For several centuries, in the lands of the Sverdlovsk, Chelyabinsk regions, the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug, legends about a mysterious snake-killer have been circulating. The Mansi call it Yalpyn Uy, the Russians call it a snake, and the Mari call it shem gut.
Witnesses agree on one thing - the reptile monster reaches a length of 2 to 15 meters, moves quickly and lives in coastal areas. And although the monster was seen several times, scientists are not going to investigate the relict snake.
The first reliable evidence of the appearance of huge snakes on the territory of Russia was recorded by the 18th century historian Gerard Miller. In the book "Description of the Siberian Kingdom" he noted that while traveling along the Yenisei he happened to meet with an Arinets, who reported the death of an entire tribe from giant snakes. “One was of extraordinary size, with a large head and a body shining like gold,” an eyewitness told Miller who managed to escape by stretching a horsehair lasso around his yurt and sprinkling ashes on the ground.
However, they say that in the same way one of the hunters, summoned to destroy a huge snake in the southeast of the Yekaterinburg district, escaped from the attack of the monster. Not finding her, the hunters stopped near the village of Bobrovka for a rest. Suddenly they heard a terrible hiss from the direction of the forest. A few seconds later, they saw a huge white snake head in the clearing. Rumor has it that the hunters then got so scared that one of them crawled under the cart, the other froze, paralyzed with horror. And the third, remembering the instructions of the elders that snakes cannot stand the smell of horses, put on a collar. The animal crawled past, and on the ground there was a wide characteristic trail on the crumpled grass.
And in the 60s and 70s of the last century, a message came from the Northern Urals from the mining engineer Lebedinsky. He asserted that, driving a troika, “… I saw a huge snake crossing the road. The three stopped and began to back away. And I returned to the neighboring Vogul village and asked the Voguls to start chasing the snake. The Voguls refused: apparently, they considered the snake sacred. After much questioning, however, I managed to find out her whereabouts. I killed the snake by shooting a shot in the head. The specimen turned out to be about 8 fathoms (16 m) long and as thick as a good 4 inches (17.8 cm) log. Lebedinsky claimed that he sent the snake skin to England. Whether it is true or not is impossible to verify. The find was never delivered to England.
Reports of mysterious huge snakes, often attacking people, were received throughout the 20th century. So, local historian B. Kazakov in the late 50s claimed that the black snake lived on Lake Argazi (Chelyabinsk region), the length of which was 50 meters. In the summer of 1961, a large snake was seen near Lake Bolshoye Miassovo. The witness said that her “… head is big, like a catfish-fish. The body is as big as a thick log, gray, about three meters."
The latest data on the mysterious snake came in 2001 from the vicinity of Tavda, Sverdlovsk region. Eyewitnesses claimed that the creature reached over 8 meters in length and moved very quickly. The snake itself was black, and characteristic spots clearly stood out on its body. One of the specialists, having read about the description of the relict snake, was surprised, they say, it looks like an anaconda. However, after the legends about the crawling monster Yalpyn uy and shem gut were passed on to him, the specialist refused to talk at all, suggesting that he turn to zoologists.
Gennady Petrov from the village of Artemeikov, Achitsky District, said that even today in the territory of the Sverdlovsk Region, near rivers and lakes, one can find a huge snake of black color with brown and yellow spots. She spends the night mainly in trees - after her there are traces of processes on her body; often eat their own kind. The Mari call the huge snake a shem gut, and it reaches from two to 16 meters. To meet her is to trouble, which is not surprising, because the creepy monster has a habit of attacking and killing, while swallowing the victim.
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Valery Chernetsov, a Mansi researcher, argued that shem gut and yalpyn uy are one "face". Mansi hunters have repeatedly talked about their encounters with the "sacred beast" resembling a lizard. The snake reached a length of about 15-16 meters, was red-brown in color with a zigzag pattern. She spent almost all the time in the water, but spent the night only in the trees. In the spring you can hear the sounds of yalpyn uy, reminiscent of the cry of a duck and the dripping of water: "Nech, nech." The snake's habitat is the Ob River in the upper reaches of the Sosva, the Russuya and Niltang-Paul region.
Interestingly, the bourgeois Ivan Sheshin from the village of Nikito-Ivdel, the modern city of Ivdel, in his notes "About the nomadic Vogul tribe in the north of the Verkhoturye Uyezd" noted: "They (Mansi) have such sacred places along the rivers, through which they never travel in boats, they will not even touch the bottom of the sixth, but bypass these places by the shore, dragging boats on them."
Is it because the Mansi tried not to touch the bottom with the poles, because the formidable Yalpyn uy could rest at the bottom? Who is the mysterious huge snake that terrifies the inhabitants of several regions? Incredibly, the description of the Mansi reptile is in many ways similar to the horror of the Amazon - the anaconda. A huge snake has a similar color, lives near water bodies, spends the night in trees. Just like yalpyn uy (snake and shem gut), anaconda reaches a length of 2 to 16 meters, depending on the age of the individual. The inhabitants of the Amazon assure: they often have to move through the water bodies without touching the bottom, since anacondas often sleep, buried in the silt.
And yet, are the relict snakes of Russia the relatives of the Amazonian anacondas? Hopefully not. However, it is difficult not to note the reluctance of scientists to investigate the unknown animal. As the saying goes: "no proof - no problem." We can only guess when the next time the Mansi anaconda will go hunting for prey.