We use the word "kikimora" most often in an allegorical sense - this is usually the name for an evil, unpleasant woman. But in Slavic mythology, this term denoted a very specific creature - one of the varieties of spirits of the lower order.
Who are the kikimors?
The ancient Slavs believed that the kikimora is the deity of sleepy dreams. She came to a person at night and cast dream plots.
Later, kikimors were called girls who were not baptized in infancy or were cursed by their mothers. It was believed that such children were carried away by devils, and the sorcerer could "add" the kikimora to someone's house.
It was believed that the kikimora could rarely be seen with your own eyes, but you can hear the noise that it makes, since, for example, it has a habit of spinning at night. Kikimora do not bring much harm, but they can sometimes talk to a person, and this frightens out of habit.
Vision on Troitskaya Square
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There are many legends about the houses where the Kikimors allegedly settled. One of the most famous kikimors in Russia supposedly lived before in the Trinity Church of St. Petersburg. Even when the city was just being built, the ministers of the temple began to complain that someone was knocking and running in the refectory. Pop Gerasim Titov and Deacon Fedoseyev declared that it was a kikimora and that such events were not good: "Petersburg will be empty."
Rumors reached the authorities. An investigation was carried out and a protocol was drawn up. Everyone who participated in the "seditious" conversations was tortured by the Tsar's personal order in the Secret Chancellery and sentenced to beating with a whip.
Meanwhile, according to the old residents of St. Petersburg, even today on moonless nights on Troitskaya Square, not far from the house of Peter I, where the temple once stood, one can meet a strange woman who looks like a homeless woman: very thin and dirty, with a greenish skin color, and even in cold weather - without a headdress … This is the same kikimora.
Old lady in the window
On the site of the main building of the Perm Agricultural Academy, at st. Petropavlovskaya, 23, once stood the house of Elisei Leontievich Chagin. He was a respectable man - a hereditary nobleman, an adviser to the criminal chamber. But he did not differ in human qualities - he treated the courtiers badly, the servants were mercilessly flogged for the slightest offense …
Having decided to build himself a luxurious house, Chagin, however, spared money for finishing work, and the building stood for many years without finishing. And then suddenly it occurred to the owner to use for this purpose tombstones from abandoned graves at the local cemetery. So the building was completed.
Once Chagin celebrated his name day. The best people of the city gathered at them. In the midst of the celebration, the servants brought in a birthday cake. When the coverlet was removed from the dish, everyone was stupefied: the image of a skull and bones - the so-called "Adam's head", was clearly visible on the surface of the pie. The guests quickly said goodbye, and after this story, Chagin was so upset that he soon died.
It is unknown if there was any kind of investigation into this case. Local historian Dmitry Smyshlyaev believes that mysticism has nothing to do with it: just the courtyards decided to take revenge on the evil master and rolled out the dough for a pie on the tombstone where Adam's head was carved.
But one way or another, with the death of Elisei Chagin, the house became uninhabited. And there were rumors that human bones were piled in its basements, and someone's silhouette sometimes flickered in the windows … In 1842, a severe fire happened on the street. All houses were damaged, except for Chaginsky. And someone supposedly saw a little old woman in the window waving a handkerchief. Knowledgeable people recognized her as a kikimora. Most likely, she settled in the house after using stone from the cemetery for decoration.
Soon the house was demolished and the Mariinsky Women's Gymnasium was built in its place, in the former building of which the Agricultural Academy is now located. Since then, no more has been heard of the kikimor.
The abbot's curse
Another "house with kikimora" is located in the Ukrainian city of Nizhyn, next to the Annunciation Monastery. Once upon a time the abbot of the monastery, Viktor Chernyaev, lived there. Thanks to him, it was possible to rebuild the building of the monastery after a terrible fire that happened at the end of the 18th century.
They say that Chernyaev had a conflict with the new Chernigov archbishop, and he was removed from the post of abbot, which he had held since 1803. I had to leave the housing at the monastery. Leaving, the abbot cursed his former home and everyone who would live in it. He also sent a curse to the monastery itself, predicting that it would exist for no more than a hundred years.
After that, people began to notice that the house was "unclean": at night the windows here by themselves opened and slammed, the floorboards creaked …
After the October Revolution, the Annunciation Monastery was closed, and it was reopened only in 1999. But the curse still, apparently, continues to operate: it is restless here, every now and then some conflicts flare up between the monks, many leave here …
However, there is a version that the former abbot has nothing to do with it. They say that part of the building where he lived was built by a family of local Greeks, who underpaid the craftsmen for the construction, and they "planted" a kikimora in the house. She made noise and crash at night.
More than once the "house with kikimora" tried to shoot television, but during the filming, the image and the sound were constantly disappearing. Apparently, evil spirits do not want publicity at all.
They also say that men do not take root in the cursed house: who gets seriously ill, and who dies. But women feel good here, especially if they are representatives of creative professions. The kikimora seems to welcome them.