Songs about heroes have always differed from other folklore in their manner of description. There is a lot of attention to such things that in other songs do not really touch, namely the description of wealth and luxury, what is how much. Usually the people got along with more general phrases. But epics always gave off some kind of bargaining …
Of course, not all, but quite a few. This feature has always repelled me from epics. And in principle, in my folklore searches, I always managed to do without using bylinas as arguments, which is also a kind of sign for me personally: it means that Greek myths, world alphabets, words in different languages, calendar rituals, Christianity, spiritual songs, Slavic songs and even some shamanic and Indian views are all intertwined with each other, being part of the overall picture, and the epics are, as it were, aside. Disorder …
I cannot state anything or give direct answers, but some doubts and assumptions have ripened, which I want to share. Moreover, during the search for information, I have not yet met such an opinion, so it makes sense to highlight this issue.
Origins
I think everyone is well aware of the history of the appearance of epics. If not, then Wikipedia will briefly tell you what's what. I immediately begin to state my distrust, highlighting the main circle of suspects.
For the first time epics were published in 1804 as "Ancient Russian Poems" (now this rare edition is sold at Ozone for 153.9 thousand rubles - to the question of why "antiquity" is needed). And they were written or collected by the allegedly unknown Kirsha Danilov already in the middle of the 18th century. in the Urals, after which, officially, they gathered dust for about 60 years at the eccentric miner and botanist-tyrant Prokopiy Akinfeevich Demidov, who was one of the major sponsors of Moscow University. And after his death, through third hands, they fell into the hands of Fyodor Petrovich Klyucharyov.
Who was this man? Privy Counselor, Director of the Moscow Post Office (and before that Astrakhan and Tambov Post Office), neither more nor less … And also MASONIC POET. It was he who took up the publication of the "manuscript" …
Promotional video:
The same Klyucharev in 1779 published his poem "Vladimir the Great: Tragedy", dedicated to the historical prototype of the main epic prince - Vladimir Krasnaya Solnyshka. What an "unexpected" coincidence … "Tragedy" was published with the participation of Nikolai Ivanovich Novikov, a famous figure in educating Russians about their historical heritage, also a freemason, compiler of "Ancient Russian Bithliotics" (such a modest speaking title). Quoting from Wikipedia:
A company of educators gathered, however …
Here's another from FEB:
Of course, it's hard for me to judge, and even more so to assert that it was all a fake. But, you see, it's not for nothing that they say that the media is the fifth power. Do you think the 19th century was somehow different in this respect from ours? Well, if only because then it was much more difficult to verify the authenticity or the source of the data … Therefore, it was possible to successfully mix up real documents and historical and political fictions, especially for those who worked in the archives …
I really like this established opinion about Klyucharyov as a "secondary writer":
Let me remind you that Karamzin's “History of the Russian State” was the country's official chronicle before Soloviev wrote his version.
Yakubovich Andrei Fedorovich was a subordinate of Klyucharyov and a writer. Apparently, one of the "workhorses" who can be confidently entrusted with hard work. Therefore, the "chief" simply handed him the manuscript, which allegedly fell into his hands from the distant Urals.
A quote from V. Bakhtin's book "From epic to counting-rhyme":
I would have thought just the opposite - at that time it was just ALL the written texts, in number 26:
Nightingale Budimerovich
Guest Terentisha
Duke Stepanovich
Mastryukov Temryukovich
Ivan Living son
Three years Dobrynyushka stolnichel
Vasily Buslaev
about the marriage of Prince Vladimir
Grisha Rastriga
On Buzanov island
Ermak took Siberia
Stavr Boyar
Ivan Gadenovich
Churila Plenkovich
Vasily Buslaev pray traveled
Alyosha Popovich, Dobrynya Chud subdued
Mikhailo Kazarinov
Potyka Mikhailo Ivanovich
Forty Kalik with a calika
Kalin Tsar
Tsar Saul Levanidovich
Nikita Ramanovich was given the village of Preobrazhenskoye
Ilya Muromets's first trip to Kiev
Ilya traveled with Dobryneya
Prince Roman lost his wife
(according to the 1901 edition)
Monument to the tandem of Yakubovich and Klyucharyov! Especially noteworthy for our history is this absolutely uninteresting "To the public" in the first edition of the Collection, in which it is written:
And they were added! And how!.. but more on that later. In the meantime, apparently, the details have not yet been composed.
These are the origins of our science of folklore, my friends! And for me personally, as a lover of folklore, this moment is quite difficult to comprehend, since it borders on a crisis of faith. Of course, it is impossible to cross out the whole folklore - folk calendar rituals, far from secular society, will not allow this, like spiritual verses, and much more. All of them are checked, have their echoes in rituals, etymology and codes of the alphabet. To fake them, one must have remarkable knowledge of symbolism and mythology. Masons are masters of symbolism, but they are far from the compilers of the alphabet and old myths (but they are quite suitable as copyists and converters). Moreover, later on, real titans of thought became interested in folklore, entering into polemics with each other and looking for the very grains of information around the world - when dealing with such scientists,it was already difficult to fake anything. The falsifiers were exposed by the scientific community and criticized. Although various historical and literary figures still planted many pigs and buried the dogs … For an example, read Toporkov's article "The Russian werewolf and its English victims" - a very remarkable case. Nothing has changed in the modern world - the Internet is full of fantasy carried as a hidden truth, where the author of the text has already been forgotten, and fantasy continues its independent existence. But back to the epics. After all, it seems that Klyucharyov-Yakubovich were not at all the main figures in this story. The puppeteers remained in the shadows for another decade …read Toporkov's article "The Russian werewolf and its English victims" - a very remarkable case. Nothing has changed in the modern world - the Internet is full of fantasy carried as a hidden truth, where the author of the text has already been forgotten, and fantasy continues its independent existence. But back to the epics. After all, it seems that Klyucharyov-Yakubovich were not at all the main figures in this story. The puppeteers remained in the shadows for another decade …read Toporkov's article "The Russian werewolf and its English victims" - a very remarkable case. Nothing has changed in the modern world - the Internet is full of fantasy carried as a hidden truth, where the author of the text has already been forgotten, and fantasy continues its independent existence. But back to the epics. After all, it seems that Klyucharyov-Yakubovich were not at all the main figures in this story. The puppeteers remained in the shadows for another decade …The puppeteers remained in the shadows for another decade …The puppeteers remained in the shadows for another decade …
Second coming
14 years have passed and the second edition of the Collection was published. And this is no longer that "amateur activity" of Klyucharev, but professional literature that came out from under the wing of Nikolai Petrovich Rumyantsev himself, an official of the highest strata, head of banking affairs, former Minister of Commerce and Minister of Foreign Affairs, State Chancellor, Chairman of the State Council, etc. etc. And after the publication of the updated and expanded Collection of Rumyantsev was elected an honorary member of the Imperial Russian Academy.
From Wikipedia:
Would Europe be enlightened without the Elsevirs? - Is not a fact…
Rumyantsev gathered around him figures of art, archaeologists, one of whom was Konstantin Fedorovich Kalaydovich - an extremely strange person, several times mentally ill, once even being treated in an insane asylum for several months, after which she lived in a monastery.
Kalaydovich himself wrote in the preface to the second edition that in 1816 Rumyantsev received the manuscript as his property and "ordered me to print it." Kalaydovich himself wrote an introduction to the second edition, in which he posed "for the first time … some essential questions of the study of the Russian epic."
In the second edition, the following epics were added to the previous ones:
Shelkan Dudentevich
Volh Vseslav'evich
Garden Bludovich
Sadko rich guest
Michael Skopin
take Kazan kingdom
under Kanatopom under the city
bright Radošov Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich
When it was dashing time to time great
Under Rigoyu was king emperor
Hike selengiyskim Cossacks
down dale girl dug the root of grievous
before our gates trampled grass
Do not Ms. Good fellow Bitova Ms. Pohmenova
I'm from the Crimea, I'm from Nagay
At the edge of the blue sea, Azov stood the city of
Boris Sheremetev
Bless, brothers, to say about the old days
Prince Repnin
In Siberian Ukraine, on the dour side of
Sadkov, the ship stood at sea
Dobrynya bathed, the Serpent carried away
In a good upstart tower under a red squinting window
Ataman Polskov
At the Lithuanian border
Oh, in grief to live, to be unproductive
Churila hegumen
Is the height of the heavenly
Durpa
There, Bukhara rode on the mountains
At the Savior, the
brave Mododians are ringing for mass Mustaches
who are not a herbalist
About clerks or robbers
About Ataman Frol Mineevich
(according to the 1901 edition)
It can be seen that a lot has appeared precisely historical, connected with the general picture of Razin's peasant revolt and the Cossacks in general. Actually, this was the reason for my turning to this topic, since I was collecting information about Razin. One would think that by the time of publication in 1804, Razin's theme was still banned by the censorship, and by 1818 everything was resolved, but no! Indeed, back in 1827, Pushkin was refused the publication of Songs about Razin.
Of course, Kalaydovich was a figurehead, just like Yakubovich at one time, a puppet and had a "supervisor" from Rumyantsev - Alexei Fedorovich Malinovsky, managing the Archives of the Collegium of Foreign Affairs! Well, and between great deeds, who prepared the publication of the manuscript "The Lay of Igor's Campaign" in 1800 … He published it not alone, but together with N. N. Bantysh-Kamensky. The manuscript itself, dating back to the 16th century. and owned at the time of publication by A. I. Musin-Pushkin, burned down during a fire in Moscow in 1812, since then it is Malinovsky's publication that has been considered the primary source. Musin-Pushkin himself once made a name for himself by publishing old chronicles, including Lavrentiev's. But "The Word about Igor's Campaign" made him a world-class star.
We have already seen the surname of Bantysh-Kamensky above, as a person who supplies material for Novikov's "Viflioteka". And he had a lot of material, because he spent his entire life in the Archives of the Collegium of Foreign Affairs, starting with the actuary (that is, he was in charge of all the protocols and acts) and ending with the position of manager of the Moscow archive. Ideal conditions not only for publications, but also for forgeries, by the way …
In this regard, it is interesting to read the following words of Kalaydovich in the footnote to the Collection of 1818:
I handed over with the giblets of my superiors. But this is not the first time. Vasily Alekseevich Lyovshin in his "Russian fairy tales …" (1780-1783, that is, 20 years before the first publication of "Kirsha"!), Material from which was borrowed by A. S. Pushkin, already used some plots of Kirsha's epics.
In general, one should take a closer look at Lyovshin, as he is a very controversial character in Russian culture. He wrote himself a pedigree "with evidence of the origin of the surname, time, departure to Russia." And here are the curious words of A. A. Shevtsov on Levshin's Russian Fairy Tales:
Is everything clear to you?
There we meet Prince Vladimir, and Churila, and Alyosha Popovich … Maybe folklore, as indicated, and maybe fantasy …
What distinguishes them from the "found later" bylinas is the style. Still, Lyovshin wrote for the sake of his time, was brought up on European fairy tales, which, admittedly, are sickening to read because of the bourgeois talkative and dexterous manner of presentation in their politeness. They were similar with Levshin's "Russian novels".
For example: “This hero is not so much famous for his strength as for his cunning and funny disposition. He was born in Porusia, in the house of the high priest Vaidevut. The hero of Kiev Churilo Plenkovich, among other benefits to the priest's house, included this. In a word, nine months after Churila's absence, the high priest had to declare publicly to hide his shame that Prelepa had a secret relationship with the god of the country, that Popoenza, or Perkun”
Or how do you like this: "and named to be Alesa Popoevich [This name is spoiled by the common people and turned into Alyosha Popovich.]"
By God, all that remains is to powder and put on a wig … But such was the secular society, reading, "enlightened." And novels were written for him, because it promised money and fame.
Do you understand now why the release of the collection of epics was an event? This is a completely different way of looking at poetry. The characters are the same, but the syllable is different. Wild, clumsy, daring. Such that to gentle ears he seemed barbaric and … disturbingly curious.
And it was not about them that Pushkin wrote to his brother Lev Sergeevich in October 1824: “Do you know my studies? Before lunch I write notes, I have dinner late: after lunch I ride horseback, in the evening I listen to fairy tales and reward the shortcomings of my accursed upbringing. What a delight these fairy tales are! Each is a poem! Arina Rodionovna is already, of course, a brand, but who knows … But back to the second edition and Kalaydovich.
As I said, the neurasthenic boy was looked after by serious guys who already had experience in publishing "ancient texts." I just see the scene: “Kostik! To whom they say, write about the great epic heritage! "… Who knows, maybe poor Konstantin was not strong nerves from all this, because his first frustration happened just during his work in the Moscow Archive of Foreign Affairs - the main supplier of" found Russian antiquities ".
The result was fruitful:
That is, with the second edition, they not only expanded the number of epics, but also told the whole world, finally, the official version of how a simple little-grammatical Ural man named Kirill (for persuasiveness, the Siberian version of Kirsch) Danilov wrote down folk songs for the oligarch, glorifying distant Kiev; how an unreadable manuscript was kept in the same place in the Urals for many decades, and after Demidov's death it was transferred to a certain M. N. Khozikov, who gave it to Klyucharyov … In addition, Kalaydovich gave a description of the manuscript, which says that above each verse are attached notes for playing the violin (!), But at the same time without spelling and division into parts. Masonic "second-rate" poetry reached the government level? Or was it originally planned by the government? Or was there no conspiracy?
And here's another quote:
The mentioned collection of Chulkov is "Collection of different songs", released in 1770 by Mikhail Dmitrievich Chulkov together with the same ideological Russophile N. I. Novikov. I have it, but my hands do not reach to take and read. As far as there are folk songs, I can not judge, but some researchers of the peasant song, respected by me, sometimes referred to him …
However, the angle itself is important here. The emphasis is made in every possible way on the fact that in the heroic songs we are talking about the pre-Petrine era. Why Peter! Prince of Kiev Vladimir! Primordial Rus! Knightly romance! No, even further … Miller insisted that the Bogatyrs are a new (old) incarnation of the ancient Slavic pagan gods! Honestly, as if I had never gone to the Orthodox Church … Afanasyev echoed him in his three-volume book Poetic Views of the Slavs on Nature - an amazing book, so much folklore has been collected, from sayings to myths, but the conclusion is drawn, I apologize, the dumbest - wherever spit, everything personifies a thundercloud, absolutely everything! - This is Miller's school in all its glory (not Gerhard Friedrich, but another - Orest Fedorovich Miller, also a historian, but a century later … although, who will disassemble them there). From my little experience, I could not pull the Bogatyr onto the globe,no matter how cool, honestly. Only a very small number of heroes can really be a reflection of the serpent-fighting mythological theme. But here, excuse me, this topic still walks through the cinema in all sorts of forms …
In the heroes now I see something completely different - something that is not hidden at all from the naked eye … But first - a little about the third edition of Kirsha's Collection.
Third wave
As you probably understood, all the main characters appeared just when the second edition was published. And who would doubt that immediately after that the manuscript will suddenly disappear. And so it happened … But how else, because since the 50s folklore searches have involved all of Russia. In all corners, researchers collected songs, legends, superstitions … They found especially a lot in the Russian north.
As the works of P. N. Rybnikov showed. (1861-1867) and Hilferding (1871), the same heroes that we met at Kirsha Danilov's, knew the Russian north:
Well, why travel around the "Ukrainians" of the Empire now? Tea is not the beginning of the century, it is already possible to find bogatyrs not far from the capital - and it will not take long, and there is less spending, and the names of the bogatyrs are still the same …
The real flourishing of folk culture, taking place against the background of the large-scale reforms of Alexander II, analyzing which one cannot help but be surprised and ask the question “HOW THE SOCIETY SOCIETY COULD FORGET THE ORIGINS OF ALL ITS RELIGION, WESTERN MYTHOLOGICAL LITERATURE AND BOURGEOISE ESOTHERICS ??”. After all, all this was in our villages! Only wore a different look, not elegant, not pretentious, not flashy.
And only in 1894 (after 76 !!! years), after a multiple increase in the geography of epics, the lost manuscript of Kirsha was SUDDENLY found by NV Chekhov among the papers of the same Malinovsky (mind you, not even Rumyantsev). Of course, I will not try to assure you that it was the SAME manuscript of 1804, because I do not believe.
But be that as it may, in 1901 the most authoritative (so far) edition of Kirsha Danilov's Collection was published, in which several additional songs appeared:
Sergei is good
Agafonushka
From the monastery of Bogolyubov the elder Igrimishcho
In the green garden A
pigeon's book of forty pads.
Oh grievous, oh I'm grieving hoppy
Mother-in-law, you are my mother-in-law
Pigs oink, piglets oink
Become read, begin to tell
And "About Stenka Razin" - as the publishers called it, UNCERTAIN WHERE. The fact is that the "manuscript" contained only the beginning of this song, it ended dramatically. And we don't even know who it will be about. But they always and everywhere write to us that "About Razin", although already in the edition of 1818 there is a song "On the edge of the blue sea stood the Azov city", which exactly repeats the same mysterious beginning of the torn off song "About Razin". But it's just about Yermak …
And it seems to me that the added songs are just the real folk songs that were really typed in the villages. One pigeon book in Kirsha's version already deserves close attention. And the general direction of the rest of the "new" songs (allegedly not previously censored) is visible - they are mostly everyday, simple. Apparently, they added to divert the eyes, they say, you see - crude folk art! And no heroes … well, almost …
And someone has too long a tongue
So, back to the point where I say that the heroes never hid themselves.
Well, seriously, what exactly does it tell us about the great antiquity of the heroes? Prince Vladimir? This godless "Viking" (sorry, could not resist) who became a Christian or what? There it is still unknown which of the Vladimirov became the prototype of whom: historical - literary or literary - historical. And in general, Vladimir - "owning the world" - is, here, a very real name, not literary, right? In my opinion, it is the best fit for the epic Slavic prince. And in the Golubina book of the same Kirsha, he is called not even Vladimir, but Volotomon, apparently from “Volot” - “horse” (among the Belarusians, according to Romanov), that is, the same “horse” - “prince”, possibly.
Further, Kiev … Well, what can I say. I searched around and realized that the word means something like “gathering place” or simply “capital” (and the Kaiser and Caesar, respectively, are those who gather people around them - thanks to the readers Vadim and Dmitry Andrianov, who promptly advised me link your data on this topic together with your questions). Therefore, absolutely any city in which the Prince of the World was sitting could be an epic Kiev.
Therefore, the question remains the same: why exactly "Kievan Rus"? In some epics, Tatars and other "busurmans" appear, which is associated with the Tatar-Mongol yoke, which is now "not fashionable" to believe. But again, read the later history of the "Ukrainians": Astrakhan, Don, Ural … you will also see the malicious "busurman" whom you fought ….
And here we come to my version of the heroes. Well, not my direct one - I didn’t write epics, after all. And in general, before me everything that they could have been spoken by Sokolov and Kostomarov, who in the 50s of the 19th century. wrote their historical works.
Let's start with the composition "The Riot of Stenka Razin" by Nikolai Ivanovich Kostomarov, written somewhere around 1856-1859. It contains a rather interesting description of "Russia of the 17th century":
Thus, we see a slightly different Russia. Not a single state, but the capital's power, fighting against what came before it - the tribal peasant way of life. And if the central region of the country is undoubtedly the royal dynasty, then everything behind the secular fence is already "wild Russia", which did not give up its positions for a very, very long time. And if you think so, the existence of the Cossacks from the 16th to the 19th centuries (what can I say, still, in the 21st century, exists in a rudimentary legalized form …) - this is again a huge period; well, nothing has existed for so long in human society!
It was these Cossacks who became heroes! And in order to somehow tie them up to the state and show the superiority of the Empire, the heroes were attached to the Grand Duke Vladimir, who suddenly became historical, the father of Russia, a Christian who overthrew pagan idols, CHANGED HIS WORLD VIEW, that is, a GREAT REFORMER. "Affectionate prince", "red sun", the one to whom the heroes DON'T DARE.
Indeed, in the epics themselves, the heroes are Cossacks, atamans, esauls. Here, for example, is the epic about the fight between Ilya Muromets and Zhidovin:
Under the glorious city near Kiev, On those on the steppes on Tsitsarsky, There was a heroic outpost;
Ilya Muromets was at the
outpost, Dobrynya Nikitich young was Podatamanie;
Yasaul Alyosha, priest's son;
They also had Grishka, a boyar son, They had Vaska the long-skirted ….
The heroes at the outpost, guarding the distant lines, are Cossacks far from Moscow and St. Petersburg.
And given the massive appearance of the Cossack epics in the second edition, we can conclude that it really was politically basic, and the first edition was like a probe … perhaps the same Malinovsky, who, as it were, continued his "Lay of Igor's Host" bylinas …
And if the official chronicle of the Russian state (Karamzin) did not reach the peasant revolts, then in its update - "History of Russia from ancient times" by S. M. Solovyov, published during 1851-1879. you can already subtract an interesting moment echoing Kostomarov:
That, in fact, is all that I wanted to tell. The history of modern mankind again demonstrates to us its youth - the distant heroes and their Russia of the 9th century may turn out to be a century … no, not even the 17th! It is enough to read the descriptions of "wild Russia" to move the time bar towards the end of the 18th - the beginning of the 19th century.
Here, of course, I will still stand up for folklore and repeat that it is impossible to judge anything superficially. And even in epics, whenever and by whom they were invented, there is information that helps to understand the old worldview, folklore, myths. It is impossible to instill in the people something fundamentally new; it is only possible to guide them in the direction of the necessary policy, using images that are familiar to them. So do not give up and continue searching …
Author: peremyshlin