In the far north, where the land is covered with snow for most of the year, great and endless mountains stretch from west to east. Around their golden peaks the sun makes its annual journey, the seven stars of the Big Dipper sparkle above them in the darkness of the night, and the North Star is located in the center of the universe. All the great streams of the earth rush down from these mountains, only some of them flow to the south, to the warm sea, and others to the north, to the white-foam ocean. On the tops of these mountains forests rustle, wonderful birds sing, wonderful animals live and rivers flow here in golden channels. But it was not given to a mere mortal to climb them, only the most courageous and wise crossed the limit set for people and went forever to the land of the blessed, whose shores were washed by the waters of the milky ocean
The mountains separating the north and the "white" sea from all other lands are called Mount Meru, and the greatest of them is Mandara. Outside the mountains of Meru six months lasts a day and six months - night, there the waters freeze, acquiring bizarre outlines, rainbow watercorns sparkle in the sky above the ocean, and only birds and great sages - "rishis" know the way to this land. This is how the hymns of the Veda, the most ancient sacred monument of the Indians, are told about a distant northern country, about an ancient ancestral home. A strange, unexpected fairy tale, it is incomprehensible how it was born in a distant hot India, this story would have sounded if it had not lived among the most ancient legends and another southern country - Iran.
In the Avesta, a sacred monument of the Iranian peoples, in its most ancient part of Bundahishne, which tells about the creation of the world, it also tells about the distant northern ancestral home of the Iranians - the land of gods and ancestors, where the ridges of the High Khara - Khary Berezaiti with their main peak mountain stretched from west to east Hukairya. And over the High Hara also the seven stars of the Big Dipper and the North Star, placed in the center of the universe, sparkle. From here, from the golden peaks, all earthly rivers originate, and the greatest of them is the pure Ardvi River, falling with noise into the white-foam sea of Vurukasha. Above the mountains of the High Khara, the Swift Sun is always circling, and here it lasts for six months a day, and six months a night. Only the brave and the strong in spirit can pass these mountains and get to the happy land of the blessed, washed by the waters of the white-foam ocean.
Again these fabulous golden mountains, covered with dense forests, where the sacred plant catfish, or haoma grows, and from which violent rivers flow down in golden channels. Where, how, when did the Indians and Iranians learn about the countries of cold and snow, freezing waters and the northern lights? When and where could you see the North Star high above your head? Scientists have been asking themselves these questions for a century. At the beginning of the 20th century, Bala Gangadhar Tilak's book "The Arctic Homeland in the Vedas" appeared. He believed that the ancestors of the Indians lived in the Arctic, from where in the VIII-VI millennia BC, under the influence of the coming cold weather, they left to the south.
More than 80 years have passed since the publication of the book of Tilak, and disputes about where the ancestral home of the Indians was, where the sacred mountains of Meru and Hara Berezaiti rise, do not stop. But today, most scientists have already come to the conclusion that the Indo-Iranian (Aryan) community was formed somewhere in the southern Russian steppes in the third - early second millennium BC. Soviet researcher BV Gornung suggested that the "cradle of Indo-Iranian linguistic and cultural-historical unity" was in the Middle Volga region. Scientists now know that the ancient Indo-Iranians (Aryans) were farmers and cattle breeders, they sowed bread, grazed cattle and, settling in ever wider spaces, moved east, and west, and north, and south. And somewhere in the north of their ancestral home those sacred mountains should have been located,who sang the hymns of the Avesta and the Rig Veda. But where?
Ancient Greek authors also wrote about the great northern mountains, who believed that these mountains, which they called Ripaean, occupied the entire north of Europe and were the northern border of Great Scythia. So they were depicted on one of the first maps of the earth - the map of the 6th century BC by Hecateus of Miletus. The "father of history" Herodotus wrote about the distant Northern mountains stretching from west to east. Doubting the incredible, fantastic size of the Ripean Mountains, Aristotle nevertheless believed in their existence and was convinced that it was from these mountains that all the largest rivers of Europe flow, except for the Istra-Danube. Behind the Ripean mountains, in northern Europe, the ancient Greek and Roman geographers placed the Great Northern, or Scythian, ocean.
But where exactly are the Northern Mountains - this question remains open to this day.
Perhaps the creators of the ancient Aryan hymns sung the ridges of the Urals, as the famous Soviet researchers G. M. Bongard-Levin and E. A. Grantovsky think? Indeed, the Ural Mountains are in the north in relation to India and Iran, they are rich in gold and gems and stretch far to the freezing northern sea. Yes, only the Avesta, and the Veda, and ancient historians constantly repeat that the great mountains stretched from west to east, dividing the land into north and south, and the Urals is the border between west and east. And, finally, neither the Don, nor the Dnieper, nor the Volga originate from the Ural Mountains, and the sacred river Ardvi, flowing into the "white-foam ocean", is difficult to find on the spurs of the Urals. Nor does he divide "earthly waters" into those that flow to the south and those that rushed to the north. But this is a distinctive feature of both the Meru Mountains and the High Khara. Or confused the ancient Aryans in their travels east and west with north and south? Unlikely! They knew geography very well for their time, and it is more than difficult to scare the sides of sunrise and sunset. And if neither the singers of the Vedas, nor the creators of the Avesta, nor the ancient authors were mistaken, and there really existed these mountains in the north of Europe, stretching like a bow curved towards the south, from west to east? And, probably, they did not disappear anywhere in those 3-4 thousand years that separate us from the time when the ancient Aryans began their journey to India and Iran. And only one thing remains - to look a little more closely at the map of our Motherland. Here is the Black, Azov and Caspian seas, steppes scorched by the sun; great rivers flow here from the north - the Dnieper, Don, Volga. And here is the north of the European part of the country. Cold and inhospitable White and Barents seas, Arctic Ocean. Many rivers flow here from south to north, including the mighty, full-flowing Northern Dvina, which flows into the White Sea. The huge East European Plain is replete with hills: Central Russian, Valdai, Volga … Among them, the eye will not immediately distinguish the arc, consisting of the mountains of the Kola Peninsula, small hills in the west of the Vologda region. Northern Uval and Northern Urals, which stretches from west to east for 3700 kilometers and really separates the coast of the White and Barents Seas from the rest of Europe. Northern Uval and Northern Urals, which stretches from west to east for 3700 kilometers and really separates the coast of the White and Barents Seas from the rest of Europe. Northern Uval and Northern Urals, which stretches from west to east for 3700 kilometers and really separates the coast of the White and Barents Seas from the rest of Europe.
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Part of this huge arc, and a very significant one, are the Northern Uvaly reaching the Northern Urals and stretching for two thousand kilometers from west to east. They are not high, the highest point is only 293 meters above sea level. Of course, not the Pamirs, not the Himalayas, but … it is here that the watershed of the rivers of the Caspian and White Seas is located. It is here, on the Northern Uvals, that the Unzha and Vetluga, Kama and Vyatka rivers of the Great Volga basin begin their journey to the south, and just a few kilometers from them, the Yug River begins its rapid movement to the White Sea, which, merging with the river Sukhona, forms the Malaya Severnaya Dvina. The second large watershed area also fits into the arc of the North Russian Uplands. This is the area of the White Lake, where the high-water Sheksna originates, flowing to the south, and Onega and Sukhona - to the White Sea.
What are the Northern Uvaly? "Uval … In the area of the White Sea, - as it is said in the" Dictionary of folk geographical terms "E. M. Murzaev, - a steep and high coast of the river, a mountain ridge accompanying the valley." On the watershed of the Northern Uvaly, where the mountains seem to cut the rivers into southern and northern, river valleys are deep, up to 80 meters or more canyons with steep cliffs. The Sukhona River (part of the small Northern Dvina) in the section from the town of Totma to the mouth resembles a mountain river in its swiftness, because its drop here exceeds 49 meters, and in the area of the village of Opoki the height of the banks exceeds 80 meters. The Sukhona has about 130 tributaries here. The riverbeds of the rivers flowing in the regions of the Northern Uvaly are, as a rule, lined with pure orange-yellow mica sand, and the high steep banks surrounding them are of orange mica sand.bright red plastic clay, red coarse-grained and yellow sandstone. How not to be born here legends about the rivers flowing in the "golden" channels, among the "golden" mountains!
Of course, they may argue: "How is it, because the mountains of Meru and Hara Berezaiti are the Great, the highest in the world, higher than the sky and even higher than the sun, but here they are some 293 meters?"
This is probably due to the fact that when a person leaves his homeland, her image - where the brightest sun, the greenest grasses, the cleanest rivers and the highest mountains - lives in legends and songs.
Century after century, those of the Aryans, who were then to become part of the great peoples of India and Iran, went further and further to the southeast. They met on their way the highest mountains of the world, and the image of the Great Mountains of the land of their ancestors was painted with new colors. High Khara and Meru, sung by the forefathers in their sacred hymns, of course, could not be lower than the Pamirs and the Himalayas, they had to be the highest in the world, higher than the sun. But remember: both in the hymns of the Vedas and in the Avesta, the tops of these mountains are covered with dense forests, where wonderful birds sing, where various animals live, where wonderful hopping haoma-soma grows. It turns out that the overgrown with forest, inhabited by beasts and birds, Meru and High Khara were not so high. And what about the Northern Uvals? They are three-quarters covered with forests. And what forests! Here and spruce, and fir, and linden, and maple, and elm, and elm, and bird cherry, and alder, and birch, and aspen,and even oaks. It's 60 degrees north latitude! Various shrubs grow in these places: red and black currants, rose hips, dogwood, honeysuckle, viburnum, and in abundance - hops. And in the forest meadows there is lush herbs.
At the beginning of the 20th century, these places were famous as rich hunting grounds, abundant in animals, birds and fish. But this is summer. In winter, a blizzard sweeps, a piercing northeastern wind howls on the northern slopes of Uvalov, a blizzard whirls around, covering everything around with flakes of snow. It turns out that the Aryans carried the memory of the merciless, deadly north wind - Vayu, reigning on the slopes of the Meru mountains to their new hot homeland. But before those who, having won the battle with the winds and snow, overcame this mountain barrier, the endless expanses of the sea, fancifully frozen waters opened up, and the light of the northern lights sparkled in their honor, illuminating the path further.
The memory of the mountains lives on in the hymns of the Veda and the lines of the Avesta, in the names of villages and villages of the Russian North. Listen to them: Mandara - Mandarovo, Mundora - Mundorka and Mandara Mountain "Veda"; Kharino - Kharovo, Kharachevo - Kharinskaya, Kharlovo - Kharapikha, Kharkhorino - Kharyonovo and Vysokaya Khara "Avesta"; Ripino - Ripinka, Ripina and the Ripean mountains of the ancient Greeks. And also Svyatogorye, Semigorye and many villages and villages with the names Mountain or Gorka.
The Dvina flows into the White Sea. Or is it just the consonance of Dvin - Ardvi? Or maybe not? After all, the inhabitants of the Kharovsky district, where the Kharovskaya ridge stretches, call the sand the strange word "Khara". In Sanskrit (the language of the Indo-Iranians), hara is yellow, golden, orange, reddish, sunny …
Several years ago, teachers of the Russian language from different countries of the world came to the ancient Russian city of Vologda from the Patrice Lumumba Peoples' Friendship University. And in the halls of the museum, looking at the samples of embroidery and weaving made at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries by North Russian peasant women, a young Indian said in surprise: “There is almost nothing new for me here. I saw all this many times at home. But that also shocked me the most. Explain how our embroideries could have come to you?"
Svetlana Zharnikova, art critic. "Around the World", no. 3