It seems to man that he is able to curb the forces of nature. However, our ancestors knew: it is sometimes impossible to comprehend all the greatness of the world by reason.
Since ancient times, people have believed that the waters of the great Russian Volga River hide many secrets.
I will go out to the Volga, I will pray
In pagan myths, rivers were deified, and the river deities themselves were represented as the sacred parents of peoples. It is not for nothing that the Volga is often called "mother" in Russian folklore. Allegedly, our ancestors came out of the river waters, created by the gods living in the Volga.
However, researchers believe that the river was called the mother or mother-nurse for the opportunity to catch fish, and it served as the main food for the pagan tribes living on the shores.
Traces of ancient pagan temples are still found near the Volga. This ancient Slavic word means the space of a pagan temple, located behind the altar and intended for the installation of kapyas - statues depicting gods. Pagans on the Volga banks performed prayer rituals, made sacrifices (sometimes human) to the river gods, crowned and saw off their fellow tribesmen on their last journey, dipping bodies or ashes in the Volga, as they believed, sacred waters.
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From the island to the rod
The legendary personality of the dashing chieftain Stepan Razin still attracts great attention. Many are worried about where he hid the loot. Is it at the bottom of Mother Volga?
The song “From behind the island to the rod” asserts that it was the “Volga-Volga” that Stenka sacrificed the Persian princess. Someone assures: when the sun rises over the Volga, you can see the palace of the drowned princess. True, as the legend says, certain death awaits everyone who encroaches on the riches of the magnificent ghost town. On the approaches to it, boats and ships are drowned by an evil dwarf - under this guise is the spirit of the broken ataman Razin, cursed after death.
Tunnels and elephants
On the forums of Samara fans of anomalous phenomena, it is fashionable to meet stories about the many mysterious tunnels that pass under the Volga River. They seem to lead to other shores and islands. Some describe narrow passages with brick walls and floors. Others testify to a certain tunnel two to three meters high. Its walls are lined with metal shields, and cables and air ducts stretch along them. However, most likely, these are just inventions of people with a rich imagination.
The House with Elephants, located on one of the streets on the banks of the Volga, also attracts the attention of the residents of Samara. This is the dacha of the local historian and art critic Konstantin Golovkin (1872-1921).
The house is one of the most beautiful buildings in the city, a vivid example of Russian modernism. In Samara, there have been rumors for a long time that ghosts live in the house, and black crosses allegedly periodically appear on its walls. At night, the watchmen often hear someone walking up the stairs in the building. Strange voices are heard in the night darkness of the rooms. There is an assumption that the owner of the House with Elephants, Konstantin Golovkin, once arranged spiritualistic seances in his home. It was fashionable in pre-revolutionary Russia.
River name
Many mystical legends are associated with the name of the great Russian river. At different times the Volga was called Daitya, Oaros, Rangkhoi or simply Ra. Apparently, this is why the names of settlements on the banks of the Volga often contain the syllable "ra": Astrakhan, Saratov, Samara, Syzran. And at the end of the first millennium, a new name for the Volga appeared - Itil. This is the ancient name of the river in its middle and lower reaches (like Ra). The Volga river was called not earlier than 1300. Historian Dmitry Valuev, author of the book "On the Great Russian River", published at the end of the 19th century, considered the word "Volga" to be Finnish and translated it as "Holy".
Samara onion
Near Samara, the Volga river loops around the Zhiguli mountains. For some reason, the Volga, with the enormous force of the water flow, did not break through the isthmus folded by soft rocks, but bypasses it in a huge loop, making its way through solid granite rocks in the region of Samara and Togliatti.
The mysterious Volga loop was named Samarskaya Luka. This place has been attracting the attention of paranormal researchers from all over the planet for many years.
According to experts from extrasensory perception, more than a thousand paranormal phenomena have occurred here. So, in 1932, an observer who was on the Samara square named after Frunze saw a strange ray of light that arose beyond the Volga. The beam simply hung over the mountains with no visible source.
In 1978, in one of the pioneer camps at the foot of the Zhiguli Mountains, 200 people immediately saw a vertical column of light in the sky. After hanging over the mountains for several minutes, he began to descend. Scientists explain this by air ionization, which occurs in the area of action of electromagnetic or radiation radiation. Such emissions can be caused by underground deposits of uranium and radium. It is known that there are deposits of these rocks in the Samarskaya Luka area. Samarskaya Luka is famous for its network of unexplored caves. They pass under the entire massif of the Zhiguli Mountains. There are many legends about these dungeons.
Power arrow
The Volga and Oka spit in Nizhny Novgorod is one of the main attractions of our city. This is the name of the sandy triangular cape, where two great Russian rivers merge.
There is a legend that this place has mystical power, and two powerful water streams can charge a person with positive energy. Allegedly, the Grand Duke Yuri Vsevolodovich, the founder of Nizhny Novgorod, knew about this wonderful property of Strelka and that is why he decided to build a city here.
The history of the old Rozhdestvenskaya street, parallel to the Volga, is also filled with mysticism.
“We saw a ghost in the house of the merchants Blinov brothers (in the famous Blinovsky passage),” says the amateur guide Elena Mityagina. - The video, where you can see a kind of white spot flying in the darkness of the halls, still walks on the Internet. True, I heard the opinion that this video is an informational stuff, created to attract tourists to the historic Rozhdestvenskaya street, restored in 2013”.
The second ghost, according to Elena, "lived" in a building on Rozhdestvenskaya, 37. Not so long ago there was a restaurant there. In just six months of his work, three night security guards quit one after another from the institution. Men complained that at night doors were opened and closed at will, and in one of the halls a decorative bell suddenly began to ring.
“Today a cafe has been reopened in this building,” continues Elena. - His owners decided to consecrate the premises. After the ceremony, the strange nocturnal accidents ceased, but, they say, revenue dropped significantly. Perhaps the ghost was kind …