Man-made stone labyrinths are found all over the world. As a rule, these structures with intricate passages were erected for religious, cult or military purposes; there could be other purposes …
Gray stones
Most often, the ancient labyrinths symbolized death and rebirth, and were also associated with the cult of the Sun. More than a hundred such structures are currently known. The vast majority of them are concentrated in the north and northwest of Europe. There are more than 30 of them on the Russian coast of the White Sea alone.
All of them date back to about the second half of the 3rd - beginning of the 2nd millennium BC. “The gray stones in the circles are full of miracles,” N. K. wrote about the Russian northern labyrinths. Roerich.
The northern labyrinths or "Babylon" (from the Old Russian word meaning "disorder, chaos", hence the definition "Babylonian" - winding) are of great interest to tourists and local historians. These are concentric circles of stones, laid out on the ground in the form of a horseshoe and forming intricate tunnels, from which you cannot immediately get out; they can be found in considerable numbers along the shores of the Barents, White and Baltic Seas.
Photo: lomonosov.org
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Many researchers put forward the assumption about the connection of labyrinths with the cult of the dead - after all, there are often burials next to them. There is a hypothesis that the labyrinths were built so that the souls of the dead were entangled in them, so that they could not return to the world of the living.
Some labyrinths could play the role of calendars, according to which the priests or shamans predicted the exact number of days in the current year, the dates of spring, eclipses, etc.
The path to god or devil
There are a great many labyrinths in the north of Russia. If a child was born in the tribe, another stone was added to the structure. For the ancients, labyrinthine structures were a model of the universe; they were also called "time stores". Often the space inside the labyrinth was used for ceremonies or healing rituals. By various marks or stones, the so-called "knots", people determined the time of fishing, collecting medicinal herbs and roots, and hunting. So the labyrinths, in addition to the ritual, also had a practical purpose.
There are more than 30 such structures on the islands of the Solovetsky archipelago. They usually have the shape of a spiral with a diameter of 5 to 30 m. Inside there are narrow passages that often end in dead ends. The Sami believed that they were built in honor of the seids - deities; their construction is often attributed to historical or mythical personalities, for example, giants or dwarfs.
In the 20s. last century archaeologist N. N. Vinogradov, being in the Solovetsky Special Purpose Camp (ELEPHANT), conducted a thorough research of the stone labyrinths and came to the conclusion that these are sanctuaries left by some ancient tribes, and they represent a symbolic path to the other world; additional evidence of this was the human remains found under the stones.
Modern theologians, in turn, suggest that the symbol of the labyrinth in Christianity served to denote a thorny path to God, on which a person is to face the devil, and in this case one can only hope on faith.
In the Karelian region there is a place called Kurkiyoki, near which there is also a stone labyrinth. It is not known who and when built it, but among tourists and local residents, it is shrouded in many different beliefs. So, they say that if you walk along the entire path between the stones, remembering your sins along the way, and in the center you must present gifts to the five natural elements, then you can, as it were, be cleansed and free from negative energy.
Tourists and vandals
Labyrinths always attract the attention of tourists. Of course, it is difficult to truly get lost in their twists: the guides will always help you get out, but at least for a while, thrills are provided.
The ancient labyrinths, of course, are an invaluable historical heritage that must be protected and carefully studied. Unfortunately, since the second half of the 1990s. reports of vandalism related to the destruction of places of worship in the north of Karelia, in particular, on the island of Nemetsky Kuzov, began to appear more and more often. You can also find here a lot of "remakes" - imitations of labyrinths, erected by the hands of enthusiastic visitors, primarily fans of various cults.
And in 2005, unknown persons cleared the famous ancient labyrinth at Cape Krasny from vegetation. According to the law on the protection of historical heritage, such works require an appropriate permit and they cannot be carried out just like that! But can you prove something to these "history buffs"? You can't put protection at every historical monument, and you have to rely only on the consciousness of citizens, and these hopes are far from always justified …
