The rituals and customs of the Russian and Indian peoples also have a certain similarity. We can now confidently say that they are based on the ancient tradition of the Aryans. So, the Indian scientist R. Pandey, describing the funeral rite of the Hindus, mentions a bundle of reeds, which, "obviously, serves as a boat for the deceased" [1].
This bundle of reeds symbolized a ship plying between the world of reality and "that light":
Behind the chariot which, oh boy, You rolled from the inspired
A chant followed her:
From here it was placed on the ship [2].
Some elements of the Aryan funeral rite were preserved until the beginning of the 20th century among the Greben Cossacks in their Trinity rite of "launching ships" along the Terek. The ship was built long before the holiday. In the village of Grebenskaya, it resembled a table. They put various food on the ship, the ship itself was decorated with ribbons and handkerchiefs, and then the whole village was carried to the Terek, accompanying the procession with the song "As it was across the sea, over the sea" about a small ship. The ribbons on the ship served as a substitute for a towel - a symbol of the path to the afterlife. According to the Cossacks, this rite kept in touch with their ancestors, who are in another world [3].
Ahmed ibn-Fadlan described the funeral of the Rus in great detail in his "Note":
Promotional video:
“For the poor man they make a little ship, put it there and burn it; from a rich man, they collect his property and divide it into three parts: they give a third to the family, for a third they cut his clothes and for a third they buy a hot drink, which they drink on the day when the girl kills herself and is burned together with her master … But the day appointed for the burning of him and the girl came, I went to the river, where the ship stood, and lo! It had already been pulled ashore and four elm supports were made for it, and wooden images similar to giants were placed around it … They also brought a dog, cut it into two parts and threw it into the ship …
After that, people approached with a tree and firewood, each had a lit piece of wood, which he threw into the firewood, and the fire engulfed the wood, then the ship, then the tent with the dead man, the girl and everyone in it, then a strong wind blew, the fire flame intensified and the indomitable inflammation of it was kindled more and more …
Rus said to the interpreter: “You, the Arabs, are a stupid people, for you take the sweetest and most respectable of people for you and throw him into the ground, where he is eaten by reptiles and worms; we burn it in fire - in an instant! - and he enters paradise at the same hour …"
Then they built something like a round hill on the site of the ship's anchorage, inserted a large tree into the middle, wrote on it the name of the deceased person and the name of the Russian tsar and left”[4].
As we can see, the funeral rites of the Rus and Hindus are based on the ancient tradition of the Aryans.
R. Pandey pointed out in his work that the Indians "tried in every possible way to separate the world of the living from the world of the dead" [5]. To this end, they drew a border from clods of earth and stones, while pronouncing spells.
Our ancestors also sought to protect themselves from uninvited guests from the other world. Among the Eastern Slavs, it was customary to sow their house and barn with consecrated poppy or grain in order to prevent a ghoul, witch or sorcerer there.
This was done on the eve of the "problem" dates, during which the activity of the "navei" intensified: "Shoby is a dead man, I forget the ossinavago peg at the magylu. Sprinkle the hut with self-sowing poppy seeds, the holy yogo at the church.
In Belarus, on Holy Thursday, the hostess, having stripped naked and saddled a poker, sowed grain in her yard to protect it from evil spirits. The discussion was accompanied by conspiracies. So, for example, the inhabitants of the Belarusian Polesie used to say during sowing: "I will stalwart with zirochka, I will fence myself off with a golden tynom", "I am piling a skatsin, I am absorbing with mushrooms." Outlining the circle served as the equivalent of creating an insurmountable barrier around the house, barn, herd, field.
In one of the Belarusian conspiracies to protect against the outbreak of a fire, it is said: “Jesus Khrystos himself okala etaga agnya hozits and abchyvayets”. The border, protecting from evil spirits, was also created by sweeping around the guarded object, “there was no evil spirits in the yard” [6].
The Soviet journalist I. V. Suchkov, who worked for a long time in Sri Lanka, left us with descriptions of the expulsion of "evil spirits" from the villagers of the island who were exposed to various diseases. So, for example, in the treatment of schizophrenia, a patient is painfully beaten with a broom from the flowering shoots of a coconut palm, demanding to name the demon who is allegedly tormenting him. The patient will surely utter a word … Then the sorcerer must offer a sacrifice to the demon. The victim becomes a rooster, to which a yellow ribbon is wound around its neck in order to depict its path to the other world. According to the Ceylonians, the demon deceived by the ribbon will surely get away [7].
The inhabitants of Russian villages deceived the "demons" in a different way. A sick child was “sold” to someone they knew. Old-timers from the village of Taman told researchers about the ritual of “selling a child”: “The colas are so bad, go to babtsi … Vona pass y kazhe:“Tse should be sold to someone else. Someone pidgovyty. Nehay proyde, coupe. Tilky kriziz vicno ". The child was returned after recovery [8].
In general, the folk customs and rituals of the Russians and Indians have significant similarities.
[1] Pandey R. Ancient Indian home rituals (customs) / Per. from English. A. A. Vigasina. Ed. 2nd. - M.: "High school", 1990. - P. 210
[2] Rig Veda. Mandalas IX - X. - M., 1999.-- S. 292.
[3] See: Great N. N. Cossacks of the Eastern Ciscaucasia in the XVIII-XIX centuries. - Rostov-on-Don, 2001.-- S. 154-155.
[4] Legends of Muslim writers about the Slavs and Russians (from the middle of the 7th century to the end of the 10th century AD) - St. Petersburg: IAN, 1870. - pp. 96-101.
[5] Pandey R. Ancient Indian home rituals. - S. 210.
[6] See: Levkievskaya EE Slavic amulet. Semantics and structure. - M.: "Indrik", 2002. - S. 39-40.
[7] See: IV Suchkov. Colors of a Distant Island. - M.: "Science", 1980. - P. 77.
[8] See: Sementsov M. V. To the interpretation of the symbolic meaning of the magic-therapeutic rite of "selling" a child (based on the materials of the folklore-ethnographic expedition to the village of Taman in 1993) // Orthodoxy, traditional culture, education. - Krasnodar: Publishing house "Kribibkollektor", 2000. - P. 61.
From my book: "Ancient Slavic Writings"
Author: Evgeny Koparev
