It should be noted that our Northern Territory cannot be rich in treasures of any significant value in monetary terms. Few trade caravans passed here. And although there were wealthy people among the inhabitants, gold did not have much circulation among them. If we recall Mr. Veliky Novgorod, who had a rather serious relationship with the Pomeranian lands, then it is not difficult to remember that there, too, circulation had at best silver. For scientists it is a treasure, but for treasure hunters it is a serious hassle. How to sell what you have found. This, of course. well, you look and plunder historical values will become less.
The treasure itself is also a gift to the higher forces of nature, a burial place from someone else's gaze and a powerful emitter of someone else's aura. Therefore, the search for treasure is not a safe thing. On the head of a person who tried to find a treasure, various misfortunes were always called upon - illness, death, various misfortunes.
Any find of objects that can be attributed to treasures, more precisely, will be attributed to chance, luck, happiness. A treasure can be a chest with silver dishes, an earthen pot with a dozen dimes, a gold chain and a tin can with tsarist "imperials".
But be that as it may not, each find is historically conditioned and historically possible.
The reasons for hiding treasures in the North are about the same as in the rest of Russia and, accordingly, in the rest of the world. The raids of the nomads. The oppression of boyar servants, the invasion of enemies - all this contributed to the fact that people tried to preserve their wealth. To hide, to hide your property - such was the law of Russian life.
We will talk about all kinds of treasures, but of course the treasures made by dashing people - robbers - attract the most attention.
It is about them that popular rumor has added a huge number of tales and legends. It is these treasures that are most interesting to us. Let us refer to the testimony of the local historian of the Krasnoborsk region, Vladimir Sivtsev. He collected many legends and rumors that in the Shelomya region, where at the end of the 16th century Yermak stood and waited for him to be equipped and prepared for a march to Siberia. The famous robber chieftain Kudeyar also visited the same place with a difference of ten years approximately according to fairy tales.
It is difficult to say who Kudeyar is, according to a number of legends that have indirect confirmation in the annals, he was a relative of Ivan the Terrible himself. Although, in addition to the ataman Kudeyar, a dozen or two other atamans who bore a similar nickname walked across Russia. So, it is unlikely that Kudeyar who visited the Krasnoborsk regions was exactly that famous Kudeyar. But, be that as it may, rumor ascribes treasures to him, buried near Krasnoborsk. So the Krasnoborskaya side was lucky with rumors about treasures. Here is the well of Ermak with the alleged treasures, here is the Golden Hollow, where, according to one version, Yermak threw the surplus of his good, before going to Siberia.
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You can, of course, think about the treasures of ancient Chudi and Vikings. Moreover, both those and others have visited our area. And the Vikings even, judging by the sources, hunted for the Chud and Biarmian treasures. Someone Thorir the Dog, as Snorri Sturluson, the famous author of sagas from Scandinavia, says, first traded on the Dvina River, after which he decided to rob the temple of the local goddess Yomala, then he and other Vikings stole the goddess's necklace. The famous northern writer Yevgeny Bogdanov also tells about this event in the story “Yomaly's Necklace”.
It must be assumed that many such temples could have survived not plundered in the depths of our northern forests. A lot of Chud silver once fell into the hands of the Stroganovs, the owners of the city of Solvychegodsk.
There is even a legend that the famous library of Ivan the Terrible, which for centuries has been hunted by both historians and adventurers of all stripes, can be hidden, at least partially, somewhere in the Solvychegodsk region. That the merchants Stroganovs, at the request of the king, took out part of the books in order to temporarily hide them from the eyes of people. So they hid it for centuries. What kind of books are these and why they had to be hidden so much - there are also many rumors about this. These are magic books and books of predictions, and books in a completely different way representing the history of our world.
Another myth of treasure hunters is the Golden Woman, which many were looking for, from the Pomor regions to the Urals. And according to legends, in case of danger for her, the statue could be moved to completely remote places - to the upper reaches of the Ob, the regions of Taimyr or the Polar Urals.
They could leave small treasures, consisting of bulky junk, which was inconvenient to drag to distant lands, the Pomors who left to settle in Siberia, and someday return tea to their native lands.
Further, the treks of the Novgorod ushkuiniks could contribute to the laying of valuable things in the "burials". So in the Shenkur region, a story is told about the Chud tribe, which did not let strangers into their lands. And when the fighting squad of Novgorodians surrounded the Chudi fortifications made inside the hill, they did not want to surrender. They knocked out the supports of the logs and buried themselves, with all their good, inside the hill.
Then, in the Dvina Territories, a period of battles and turmoil begins, associated with the struggle with Moscow in the 14-15 centuries. Many towns along the Dvina and Vaga were taken on the "shield" by both supporters of Moscow and supporters of Novgorod the Great. Someone probably hid the good so that it would not get to the enemy.
The next period is “times of trouble” and times of “schism”. The 17th century in Pomorie could give rise to a large number of treasures. Well, the most important period, which is most talked about in the districts of the Arkhangelsk region, is the 20th century, when the vicissitudes of the civil war, the risk of being dispossessed and the destruction of monasteries forced to hide money and silverware. Most often, treasures from this period are found, but mostly they are only of historical value.
We have always looked for treasures. Including in the North. They are looked for in beams, abandoned wells, old houses, attics. If a person managed to find at least a couple of copper coins, rumor could turn the find into a cart of gold ducats. I myself remember how, while searching for the Yermak well, I discovered quartz, which happens to be a companion of gold-bearing veins, so in Arkhangelsk there were already stories waiting for us that the expedition had found several pieces of "industrial gold".
It should be noted that searching for treasures is a dangerous thing. After all. When burying treasures, a spell was always used. In addition to mounds, burial grounds, caves, old fortress ruins, water is a favorite place to hide treasures. The treasures were hidden in rivers, wells, pools, streams, swamps. A lonely tree, stone or hill was made natural omens. It was said that from time to time a glow could appear over the treasure.
The people also believe that a rare treasure can do without evil spirits. There is even a special spirit - a "storeman" who guards the treasure. He also has henchmen - "kladenets". There is. They make sacrifices to him in the form of a human soul or life. By the way, the Sword, hidden for the hero in fairy tales, was also called “kladenets”.
What are they not coming up with about treasures? Especially giving them magical properties. And the magic treasures are divided according to the vow. Separately, there are treasures conceived for a number (a treasure appeared to you in the form of a person - name the correct number, and your treasure); lesson - the treasure is in the performance of any business; nominal (will appear only to a person with a specific name); on lucky or "lucky" - treasures of players and adventurers.
Treasures, according to popular beliefs, like people, are young and old, with a good character and bad, they are not only born, live, but also die falling through to their unlucky owners. These are, of course, fairy tales. But what happened to the treasures. In the region of the Verkhnyaya Uftyuga River of the Krasnoborsk District, they say that in order to get Ermak's treasure, it is necessary that fifty people lay down their heads in search of him, only the fifty-first will be given it in their hands.
Sometimes, treasure hunting epidemics engulfed entire villages. This happened more than once in the search for Yermak's treasures in the Krasnoborsk region. We were told that while trying to dig Yermak's well, several workers almost drowned a tractor, under which the earth suddenly began to disperse.
Since the 20th century, everything has changed so much in Russia that the external signs of the treasures are mostly now lost. And it should be noted that the end of the 20th and the beginning of the current 21st century is the era of the professionalization of treasure hunting. People acquire metal detectors, organize expeditions, calculate the places where treasures can be found more likely. It is believed that you can find mortgages of the royal golden fives at the corners of the collapsed houses. My grandmother told me about this in the Lensky district.
And as a child, all in the same village of Slobodchikovo, Lensky District, underground I found a tin box filled with tsarist paper money with a small addition of silver and copper coins. A total of about two thousand rubles. Very, I must say, a lot of money in the pre-revolutionary period!
Perspective, according to the stories of one treasure hunter, are monastic wells. It's not even about the treasures hidden there, but about those individual coins that the pilgrims threw for luck. In the first years of Soviet power, the Bolsheviks extracted from some of these wells up to 20-30 poods of copper and silver coins.
They hid treasures in forest springs and springs. True, over the years, the coins sink deeper, and the water of the keys becomes just silver. The destruction of the floors of churches and monasteries in our region is associated both with the barbarism of people and with attempts to find church treasures. And attempts to find walled up gifts in mortgage pillars is sacrilege. Sometimes, and would-be treasure hunters found them. But since then everything in life has gone awry for them.
Underwater archeology in our White Sea could have prospects, in such seas everything is better preserved, moreover, there are no ship worms eating wood. But we must admit that the "golden" galleons with a load of Indian treasures did not pass here. Sunken ships are mainly of historical value only.
The interest in treasures is great all over the world. So we, promoting the theme of Yermak in the North, resorted to stories about his treasures in order to interest people. Which we have achieved.
And in Solvychegodsk they are going to look for a bust hidden somewhere in the nearby forests, once exiled to these parts of Stalin. In the Kholmogory Territories, somewhere near the village of Massacre, a battle between the supporters of Novgorod and the supporters of Moscow most likely took place, according to another version, it was there that the alien Vikings fought with the local Chud in a hot battle. It is not for nothing that a large treasure with coins of the 11-12 centuries was found in Arkhangelsk.
Those who suddenly want to engage in a "wild" search for treasures should be reminded of Article 243 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, according to which any excavations and searches on the territory of architectural monuments or temples can be regarded as "Destruction or damage to historical and cultural monuments." Studying history is one thing, but destroying it in a fit of greed or stupidity is quite another.
Our northern nature itself is a real treasure that must be protected. And the stories about the hoards are stories about one of the aspects of the life of our region. May God grant that archaeologists discover more than one secret of our North.
Author: BRATKOV