Legends about suddenly, as a rule at night, appearing "circles" in the vast expanses of Russia have existed in Russian folklore since time immemorial.
Outstanding folklorist and ethnographer Alexander Afanasyev in his book "Poetic views of the Slavs on nature" noted that Ukrainian peasants often excitedly told him about such phenomena - round bald patches of fallen wheat or rye. The peasants could not rationally explain their origin, they assured that such circles are, they say, places where Mavki dance at night, that is, evil spirits.
A. Afanasyev found similar information about "crop circles" in Bulgarian folklore. He notes that as early as the 9th century in the skies over Bulgaria from time to time appeared some "self-forks" or "self-divas". "Self-pitchforks are flying through the air between heaven and earth …" These, judging by the descriptions, are humanoid creatures, but not people. When they descend to the ground, they "sing and dance in the meadows and leave large circles on the grass, consisting of a narrow path killed by their feet."
And here is from the book of the folklorist M. Zabylin: “In the summer, the villagers, going to work, notice green or yellow circles in the meadows … Circles appeared recently, but before they were not. Such news is a golden treasure for healers. Healers receive visitors with gifts and with a request to protect them, visitors … Having collected supplies from all over the village, the healer goes into the field, scoops up a circle from the ground, and that's the end of the matter."
Decades, even centuries, have passed, and rumors, talk about circles found in the morning by peasants in the fields, continue to spread to this day in the Russian peasant environment. Over the years, several such stories were recorded in the villages of the Moscow and Vladimir regions, as well as in the south of the country - in the villages of the Rostov region and Krasnodar region.
The peasants living in the south of Russia call such formations "spitting devil". And the villagers of the central regions of the USSR - "witch circles". By the way, quite apt.
The character of Russian folklore, the devil, is a creature, as you know, malicious and harmful, extremely dangerous for any person. His saliva is believed to be poisonous. The devil spat - and a trace appeared, "a circle on the field." It is impossible to enter the "devil's spit": everything there "smelled of evil spirits." This is a "lost place", a "poisoned place."
The etymology of the concept "witch's circle" is also clear. A witch is a woman who sold her soul to the devil, to the devil. A professional black magic, a witch, according to legends, is only engaged in that which causes damage to people, as well as to pets. She knows how to fly and flies exclusively at night in a "mortar" or "broomstick".
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In the opinion of the peasants, the "witch's circles" are the places where the "stupa" and "pomela" were planted. The witch, announcing the surroundings with wild inhuman screams, allegedly dances for some time in the middle of the night on a "circle". Then he flies away.
As the sixty-year-old O. S. Timoshkina from the Serpukhov district of the Moscow region (1988) claims, “my mother used to say: you can't even enter the“witch's circle”for half a step - you will get sick. This is a place cursed by God."
V. Pomazov from the city of Serpukhov, Moscow Region, says the same: “I myself am from Gorky. And even as a child, I heard about the "witch's circles" that supposedly appeared from time to time in the fields of the Gorky region. But personally I have never seen such "circles"."
In 1978, in the area of the village of Sharapova Okhota near Moscow, a "witch's circle" was discovered. It was examined by a group of enthusiasts consisting of V. Fomenko, Yu. Simakov, A. Pluzhnikov, at that time - candidates of sciences. In their unpublished collective work "On the study of the places of contact of UFOs with the Earth's surface" they indicate that soil samples were taken on the "circle".
The analysis showed that “a circular footprint on the ground has a strange effect on the soil microfauna. The simplest microorganisms were studied. It turned out that there are no protozoa in the soil where the object landed. Moreover, flagellates and ciliates have disappeared. " Meanwhile, in every cubic decimeter of the earth, taken literally a few centimeters from the "circle", they were in the thousands.
The authors of the article emphasize that it is not always possible to see the site of the alleged UFO landing. Sometimes, after questioning the witnesses of the landing of the "flying saucer", the researchers, having gone with them to the landing zone, do not find any "circles" there. In this case, to find the landing site, biophysical frames were used - L-shaped and U-shaped.
As A. Pluzhnikov writes in the already cited article "Research of UFO Landing Sites": "A dowsing operator is a person who has developed the ability to subconsciously feel anomalies in the environment." "The method of dowsing allows for ten to twenty minutes to identify the place of landing of a UFO that is not visible to the eye or what we take for a landing site."
The zone is identified by biopo-finding, that is, getting bearings to it from different places of a grain field or grass meadow. A. Pluzhnikov reports: "The technique is as follows: several penetrations are made in different directions, a system of points is formed, then an adjustment is made."
This is how several invisible "witch circles" were discovered in the Moscow region.
It sometimes happened that the frames in the hands of the operators rotated in different sectors of the "circles" at different speeds.
Thanks to this effect, an anomaly was discovered at the landing site in the area, for example, the village of Sharapova Okhota - a central spot with a diameter of about five meters. At a distance of one and a half meters from the central spot, an annular anomaly half a meter wide was recorded. A third such ring ran along the perimeter of the zone.
A central spot with a diameter of about three meters was found at the site of the "flying saucer" landing in the vicinity of the village of Podrezkovo, Moscow Region. However, no ring anomalies were found there. And on the "witch's circle" in the vicinity of the city of New Jerusalem, Moscow region, an energy anomaly in the form of an eight was recorded.
Investigations of the "circles" not visible to the eye in the area of the villages of Podrezkovo, Levkovo, Strokino, Slashchevo and others were carried out with the help of electrical devices. Estimates of the measurements carried out showed that on some "circles" there is not one anomalous "spot", but three. And their geometric centers are not the same.
It was suggested that the first "spot" is a consequence of braking at the time of the UFO landing, the second is the actual landing track, and the third is from a short-term hovering of the object during takeoff. The same was stated by eyewitnesses who observed the moment of braking during landing, and when the object took off - a short-term hovering of the UFO.
The most powerful signal came directly from the landing track.
“It is interesting to note that in the places of intersection of such anomalous spots on the terrain there are special active points recorded by devices,” R. Varlamov pointed out in “Generalization of data on the study of physical traces of UFOs”.
N. Sochevanov, who took part in the study of the "crop circles", candidate of geological and mineralogical sciences, having collected rock samples in some anomalous areas, carried out spectral and silicate chemical analyzes of pound samples. Having established that there are sharp differences in the samples in a number of elements, he also made a mineralogical analysis.
Samples taken in the "field circle" were compared with samples outside of it each time. According to the results, for example, of analyzes of the "spot" in the village of Podrezkovo, the amount of lead in it exceeded the background level by 14 times, mercury by 8 times, manganese by 6 times, and zirconium by 2.5 times. Sampling yielded significant differences for 20 items.
And on the circular anomaly found near the village of Rastorguevo, Moscow region, the difference in the content of elements on the "spot" compared to the background was as follows: for tin - 2.5 times, for copper - 3 times, for zinc - also 3 times, for silver - 5 times, for lead - 8 times, for molybdenum - 20 times.
No less puzzling are the results of the chemical analysis of plants collected on "circles". So, say, a herbarium was drawn up in the area of the alleged UFO landing in the vicinity of the village of Perkhushkovo, Moscow Region. The percentage of trace elements in cereals collected on the "spot" was revealed. Here are just some figures: the range for potassium is from 11 to 27%, for phosphorus - from 8 to 11%, for nitrogen - from 9 to 11%.
L. Tselina in her work (unpublished) "Results of chemical analysis of plants from planting sites" writes: "A reasonable question arises: how common or unusual are these results? As all agrochemists know, under natural conditions, the amount of trace elements in the dry matter of cereal plants does not exceed 2-3%.
Depending on the impact of fertilizers and varietal characteristics, the quantitative indicator can reach 5-8%, but not more. However, the analysis of plants from the place of planting showed that the spread is abnormally higher than the norm”.