. Indeed, these people are not tall, but wiry and strong. Yes, in our mountain taiga area it is easier to survive for such strong, robust, but nimble people.

According to another, probably more reliable version, the self-name “Mansi” should be translated as simply “people”. Previously, the Komi people and Russian settlers in the Urals called the Mansi tribes Voguls (from the word vegul - wild). The Pelym Mansi were mistakenly called Ostyaks, thus mixing them with the more northern related Finno-Ugric ethnic group - the Khanty.

In general, the presence of the Mansi in the Urals is surrounded by an aura of mysteries and secrets. It seems that the reason for this may be the lack of knowledge of this topic, poor understanding by modern researchers of the history and national mentality of the people. People living in remote places remained closed to study for many centuries. This made it possible to preserve, to a large extent, ancient identity, knowledge and culture.

There is no consensus among scientists about the exact time of formation of the Mansi people in the Urals. It is believed that the Mansi and their related Khanty arose from the merger of the ancient Ugric people and the indigenous Ural tribes about three thousand years ago. The Ugrians inhabiting the south of Western Siberia and the north of Kazakhstan, as a result of the “Great Migration of Peoples” that began at the dawn of the New Era, were forced to migrate from their native places (Siberian steppes) far to the north and west, to the region of modern Hungary, Kuban, and the Black Sea region. Over several millennia, tribes of Ugric herders came to the Urals and mixed with the indigenous tribes of hunters and fishermen.

Since the 15th century, the Voguls, who lived in the Urals and the Cis-Urals, wore clothes made of skins and “fish skins”, and worshiped wooden idols, were drawn into lively trade relations with Russian settlers.

Mansi legends

The oldest myth of the indigenous Uralians, which arose around the 4th-6th millennium BC, tells of a diving loon bird. The bird, sent by the supreme god Nomi-Torum, dived and took out a lump of silt from the bottom of the ocean, and then another. The lump gradually increased, first to the size of a hummock, then an island. On the tenth day everything became earth.

All this is quite consistent with the ancient geological processes occurring during the formation of the Ural Mountains. As a result, the ocean floor rose to a height of several kilometers. Now these rocks make up part of the Ural mountain ranges.

As a result of the merger of the Ugrians and the Ural tribes, two peoples were formed - the Mansi, who occupied the Urals, the Urals, the Kama basin, the Trans-Urals, and the Khanty - the middle and lower Ob region.

According to shamanic ideas, the Great Spirit originally existed on Earth. As a result of the development of the Universe, five Mothers of Nature were born - Fire, Air, Water, Earth, Space. These five Mothers fill all things and objects in the world with invisible essence. As a result of their endless interaction, countless small spirits were born that a person encounters everywhere - the spirits of rivers, forests, lakes, rocks, etc.

... Let us plunge for a while again into the origins of paganism, into the dark jungle of centuries. The ancient people were divided into two groups, the so-called phratries. One was made up of the Ugric newcomers "Mos phratry", the other - the Ural aborigines "Por phratry". According to a custom that has survived to this day, marriages should be concluded between people from different phratries. There was a constant mixing of people to prevent the extinction of the nation. Each phratry was personified by its own idol-beast. Por's ancestor was a bear, and Mos was the Kaltash woman, manifesting herself in the form of a goose, butterfly, and hare. We have received information about the veneration of ancestral animals and the prohibition of hunting them.

Shamans

The restoration, study and veneration of ancestral roots was carried out by shamans, who firmly believed in people inheriting the knowledge of their ancestors. All proper names, by which children were called, were agreed upon with the spirits through the shaman. Since each name has a certain totemic power - the name of an ancient animal, plant or their attributes. It was believed that with this name the qualities of this totemic character are transmitted to a person. In return, a person must protect and preserve the species of his animal or plant in every possible way, preserve it, and worship it. Only during a special ritual was it allowed to eat pieces of a totemic animal or plant to restore strength lost over a long time. With them, a person received the strength and energy of this type of animal. After all, the basis of the knowledge of ancient shamans is the inseparable connection between Man and Nature. Everything a person does is reflected in the surrounding nature and vice versa. Events occurring in the Universe affect a person and influence his destiny. A respectful attitude towards the world of Nature allowed the tribes of the Ural Mansi to live for thousands of years without negative consequences for themselves and the environment. One of the main tasks of the head of the clan and the shaman at all times was to maintain balance in nature and society. The head of the clan was sometimes also a shaman, a mediator between the gods and the human world. Shamans passed on their knowledge to their heirs. They knew how to understand the language of animals, the secret movements of human souls, unravel the signs of the future and reveal to those in need their path in life. They had the ability to heal.

Faith and religion

At first, the authorities were quite loyal to the ancient pagan faith. The first baptisms of the Mansi were like a holiday, they were given rich gifts, they were asked to henceforth worship only the Russian god and hide their own people away... This action took place on Chusovaya in 1603. Probably, from that time on, among some Mansi clans, Russian gods began to play the role of good helping spirits. On pagan holidays, they were smeared with blood on their lips on icons, they were presented with a heart freshly cut out from a sacrificial deer, they were poured a glass of vodka, and they were offered sweets.

In 1751, a mass baptism of Vishera Mansi took place in Starye Sypuchi. At the same time, alien relics were destroyed. For example, in 1723, a huge number of domestic blockheads were collected and burned by the Russian administration in Berezovo (wooden and iron idols). But the implanted Christian faith stubbornly refused to take root. Despite the fact that baptized Mansi began to be exempted from paying yasak for a period of a year. The natives could not forgive the Russians for the destroyed idiots. The eradication of paganism continued during Soviet times, with exactly the same result. Even in our time, at Mansi funerals, you can see how a low cross is placed on the grave, which symbolizes that the person believed “a little” in the Russian god.

The consequence of this was the transfer of open Mansi sanctuaries located in Paul villages to remote taiga places. As time has shown, Orthodoxy did not take root in the North of the Urals and Siberia. The Mansi, as before, visited the temples of both local spirits and tribal deities. Formally, the majority of them were baptized and bore Russian names.

By and large, this situation continues to this day. What remains of the once powerful people is a very small handful of people living in hard-to-reach places in the mountainous Urals. Former owners The Ural Mountains, now left without hunting grounds, without fish, without forests, without state help, live as hermits in lonely “yurts” and, in bureaucratic language, “compact settlements.” But the ancient pagan faith continues to live no matter what.

Holidays and rituals

Later, sacred rituals appeared, “bear holidays,” the meaning of which was to ask people to remove the blame from them if they successfully hunted a bear. After all, such production provided food, clothing, and medicine for several families for a long time. Other cleansing rituals were also carried out, to which people from neighboring villages were invited. Residents gathered at the hunter's house for a festive feast. The bear was given the main role - the head and skin were placed in a place of honor in the house. A treat and gifts were placed in front of him - pieces of cloth, coins. The holiday lasted from 3 to 7 days. They sang songs, told fairy tales and hunting stories, and danced scenes from hunting. In the first days of August, a holiday of offering to the Spirits of the Earth was held.

Almost all residents of one or more clans gathered. In a place of honor was a god dressed in black or dark robes. A festive table was set for him nearby, and a little further away - for people. Boiled venison, vodka, and fresh blood were served in three dishes. The sacrificial deer were brought up. The image of the spirit was circled three times around the head while reading the prayer. The animal was killed with blows from the butt of an ax. Horned skulls with ribbons were hung on trees. White (spirits of the sky), red (spirits of the earth), black (spirits of the underworld). Everyone present must tie their own ribbon. Women were not allowed to participate in the ceremony.

The Mansi believed that a person has several souls, men have five, women have four. They believed that the main strength and the soul lived in the long hair worn by male heroes and shamans. A person deprived of hair lost his masculine and hunting strength. After death they have different fates. One of them remains on earth forever, becoming one of the spirits of the ancestors. The ancestral spirit does not lose contact with its descendants and other relatives, becoming a protector and helper. After time, from about a year to several centuries, the spirits are no longer in the vicinity of Paul, but nevertheless participate in helping the living. They find natural shelters - a rock, a tree, a spring, etc. Literally, just a few decades ago, the Mansi on Vizhay built a special barn for the spirits of their ancestors. Small, less than a meter, on a high leg, it served as a shelter for him and, as needed, was called for help. Thus, the spirit of the ancestor remained forever in our “average” world.

The second soul is responsible for the ability to maintain life in the body, breathe and move. She is incarnated in one of the descendants of a person, after whose death she returns in the form of a bird to the Tree of the World. That is, he lives in the “upper” world.

The third constitutes a person's personality and contains the collective knowledge of previous generations. Located in the “lower” world, between resurrections he sometimes returns to our world in the form of a ghost, probably to see his family.

From the history of the Vishera Mansi

In the 15th-16th centuries there was a partial Russian conquest of the Mansi lands. Mansi are obliged to pay yasak, sable per person per year. In return, the state offered protection from attacks by other enemies from the east.

In 1607, Tsar Vasily Shuisky imposed a yasak on 35 Mansi men living on Vishera: 4 forty and 15’sables, i.e. 175 sable skins. The local authorities took no less. And in 1599, the Verkhoturye voivode wrote the following “conveying” letter to Moscow: “I am sending with the clerk, Ondrei, and Ermolin our yasak and funeral treasuries and ten-dollar duties of thirty forty and twenty-four sables, and including two forty and seven sables with navels.” , twenty-two forty and sixteen martens, four under-perch, twenty-four beavers, ten gagche yarets, eleven otters, two black squirrels, seventy red foxes, six hundred and fifty-nine squirrels, two wolves, a fur coat, a belly without navels, ninety-eight sable navels... .“ This is only part of the yasak handed over by 120-150 Mansi men.

In 1787, there were still three Vogul villages on Vishera, and a hundred years later, Professor Krylov, who traveled along Vishera, wrote: “Previously, the Voguls led a semi-nomadic life here, who until about two hundred years ago owned the upper reaches of this river starting from Pisanoy Kamen, located near the village of Pisana . At present, there are few traces left of their stay on Vishera, while in the people's memory there are still quite vivid memories of the places of former residence of the Voguls and of relations with them. Some old hunters, living to this day, in their youth saw the time-destroyed remains of some Vogul yurts scattered along the banks of the Vishera and its tributaries, above the modern village of Akchima. So, thirty miles up the river from this village there was one yurt - on the right bank of the river, another on the place where the village of Ust-Uls is now located; about five versts higher, the third, which belonged to the Vogul Kondrata, as the Russians called him; two versts even higher is the Loginov yurt, the remains of which were noticeable about 35 years ago... Like a funeral list, the professor lists the dead remains of the Mansi (Vogul) yurts. On Vishera there was only one half-Russified Mansi village left, Ust-Uls. The Mansi went to the east and partly broke up there into small groups, settled on the ground, gradually losing their national appearance and character. Now the descendants of these people could no longer be distinguished in any way from the Russian population surrounding them. Only numerous Mansi words that have entered the lexicon of the northern population testify to the mixing that has taken place. But the most significant part of the Mansi went into the taiga and climbed into remote slums.

Bakhtiyarov family

The Vishera Ural is the last area in the Perm region where representatives of the ancient Mansi people live. The entire southern and central part of the reserve, stretching from the mountains Martai and Nyatai Tump towards Bolshaya Capelin and Niols, is the ancestral land of the Mansi family of the Bakhtiyarovs. To the north of them are the lands of the neighboring family of Lozvinsky Mansi - the Anyamovs.

The current head of the Vishera Mansi family, Alexey Nikolaevich Bakhtiyarov, is 60 years old (born in 1955). He permanently resides at the Larch cordon, works as a laboratory assistant in the scientific department of the reserve and all year round conducts observations of nature. His wife Nina Nikolaevna (1957-2015) and their 25-year-old son Nikolai (born 1987) lived with him in a small taiga hut nestled on the right bank of the Bolshoi Larch Stream. In the summer, forest hermits often have their daughters visiting them: Anna (born 1985), who lives in the village of Vaya, Krasnovishersky district, and Elizaveta (born 1990). At the base of the former Capelin weather station, their cousin Mikhail Petrovich Bakhtiyarov (born 1965) works as a security inspector.

Every summer, close relatives of the Bakhtiyarovs who live in the Ivdel district of the Sverdlovsk region come to visit the reserve from beyond the Ural Range: brothers Timofey and Andrey. Timofey's wife Tatyana with their little son Alexei, Mikhail's daughter Nina and others.

This is, in general terms, the current situation of the last representatives of the ancient Ural ethnic group in the northeast of the Perm land. After the death of the previous head of the family, Nikolai Yakimovich Bakhtiyarov, in 1997, his grown sons finally abandoned their ancient reindeer herding business. The once large population of domestic reindeer quickly disappeared. Nowadays the Vishera Bakhtiyarovs do not have their own herd and support themselves mainly by working in the reserve. Therefore, in the vastness of the local tundra you will no longer see distant silhouettes of reindeer herding tents and Mansi sleds gliding along the tops of the mountain plateaus. In the modern environment of the Vishera-Lozvinsky Mansi, there are hardly many enthusiasts who are ready to exchange a relatively quiet life in a forest village or on a reserved border for the hard work of an ever-wandering shepherd of reindeer herds.

Archaeological travels around Tyumen and its environs Matveev Alexander Vasilievich

ANCIENT HOMELAND OF SOUTH MANSI

ANCIENT HOMELAND OF SOUTH MANSI

III. "Peace" in the Southern Regions Historians generally agree that the "peace" movement originated in Aquitaine, accepting the testimony of Raoul Glaber, who describes its spread through the province of Arles, then through Lyonne and Burgundy and finally into the most distant parts