Yakutia: Before Its Incorporation into the Russian State 9780773593541

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ARCTIC INSTITUTE OF NORTH AMERICA ANTHROPOLOGY OF THE NORTH: TRANSLATIONS FROM RUSSIAN SOURCES Editor: HENRY N. MICHAEL Advisory Committee CHESTER S. CHARD University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wis. ROBERT C. FAYLOR Arctic Institute of North America, Washington, D.C. LAWRENCE KRADER The City University of New York, New York, N.Y. HENRY N. MICHAEL Temple University, Philadelphia, Pa. HUGH M. RAUP Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Md. DEMITRI B. SHIMKIN University of Illinois, Urbana, Ill. JAMES W. VANSTONE Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago, Ill. HENRY B. COLLINS Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. (Chairman)

ARCTIC INSTITUTE OF NORTH AMERICA ANTHROPOLOGY OF THE NORTH: TRANSLATIONS FROM RUSSIAN SOURCES

NUMBER 8

ARCTIC INSTITUTE OF NORTH AMERICA

Anthropology of the North: Translations from Russian Sources Edited by HENRY N. MICHAEL

1. The Ancient Culture of the Bering Sea and the Eskimo Prob. km. By S. 1. RUDENKO. Translated by PAUL TOLSTOY. Edited by HENRY N. MICHAEL. 1961. 111 + 186 pages, map, II figures, 38 plates. $3.00. Out of print. 2. Studies in Siberian Ethnogenesis. Edited by HENRY N. MICHAEL. 1962. vii + 313 pages, 7 maps, 5 text figures, 4 plates. $3.50. Available from the University of Toronto Press, Toronto 5, Ontario, Canada. 3. Ethnic Origins of the Peoples of Northeastern Asia. By M. G. LEVIN. Edited by HENRY N. MICHAEL. 1963. Xii + 355 pages, 5 maps, 5 text figures, 8 plates. $3.50. Available from the University of Toronto Press, Toronto 5, Ontario, Canada. 4. Studies in Siberian Shamanism. Edited by HENRY N. MICHAEL. 1963. vi + 229 pages, 51 text figures. $3.25. Available from the University of Toronto Press, Toronto 5, Ontario, Canada. 5. The Archaeology and Geomorphology of Northern Asia: Selected Works. Edited by HENRY N. MICHAEL. 1964. XVI + 512 pages, 214 figures and maps. $6.5o. Available from the University of Toronto Press, Toronto 5, Ontario, Canada. 6. The Soviet Far East in Antiquity: An Archaeological and Historical Study of the Maritime Region of the U.S.S.R. By A. P. OKLADNIKOV. Edited by HENRY N. MICHAEL. 1965. X + 280 pages, 52 figures and maps. $6.00. Available from the University of Toronto Press, Toronto 5, Ontario, Canada. 7. Lieutenant Zagoskin's Travels in Russian America, 1842:844: The First Ethnographic and Geographic Investigations in the Yukon and Kuskokwim Valleys of Alaska. Edited by HENRY N. MICHAEL. 1967. XVIii + 360 pages, 19 text figures, 3 8. maps. $ro.00. Available from the University of Toronto Press, Toronto 5, Ontario, Canada. 8. Yakutia before Its Incorporation into the Russian State. Edited by HENRY M. MICHAEL. 1970. Xhl + 500 pages, 84 figures, 4 maps. $ro.00. Available from McGill—Queen's University Press, 345 8 Rcdpath Street, Montreal tog, Quebec, Canada.

Yakutia BEFORE ITS INCORPORATION INTO THE RUSSIAN STATE

A. P. Okladnikov Edited by Henry N. Michael Arctic Institute of North America

MONTREAL & LONDON

McGill-Queen's University Press 1970

© Arctic Institute of North America 1970 Printed in Canada International Standard Book Number 0-7735-9068-4 Library of Congress Catalog Card No. 71-102976 ANTHROPOLOGY OF THE NORTH: TRANSLATIONS FROM RUSSIAN SOURCES

is supported by National Science Foundation grants GN-362 and GN-537

Editor's Preface

A. P. Okladnikov had conducted archaeological and ethnographic fieldwork for at least two decades before summarizing his findings in the 1955 edition of Yakutia before Its Incorporation into the Russian State. In reviewing Okladnikov's works done prior to the publication of the present work, S. V. Bakhrushin, the distinguished historian of Siberia (1882-195o), wrote: "The results of archaeological investigations, which have attained such a wide scope in Soviet times, are new and invaluable sources for the early history of Yakutia. To these eminently belong the exceptionally meaningful discoveries of A. P. Okladnikov, which have opened up new horizons not only to the study of Yakut antiquities but to world archaeology as well. Yakut science is justly proud of these discoveries. As a result of his works on the Lena ... he was able to expose not only the remains of the early Lena cultures but also to establish the connections between them and the cultures of the Cis-Baykal."* Bakhrushin then pointed out the combination of methods—historical, ethnograhic, archaeological, and linguistic — that Okladnikov used to document his theory of the formation of the Yakut people. The translation of Yakutia before Its Incorporation brings, for the first time, a systematic presentation of both the prehistory and history of the Yakuts to the English-reading scholar. Particularly interesting are the passages which compare terms among the languages of the Turkic family. In doing this, Okladnikov brings out the rich detail of the Yakut epos (olonkho). While some of Okladnikov's conclusions about processes (changing social structure, formation of subrace, et al.) are projective and even speculative, they may be explained in some cases by the paucity of available materials in an archaeologically pioneer setting. In other analyses Academician Okladnikov adheres to the well-established tenets of classical Marxism. Subsequent to the work presented here in translation, Okladnikov has made additional important contributions to the prehistory of Siberia and the Soviet Far East. Several of these have been translated into English.t * Bakhrushin, S. V., Nauchnye trudy (Scientific works), vol. 3, pt. 2, pp. 264-65. Moscow, 1955. t E.g., Okladnikov, A. P. Paleolithic remains in the Lena River basin, Anthropology of the North: Translations from Russian Sources, no. 5, 1964, PP. 33-79; Ethnic and cultural

ix

Editor's Preface As in previous numbers of this series, we have used the transliteration system recommended by the United States Board on Geographic Names. However, the Russian "soft sign" has not been transliterated as an apostrophe. Special symbols used in the transliteration of Yakut—both into Russian and English—were retained in those instances where approximation by the use of conventional letters of the English alphabet would result in gross distortion of the original sound. The system is explained in detail in J. R. Krueger's Yakut Manual.* Throughout the book, all words or sentences appearing in square brackets are those of the Editor unless specified as those of the Translator. Any words or sentences appearing in parentheses are those of Professor Okladnikov and when this fact needs to be emphasized, the parenthetical statement is followed by the word "Author." Some of the general names for the various types of administrative areas have been transliterated rather than translated, since no ordered or generally accepted translation of them exists. A kray denotes a very large administrative unit. At present there are nine krays in the Soviet Union, six of them in the R.S.F.S.R. and three recently established ones in the agricultural "pioneer" areas located in the north of Kazakhstan. Each kray except the Maritime (Primorskiy), contains subdivisions called oblasts. These may be autonomous oblasts containing an ethnic group (as they do in the six krays of the R.S.F.S.R.) or they are simply administrative oblasts, as in the case of the newly established Kazakhstan krays. Additionally, Krasnoyarsk kray in western Siberia contains two national okrugs - very large areas sparsely inhabited by small ethnic groups with limited autonomy. Several of the administrative oblasts of the various union republics also contain national okrugs. (Only ten of the fifteen union republics have oblasts.) Those republics that do not have oblasts are directly subdivided into rayons and other, usually smaller, administrative units (for instance, soviets, or, in parts of the Yakut A.S.S.R., naslegs). In addition to this fairly complicated administrative division (which seems to be a compromise between ethnic and central administrative aspirations), some of the older works, particularly ethnographic and geographic ones, contain administrative terms no longer in existence, such as guberniya, uprava, uyezd, ulus, volost, or sloboda. Whenever it is necessary to cite them, these terms are transliterated rather than translated. Dr. and Mrs. Stephen P. Dunn translated most of the work. (The

connection of middle Yenisey tribes during the Neolithic, ibid., pp. 8o-111; The Shilka cave, ibid., pp. 112-18o; The Soviet Far East in antiquity, Anthropology of the North: Translations from Russian Sources, no. 6, p. 280. See also, Okladnikov, A. P., Archaeology of the Soviet Arctic, Acta Arctica, Fasc. XII, Copenhagen, 1960, pp. 35-45; The Paleolithic of Trans-Baykal, American Antiquity, vol. 26, no. 4, 1961, pp. 486-497; An ancient settlement on Pkhusun Bay, Arctic Anthropology, vol. 3, no. I, 1965; Okladnikov, A. P. and Nekrasov, I. A., New traces of an inland Neolithic culture in the Chukotsk (Chukchi) peninsula, American Antiquity, vol. 27, no. 4, 1962, pp. 546-56, and other articles. • Krueger, John R., Yakut Manual. Indiana University Publications, Uralic and Altaic Studies, vol. 21, pp. 45-46. The Hague, 1962. This manual also includes a handy gazeteer of Yakut place names (pp. 311.80).

x

Editor's Preface exception is Okladnikov's foreword to the English edition which was translated by the Editor.) Mrs. Natalie Frenkley of Arctic Bibliography has checked the bibliography. Mr. Edward Schumacher of the Smithsonian Institution has redrawn some of the maps and site profiles. To all go my profound thanks. NOVEMBER I969

Henry N. Michael

xi

Contents

EDITOR'S PREFACE ABBREVIATIONS ILLUSTRATIONS AUTHOR'S FOREWORD TO THE ENGLISH EDITION NOTES TO AUTHOR'S FOREWORD FROM THE [SOVIET] EDITOR INTRODUCTION

PART I:

Section One:

THE STONE AGE WITHIN THE TERRITORY OF THE PRESENT-DAY YAKUT A.S.S.R. The Beginnings of Human Life in Yakutia I. THE PREGLACLAL AND GLACIAL PERIODS IN YAKUTIA 2. THE MOST ANCIENT TRACES OF MAN IN YAKUTIA 3. THE LATE PALEOLITHIC OF YAKUTIA

9 23 49

Section Two: The Neolithic Period I. MATERIAL CULTURE AND ECONOMY OF THE POPULATION OF THE MIDDLE LENA

65

2. ART, BELIEFS, AND WORLD-VIEW OF THE NEOLITHIC TRIBES OF THE MIDDLE LENA

89

3. TRIBES OF NORTHERN YAKUTIA IN THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

105

4. CONNECTIONS OF THE NEOLITHIC TRIBES OF YAKUTIA WITH THE WEST AND EAST

PART II: Section One:

123

THE TRIBES OF YAKUTIA IN THE AGE OF METAL The Tribes of the Lena Region in the Bronze Age I. THE DISCOVERY OF BRONZE

133

2. BRONZE AGE ART IN THE TAIGA

155

3. CONNECTIONS BETWEEN THE BRONZE AGE CULTURE OF THE MIDDLE LENA AND CULTURES OF OTHER 167

PEOPLES

Section Two: The Spread of Iron on the Middle Lena I. THE APPEARANCE OF IRON ON THE LENA

185

2. THE FIRST BLACKSMITHS ON THE MIDDLE LENA

195

3. CHANGES IN ART AND BELIEFS AND THE BIRTH OF IDEOGRAPHIC WRITING

207

4. THE ANCIENT TRIBES OF THE ARCTIC COAST

PART III:

Section One:

215

THE EARLY HISTORY OF THE YAKUT PEOPLE The Origin of the Yakut People—Introduction I. IDEAS OF THE YAKUTS ABOUT THE SOUTH

229

2. STEPPE SURVIVALS IN THE ECONOMY AND MILITARY TECHNOLOGY OF THE YAKUTS

237

3. SOUTHERN ELEMENTS IN THE CLOTHING OF THE YAKUTS 4. THE YAKUT EPOS

253

(Olonkho)

AND ITS CONNECTIONS

WITH THE SOUTH 5. LINGUISTIC EVIDENCE OF YAKUT ORIGINS

263 287

6. NORTHERN ELEMENTS IN THE CULTURE OF THE YAKUTS

291

Section Two: Early History of the Yakut Nationality I. THE CULTURE OF THE KURYKANS—THE SOUTHERN ANCESTORS OF THE YAKUTS IN THE CIS-BAYKAL 2. THE LENA FOREST ANCESTORS OF THE YAKUTS

305 339

3. LEGENDS RELATING TO THE APPEARANCE OF YAKUT ANCESTORS ON THE MIDDLE LENA

353

Section Three: The Yakuts on the Middle Lena before the Arrival of the Russians I. THE ECONOMY AND WAY OF LIFE OF THE ANCIENT YAKUTS

381

2. THE ART AND RELIGION OF THE ANCIENT YAKUTS ON THE BASIS OF ARCHAEOLOGICAL DATA 3. THE SOCIAL STRUCTURE OF THE ANCIENT YAKUTS

391 395

4. HISTORICAL EVENTS OF THE 16TH AND 17TH CENTURIES IN YAKUTIA

417

NOTES AND REFERENCES

449

BIBLIOGRAPHY

457

INDEX

493

Abbreviations

AN SSSR

Akademiya Nauk SSSR

BZh

Botanicheskiy zhurnal Akademii Nauk SSSR

EO

Etnograficheskoye obozreniye

IAN IGAIMK

Izvestiya Akademii Nauk Izvestiya Gosudarstvennoy Akademii istorii materialnoy kultury Izvestiya Geologicheskogo komiteta Izvestiya Obshchestva arkheologii, istorii i etnografii pri Kazanskom universitete Izvestiya Obshchestva lyubiteley yestestvoznaniya, antropologii i etnografii pri Moskovskom universitete Izvestiya Russkogo Arkheologicheskogo obshchestva Izvestiya Russkogo Geograficheskogo obshchestva Izvestiya Vsesoyuznogo Geograficheskogo obshchestva Izvestiya Vostochno-Sibirskogo otdela Russkogo Geograficheskogo obshchestva Izvestiya Yakutskogo otdela Russkogo Geograficheskogo obshchestva Izvestiya Zapadno-Sibirskogo otdela Russkogo Geograficheskogo obshchestva

IGK IOAIE IOLYeAE IRAQ IRGO IVGO IVSORGO IYaORGO IZSORGO KSIIMK

Kratkiye soobshcheniya o dokladakh i polevykh issledovaniyakh Instituta istorii materialnoy kultury Akademii Nauk SSSR

ME MGU MIA MIFR

Materialy po etnografii Moskovskiy gosudarstvennyy universitet Materialy i issledovaniya po arkheologii SSSR Materialy i issledovaniya po istorii flory i rastitelnosti SSSR Ministerstvo vnutrennikh del Yakutskoy ASSR

MVD YaASSR

NIIYaLI YaASSR Nauchno-issledovatelskiy institut yazyka, literatury i istorii Yakutskoy ASSR

PIDO

Problemy istorii dokapitalisticheskikh obshchestv

SA SB SE SGAIMK

Sovetskaya arkheologiya Sovetskaya botanika Sovetskaya etnografiya Soobshcheniya Gosudarstvennoy akademi; istorii materialnoy kultury Sbornik Muzeya antropologii i etnografi; Sovetskiy Sever Sibirskaya sovetskaya entsiklopediya Sibirskaya zhivaya starina

SMAE SS SSE SZhS TANII TGIM TGK TGM TIAAE TIGN TKIChP TMK TNIIYaK TsNIGRI TVORAO TVSORGO UZLGU UZMGU UZMo1GU

Trudy Arkticheskogo nauchno-issledovatelskogo instituta Trudy Gosudarstvennogo istoricheskogo muzeya Trudy Geologicheskogo komiteta Trudy Geologicheskogo muzeya Akademii Nauk SSSR Trudy Instituta antropologii, arkheologii i etnografii Akademii Nauk SSSR Trudy Instituta geologicheskikh nauk Akademii Nauk SSSR Trudy Komissii po izucheniyu chetvertichnogo perioda Akademii Nauk SSSR Trudy Mongolskoy komissii Trudy Nauchno-issledovatelskogo instituta Yazyka i kultury pri SNK YaASSR Tsentralnyy nauchno-issledovatelskiy geologorazvedochnyy Institut Trudy Vostochnogo otdeleniya Russkogo arkheologicheskogo obshchestva Trudy Vostochno-Sibirskogo otdela Russkogo geograficheskogo obshchestva Uchenyye zapiski Leningradskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta Uchenyye zapiski Moskovskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta Uchenyye zapiski Molotovskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta

VAN VDI VLGU VRGO

Vestnik Akademii Nauk SSSR Vestnik drevney istorii Vestnik Leningradskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta Vestnik Russkogo geograficheskogo obshchestva

ZAN ZhMNP ZhS ZMO ZORSA RAO

Zapiski Akademii Nauk Zhurnal Ministerstva narodnogo prosveshcheniya Zhivaya starina Zapiski Mineralogicheskogo obshchestva Zapiski Otdeleniya russkoy i slavyanskoy arkheologii Russkogo arkheologicheskogo obshchestva

ZRAO ZRGO ZSORGO ZVORAO ZVSORGO ZYaKOGO ZYaORGO ZZSORGO

Zapiski Russkogo arkheologicheskogo obshchestva Zapiski Russkogo geograficheskogo obshchestva Zapiski Sibirskogo otdela Russkogo geograficheskogo obshchestva Zapiski Vostochnogo otdela Russkogo arkheologicheskogo obshchestva Zapiski Vostochno-Sibirskogo otdela Russkogo geograficheskogo obshchestva Zapiski Yakutskogo krayevogo otdela Geograficheskogo obshchestva Zapiski Yakutskogo otdela Russkogo geograficheskogo obshchestva Zapiski Zapadno-Sibirskogo otdela Russkogo geograficheskogo obshchestva

Illustrations

FIGURES t. Stone artifacts from Chastinskaya 2. The Paleolithic settlement of Buret 3. Female statuettes of the Paleolithic, and representations of birds 4. General view of the Shishkino cliffs on the Lena River 5. View of the inscribed rock at Shishkino and the Lena 6. Paleolithic drawings of horses 7. Paleolithic figures of bulls 8. Paleolithic settlement near the village of Makarovo—general view 9. Paleolithic settlement near the village of Makarovo to. Late Paleolithic tools from Lena campsites it. Neolithic pottery of Yakutia 12. Neolithic arrowheads from the Kullaty site 13. Polished tools from Neolithic sites in Yakutia 14. Representations of dwellings in the cliff drawings of Yakutia 15. Small Neolithic tools from Kullaty 16. Small stone tools from Kullaty 17. Blanks and striker from Kullaty 18. Bone and antler artifacts from Kullaty 19. Neolithic representations of elks zo. The inscription cliff of Suruktaakh-khaya on the Markha River 21. Stone, bone, and wooden objects from the place of sacrifice at the cliff of Suruktaakh-khaya 22. Figures of wounded animals 23. Representations of animals in snares and traps 24. Stone tools from the lower layer of the Uolba site 25. Neolithic finds on the lower Lena at Zhigansk 26. General view of the workshop site, Khayyrgas 27. General view of the site of a Neolithic settlement on the Amguema River 28. Stone artifacts from the Neolithic campsite on the Amguema River and from the Kolyma River 29. Stone artifacts from Uolba compared with Karelian and Scandinavian artifacts

30. Bronze Age ornaments 31. Bronze Age burial on Bugachan River 32. Objects from a Bronze Age burial at Kullaty River 33. Anthropomorphic figurines 34. Arrowheads from a Bronze Age burial on the Kullaty River 35. Objects from settlements and burials of the Early Bronze Age period 36. Bronze artifacts of Yakutia and China 37. Fragments of Bronze Age vessels. Vicinity of Yakutsk 38. Cliff drawing from Toyon-Aryy 39. Bronze Age representations of animals 40. Cliff drawings at the village of Sinskoye, Yakutia 41. Drawing on the cliff of Suruktaakh-khaya 42. Bronze representation of a shaman-ancestor, Ilim River 43. Cliff drawing in red ochre, Scandinavia 44. Cliff drawing in red ochre, Suruktaakh-khaya on the Markha River 45. Bronze vessels of the Scythian period and a Yakut choron 46. Bronze sword from Lake Andreyevskoye 47. Bronze Age spearheads 48. Yakutian vessels compared with ancient Chinese ones 49. Bronze celts from China and eastern Siberia 50. Iron swords of the Scythian period 51. Objects from the slab graves on Mankhay Mountain 52. Finds on Yuyuke River 53. Finds in Mukhtuya and Sikteekh 54. Early Iron age pottery from Sikteekh on the lower Lena 55. Cliff drawings on the middle Lena, Chasovnya cliff, Toyon-Ary 56. Representations of lions on saddles and a belt 57. Hitching-post (serge) of the Yakuts of the Sottinsk nasleg 58. Old Yakut equipment 59. Yakut woman in old-fashioned sangyyakh with wings on the back (after Maak) 6o. Yakut woman in the 18th-century costume (after Georgi) 61. The world-tree Aal luuk mas (from the drawing of I. V. Popov, Tattinsk rayon) 62. Tattooed Yakuts, a girl and a young man (after Gmelin) 63. Traditional Yakut costumes of the 18th century 64. Old Yakut burial in Olekminsk 65. Figures of horsemen with banners 66. Kurykan cliff drawing at Kurtukhay 67. Kurykan cliff drawing at Mankhay 68. A Kurykan cliff drawing at Shishkino 69. Chinese drawing depicting a Kurykan (after Pozdneyev) 70. Figures of horses with manes in the shape of teeth 71. Native of the Dubo tribe. A Chinese drawing (after Pozdneyev) 72. Old-fashioned Yakut hats and horse tassel compared with pictures of hats and tassels on the cliff drawings 73. Runic inscriptions of the upper Lena 74. Finds in the cliff burial at Vorobyevo village

75. Ground plan of an old kholomo, locality of Zelenoye 76. Ground plan of one of the small houses in the vicinity of Zelenoye, below Sangar-khaya Objects from the "small houses" 77. 78. Sample of steppe decoration ("ram's horn") 79. Finds from the kyrgys-ötökh type of dwelling 80. Arangas (aboveground burial of reindeer herder). Bulun 81. Ancient Yakut cliff drawings compared with Altayan drawings 82. Yakuts in old-fashioned clothing at an ysyakh. From a painting by M. M. Nosov o 83. Map of the world according to the olonkho "Duguya Bege" (after S. I. Bob) 84. Summary table of achaeological relics in Yakutia MAPS i. Distribution of Paleolithic settlements in eastern Siberia 2. Outline map of the distribution of Neolithic sites in Yakutia 3. Bronze Age finds in Yakutia 4. Schematic map of the settlement of the Yakuts and Tygyn's campaigns before the arrival of the Russians, according to historical traditions of the Yakuts of the former Yakutsk, Vilyuy, Verkhoyansk, and Kolyma okrugs o Made by S. I. Bolo and I. D. of Yakutsk oblast. Collected by S. I. Bob. Novgorodov in 1943-44

Author's Foreword to the English Edition

The first edition of the work "The Past of Yakutia Prior to its Incorporation into the Russian State" was published in the city of Yakutsk in 195o as the initial volume of a projected three-volume work entitled "The History of Yakutia." The second edition was published in Leningrad in 1955. The book is based on archaeological field investigations (jointly carried out in the Lena River valley by my wife, Vera Dmitriyevna Zaporozhskaya, and myself) on literary sources, as well as on museum collections pertinent to the ethnography of Yakutia. The first archaeological surveys and excavations were done by me during the period 1925-3o in the upper reaches of the Lena River valley. During 1939-44 the investigations were continued in the middle and lower reaches of the Lena under the joint auspices of the Yakut Institute of Language, Literature, and History, and the N. Ya. Marr Institute for the History of Material Culture attached to the Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R. (now the Institute of Archaeology of the Academy of Sciences). These investigations included the part of Yakutia reaching from the confluence of the Vitim and Lena to the mouth of the Lena. Later, in 1945 and 1946, under the auspices of the Institute for the History of Material Culture and the Arctic Institute of the Glaysevmorputi* archaeological works were accomplished in the Kolyma River valley, the Sea of Okhotsk coast, the mouth of the Khatanga, and in the vicinity of Cape Chelyushkin (Faddeya Islands and Simsa Bay). The work was carried out under rather difficult conditions, particularly during the war and the period immediately following it. A simple fisherman's boat and the help of three or four co-workers were used. Nonetheless, in conducting these investigations in the empty regions of the North where previously no systematic surveys (not to mention excavations) had been made, we were, to express it figuratively, uncovering the untouched layers of the history of northern peoples. Thus we were able to characterize the principal cultures and cultural-historical stages of the early population settled there prior to the arrival of the predecessors of • Glavnoye upravleniye Severnogo morskogo puti (The Chief Administration of the Northern Sea Route).

AUTHOR'S FOREWORD

the Yakuts, and their development, on the soil of Yakutia, of cattlebreeding, which had its origins in the south. Naturally enough, since the appearance of the second edition of this work in 1955, new data has been gathered, presenting the investigators with new problems. In part these pertain to the problem of the origin of the Yakut people and their culture. The history of the composition of the Yakut nationality and its culture have long attracted the attention of various specialists—historians, linguists, ethnographers, and physical anthropologists. As is apparent from the presentations in the book, I decidedly attach myself to the traditional point of view according to which the nucleus of the Yakut nationality and its culture was formed "in the south." However, later in time the influence of the northern aborigines also had its effect. As regards the immediate southern ancestors of the Yakuts, these were, in my opinion (shared by a number of other students), the ancient Kurykans, the Ku-li-kang of the Chinese chronicles. The finding of definite Turkic elements in the language of the Buryats testifies not only to the long-lasting proximity and contacts of Buryat ancestors with those of the Yakuts but also to the absorption, by the latter, of some of the ancient Turkic (Uygur)-speaking population of the Cis-Baykal.' A new, important addendum to the outline of the life of the Kurykans which is described in this work is furnished by the results of recent investigations on the Angara undertaken in connection with the construction of the Bratsk hydroelectric station. Near an old Russian settlement, Balagansk, at the mouth of the Unga River, we discovered and excavated two medieval sites. One of these, a fortified hillsite on Ulan-Bor, yielded a typically Kurykan-Turk inventory of the 7th-8th centuries A.D., including the characteristic ceramics and also an earring with a pendant. The second site, in the immediate vicinity of the fortified hillsite, but on a lower terrace, belonged to cattle-breeders and farmers of Middle Asian provenience—the ancient Sogdians. To them also belonged the burial ground, uphill, in which there were found human remains with skulls similar to those of the present-day Tadzhiks and to those of the medieval Sogdians. In the culture-yielding stratum of the lower site there were found typically Middle Asian, Sogdian lamps (chiraga), both clay and iron ones. Also found were glass fragments of vessels manufactured in Middle Asia, most likely in Samarkand, and with them a chalcedony seal with intaglio—an image of the winged bull Gopat-Shakh, the deity of Achaemenidian Persia? In two works, Shishkinskiye pisanitsy (The Shishkino Inscriptions), Irkutsk, 1959, and Lenskiye pisanitsy (Lena Inscriptions), Leningrad, 1959, the art of the Kurykans, their cliff drawing, and their culture in general was more fully characterized than previously.* Further investigations by S. A. Fedoseyeva and Yu. A. Mochanov have resulted in new data on the very early cultures and cultural-historical stages of the Lena region. These young people, working in a propitious setting supported by the Yakutsk Branch of the Academy of Sciences of • [Both works are A. P. Okladnikov's. Editor, A.I.N.A.]

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the U.S.S.R. (within the Siberian Division of the Academy), energetically carried out extensive excavations in regions not included in my own investigations: namely, the valleys of two large tributaries of the Lena—the Vilyuy and the Aldan. Their works not only widened the territorial extent of hitherto available sources on the early history of the tribes of Yakutia, but they also added to our understanding of the development of their cultures. At the same time, serious archaeological works in the North, the Chukchi and Kamchatka peninsulas, were undertaken by N. N. Dikov, D. A. Sergeyev, R. S. Vasilevski, and others. Let us dwell briefly on the results of these new investigations insofar as they relate to those parts of the Vilyuy and Aldan that are in Yakutia proper. On the Vilyuy, extensive works were undertaken by Fedoseyeva in the area of the construction of the Vilyuy hydroelectric station as well as in adjacent regions. Over the period of five years, exploratory surveys were made in the valleys of the Vilyuy, Chona, Chirkuo, and Akhataranda [Akhtaranda]. A number of sites was also excavated. Among them, at the settlement of Tuoy-khaya, one thousand square meters were excavated. At Tumul, it was three thousand and twenty square meters, and at the workshop site of Ust-Chirkuo, eight hundred and sixty square meters. At Tuoy-khaya the Neolithic burial ground was also excavated, and it yielded interesting grave furnishings and osseous remains. At the site Chona I and at a detached part of the settlement Tuoykhaya, a complex of finds came to light which Fedoseyeva assigns to the Early Neolithic. This complex is characterized by stone artifacts which typologically are close to those of the Isakovo period of the Cis-Baykal. It includes ground trapezoid adzes, ground knives of slate, and triangular arrowheads with an asymmetric notch in the base. Ceramics are represented by vessels of paraboloid shape with the outer surface covered with relief stampings of netting. Fedoseyeva includes in this complex the socalled "wedge-like cores" (or "core-scrapers," as Professor B. E. Petrie had first classified them). She assigns particular significance to them for the dating of the "Early Neolithic" of the Vilyuy. She opines that this type of core is a legacy of a Mesolithic culture of Siberia which "almost coincides with the territory of the northern Asiatic province of the Upper Paleolithic culture as determined by S. N. Zamyatnin." Additionally, she is of the opinion that the Mesolithic culture of Alaska, represented by wedge-shaped cores uncovered on the University of Alaska campus,3 is close to the Asiatic ones. With the wedge-shaped cores were also found microbladed insets trimmed with pressure flaking. Included were coreand flake-gravers; of the latter [there were] both angular and lateral ones. Arrowheads were made from knife-like blades. Their closest analogues are to be found among grave inventories of the Khin period of the CisBaykal. Basing her conclusions on these analogues, Fedoseyeva dates the Early Neolithic on the Vilyuy to the fourth, and perhaps the fifth millennium B.c. At any rate, during the Neolithic the upper Vilyuy was the northernmost region of the Isakovo cultural realm. The art and religious orientation of the Vilyuy population of that [Neolithic] period is characterized by a sculptured likeness of an elk, xxv

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from the site of Tuoy-khaya. The figure of the elk was prepared by pressure flaking a chip of flinty slate, and in treatment is very close to some of the schematic representations of elks from Kameniye ostrova [Stony Islands] on the Angara. (The islands are now inundated by the waters of the Bratsk reservoir of the Angara Valley.) Fedoseyeva writes that the primitive hunter, having made a representation of the elk and having performed magical rites over it, strove for a successful hunt and the multiplication of this animal, so important to the economy. The next stage in the development of the Neolithic on the Vilyuy is represented by the burial ground of Tuoy-khaya and a number of other settlements, such as Tumul, Mas-aryy, Markhaya, Labyyr, and UlakhanEdzhek. In them there appear, together with the old types of stone artifacts, new ones: distinctive lobed axes, subrectangular adzes similar to the Serovo ones, multi-faceted polyhedral gravers prepared from prismatic cores, three-sided arrowheads similar in cross-section to a triangular file, arrowheads in the shape of elongated triangles with the surfaces worked diagonally with pressure flaking. In the Tuoy-khaya burial mound were found splendid [composite] bone daggers with flint sideblades set fast in the grooves. Together with the old Isakovo-Serovo types of vessels with imprints of netting on their surfaces, there appear new types with their surfaces covered with strokes and impressions made with a ribbed paddle. A new mode of ornamentation expresses itself in pea-like nodules pushed with a stick above the general surface from inside the vessel. Such nodules are found in two or three horizontal belts below the rim of the vessel. Contrary to the fishing tribes in the Cis-Baykal, their contemporaries on the Vilyuy supported themselves by hunting. An interesting detail of the life of these people is the ritual interment of a dog, found within the burial ground of Tuoy-khaya. The trunk of the dog had been cremated, but the skull had been buried separately, accompanied by stone arrowheads and red ochre. Human burials at Tuoy-khaya were also ochred, but the grave inventories were relatively poor. Even though it lacks some of the stone artifacts typical of the Serovo inventories in the Cis-Baykal, the developed Neolithic of the Vilyuy is, all in all, close to it. Yet there are local traits: lobed adzes shaped not by grinding but knapping, and stone arrowheads in the shape of a threesided file (the Uolba type). Fedoseyeva believes that the Isakovo ethnic grouping of the fourth millennium B.C. breaks up into several local groupings with the approach of the third millennium. One of these was composed of the tribes of the lower Angara and Ilim rivers. A second group, the Cis-Baykal one in the proper sense of the term, occupied the upper Angara and Lena valleys. The third was the upper Vilyuy group. According to Debets, who examined the skulls from Tuoy-khaya, in physical type the developed Neolithic population of the upper Vilyuy was analogous to the Khatanga type which today is characteristic of the Tungus (Evenkis) of the Yenisey Basin. Fedoseyeva dates the workshop site at Ust-Chirkuo and several others to the Late Neolithic. At this time the old technique of making [and xxvi

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ornamenting] clay vessels with the help of netting is displaced by pounding [the surface] with a ribbed paddle. Subtriangular arrowheads with a straight base replace the earlier type with a notched haft. New types of stone tools appear: sharp-butted axes with almond-shaped crosssections, heavy oval-shaped knives finished with pressure retouch on both sides. Comb impressions together with horizontally oriented troughs and fillets appear on the surfaces of ceramics. Rarely is pseudo-textile (checkerboard) ornamentation encountered. The overwhelming majority of the stone tools and clay vessels of the upper Vilyuy Neolithic shows a concurrence with the Glazkovo finds of the Cis-Baykal, which provides a basis to date the former to the second millennium B.C. Also, judging by the fact that pseudo-textile ornamentation during the Neolithic was characteristic of the lower Lena, Fedoseyeva is of the opinion that it was from this area that this practice spread to the Vilyuy as well as to other regions of eastern Siberia. Of special interest are some artifacts which, according to Fedoseyeva, belong to the Bronze Age of the Vilyuy Valley. Settlements of this period are represented by the sites Ust-Chona II and Tuoy-khaya. The artifacts are best preserved in a small area of the northern half of Tuoykhaya. The ceramics of this period were characterized by vessels with concave necks, everted rims, and rounded bodies. The vessels were ornamented with applique fillets segmented by oblique incisions. Together with flint arrowheads, scrapers, and knife-like blades of former types, there appear hewing tools roughly made from flinty river pebbles—witnesses to the degradation of stone-working. Ceramic caldrons, used for smelting and pouring metal into forms, point to the local practice of metallurgy. Such caldrons were found in Yakutsk, near the Experimental Farm Station in Pokrovsk, and in the upper layer of the Kullaty site. Generally these antiquities may be dated to the end of the second or the beginning of the first millennium B.C. Judging from the established continuity in the shape and technique of manufacture of tools and clay vessels, the population of the upper Vilyuy Valley during the Bronze Age expresses a continuation of the Neolithic population and is heir to its culture. The Early Iron Age of the upper Vilyuy is almost fully analogous with that of the middle Lena as represented by my finds at Mukhtu and Staryy Siktyakh. Stone tools (crude hewing tools prepared from flinty pebbles) are still found, but the grinding of stone and the technique of separating thin blades from prismatic cores disappear. There is no pressure retouching. Ceramics are represented by round-bottomed vessels (with the bottom slightly flattened) with an everted rim and constricted neck. The vessels are ornamented with narrow applique fillets girdling the vessel in several parallel belts. While, during the Bronze Age these fillets had a triangular cross-section, now they have a trapezoidal one. Iron artifacts are represented only by flat, triangular arrowheads. The art and beliefs of the Iron Age population of the upper Vilyuy are expressed with a representation of a bear carved from bone. It was found at Tumul and is quite schematic xxvii

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and rather than resembling the earlier realistic representations, it is closer to the later, ethnographic ones of the 18th and i9th centuries. Thus, excavations on the upper Vilyuy confirm that here, uninterruptedly over the centuries and millennia, there existed a continuum in culture and, basically, in population. Fedoseyeva thinks that that population was ancestral to the present-day Yenisey Tungus (Evenkis). Her basis for this statement is as follows. At the time of the arrival of the Russians, there lived on the upper Vilyuy the Dogochagir, Norilets, Kondogir, and Oblinets Tungus. They led the same type of life as did the tribes of the upper Vilyuy during the first millennium A.D.—they were nomads, hunters, and fishermen. They lived in conical structures covered with deerskins or birch bark. They made iron artifacts, both for the hunt and for use as arms. For the working of hides they used crudely made stone scrapers. They kept dogs for the hunt. And, importantly, the only skull from the Neolithic burial at Tuoy-khaya represents the present-day Tungus, belonging, in the classification of G. F. Debets, to the Katanga Mongoloid group. This statement in general corresponds to a hypothesis, based on ethnographic and linguistic data, and voiced by me and supported by G. M. Vasilevich; that is, a hypothesis that the regions in which the Tungus tribes and their culture were formed were located in the taiga adjacent to the Cis-Baykal. The early population of the middle Vilyuy was in contact with the Paleo-Asiatic tribes living to the east of them, most likely the Yukagirs. These contacts, at first episodic, strengthened during the Bronze Age. Fedoseyeva writes: "Apparently, these were promoted by the effect of a push toward the middle Lena by an Evenki population, related to that of the upper Vilyuy, from regions to the south from whence they were being pressed by Turkic and Mongolic peoples."' In the Aldan River valley important works were conducted also by S. A. Fedoseyeva and by Yu. A. Mochanov. Results of these investigations were reported in articles written by Mochanov and in the abstract of his dissertation. In his articles, among other things, Mochanov considers the problems of the Paleolithic in the Aldan Valley. These are of penetrating interest to investigators of the early prehistory of northern Asia. During the past few years remains of the early Upper Paleolithic were found in the northern Urals beyond the Arctic Circle." Of particular interest are remains which are analogous to the early, ones of the Kostenki-Streletkaya culture on the Don River. Thus the new discoveries in the Urals point out that the European North was occupied by man unexpectedly early, already in the beginning of the Upper Paleolithic. It is in this connection that the new finds of Mochanov at Ikhin on the Aldan are important. At Ikhin, in the alluvium of the 18-m river terrace lay remains of typical Upper Pleistocene fauna: bones of the bison and gopher. This site is located downstream from the mouth of the Amga, at almost 63° N.; that is, considerably further north than hitherto described Paleolithic settlements of Yakutia. Mochanov writes: "Alas, this site, most likely a briefly occupied hunting camp, did not yield sufficient archaeological material to deduce much

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about the culture of the people who left it. At the present, it is important as a witness to the fact that the valley of the Aldan was already settled toward the end of the Upper Pleistocene." Of great importance for the periodization of Stone Age cultures in Yakutia is the fact that there are, in the valley of the Aldan, multilayered sites associated with the phase of alluvial deposits which built up the [now] high floodplain terrace of the river. Many such sites were found earlier in analogous conditions in the valley of the lower Lena, at the locality of Staryy Siktyakh. However, the spectrum of the cultureyielding strata of the Aldan sites was wider. At a number of points cultural remains were uncovered which were associated with the lower horizons of the alluvial deposits—the sites of Ust-Timpton, Ust-Sumnagin, and Belkachi I. In other cases, they were associated with the silty and sandy loams mantling the terraces above the floodplain (the sites of Ust-Sumnagin III, Bilir, and Ust-Mil). The fauna of the sites is typical of forested country and has no reference to that of the Upper Pleistocene. It is represented by the bones of the elk, bear, and reindeer. These are usual for this region. According to Mochanov, the stone inventory is typically represented by both prismatic and wedge-shaped cores. The latter are often called "core scrapers" in Siberian archaeological literature. There are the regularly worked knifelike blades, and small artifacts are represented by punches, gravers, endscrapers (including scrapers with small lobes next to the cutting edge). The larger implements are not made from flinty materials like the small ones, but from diabase and quartzite. Here belong the "cleavers," large scrapers, choppers, and adzes made from large river pebbles, either whole or split down the middle. Smoothed sandstone flagstones are also found, "on which, to all appearances, were worked bone implements," since "not one of the stone artifacts showed any traces of grinding." The finds included pebble net sinkers. The sites characterized above are the remains of seasonal camps of hunters and fishermen. "The people who dwelt in these places occupied surface huts or tents only. With these are associated hearths constructed of river pebbles, and most of the tools, weapons, and bones of animals and fishes were found around the hearths."' Mochanov assigns these sites to the Late [Upper] Paleolithic, since these articles are found in Early Holocene deposits and do not contain ceramics. However, by the same token they could be called Early [Upper Paleolithic or "pre-ceramic" Neolithic. At any rate, we do not find in them artifacts that are typical of the Late Paleolithic or of the Mesolithic of Siberia, such as the "Siberian scrapers,"* choppers (these are not illustrated by Mochanov), as well as other objects. All in all, these represent an impoverished and "primitivized" Neolithic collection of artifacts, and it thus is impossible to accept the term "Holocene Paleolithic" which Mochanov proposes for it. And it is even more difficult to agree with the identification of these [material] complexes with those of such sites as Sirataki, Tatikawa, and Arayya in Japan, and the Upper Cave at Chouk'outien and T'aiyüan in northern • [That is, unusually large hand scrapers. Editor, A.I N.A.]

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China. Also, the date of 8000 B.c. remains conditional. Even more premature are the sweeping generalizations concerning the meaning of these finds in the prehistory of neighboring regions. Reference is, first of all, to his criticism of Nelson's hypothesis about connectives between finds in Alaska and the Gobi being proof that the peopling of Alaska during the Stone Age took place from Mongolia through the Far East.* Mochanov does not present convincing evidence that the primitive "pebble" adzes from the Aldan can be compared to those from the Amur, or that the latter derived from the Aldan. Yet, if the Early Holocene origin of a pre-ceramic culture on the Aldan could be substantiated, this in itself would be of great interest. (Incidentally, the hypothetical date of 8000 B.C. takes us only to the Middle Holocene, not to the Early.) According to Mochanov, the Stone Age stratigraphy in the Aldan Valley is best represented by the multi-layered site Belkachi I8 In this site there are strata with finds which belong to the so-called "Holocene Paleolithic" as well as later ones belonging to the Neolithic in the full sense of the term. The site is located on the i4-m terrace, the elevated floodplain on the left bank of the Aldan, some 13 km south of the mouth of the river Ulakhan-Elge, within the territory of the present-day village of Belkachi. The thickness of the alluvial deposits of the terrace may be divided into three "bands" [horizons]. The lower two were formed by stream deposits—the lowest is a pebble-bed accumulated during the Upper Pleistocene; above it is a band of clay and sand, also of Upper Pleistocene derivation. The third band, composed of yellowish and lightgray silts and sands, is intercalated with silts of the type just mentioned, but also contains vegetal humus, this testifying to the existence of buried soil horizons. Separate cultural remains, represented by flinty "diabase" artifacts, were found at the depth of about 4 m, but the cultural layers yielding most are at the depth of 3.o-3.2 m from the surface. Mochanov recognizes eleven such layers. All are separated by "sterile inter-layers." Apparently the finds are associated with buried soil horizons. At depths greater than t m, the layers were frozen. Mochanov assigns the lowest four layers (xi to viii) to the beginning of the Holocene. There is a radiocarbon date of 6720±50 B.P.; that is, 477o B.C. (LE-65o).1. Mochanov conditionally dates the eleventh layer to the seventh millennium B.C. From Layer xi to viii there was no pottery. • [That is, the Soviet Far East, or more properly northeastern Asia. Editor, A.I.N.A.] t [Since writing this preface to the English-language edition, Professor Okladnikov has sent me additional radiocarbon dates for the site of Belkachi I. All samples have been processed by the Leningrad laboratory (LE). Here, then, is the complete set: LE-698. Layer Xa; depth 3.1 m 6750±70 B.P. 4800 B.C. LE-65o. Laycr X; depth 3.0 m 6720±50 B.P. 477o B.C. LE-697. Layer IX; depth 2.4 m 6250±60 B.P. 4300 B.C. LE-678. Layer VIII; depth 1.8 m 5900±70 B.P. 395 0 B.C. LE-676. Layer VII; depth 1.2 m 5970±70 B.P. 4020 B.C. LE-656. Layer VI; depth t.t m 5270±70 B.P. 3320 B.C. LE-666. Less than 1.o m 2930±5o B.P. 980 B.C. Editor, A.I.N.A.]

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Arrowheads, gravers, side-blades, punches, points, blades with obliquely cut edges, and knives were made of laminae. Large, roughly prepared tools were made from quarzite and diabase pebbles. As one progresses upward in these layers, the number of artifacts made from miniature blades diminishes, and the dimensions of the cores increase. Two layers, the seventh and sixth, belong to the Early Neolithic, an already fully developed Neolithic. Pottery is represented by fragments of vessels with imprints of netting; that is, analogous to that of the Isakovo and Serovo periods of the Cis-Baykal. Some of the vessels have a series of perforations below the rim, circling its circumference. Others (from Layer VI) are encircled by one or two rings of applique fillets. In the stone inventory we find bilaterally retouched artifacts, among them arrowheads in the shape of a three-sided file (triangular in cross-section), in the shape of [freshly struck] blades [only] lightly worked at the edges, and also almond-shaped and leaf-shaped arrowheads made from laminae. Ground adzes, of rectangular shape, are also present. Mochanov assigns Layers V and IV to the "Middle Neolithic." These layers are at the depth of from 62 cm to 82 cm. Net-impressed pottery is replaced with vessels which have impressions made with a paddle wrapped with cord. In the stone inventory, new forms are found: "chiselscrapers" made from chips, pointed lamellae with a notched cutting edge, transversally located,* flaked adzes with lobes and ground, shouldered ones, fiddle-shaped small hoes, and triangular arrowheads with an asymmetric barb. In Layer III, at the depth of from 44 cm to 58 cm, there were found sherds covered on the outside with imprints of a paddle into which checkered and rhomboid designs had been incised. The clay used for the manufacture of the vessels shows an admixture of animal hairs and needles of conifers. The stone inventory remains the same as in the "Middle Neolithic" except that the percentage of laminae and artifacts made from them diminishes to only 26.53 percent of the total number of [stone] artifacts. Small triangular and trapezoidal end-scrapers made from chips are common. Mochanov proposes a general chronological classification for the Stone Age of Yakutia (that is, the middle Lena Valley and those of the Aldan and Vilyuy) based on the stratigraphy of the Belkachi site. For the "Holocene Paleolithic" he suggests the term "Sumnagin Culture" after the finds at the site Sumnagin I. He is of the opinion that this culture has local Pleistocene sources. To it are tied the widespread blade and graver techniques of northeastern Asia. Gradually spreading to the northeast, these techniques reach Alaska during the terminal stages of development, toward the end of the fifth millennium B.C. In Alaska it encounters the Paleo-Indian wave emanating from the High Prairies and Great Basin. "The interaction of these two cultural waves in the end results in a unique * [This artifact and many of those described earlier and subsequently are illustrated in a recently published article. See, Mochanov, Yu. A.. Belkachinskaya neoliticheskaya kultura na Aldane (The Belkachi Neolithic culture on the Aldan River). Sovetskaya arkheologiya. No. 4 (5 967), PP. 564-77. Editor, A.t.N.A.]

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culture which, in several local variants, spreads across North America from Bering Strait to Greenland." Mochanov names the [local] "Early Neolithic" the Syalakh culture, after a settlement site discovered by Okladnikov. At this time, the bow and arrow appear. Fishing becomes established as a major segment of the economy. Bilateral working of the surfaces of stone artifacts is applied for the first time, as is the grinding of stone. Belkachi culture is the name suggested for the "Middle Neolithic." At this time one of the great accomplishments of northern Asiatic technique, the making of pottery by pounding [slabs of clay together], comes into its own. As before, the vessels are egg-shaped, with imprints of corded paddles and ornamented with horizontal or zig-zag lines applied with a denticulated stamp. According to Mochanov, the people of the Belkachi culture, having occupied very large areas, came into contact with various tribes and strongly influenced the latter's culture. He writes that the spread of the Belkachi culture in the northeasterly direction, toward Bering Strait, "supports the proposition that it could have been instrumental in the appearance in North America, of vessels covered with cord imprints as in the Firth River Cord-marked horizon of the site Engigstciak [excavated by MacNeish]. The Late Neolithic of Yakutia is described by Mochanov as the Ymyyakhtakh culture (after a site, downriver from Yakutsk, investigated by Okladnikov). As was pointed out above, the characteristic traits of this culture included ceramics with pseudo-textile or checkered imprints (Mochanov calls them "waffled"). The stone work contains triangular arrowheads retouched on both sides and many-faceted gravers with corelike retouched handles. Mochanov remarks: "There is widespread opinion in the literature that the appearance in the Norton Bay Complex of waffled ceramics about goo s.c. is tied to the Late Neolithic waffled ceramics of Yakutia." Mochanov does not agree with this opinion since, he claims, between the Ymyyakhtakh waffled ceramics and the more recent Alaska ones there must have been a transitional ceramic complex which has not yet come to light. Concerning the age of the Late Neolithic of Yakutia, Mochanov is in agreement with Okladnikov, who, on the basis of Cis-Baykal Glazkovo Period analogues, dates it to the second millennium B.C. Unfortunately, in Mochanov's published works, the interesting stratigraphic scheme described above is not supported by a detailed analysis of the material culture and by statistical data which could convince us of regularity of combinations of various types of artifacts. The number of artifacts which represents a particular type of tool remains unknown, while it is precisely the quantitative index, and not a simple comparison of percentages, which has the determining value in this case. Besides, there is no certainty that the "choppers" and "Paleolithic scrapers" mentioned in Mochanov's articles are exactly the same in shape as those artifacts for which these terms have become established in our [Soviet] literature. At least, the "handaxe" (illustrated by Mochanov) has nothing in common with the established handaxes. It is most likely

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an ordinary blank of which dozens are encountered in Neolithic sites. Thus, Mochanov's schema must be taken conditionally, on faith, and with stipulations. Also, one must approach with extreme caution Mochanov's propositions of solidly-based mutual Stone Age cultural relationships between Yakutia and Alaska and North America in general. These are nothing more than working hypotheses for which there is no factual basis. It is even difficult to agree with him when he overemphasizes the extent of influence of the culture of Yakutia on those of neighboring regions, including the valley of the Amur. This reflects an obvious enthusiasm for his Yakutian materials and a prejudice against materials from other regions. In any case, he is hardly right when he denies the existence of an indigenous Novopetrovsk blade culture on the middle Amur and attempts to deduce a "Macrolithic Culture" from Yakutia. However, he is apparently right when he writes that the earliest pottery of Yakutia was of the net-impressed, Isakovo-Serovo type. His conclusion that it is followed by [straw-] stroked pottery is very interesting. In this connection, one should point out that stroked pottery is characteristic of the burials of the rich Verkholensk cemetery on the Lena, which in age is close to the Serovo cemeteries of the Cis-Baykal. As I have written earlier, after the fully developed Neolithic of Yakutia, there indeed follows a new culture, represented by the Ymyyakhtakh site. I have dated it to the beginning of the local Bronze Age and correlated it with the Glazkovo remains on the Angara and upper Lena. Of no lesser meaning for the understanding of the historical processes which took place in Yakutia are the new investigations in the [Soviet] Far East (the Amur and Primorye*) and also in northeastern Asia—the Chukchi and Kamchatka peninsulas, the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk and Sakhalin Island, as well as the Kurile Archipelago. Such are, for instance, the excavations of ancient Eskimo cemeteries on the Chukchi Peninsula carried out by M. G. Levin, D. A. Sergeyev, N. N. Dikov, and S. A. Arutyunov;fi the investigation of early Koryak remains in the region of Magadan by R. S. Vasilevskiy; and the excavations of settlements and cemeteries on the middle Amur done by A. P. Derevyanko, N. I. Zabelina, and myself. Within the territory of the Primorye [Maritime Region] there were uncovered, for the first time, caves containing remains of Upper Pleistocene fauna and stone artifacts, among them cores of Levallois type. The excavations were done by N. D. Ovodov, N. K. Vereshchagin, E. G. Leshok, and myself. Materials from the Stone Age of Kamchatka were collected by N. N. Dikov. Among them were preceramic materials ("The Kamchatka Paleolithic") which represent something altogether unexpected and unusual.9 The early Kamchatka settlement at Ushki Lake, described in the • [Primorye, the Maritime Region, occupying the Ussuri Valley and the southern half of the Sikhote Alin Range. Editor, A.I.N.A.) t [Some of the reports of these excavations have been translated into English. See, Anthropology of the North: Translations from Russian Sources. No. 5, pp. 296.346. Editor, A.I.N.A.)

AUTHOR'S FOREWORD

works of Dikov, is a multi-layered site. The upper layers are Neolithic; below these are remains which Dikov dates to the Mesolithic. Even deeper are culture-yielding layers which he dates to the Paleolithic. Altogether there are eight layers. The three lowest layers, V to VIII, are characterized by a pollen complex which reflects a floral cover of a stone tundra; that is, one which refers to the Upper Pleistocene. Above these layers the composition of the pollen changes, indicating Holocene flora. Thus the transition between the Pleistocene and Holocene is represented in the fifth and sixth layers. The fifth layer yielded a radiocarbon date of 10,360±350 [B.P.]. Consequently, the lower strata at Ushki are older.1° N. N. Dikov, N. A. Shilo, and A. V. Lozhkinare are of the opinion that Layers VI and VII are "approximately 14,000-16,000 years old (and date to the late period of the Upper Paleolithic). This would be equal to the Magdalenian-Azilian periods in the schema of European geochronology." This makes the finds in the lower, "Paleolithic," layers of Ushki the more interesting. These include "wedge-shaped cores" (core scrapers), micro-blades, and scrapers (their type was not conveyed). Dikov correlates these finds with those of the Upper Paleolithic sites of eastern Siberia. Yet closer to them are objects of this type from Mesolithic (i.e., preceramic in the broad sense of the word) sites in the Primorye [Maritime Region] and on the Japanese Islands. A second group of stone artifacts are bilaterally-worked hafted arrowheads from Layer VIII, and elongated leaf-shaped ones from Layers V and VI. Dikov relates them to North American Lerma-like points of the Early Cordilleran Complex of the Pacific Northwest. Of extraordinary interest is the find of a large collection of more than Boo perforated soapstone beads and other objects neatly aligned in a specially dug pit below layers five and six. The pit was sprinkled with bright-red ochre. Dikov thinks that this represents the remains of a burial, with the skeleton once associated with it having completely disintegrated. This is plausible. One cannot exclude the possibility that there was a skeleton, most likely interred in a sitting position. But there is also another explanation. I have come across it at Kuba-Sengir in Turkmenistan, on the Krasnovodsk Peninsula. In a Late Mesolithic pit, lined with ochre, there lay a number of beads and shells, some of them [once] strung. Here were also the flint tools used for the manufacture of such beads. Dikov writes that he also found odd tools of albite in the pit containing the beads—graver-like points, no doubt used for the perforation of the beads. In connection with the finding of the beads he writes further that "this ancient Kamchatka culture actively spread to America. The large number of beads, individual and strung, which had been preserved in the Ushki burial, represent typical Indian wampum, and reveal the deep Kamchatka and, in the final analysis, Asiatic roots of the age-old Indian custom of wearing similar adornments." Also, in his words, the Ushki arrowheads and the magical use of red ochre bear witness to these Asian-American contacts. The thought of connections between the beads of the Ushki site and the wampum of the American Indians is fully acceptable. Quite some time ago, I had mentioned that beads of the xxxiv

AUTHOR'S FOREWORD

wampum type, widely distributed in the Neolithic of the Cis-Baykal, were used in the same manner; that is, sewn on clothing." Not long ago, during the excavation of a Mesolithic settlement at the mouth of the Belaya River near Irkutsk, there were found perforated soapstone beads very similar to the Ushki ones. Also of interest is the fact that on the Amur, in the settlements of Mesolithic cast (at the railroad bridge in Khabarovsk and in the village of Venyukovo on the Ussuri), the most frequent among the stone artifacts are leaf-shaped, bilaterally retouched arrowheads which are accompanied by hewing tools made from large pebbles that in technique of preparation and shape are close to those of Hoabinh in Vietnam, and also by wedge-shaped cores (core scrapers) of the type found near Fairbanks, Alaska. In summary, more and more evidence is being accumulated that points to contacts between the early population of the American continent and that of northern Asia. And a new confirmation of these contacts is furnished by the finds in Yakutia and Kamchatka, which were described above. Pertinent to these contacts and of unusual interest are also the new finds on the middle Amur and in the valley of the Zeya (the sites on the Gromatukha River and at the village of Sergeyevka), where tools made from [large river] pebbles, bilaterally retouched leaf-shaped arrowheads, large core scrapers, and ceramics were found. Apparently, the technical and cultural tradition which was represented in the sites of the lower Amur and the Ussuri continued in the Neolithic of the middle Amur 12 The recent excavations of Neolithic settlements east of Lake Baykal, in Chita oblast, the Buryat A.S.S.R., and on the Amur (Gromatukha), are also interesting for the retracing of the contacts with other regions of the Neolithic population of Yakutia, and of tribes who settled this territory during the Bronze Age. Foremost, this interest is generated by those sites which yielded ceramics made from a paste, with admixtures of vegetal fibers and animal hairs. Such sites were the Shilka cave, those among the large lakes near Chita (for instance, Lake Igren and Lakc Kenon), and also the Yeravninskiye Lakes [farther to the west]. These new finds confirm the ties of Yakutia with the Trans-Baykal and also with the [Soviet] Far East, and, through it, with Alaska." For a deeper understanding of the ancient population of Yakutia and its cultures, the results of the new investigations in western as well as eastern Siberia, are also influential. Such are in part, the discovery of an original center of the Wooded Bronze in the Tom River Basin. This discovery makes it clear that Siberian cultures of the Bronze Age, including the [western] Siberian variant of the Seima culture and the Trans-Baykal culture of the slab-lined graves, had considerable influence in the formation of the early dynastic Yin-Shang culture of northern China. In the light of these facts it probably will become necessary to re-examine the problem of the origin of the unique celts of the taiga type. As indicated earlier, these new data only clarify and fill in the picture of Yakutia of the past, before its inclusion into the Russian state, as it xxxv

AUTHOR'S FOREWORD

was sketched in the 1955 edition of the work, and which in my opinion alone formed the basis for its translation and publication in English. It is indeed gratifying to view its publication as acknowledgement of a useful contribution of Soviet scholars to the study of the early history of northern Asia. I am particularly grateful to Henry Michael and the Arctic Institute of North America for their efforts expended in order to acquaint the English-reading scholars with the results of Soviet investigations in the archaeology, physical anthropology, and ethnography of northern Asia, in part through my works and those of my close associates, M. G. Levin and S. I. Rudenko. NOVOSIBIRSK, OCTOBER

1967

A. P.

Okladnikov

Notes and References for Author's Foreword to the English Edition

1 In this connection, the detailed linguistic investigation of the Polish scholar Stanislaw Kaluzinski on Mongolic elements in the Yakut language is of great interest. Cf. Stanislaw Kaluzinski, Mongolische Elemente in der Jakutischen Sprache. Warszawa, 1961. Other published works bearing on the history of the Yakuts that have come to my attention recently are: Gogolev, Z. V., Raskopki yakutskikh mogil XVII veka (Excavations of 17th century Yakut graves). Trudy Yakutskogo filsala Akadenrii Nauk SSSR, No. 1 (8), Yakutsk, 1958; Jochansen, U., Die Ornamentik der Jakuten. Hamburg, 1954. 2 A. P. Okladnikov, Novye dannye po istorii Pribaykala v tyurkskoye vremya; sogdiyskaya koloniya na r. Unge (New data for the history of the Cis-Baykay during the Türk period; a Sogdian colony on the Unga River). In Tyurkologicheskiye issledovaniya, MoscowLeningrad 1963, pp. 273-81. 3 Cf. Okladnikov, A. P., 1)alekoye proshloye Primorya (The remote past of the Maritime Region). Vladivostok, 1959, pp. 38-41. [Translated into English and published under the title "The Soviet Far East in antiquity: An archaeological and historical study of the Maritime Region of the U.S.S.R." Anthropology of the North: Translations from Russian Sources, No. 6. University of Toronto Press, 1965. Editor, A.I.N.A.] 4 Cf. Okladnikov, A. P., Petroglifi Angary (The Angara petroglyphs). Moscow-Leningrad, 1966, pp. 126-27, and Fig. 41.

Fedoseyeva, S. A., Drevniye kultury Verkhnego Vilynya (The ancient cultures of the upper Vilyuy). Author's abstract of dissertation. Novosibirsk, 1964; idem, Nakhodki neolita na reke Amge (Neolithic finds on the Amga River). Nauchnye soobshcheniya Yakutskogo filiala Sibirskogo otdeleniya AN SSSR, No. 2, Yakutsk, 196o; idem, Rezultaty pervoy arkheologicheskoy razvedki na Vilyuye (Results of the first archaeological reconnaissance on the Vilyuy). In the collection Doklady pervoy konferentsii molodykh spetsialistov: sektsiya gumanitarnykh narrk, Yakutsk, 196,. Fedoseyeva, S. E. and Larichev, V. E., Neolit Yakutii. Materialy po drevney istorii Sibiri. Drevnaya Sibir. (The Neolithic of Siberia. Materials for the early history of Siberia. Ancient Siberia.) Printer's dummy of the first volume of lstoriya Sibiri. Ulan-Ude, 1964, pp. 183-93. ibid., Larichev, V. E. and S. A. Fedoseyeva, Bronzovyy vek Yakutii (The Bronze Age of Yakutiya), pp. 327-35. °Such are, for instance, Medvezhya peshchera [Bear Cave] located near 62° N. See, Guslitser, B. I., Medvezhya peshchera v basseyne Verkhney Pechory (Medvezhya peshchera [Bear Cave] in the upper Pechora Basin). In Spelologiya i korstovedeniye, Moscow, 196o. Bader, O. N., Izucheniye ostatkov paleolita v uralskikh peshcherakh (The Study of Paleolithic remains in Uralian caves). Peshchery, No. 5 (6). Perm, 1965, pp. 183-88. 7 Mochanov, Yu. A., Paleolit Aldana. Predvaritelnoye soobshcheniye. (The Paleolithic of the Aldan [Plateau]. Preliminary report.) In Sbornik nauchnykh statey, No. 4, published by The Emelyan Yaroslayskiy Regional Museum of Yakutsk. Yakutsk, 1966, pp. 209-21; idem, Paleolit Aldana (The Paleolithic of the Aldan). Doklady i soobshcheniya arkheologov SSSR na VII mezhdunarodnom kongresse doistorikov i protoistorikov. Moscow, 1966.

NOTES TO AUTHOR'S FOREWORD

8 Mochanov, Yu. A., Mnogosloynaya stovyanka Belkachi 1 i periodizatsiya kamenogo veka Yakutii (The multi-layered site of Belkachi I and the periodization of the Stone Age of Yakutia). Author's abstract. Moscow, 1966. Idem, Ranniy neolit Aldana (The Early Neolithic of the Aldan). Sovetskaya arkheologiya, No. 2, 1967.

9 Dikov, N. N., Otkrytiye paleolita na Kamchatke i problema pervonachalnogo zaseleniya Ameriki (The discovery of Paleolithic materials on Kamchatka and the problem of the initial settling of America). Cf. Istoriya i kultura narodov Severa Dalnego Vostoka (The history and cultures of the peoples of the northern Far East). Trudy Severovostochnogo kompleksnogo nauchno-issledovatelskogo instituta Sibirskogo otdeleniya AN SSSR, No. 17, Moscow, 1967. Ibid., Shilo, N. A., N. N. Dikov, and A. V. Lozhkin, Perviye dannye po stratigrafii paleolita Kamchatki (The first data on the stratigraphy of the Kamchatka Paleolithic). 10 However, it should be kept in mind that when dealing with radiocarbon dates in areas of volcanic activity (to which both Kamchatka and the Japanese Islands with their many active volcanoes belong), there is the possibility of heightened radiation. And, as the findings of Soviet investigators (Sulerzhitskiy) have shown, this reflects in the radiocarbon dates: the age of some samples tends to be earlier. Some of the Japanese investigators are of the same opinion and object to the great antiquity assigned to the Neolithic of Japan on the basis of radiocarbon dates. 11 See, Okladnikov, A. P., Neolit i bronzovyy vek Pribaykalya (The Neolithic and Bronze Ages of the Cis-Baykal). MM, No. 18, pp. 275-76. 12 Okladnikov, A. P., Arkheologiya doliny r. Zei i Srednego Amura (The archaeology of the Zeya River valley and of the middle Amur). Sovetskaya arkheologiya, No.t (1966); Derevyanko, A. P., Noviye dannye po arkheologii Srednogo Amura (New data for the archaeology of the middle Amur). Iavestiya Sibirskogo otdeleniya AN SSSR. Seriya obshchestvennykh nark, No. 9, 1964. !dens, Novopetrovskaya kultura plastin na Srednem Amure (The Novopetrovsk Flake Culture of the middle Amur). Sovetskaya arkheologiya, No, 3, 1965. 18 See, Okladnikov, A. P., Shilkinskaya pershchera: Pamyatnik drevney kultury verkhovev Amura (The Shilka cave: Remains of an ancient culture on the upper Amur), MIA SSSR, No. 86, 1960, pp. 9-71. [Translated into English and published in Anthropology of the North; Translations from Russian Sources, No. 5, 1964, pp. 113-80. Editor, A.I.N,A.]

From the [Soviet] Editor

The history of the peoples of Yakutia falls into three periods. The first of these embraces the role of the northern tribes until their incorporation into the Russian state, when undifferentiated primitive-communal relations prevailed among the vast majority of the tribes of the North, who occupied themselves with hunting, fishing, or, at best, with reindeer-breeding. The only exceptions to this were the Yakuts, who, even before the arrival of their southern ancestors on the middle Lena, possessed elements of a more progressed social structure—a patriarchal-feudal system characteristic of the pastoral tribes in the steppes of southern Siberia and Middle and Central Asia.* However, even among the Yakuts, the ancient clan organization in its patriarchal form, characteristic of the highest stage of the primitive-communal system, was still functioning when the Russians arrived. The second period extends from the time of incorporation to the October Revolution. During this period there took place among the Yakut tribes, under the conditions of the centralized Russian feudal serf-owning state, at first (during the 17th and i8th centuries) an accelerated development of feudal class relations, then (and in the igth century) the initial development of capitalistic relations, penetrating in the course of time more and more deeply into the life of Yakut society, setting up and strengthening the capitalist system. The third period embraces the history of the peoples of Yakutia from the October Revolution to the present time. The first volume of the History of Yakutia considers the first period only; that is, the history of the northern tribes which inhabited the territory of the present Yakut Autonomous Republic from ancient times until the arrival of the Russians on the Lena, and the subsequent incorporation of these regions with the Russian state in the first half of the i7th century. * [Russian geographers differentiate Middle Asia (Srednyaya Aaiya) from Central Asia (Tsentralnaya Aziya) as follows: Middle Asia extends from the Caspian Sea eastward to the Chinese border and from the Irtysh—Aral Sea watershed southward to the Iranian and Afghanistan borders; Central Asia occupies the northwestern reaches of China and all of the Mongolian People's Republic. This is a similar differentiation as implied by the now obsolete terms of "Russian Turkestan" and "Chinese Turkestan." Editor, A.t.x.A.]

FROM THE [SOVIET] EDITOR

The present, second edition of the first volume of the History of Yakutia differs from the first edition in that the author, while preserving its scholarly and at the same time popular-scientific character, adduced and widely used the factual materials accumulated in the past four years and the results of new studies, both his own and those of other Soviet and foreign scientists. As before, the first volume of the History of Yakutia will pose certain debatable questions, in the interpretations of which the author maintains his own views. The most important of these is the question of Yakut social structure in the i6th and i7th centuries. As is well known, some researchers (S. A. Tokarev, 1965, for instance) propose that the development of Yakut society had reached the early slave-holding stage, that the ancestors of the Yakuts evolved from the matriarchal clan to class society within the present territory of Yakutia, and that therefore the past of the ancestors of the Yakuts before their arrival on the Lena was of no significance in relation to this process. Other authors (S. V. Bakhrushin, 1926, for instance) are of the opinion that feudal relations were already [at the time of their arrival] developing among the Yakuts. In A. P. Okladnikov's opinion [as expressed in the present work], the Yakuts in the past were, in one way or another, in contact with other steppe peoples of southern Siberia and Central Asia, [a contact] which was reflected in their social structure. In his words, the ancestors of the Yakuts, even at this time, knew social inequality and were involved in the process of developing a class structure among nomads who had developed along patriarchal-feudal lines. The social structure of the ancestors of the Yakuts, in his opinion, agrees with folkloristic data, and is characterized by those features which, according to Engels, were peculiar to the final phase of the development of the clan system. The specific historical conditions in which the ancestors of the Yakuts found themselves favored the development not of a slave-holding but of a feudal structure, which, however, already existed by virtue of the general backwardness of the Yakuts and the low level of development of the productive forces in the patriarchal clan integument. Hence, in particular, the new view of the events of the i6th and i7th centuries connected with the name of Tygyn. On the basis of folkloristic sources, Okladnikov sees in Tygyn not a feudal ruler and not a simple bandit chieftain, but a usurping tribal chief typical of the period of decay of the clan structure, who, however, did not succeed in reaching his goal, since his attempts were reactionary, and contradicted the interests of the people and the course of historical development. The appearance in 1949 of the first volume of the History of Yakutia as the first general work dedicated to the past of Yakutia before its incorporation into the Russian state in which this past was considered in many ways in a new light against a broad historical background, adducing a large amount of factual material, much of it fresh, entirely unknown, or insufficiently used, aroused great interest among our scientific public. The same attention was shown during the preparation of the second edition of this work. L. P. Potapov, A. A. Popov, and E. I. Ubryatova were valuable advisors to the author. xl

FROM THE [SOVIET] EDITOR

The critical remarks and counsels expressed, at the time of the appraisal of the book, in a meeting of the Division of History and Philosophy of the Academy of Sciences on 8 March 195o, and in a number of reviews and comments by Gogolev, Blokh, Boriskovskiy, Olkhon, Bernshtam, Chernetsov, Stepanov, and Tokarev have been considered and used in preparing the second edition.* The author removed some of the inaccurate statements present in the first edition; for example, those about "kinetic speech," the "magical" origin of pictographic writing, a special "epoch of definite image thinking," and also certain inexact formulations concerning the origin of the Yakut people. This second, expanded, and substantially revised edition of the first volume of the History of Yakutia significantly advances the study of the past of the peoples of the North and comprises a new contribution to the history of Yakutia. L. P. Potapov

• Z. Gogolev in Sots. Yakutiya, 5 September 1949; M. Blokh in Sots. Yakutiya, 27 May 195o; P. I. Boriskovskiy in Vestnik LGU, 1950, No. 2, 1 45-49; A. Olkhon in Sib. ogni, 1950, No. 3, 159-6o; A. N. Bernshtam in Sov. kniga, 1950, No. 5, 69-72; A. Olkhon in Vost: Sib. pravda, 16 March 195o; V. N. Chernetsov in SE, 1950, No. 3, 214-19; N. N. Stepanov in Voprosy istorii, 195o, No. 5, 134-39; S. A. Tokarev in VDI, 195r, No. 2, 550-55.

xli

Introduction

The history of the peoples of the North, that is, the past of that part of mankind which, over the course of millennia, has inhabited the bleak forested areas of the subarctic and the Arctic proper, early attracted the attention of investigators in the various specialties—ethnographers, archaeologists, historians and linguists—all those who are interested in the history of man's culture and his struggle with nature. The distant past of the northern tribes and peoples, which is the subject of this book, is of particularly great interest to science.* To the number of these formerly forgotten tribes belong the peoples of our North: Unangan-Aleuts, Karagass-Tofalars, Nentsy-Samoyeds, Even-Lamuts and Evenki-Tungus, Luorvetlany-Chukchis, NymylanyKoryaks, Sakhalars-Yakuts and other inhabitants of the northern taiga, wooded tundra and tundra as well as dwellers on the seacoasts and islands of the northern seas. As has been shown by the researches of Soviet scientists, historians, archaeologists, ethnographers, linguists, and physical anthropologists, who widely used the data accumulated by their predecessors and also collected vast new material, these tribes had their own history, and had undergone a course of development deeply interesting from a broad historical point of view. The northern tribes certainly lagged in many respects behind others inhabiting regions of the earth more favorable to man. Their productive forces remained for centuries and millennia on an extraordinarily low level—matched by the generally primitive character of their culture—and until the 19th and loth centuries the tribes retained survivals from the most remote past. They certainly could not become agriculturalists in their bleak environment, or pastoralists of the steppe type. They were ignorant of advanced forms of social structure and [of the concept] of the state; they founded no mighty empire, built no pyramids, had no true system of writing. The majority of the northern tribes in general did not develop beyond the limits of the primitive-communal system. Until quite recently, • [A passage of several paragraphs was omitted because its polemic contents do not pertain to or illuminate the significant materials of the book. Editor, A.I.N.A.] I

INTRODUCTION

they existed as communities of separate, isolated clans and tribes. Their history, as the Siberian historian P. A. Slovtsov expressed it, was actually "a history of melancholy lands ... without victories, without politics, a history which saw no great worlds around itself ... leaving behind instead of Ellora temples a few burial mounds or unread inscriptions on cliffs" (Slovtsov 1886: I, xxi). But from the above it does not follow that the northern tribes remained outside the world history of mankind, since in reality there can be no world history which is the history of only a few chosen or fortunate peoples, who, by force of special conditions, occupied a predominant place in the world. [...] Certainly, there was a multitude of most diverse survivals of the distant past among them. But survivals from ancient times do not exist only in the Far North or the far south. This is not important; what is important is that the variety of cultures and languages, economic systems and ways of life, even among the most backward Siberian tribes, could not have appeared suddenly or have been formed in a short period of time. By its very nature, the process of settlement of the raw northern reaches no doubt required a very long time, particularly under conditions of a primitive hunting and fishing economy at a low level of development of its productive forces. And so did the creation and development of specific cultures which, as original variants of a cultural-historical development, were cast into rather complete and definite forms. The development of the culture of the peoples of the north, of course, was full of various discoveries and inventions which consistently replaced each other. The development must have expressed itself in a number of separate phases and individual chronological links. If earlier there could exist a preconceived general idea about all northern tribes and cultures, without exception, as being "non-historical," "living fossils," it is now quite obvious that this idea does not correspond to reality. For example, some earlier investigators categorically denied the presence of a local bronze culture. Others supposed that the Iron Age in the northern taiga began very recently, not more than five or six hundred years ago. However, the facts are that, in the north, and particularly in Yakutia throughout the extent of the Lena Valley, a definite sequence of cultural historical stages took place, in the course of which new discoveries and inventions succeeded previous ones. In place of inefficient forms of economy, material culture, social structure, art, and belief, new and more progressive ones arose. This was basically the same sequence of Paleolithic, Neolithic, Bronze Age, and Iron Age as had taken place in more progressive countries in which conditions were more favorable to human life. As in more progressive parts of the world, the ancient tribes of the north, consistently developing and transforming their material culture, moved forward at the same time in the area of social relations: from early forms of clan relations to the fully developed matriclan, from matriclan to patriclan, and finally from primitive-communal, pre-class relations to class society. Just as consistently and irrepressibly, their intellectual culture developed, their world-view and art changed. 2

INTRODUCTION

Even as a special variant of general human cultural-historical development, the question of the historical course of these "Hyperboreans" must consequently enter into the realm of problems to be considered by a world history. Indeed, the history of the northern tribes is not limited to merely one form of cultural progress, to the development of social institutions, or to the history of their transformation, or even to their decline under worsening conditions. No less interesting from a historical point of view are such specific historical problems as the original settlement of the North, the origin and mutual relationships among the northern tribes, and, finally, their cultural and other contacts with populations of other parts of the earth. The most ancient monuments of human culture in the North are interesting in that they tell of a remarkable event in the distant history of mankind—of the spread of man from his points of origin to new northern places and of important successes which our ancestors achieved at that time in the struggle with nature. The Lena Paleolithic sites are presently the most northerly and at the same time the most easterly remains of the Upper Paleolithic on earth. Thus, they are witness to the settlement of Ice Age people farther to the north and east in Asia than could have been hitherto imagined. These Paleolithic remains reveal that, having penetrated into the Lena Valley and spread Io,000-15,000 years ago almost to the latitude of present-day Yakutsk, primitive hunters of mammoths, wild horses, and reindeer created, like the rest of their Asiatic contemporaries, their own original culture. In particular, they left behind, at the close of the Paleolithic, specimens of cliff inscriptions unique in all of northern Asia and eastern Europe. The historical process, of course, was not cut short or discontinued in later times. On the contrary, just as one would expect, it became more crowded with events, more varied in its forms and local expressions. From a historical point of view, the greatest value of the facts relating to the northern tribes consists precisely in their reflections of special phenomena which, in many respects, are peculiar and new to us, and in their unique local forms. For instance, there was a typical Neolithic culture, with ground hammers, pottery, bows and arrows, but with a different economic base from that of the Oka and Volga, with other types of tools, and with a markedly characteristic art. Or, there was a culture of the Bronze or Iron Age, but by no means the one so well known to us from the remains of steppe sites in the neighboring regions of southern Siberia and eastern Europe. Here it was something entirely different and in many respects profoundly unique and new. Art, social relations, and a world-view developed here at special tempos, in their own way, and clearly marked with the local taiga coloration. Thus the special world of the North's ancient cultures is gradually revealed to the investigator—a world which, for all the narrowness and isolation of its communities, is yet, in some measure, in definite cultural contact with the world surrounding it. For example, there were the contacts of the northern tribes with the populations of Mongolia and 3

INTRODUCTION

China, which started in the depths of the Stone Age, at a distant time when mankind was going through its childhood and the mammoth hunters first began to conquer the northern expanses. Of the contacts, the most influential were those with the culture of the Chinese people—an advanced one for east Asia at a time when the tribes of the Trans-Baykal and Yakutia were just crossing the boundary between the Stone and Bronze Ages, the epoch of the general use of metal. Even more clearly represented are the ancient contacts of the tribes of Yakutia with their nearest neighbors in the Old World, the ancestors of various tribes and peoples of the [present] Soviet Union. The contacts of the population of Siberia with the west, as will be shown later, also began in the Old Stone Age, when groups of primitive hunters arrived on the banks of the Angara and Lena. They left remains of their settlement on the Angara near the [present] Military Hospital in Irkutsk, at Malta, Buret, and at Chastinskaya on the Lena. These people most probably came from eastern Europe, from the great Russian plain, where on the banks of the Don and the Dnieper the culture of their close relatives, the people of the Aurignacian-Solutrean and early Magdalenian periods, was already flourishing at that time. The tribes of Yakutia also developed their culture in close contact with tribes of the rest of Siberia and of eastern Europe in the periods that followed—the Neolithic and the Bronze Ages. Finally, iron probably reached the Lena also from these places, through [the movements of] the Scythian and Saka [Sacian, the Sacae] tribes of Middle Asia, Siberia, and the Black Sea shores, Archaeological data reveal how elements of the early hyperborean cultures spread in their turn far to the west, and the significant role in the formation of the physical types of population in eastern, and, in part, in western Europe, played by the penetration of aboriginal northern tribes to the northwestern regions of the present Soviet Union and adjoining countries. While the first part of this volume is devoted to the more distant past of the aboriginal tribes of the North, the second part considers the events of the following period, events that are inseparably tied to one of the most interesting questions of the early history of the northern tribes and the historical geography of Siberia generally: the question of the origin and early history of the Yakut nation. The unique position of the Yakut people as a center of a Turkic pastoralist culture among the hunters and reindeer herdsmen of the taiga and tundra, and also the special place occupied by the Yakut language even among Asian languages related to it, early attracted the attention of the most eminent linguists, historians, and ethnographers to this historical and ethnographic puzzle. Various investigators carried out extensive and fruitful work, gathered plentiful material, and expressed a multitude of different opinions and guesses. In the light of these old materials and the newly gathered facts, primarily archaeological, the contours of the major events in the early history of the north of Asia connected with the appearance here of the Turkic-speaking 4

INTRODUCTION

ancestors of the Yakuts become clearer. First, it becomes evident that the history of the cultural development and early historical fortunes of one of the most numerous peoples of the North, the Yakuts, is indissolubly connected with the history of the steppe peoples, related to them, who inhabited the wide expanse stretching from the Amur to the Altay. We can now reconstruct the early history of the southern ancestors of the Yakuts, and the process of their assimilation of the aboriginal northern tribes, considerably more fully and solidly, and can define more clearly the character of those complex events as a result of which the Yakut people and their culture came into being in their present form on the middle Lena during the course of time, on the basis, figuratively speaking, of a thick stratum of southern origin, enriched with borrowed northern elements. The new data also reveal something which, it seems, should never have been left out of the account. In the undeservedly forgotten papers of Yakov Lindenau, an unexpectedly clear picture of the flight of the ancestral Yakuts to the north is placed before the investigator's eyes. In place of mythological heroes, there appear for the first time the previously unknown names of real chiefs of Yakut tribes in the 15th and i6th centuries—Aan-Tytyyik, Badzhey, and Munnan. Finally, the study of later archaeological remains, and in particular of folklore materials (little known or altogether unused by historians), opens up the possibility of a more detailed exposition of those events which took place in Yakutia immediately before the arrival of the Russians. The folkloristic sources portray quite fully and exactly the stormy sequence of events at the end of the i6th and during the first third of the i7th centuries, caused in the last analysis by the decay of the old Yakut tribal structure, the disintegration of their previous tribal organization. These dramatic events, which are connected in Yakut folklore with the name of the Kangalasy chieftain Tygyn, profoundly stirred the taigadwelling Yakuts and left a lasting impression in the popular memory. In the light of the tradition there is newly revealed not so much the personal fate of Tygyn himself, who by the whim of history found himself in the center of events, as the life of the Yakut people and their social relations in that interesting period during which the influence of the Russian administration and culture had not yet affected them. If we consider attentively the facts which illustrate the history of Yakutia from the Paleolithic to its incorporation into the Russian state, it is easy to see that this long course negotiated by the northern tribes and peoples was filled with various events, significant and striking in their own way. This entire course of history has, besides, an even wider significance from a general point of view. It is important in that it clearly contradicts the ideas of the "inability" of northern tribes to develop an independent history, that is, of "historical" and "non-historical" tribes and peoples, of "higher" and "lower" races.

PART I THE STONE AGE WITHIN THE TERRITORY OF THE PRESENT-DAY YAKUT A.S.S.R.

SECTION ONE THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

The Preglacial and Glacial Periods in Yakutia

Chapter 1

Most ancient man appeared on earth, as is well known, about a million years ago, during the transition between two great stages in earth's history —the Tertiary and Quaternary periods. The Tertiary period, during which the true prehistory of man, the evolution of his closest predecessors, a type of now extinct anthropoid apes, took place, is divided into a number of stages—the Paleocene, Eocene, Oligocene, Miocene, and Pliocene. These stages take up an immense space of time in comparison with the entire subsequent history of man, having begun about fifty million years ago and having ended approximately a million years ago. This was a time of transition during which immense changes took place in the cast of our whole planet: mountain ranges emerged, seas and bays were formed, the outlines and structure of entire continents were changed. These changes proceeded on a geological scale, slowly and gradually, over the course of millions of years, but their consequences were truly grandiose. Suffice it to say that during this time the mountains of the Caucasus, the Carpathians, and the Alps arose, and the central part of Asia, with the greatest mountain peaks in the world—the Pamir and Himalayan mountain ranges—was uplifted. This was also the time when the character of the flora and animal world over the whole earth changed basically. Even at the beginning of the Tertiary period, the most ancient plants, including the giant sago palms, the tree ferns, and the horse-tails, were giving place to the new and more structurally developed angiosperms and to deciduous forests. A decisive transformation took place in the fauna. For hundreds of millions of years before, lower forms had predominated—the reptiles, particularly the lizards, which often reached enormous proportions. Mammals did not yet exist. There were no birds. In the forests, consisting of huge ferns and horse-tails, the melodious singing of birds was not heard, only the rustling of the stiff wings of the flying half-lizard, half-bird whose jaws were set with sharp teeth. At the end of the Cretaceous, the great lizards died out and the flying "dragons," the predecessors of the contemporary birds, became extinct. During the Tertiary, the era of reptiles 9

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

gave way to one of the mammals, whose first representatives appeared during Jurassic times. There occurred, finally, the most important event in the whole history of the development of life on earth: in the Tertiary and the beginning of the Quaternary there appeared the first ape-like ancestors of man, who was to dominate the whole earth (Serebrovskiy 1936; Gromov and Mirchink 1936; Komarov 193o; Krishtofovich 1933; Skott 1937; Borisyak 1932; Pavlov 1936: 143-66). During the Tertiary, they were surrounded by natural conditions incomparably more favorable than later, at the beginning of the Quaternary. At the beginning of the Tertiary the climate was warmer, and the flora, over most of the earth, was incomparably richer than now. In the south of the U.S.S.R., for example, where a temperate zone now prevails, there grew at that time the laurel tree, palm, eucalyptus, fig tree, sequoia, bald cypress, and other evergreen tropical forest plants which can grow only under conditions of a moist, warm climate. Also, the natural world of northern Asia, including present-day Yakutia (where the world's cold pole is now to be found) was incomparably richer. True, there were no tropical jungles or savannas here, similar to those of the Indian or African landscapes of our time; nevertheless the flora of northern Asia differed radically from that of today. In place of the somber Siberian taiga, where inconspicuous conifers predominate, a temperate forest stretched from the Urals to the Pacific Ocean—a forest of deciduous trees presently characteristic of the temperate zone: beech, hornbeam, alder, birch, elm, maple, oak, hazel, and even walnut. The variegated deciduous forest of the Tertiary period grew also where now there is only treeless tundra, or a moss bog or barren rocky field. It covered even those vast stretches of the Far North which are now under the waters of the Arctic Ocean. The fossilized remains of Tertiary flora found in the Arctic, including the islands of the Arctic Ocean, are witness to this. As early as the beginning of the 19th century, the fossilized forests of the Tertiary of the Novosibirskiye [New Siberian] islands became known. In 1830, Gedenshtrom wrote: The wooden mountains on New Siberia constitute ... an inexplicable riddle. On the southern coast of this island stands a sheer mountain cliff made up of thick horizontal layers of sandstone and logs of glossy resinous wood, one covering the other to the very top. Ascending the mountain one sees everywhere pieces of petrified pine wood, covered in places with what looks like a thin coating of ashes. The appearance is so deceptive that at first one tries to blow away the adhering ash, but it resists even a knife. At the top of the mountain there is a new wonder. At the very crest of the mountain, the ends of the logs of resinous wood jut out of the rock, covered with ashes to the height of a quarter [of a foot] or more and are closely packed together. Here the logs are in a vertical position, but on a cliff of the same mountain in a horizontal one. This phenomenon is so incomprehensible that no speculation, it seems, can take place here (Gedenshtrom 1830: 129; Schmalhausen 189o). I0

The Preglacial and Glacial Periods A second noteworthy find of remains of Tertiary flora occurred in the region of Lake Taastaak, on the flat uplands of the northern slope of the Poloustnyi range, between the mouths of the Khroma and Indigirka rivers, where amber formed from the resin of Tertiary trees was found as early as the 18th and 19th centuries. All this flora of the Tertiary period—variegated in its makeup and temperately thermophilic in character—developed in northern Asia under conditions entirely favorable to it. Tertiary trees reached great heights and thicknesses; wide annual rings are to be seen in the cross-sections of their trunks, signs of rapid and complacent growth. In 1942, a stump of wood was found on the lower Lena, far north of the Arctic Circle, on the shores of Lake Sardakh-Khaya, zo m above the level of the Sardakh channel. Its roots, uncovered on the eroded bank, were still covered with remnants of bark. The tree which stood here in Tertiary times was a veritable giant— its diameter reached 2 m. This is especially remarkable because it grew in a place where now not only trees but even large bushes do not grow (Karavayev 1948). The existence of Tertiary forests in northeastern Yakutia certainly required an entirely different climate from the present one: incomparably moister, warmer, milder, with an annual mean temperature of approximately +1o° C. It must have been very much like the present climate of the Japanese islands or nearby southern Manchuria (Tolmachev 1944; Markov 1951: 246-50; Karavayev 1948). The climate of Yakutia retained its warm temperature character even later, until the very beginning of the Quaternary period; concurrently, thermophilic vegetation also continued to exist for a long time, although certain changes took place in it. In 1915, the geologist V. N. Zverev found on Mamontova Gora [Mammoth Mountain], situated on the right bank of the Aldan, some 3o km from the mouth of the Amga, numerous remains of plants deposited in light gray or yellow-gray sand which reached a thickness of up to 4o m. The sand was filled with cones of various species of conifers, including spruce (Zverev 1914; Sukachev 1910, 1938; Krishtofovich 1924; Palibin 1934, 1946; Tikhomirov 1941, 1946) . The remains of walnuts are even more important for the characterization of environmental conditions in this early Quaternary period. The extinct walnut of the Aldan belonged, like its contemporaries the spruce and the pine, to the American form, the white walnut (Krishtofovich 1915). Today, the American white walnut grows in the eastern states of North America from the St. Lawrence valley to eastern Dakota and southern Missouri. Comparing the annual isotherms of the northern boundaries of distribution of the Manchurian and American white walnuts, A. N. Krishtofovich suggests that the climatic conditions of the Aldan region where Mamontova Gora [Mammoth Mountain] is located, were characterized by an annual isotherm of between + I° and +5° C. At the present, continues this investigator, these isotherms are located some ten to fifteen degrees of latitude to the south and produce a flora analogous to the Aldan one. II

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

For all the variety and richness of the plant world of Yakutia during the transitional period between the Tertiary and Quaternary, certain essentially new features can be observed which indicate a shift to more severe conditions. Within the mixed coniferous-deciduous forests, the more pronouncedly thermophilic species die out. In the course of time the coniferous trees, capable of existing under more severe climatic circumstances, dominate these forests. Finally, there are those plants which relate the flora of northern Yakutia to the mountain regions of Central Asia. On Wrangel Island, for example, many forms grow to this day which are common to the high mountain regions of Central Asia (Nazarov 1941). In the tundras and mountain regions of continental Yakutia, plants identical with species of the Himalayas have been found. This connection, clear and at the same time unexpected at first glance, is explainable by the great topographic changes [which had occurred] by the beginning of the Quaternary. While earlier the surface may have consisted of an elevated, flat plateau, eroded only to a very slight degree, by the end of the Tertiary, when the huge expanses of the Asian continent and Europe were affected by extensive mountainforming processes, its aspect was essentially altered. Where earlier there had stretched the shallow, ancient sea of Thetis, dried up in places, there now arose great knots and chains of mountains, forming such mountainous regions as the Alps, the Crimea, the Caucasus, mountainous Central Asia, and the Himalayas. Simultaneously, as a result of the decrease in moisture in the depths of Asia, the climate there became ever drier (Komarov 1908-09: I, 53; II, 379) . The orogenic processes which gripped a large part of the Old World from the Atlantic to the Pacific and Indian oceans had affected Yakutia in a still earlier period, the Cretaceous. They led to the formation of the mountainous landscape that exists to our day. In the east of Asia, many of the ranges which now fringe the shores of the Sea of Okhotsk and the Bering Sea were then formed. During this time some ancient alpine plants of the mountainous regions of Central Asia penetrated north to the mouth of the Lena, and even to Wrangel Island where such connectives with the flora of the Central Asian mountains were found. Then followed new, still more significant changes in the natural conditions of Yakutia, on the basis of which the first activities of man took place in this territory. These changes, occurring within the Quaternary period, called forth catastrophic changes in the animal and plant world of a major part of the Old and New Worlds, and, as will be seen later, left their imprint on the development of all human cultures. These changes were heralded in part by the transformations of the earth's surface which were reflected in the appearance of extensive mountain landscapes at the end of the Tertiary. They continued also at the beginning of the Quaternary. Despite the fact that the Quaternary was at least thirty to forty times shorter than the Tertiary, topographic changes of grandiose proportions also took place throughout it. During these millions of years, the present Aegean, Red, and Dead seas were formed. Asia was definitely separated I2

The Preglacial and Glacial Periods from the American continent with which it had been united earlier by a wide bridge in the region of the present Bering Strait. At this time the islands of the Laptev and East Siberian seas, the Japanese Islands, and the Sunda Archipelago were separated from the Asian continent. Even more significant as an influence on the animal and plant worlds were the events which changed the general climatic conditions of the earth. Because of not yet wholly explained causes, it became considerably colder than previously over a significant part of Europe, Asia, and America. At the same time, humidity increased, and consequently the annual amount of precipitation increased considerably. Masses of snow, and later of ice, began to accumulate. These ever-growing masses of glacier ice could not long remain in a stationary position. Spreading out from the places of accumulation, rivers of ice moved through the mountainous regions. With time, individual glaciers flowed together and formed a solid sea of ice, introducing an epoch during which the most populous and richest regions of Europe were covered with solid ice—a massive "shield" bulging in the middle. This ice shield stretched from England to the Urals and occupied an area of about five million square kilometers. In maximum thickness it reached 2 km, and in its center covered even the highest mountain peaks of the region. In addition to the European ice shield there was another, the Taymyr, some Soo m thick and extending over an area of about four million square kilometers. This dead desert of ice covered for hundreds and even thousands of kilometers areas where today are to be found the richest and most densely populated countries of Europe. [Also, it] was more forbidding than the hottest deserts of our times in Asia and Africa. We may gain some idea of how the glacier-covered regions of the continent appeared from the impressions of travellers who have studied the interior area of contemporary Greenland. Greenland is now in a glacial period and its entire surface of two million square kilometers is covered with ice, up to 2.5 km thick. Peary, one of Greenland's investigators, wrote: Greenland is a polar Sahara in comparison with which the African Sahara is quite effaced. In this frozen desert there are not the smallest signs of animal or plant life, neither fragments of rock nor grains of sand. The traveller who, like me, spends weeks here, sees besides himself and his companions only an endless space of snowy plains, an endless cupola of cold, dark blue sky and a white cold sun (Kalesnik 1939: 201). In the extensive areas of Europe and western Siberia occupied by ice, the glaciers relentlessly destroyed the formerly rich flora and fauna. The luxuriant subtropical forest died out. The various animals which had inhabited it, accustomed to the mild climate of the Tertiary, could not survive. The negative influence of the glaciers was felt not only in the territory buried under the ice but also in the surrounding circumglacial regions where the thermophilic vegetation either died out altogether or, adapting itself to new and more severe conditions, metamorphosed and retreated 13

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

farther and farther before the ice. The same happened to [part of] the animal world. It might seem at first glance that all these catastrophic events would develop with the greatest force in Yakutia, in northern and northeastern Asia, since here the coldest climate and the greatest amount of ice would exist. But in reality events proceeded less simply and in many ways differently than in the West. The question of the glacial period in eastern Siberia and in northern Asia as a whole was first posed in the second half of the Igth century by the leading Russian geographer of that time, P. A. Kropotkin. Kropotkin gathered various data on glacial phenomena of the Vitim plateau and in the region of the Olekma goldfields. Proceeding from these, he first came to the conclusion that there existed in these places not only glaciers but a solid ice shield. The glaciers, having descended from the Yuzhno-Muiskiy [South Muya] range and its western continuation, spread over the entire Vitim plateau as a solid cover of ice, which rounded the elevated portions of the plateau to the forms which we notice at present. Moving farther into the Muya and Tsipa valleys, the mighty glaciers deepened the valleys and, being pushed toward the north by the mass of ice descending from the Vitim plateau, produced those abrupt, sharp outlines which we note in the Severo-Muiskiy [North MuyaI range on its slope facing the Muya valley and carved into the three-sided pyramids of gentle slopes the steep-sided triangular terraces which give this slope of the SeveroMuiskiy range its characterizing form (Kropotkin 1873).

The views of Kropotkin were supported and developed by further studies which showed that glacial phenomena had indeed taken place in Yakutia and that the results of the activity of ancient glaciers are observable there. These studies also showed, however, that the glaciation of Siberia and particularly Yakutia lagged considerably behind that of western and eastern Europe in magnitude, since the continental climate preserved this part of Asia from complete glaciation and its destructive consequences. The cold Arctic sea which washed the Siberian shores, as it does in our time, allowed too little evaporation for the [ultimate] accumulation of the enormous masses of snow and ice necessary for the formation of a solid ice-shield. Also, the moisture-bearing winds of the Pacific were barred from penetrating deep into Siberia by the high mountains of Central Asia and the Far East (Voyeykov 1915). The accumulation of snow and the formation of ice for this reason proceeded here incomparably more slowly than in western Europe. Even in the Urals and on the territory of western Siberia, the thickness and dimensions of the glacial covering were markedly lesser in comparison with the European ice-shield. Further to the east, the glaciers did not even flow together into one solid cover but occupied only the highest mountain ranges, slowly flowing out from them in thin ice streams of varying length and thickness. In the north, significant traces of glaciers are found in the mountains of the Chukchi Peninsula, in the valleys of the Olekma and Vitim rivers, 14

The Preglacial and Glacial Periods in the Verkhoyansk Range (where they do not, however, reach the opposite [west] bank of the Lena River), and in other mountain systems of northeastern Yakutia and also in the Taymyr Peninsula and areas near it (Map I).

P A• H

•• S

•

PALEOLITHIC SITES

•

PRESERVED CARCASSES OF ANIMALS

•

Map i. Distribution of Paleolithic settlements in eastern Siberia. i—Paleolithic settlements; x—carcasses of extinct animals. The ice of the terminal glaciation lay along the shores of the Pacific Ocean in a prominent, smoothly curving arc extending from the Aldan to the Bering Strait; it reached the Arctic Ocean in two broad spurs strongly curved to the west, one along the Lena River (on the KharaUlakhskiy Range), and the other on the Yana-Indigirka interfluvium (Gerasimov and Markov 1939: 29o). A separate glacial massif occupied at this time the Olekma-Vitim mountainous region, and reached close to the Lena along its wide curve between Nyuya and Olekminsk. But the remainder of eastern Siberia— north of Lake Baykal and south of the Arctic Ocean, east of the Yenisey and west of the lower Amur—remained free from ice (Gerasimov and Markov 1939: 29o). That the same thick and uninterrupted ice cover which prevailed in Europe did not exist in eastern Siberia and in the north of the [Soviet] Far East is also confirmed by the presence of permafrost, widely distributed in these regions. Permafrost is one of the most characteristic remnants of the glacial epoch in contemporary nature. Permafrost —that is, the condition under which the earth at a definite depth always retains a temperature below zero—is very widely distributed in Siberia, 15

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

and the depth of the frozen layer is considerable. Even a hundred years ago, in the attempt to dig a well at Yakutsk, permafrosted ground was found to reach a depth of 116 m and to continue even deeper. In other regions of Yakutia, the permafrost reaches even deeper, some 300-400 m and even 600 m in places. The age of permafrost is revealed by the finds in it of intact bodies of extinct animals—mammoths, rhinoceri, wild horses, and musk oxen (Tumel 1946: 206; Sumgin 1934, 1936; Grigoryev 1930; Sumgin et al. 1940: 208-17). This signifies that the permafrost within which these remains were contained has remained in an unchanged condition for millennia; otherwise the bodies of the ancient animals could not have been preserved. Geophysical observations also show that the permafrost was formed during a colder time, when the winter temperatures were lower than now, since, as one penetrates deeper into the permafrosted earth, its temperature, after a certain point, does not rise but falls. The frozen soil thus serves as a kind of storehouse for the "remanent" cold accumulated in ancient times. Permafrost could occur only because the earth was not protected from the incessantly increasing freeze, because the surface was free of snow and ice. From the above it follows that however intense the cold of glacial times may have been, there continued to exist in those open expanses of northern Asia, free of snow and ice, vegetation, and consequently various animals—herbivore, rodents, and of course carnivores. And, in fact, paleobotanical studies show that in the extensive open expanses of Yakutia, to its extreme north, there existed during the glacial era a rather rich and various vegetation. Among the woody plants that persevered during the glacial period were primarily the most resistant plants of the upper zones of the mountains, which grew here even during the preceding Tertiary period. These were mainly the species already mentioned, which had migrated at the beginning of the Quaternary northward along the mountain chains and peaks from the regions of Central Asia. At the same time, species of local origin were evolved, carrying within themselves the effects of long adaptation to the natural conditions, which were becoming ever more severe. Among the trees, the most resistant proved to be the conifers, such as the ancient species of spruce, dwarf cedar, and especially the Daurian larch, which is so well adapted to severe climatic conditions that it can survive in the solidly frozen soil, spreading its roots, which grow just below the thin covering of moss, only laterally and not downward. In the unforested areas grew not only lichens or mosses but also various herbs, sedges, and grasses suitable as food for herbivorous animals. The earliest history of the animals of northern Asia during Tertiary and early Quaternary remains as yet almost wholly unexplained. In this extensive territory, where numerous remains of the luxuriant thermophilic flora of the Tertiary have been found, not one instance of its corresponding fauna has been recorded. The nearest regions to the west where fauna of this kind has been found are in the valleys of the Irtysh at Pavlodar and of the Ob at Omak (Gromov 1 934: 57). Here, in the forests of magnolias, 16

The Preglacial and Glacial Periods laurels, and fig trees lived rhinoceri, giraffes, and three-toed relatives of the ancestors of horses, the hipparions. Pavlodar on the Irtysh is also the nearest point in the east of our country where remains of animals of a very early time have been found, dating, in V. I. Gromov's opinion, to the interglacial phase which in eastern Europe and Siberia separates the so-called Mindel glaciation from the subsequent maximal Riss glaciation. At Pavlodar remains were found of the ancient elephant, the Trogontherium, and of the so-called Merck's rhinoceros, more ancient than the woolly Siberian rhinoceros.' A skull of Merck's rhinoceros was also found in eastern Siberia, the animal apparently having migrated from Yakutia. A completely different picture, striking in its wealth of remains of ancient animals in the far north of Yakutia, is revealed for the transitional period to the glacial age proper, the final formation of which was connected in Europe with the time of the Riss glaciation. This fauna is not characteristic of Yakutia alone. At this time it occupies the expanse of the Old World from northern China to Spain and Italy and even reaches into North America. Foremost in this "marvellously consistent" faunistic complex (to use the words of the zoologists) were the ancient pachyderms —the mammoth and the rhinoceros (Cherskiy 1891: Is; Gromov 1939: 190).2 Both of these extinct animals, especially the mammoth, were closely tied to the fate of primitive man in Europe and northern Asia, thus affecting all areas of the existence of our distant ancestors. The long-lasting coexistence of the primitive hunter and the mammoth, and the important role of the latter, are reflected not only in the wealth of mammoth bones at Paleolithic settlements beginning with very early times, and not only by the widespread use of mammoth tusks and bones generally. Their use in Paleolithic technology ranged from small bone carvings to construction of a shelter. The important role of the mammoth in the spiritual life of Paleolithic man is clearly represented in his works of art. One of the best examples of the artistic production of the Paleolithic craftsmen of Siberia is the representation of a mammoth found in Malta; it is quite similar in character and style to the realistic drawings in the caves of western Europe. To imagine Upper Paleolithic man without the mammoth is as difficult as to imagine the steppe nomad without the horse, or the Eskimo without the walrus and the seal. Because of permafrost, the northern regions of Siberia and Alaska are the only ones in the world where entire bodies of mammoths have been found with the soft tissues, the hairy covering, and the internal organs intact. Therefore, we should treat these finds in some detail. The first to establish the actual appearance of the extinct mammothelephant and its great age were simple hunters of mammoth bone in the 17th century. For a long time scientists in the West did not have a correct concept of the mammoth, whose tusks were highly valued in Europe and Asia as material for artistic carvings and particularly for the decoration of costly weapons. Some, confusing mammoths with walruses, whose tusks were used for the same purpose, wrote that in northern Siberia there was the 17

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

"land-water beast-behemoth," the hunt for which was no less dangerous than crocodile-hunting. Others believed that the mammoth lived underground, thus repeating mythological tales of the natives of Siberia, which had been included in the old Chinese encyclopedias, in which the gigantic "earth-rat" of the northern countries is mentioned. Thus, for instance, lssbrandt Ides,* travelling to the Far East as Russian emissary to the Chinese government, transmitted with full credence the tales of the inhabitants of Siberia, who told him that the mammoths lived underground, where they wandered back and forth, lifting the earth over them, afterwhich it settled, forming deep chasms. If the mammoth came out on the surface and breathed air, he soon died. Therefore, the bodies of mammoths were found on high banks of rivers where they had accidentally crawled out onto the surface. Witsen, the first author to write a basic description of materials on Siberia, which he published in the West, wrote that the mammoth lived underground and was like a gigantic rat. "The great riddle of earthquakes," he wrote, "is now easily explained by the underground movements of these huge rats" (Obruchev 1931: 127). But at the same time, "many Muscovites," as Witsen puts it, told him that the mammoth had died long ago and was not a gigantic rat but an elephant. He wrote further that the old Sibiryaks [Siberians] among the Russians, in distinction from the unbaptized pagans, "say and believe that the mammoth is just the same beast as the elephant, only his teeth are more curved and somewhat closer together than the elephant's (Anuchin 1879: 38). These Russians, well acquainted by personal experience with the remains of mammoths, also first advanced the hypothesis of the mammoth's death as a result of a basic change in the natural conditions of northern Siberia. They even admitted as an explanation of such grand-scale changes in the climate a shift in the inclination of the earth's axis, a "turn" of the whole globe. Witsen continues: "These Muscovites hold the opinion that in the course of time the world had undergone a change, so that the countries where cold now prevails were previously warm and so that elephants could have lived in countries which are now cold" (Anuchin 1879: 38). The Sibiryaks also had told Ides that before the Deluge, Siberia was warmer and there were elephants there. After the Deluge, during which the mammoths were drowned, it became colder, and "since that time the bodies of the mammoths lie in the frozen earth and are saved from rotting until they come to the surface and melt away" (Anuchin 1879: 38). This later guess, called forth by the belief in the biblical legend of the universal deluge which was natural at that time, was developed much later by authoritative scientists toward the end of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th centuries; for example, by P. S. Pallas. The assertion of the Siberian collectors of mammoth ivory of the 17th ' [Evert Issbrant Ides, a Danish citizen sent by the Moscow government in 1692 on a diplomatic and trade mission to China. He wrote an interesting account of his voyage and published it in 1699 in French, and later in Dutch and German. (E. I. Ides, Dreijaarige Reise naar China, Amsterdam, 1704. Editor, A.I.x.A.)]

18

The Preglacial and Glacial Periods and early i8th centuries that the mammoth was an elephant was then wholly confirmed by new finds of mammoth bodies. The most remarkable of these were the mammoth found in 1[799 at Bykoviy [Bull] Cape at the mouth of the Lena, and the Berezovka mammoth found a hundred years later, in 190o, on a tributary of the Kolyma River, the Berezovka; this mammoth was brought to Petersburg by an expedition of the Academy of Sciences. Extensive studies of the Berezovka mammoth were the basis for the elucidation of the mammoth's anatomy, way of life, and conditions of existence. The conditions under which the body of the Berezovka mammoth was found showed that it had died as the result of an accident, having fallen from some height or having stumbled into a crevasse. In falling, rear first, the beast's heavy body crashed with such force that the bones of the pelvis fractured, as did the shoulder bone. The full oblique fracture of the right shoulder bone and the compound fracture of both pelvic bones caused ruptures of the blood vessels and hemorrhaging in the mammoth's abdomen (Gerts 1902).8 Traces of a massive hemorrhage in the region of the spine around the scapulae are in their turn explained by the fact that a mass of earth fell on top of the animal, causing an extensive new contusion with its weight. The studies showed further that the mammoth, deprived of air, died of suffocation. In this position, its body was found during the excavations in 1901 (Byalynitskiy-Birulya 1903). As Cuvier had shown, the mammoth was closest in its anatomical features to the present-day Indian elephant, but at the same time showed significant differences from the modern elephant. Mammoths had larger, clumsier bodies, and were less tall relative to their length than the modern elephant. The mammoth had a large head (half the length of the torso) and a short tail, ending in long, black, bristling hairs. The mammoth's body differed from that of contemporary elephants also in that its strongly curved spine was higher and its rear portion sloped downward more abruptly.4 Its torso was entirely covered with dense brownish-black or reddish-brown wool, especially thick on the sides oil the lower part of the torso, where it took the form of a sheer fringe of long hairs. The most characteristic feature of the mammoth was its tusks, that is, incisors, huge and spirally curved with the ends inward and upward (Zalenskiy 19o3a, 19o3b). As V. E. Garutt suggests, the mammoth's spiral tusks were not useless to him. Although the modern elephant uses his tusks as crowbars to dig up roots of plants, the mammoth scraped away the snow with them and thus obtained food in the winter. "Straight tusks such as modern elephants have, would not be very effective in scraping away snow, since the animal could only use the ends of them. The spirally curved tusks of the mammoth make it possible to scrape away the snow with almost all of their lateral surfaces and thus speed the work. It is because of this that well-preserved tusks show signs of wear on their lateral surfaces" (Garutt 1946: 139). The remains of food found in the stomach and teeth of the mammoth were hardly the least valuable of the finds of the 1901 expedition. They 19

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

had the form of densely compressed dark brown hay, chewed comparatively little. The main mass consisted of remains of stalks and leaves of cereals and sedges. Still better preserved were the remains of food which had stayed between the teeth and were not as much chewed as what had passed into the animal's stomach. The study of these food remnants showed that, contrary to the statements of some earlier investigators, the mammoth fed not on branches of coniferous plants but on a more tender and nourishing fare—meadow grasses. According to V. I. Gromov, one mammoth required up to too kg of plant food per day (Gromov 1938). Judging by the contents of the Berezovka mammoth's stomach, it was primarily an herbivorous animal. The mammoth grazed in floodplain meadows with elevated and sunken spots, similar to the present meadows upriver from the mouth of the Aldan. The ripe seeds of the sedges, cereals, and other plants show that the animal died in the latter half of the summer; the unshed spikes of sedges and the seeds of other plants make this conclusion more precise and indicate that the mammoth died in the second half of July or the beginning of August, that is, at the very height of summer (Sukachev 1914; Tolmachev 1928: 132-33). Thus, the ancient Siberian mammoth-elephants were supremely adapted to life in the severe climatic conditions of glacial times. A contemporary of the mammoth, and its "constant companion," was the Siberian rhinoceros. In the permafrosted layers of the Quaternary deposits of Yakutia, the bodies of these animals were found along with those of mammoths. The first such find was made by Vilyuy Yakuts in 1771, on the banks of the Vilyuy at 64° N. The second complete body of a rhinoceros was found to6 years later in 1877 on the left bank of the Khalbyi, 15 to 20 km upstream from its confluence with the Bytantay (a tributary of the Yana) (Cherskiy 1878, 1879). In its dimensions, the Siberian rhinoceros approached the African white rhinoceros, which reaches 2.2 m in height at the shoulders. Its legs, however, were shorter and thicker, and its torso stronger and more massive, and consequently even more awkward than that of the tropical rhinoceri. Like the contemporary rhinoceros of tropical countries, the extinct hairy rhinoceros from Siberia was truly terrible, if we consider the strength of the animal with its fighting weapon and its disposition probably as fierce as that of its southern relation. On its nose was a curved horn in the form of a monstrous massive saber about one meter long, and another horn somewhat smaller than the first stood on its forehead. Such horns have long been found in the Far North, the inhabitants believing that they were the talons of a mythical bird, the eksekyu-kyyl, supposed to be so huge that its wings covered the sun. The gigantic horns of the Siberian rhinoceros may have served it, furthermore, not only as weapons. It is entirely possible that, as some researchers propose, it used the forward horn to dig up the snow in searching for food in the winter, since the horn usually proves to be worn on the frontal, curved portion. The nasal partition of the Siberian rhinoceros was ossified, apparently because it had to support this heavy structure. 20

The Preglacial and Glacial Periods The construction of the rhinoceros' mouth, its especially thick and straight-cut lip, indicates that it lived not only on leaves of trees and branches of bushes, but also browsed on grass like the mammoth. In two cases, the remains of bushes have been found among the teeth of rhinoceri found in Yakutia (Cherskiy 1876: 153; Schmalhausen 1876). Simultaneously with these two huge extinct animals of the glacial epoch, well adapted to the severe climate, extreme cold, and piercing winds of the north, there existed other animals, both surviving and extinct. The bones and sometimes the carcasses of these are found, together with the remains of mammoths and rhinoceri, in the same places, in identical geological conditions. The northernmost places of the Yakut republic, among them the remote islands now surrounded on all sides by the waters of the Arctic Ocean, are especially well supplied with these remains (Pallas 1819; Anon. 182217). Here at one time were great numbers of reindeer, horses, wild cattle, musk oxen, foxes, and tigers. The wild horses deserve special attention; they occupied first place after the reindeer among the northern Siberian fauna of that time. The abundance of wild horses in the territory of Siberia in Quaternary times is shown by the fact that among the animal remains gathered by the Novosibirsk Expedition of 1885-86, the bones of wild horses were second in frequency of occurrence: There were 794 bones of reindeer (from 5o specimens) (Cherskiy 1891: 66-69, 356-517; Gromov 1939: 188; 1948). Among the bones collected in northern Siberia from 1900-08, the absolute majority come from wild horses: 275 of 540. Cherskiy writes: "The finding of such numerous remains of horses within the Arctic Circle [remains of] animals requiring good pasturage ... has for us a significance equivalent to that of the finding there of the bones of other representatives of more southerly regions of Siberia (the tiger, saiga, and red deer), since it bears witness to the considerably changed climate and landscape of northern Asia since that time" (Cherskiy 1891: 517). The characteristic feature of all this ancient fauna is its "mixed" composition—the presence in it of animals "exclusively of the Far North" (the fox, the Ob lemming, the musk ox, the Siberian bighorn sheep), along with representatives of the southern Siberian fauna, which in our time do not reach latitude 6o° N. (the tiger, the saiga antelope [saiga tatarica], the maral-red deer, and the wild horse). Purely Arctic species in the collections from the north of Yakutia amounted to about 8 percent, and southern species to about 26 percent. The question of the origin of the ancient fauna of northeast Asia, and of the causes of this unusual combination of animals of differing natural geographic zones, has interested zoologists for a long time. Cherskiy has suggested that at the time when the plant and animal life of northern Europe and North America had to retreat southward before the great glaciation, more favorable conditions existed in the north of Siberia. Moreover, at this very time the movement of glaciers and low temperatures to the south produced a simultaneous spread—all the way to the Crimea, France, and Spain—of the Arctic animals and the entire 21

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

mammoth fauna which had originated in Siberia. And actually, as we have seen, it is now established that at the very height of the glacial era, all the conditions for the further development of precisely this peculiar Arctic life existed here: a pronounced continental climate and broad spaces occupied by a steppe-type vegetation, combined with mountain forests and tundras. In the tundras and near the glacial massifs lived foxes, musk oxen, reindeer, and other arctic animals. In the steppes roamed herds of wild horses and cattle; along with them were found the inhabitants of the central Asiatic desert regions, the saiga antelope. In the mountainous regions, the Siberian bighorn sheep found refuge. In the forests, inhabiting the deep valleys, lived red deer and other beasts of the forest. At a time when the thermophilic fauna of the west was wiped out in considerable part by the glaciers, or retreated southward, the distant north of Asia sheltered in its boundless expanses a multitude of animals resistant to cold and modest in their demands for food. Precisely for this reason, as Cherskiy suggested in his time, a specific role in the history of the Quarternary fell to the lot of north Asia—to become the homeland and chief center from which the Arctic animals spread to the rest of the Old World.

22

The Most Ancient Traces of Man in Yakutia

Chapter

2

In the presence of so qualitatively and quantitatively rich an animal world as existed in the northern parts of Asia during the Quaternary, it might seem that Paleolithic man could have lived here then with equal success. But the question of the time of appearance of man in northeastern Asia is by no means simply resolved. While remains of the most ancient ape-man, Pithecanthropus and Sinanthropus, have been found in southern and southeastern Asia, no such remains have yet been discovered in the northeast of the Old World, or in Mongolia, beyond [that is, east of] Lake Baykal, in Tibet, and in America. No remains—bones or dwellings—have been found here of the subsequent stage of human development—the Neanderthal. This is apparently to be explained by the fact that the old ape-like men and their immediate descendants at first stayed only within the limits of their original homeland, and lived in more favorable regions of southeastern Asia, Africa, and Europe, where a mild climate prevailed, one with a rich fauna and luxuriant vegetation, facilitating man's life in the initial stages of his development. The spreading of the ancient peoples and their conquest of regions apparently required a considerable time, measured not in hundreds of years but in many millennia. This process must have had as a prerequisite the active adaptation of man to the conditions of new regions, technical re-equipment and a reorientation of the tenor of his life. N. G. Chernyshevskiy in his time expressed this well: "Any find of remains of human activity in lands outside equatorial climate necessarily belongs to a time when men already knew how to use fire well or how to defend themselves with warm clothes against the cold" (Chernyshevskiy 1906: X, Part 2, 326). Additionally, the settlement by primitive men of uninhabited regions must have had as a prerequisite a growth of the population with the result that food in their previous locale became insufficient. Having remained hunters and gatherers, primitive men required vast areas of land and hence were compelled to move out from the, for that time, densely 23

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

populated regions into neighboring regions less mild in climate but rich in game. This process was facilitated by their wandering mode of life. It is not surprising that the people of Paleolithic times began to move farther and farther to the north and in the process encountered the northern animals: the fox, the reindeer, the willow grouse. They spread toward the Black and Mediterranean seas only in comparatively later times. At this time they also learned to produce fire by relatively efficient means (probably by the use of a bow drill), and began to sew fur clothing skilfully from prepared skins and to build warm winter dwellings. Another circumstance which must have hindered the early spread of Paleolithic man from west to east, from Europe and Middle Asia into the depths of Siberia, is no less important. V. I. Gromov suggests that during the period of maximal glaciation the huge masses of ice on the Taymyr Peninsula constituted an immense barrier which impeded the free flow of the Siberian rivers to the north. In the West Siberian lowlands an extensive water basin was formed and barred man's way from west to east. At the end of the glacial period, as a result of a considerable warming of the climate prior to the last wave of glaciation, the Taymyr glacial massif began to contract abruptly. The waters of the West Siberian rivers ceased to flow into the Aral-Caspian lowland through the Turgay Strait [now Turgay Gate], and began to flow freely into the Arctic Ocean. At this time, the present valleys of these great water arteries began to form those of the Ob, Irtysh, Yenisey, and other Siberian rivers, on whose banks we find the campsites of Paleolithic men (Gromov 1948: 295-96). Only the disappearance of the glacial barrier and its reservoir in the West Siberian lowlands opened the path of Paleolithic man from west to east, to the banks of the Angara and Lake Baykal, and still farther into the depths of northern Asia. The Siberian Paleolithic sites now known are therefore much younger than the oldest Paleolithic settlements of the Crimea, the Ukraine, Middle Asia, and the Caucasus, which belong to the Middle and even the Early Paleolithic. The age of the former is nevertheless rather great, even in terms of geological periodization. These sites indicate that at first Paleolithic men reached the Urals, crossed them, and finally arrived at the Altay mountains, the Yenisey, and the Angara. It is entirely possible, as will be seen later, that other primitive tribes, living in Mongolia, China, and neighboring regions of southern Asia, encountered at this time the first settlers from the west. True, until recently the existence of ancient traces of man in such severe regions of northern Asia as Yakutia was not at all established, and those few examples which seemed to indicate his presence were unconvincing. It was therefore concluded that Paleolithic man had confined himself only to areas most favorable to his existence—southern Siberia and the Baykal region—and that the extensive northern territories remained altogether uninhabited. Yet, even the first systematic searches for remains of Paleolithic man made it clear that such a conclusion was incorrect. As early as 1927, the first stone tools of Paleolithic form, and fragments 24

The Most Ancient Traces of Man of bones of extinct Quaternary animals, were found on the high ancient banks of the Biryulka River (Okladnikov 1946b). Then in 1941-43, the work of the Lena Historical-Ethnographic Expedition uncovered Paleolithic sites also in many other places, including the south Lena rayons of the Yakut A.S.S.R.—the Olekminskiy and Lenskiy (Nyuyskiy) In all, about twenty-eight sites with Paleolithic remains have been found on the Lena (Map 1), extending from the village of Biryulskoye in the south to the mouth of the Markhachan in the north (Okladnikov 1953d). The great antiquity of these finds is documented both by archaeological materials; for example, the character of the stone tools, and by other data, primarily paleontological and geological. The first indication of the remote date of the Paleolithic settlements is the fact of the deposition of the remains at a considerable depth below the surface and in layers of definite character. While traces of later cultures are found in the topsoil (the dark soil layer) or immediately beneath it, Paleolithic objects lie deeper and in completely different layers—in yellow or reddish loans, in loess-like soils, or in ancient sands. The formation of such deposits, especially the loess-like ones, took place under climatic conditions differing sharply from those of today—in a more severe climate; that is, during the glacial period or close to it. This is confirmed by the remains of fauna, both small (e.g., mussels) and large, in the form of sizeable bones of extinct animals of the Quaternary. Under the conditions described, traces of ancient man on the Lena were found, for example, near the village of Chastinskaya, downstream from Kirensk. Here the Lena had strongly undermined a bank and cut through deposits of the twenty-meter river terrace. The culture-bearing layer contained individual small stones brought there by man, shattered bones of animals, and worked stones—stone chips, flakes, and also finished tools. Animal bones, stone artifacts, and pebbles were distributed in two particular accumulations or patches. In one such area, a hearth was clearly outlined, being constructed of five small stones, around which charcoal, fragments of bones of large animals, and stone chips lay thickly. Here were also found small pieces of a reddish substance of a blood-red mineral, ochre, a common find in Paleolithic sites. In the second area there were no hearth stones, but considerably more numerous flakes and chips, many small fragments of animal bones, and bones of small animals, probably foxes. Additionally, the layer contained shells of fresh-water mollusks, which must have been just as cryophilic as those found at other points on the Lena in the deposits of ancient terraces. Along with them were found teeth of the woolly Siberian rhinoceros and wild horse which existed here in glacial times. The general picture of the deposit in which the cultural remains of the Chastinskaya campsite were buried is extraordinarily close to the conditions in which remains of Paleolithic man were found in other places in • [That is, those administrative subdivisions centered on the population centers of Olekminsk and Nyuya respectively. Editor, n.t.N.n.]

25

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

Siberia, for instance, at the well-known site of Afontova Gora [Mountain] near Krasnoyarsk and at Buret on the Angara. The stone tools of Chastinskaya are not numerous but are characteristic (Fig. I). Among them, scraper-like tools, made from rather thin and flat pieces of quartzitic pebbles, are especially distinguished. These pieces still retain part of the original pebble surface, but their sharp edges were purposely worked so as to produce a strong and durable cutting blade. The most specific feature in their preparation is retouch, that is, the preparation of the blade by pressure flaking. The retouch only notches the very edge of the tool on its convex side and is not distributed over its whole surface, still less on the flat opposite side, as was done later, at the very end of the Paleolithic. The forms of these scrapers are equally crude and simple. They do not yet have geometrically regular, finished, and stable forms. Their shapes are accidental. Along with them at Chastinskaya, there was found yet another tool of peculiar form—a small disc from which wide chips were removed with blows directed toward the center of the artifact. The same type of scraper-like and disc-shaped tools were found in two remarkable Paleolithic sites of the Baykal region, Buret and the nearby Malta, in the valley of the Belaya River, at the village of the same name. These are the most ancient of the Paleolithic settlements discovered in the immense expanse of Siberia and Mongolia east of the Urals and west of the Yellow River. The site of Chastinskaya on the Lena, as the faunal remains indicate, must be just such an ancient campsite. Only the absence of the small stone objects and bone carvings peculiar to Malta and Buret testify to its somewhat later age. However, it is important that here, in contradistinction to the much later Paleolithic sites of Siberia, were found remains of the rhinoceros, which became extinct earlier than the mammoth and did not survive the last (Würm) glaciation. Here also were found bones of another representative of glacial fauna, of a pronouncedly Arctic animal such as the fox, and the shells of cryophilic mollusks common to the deposits of the glacial epoch. Comparing all the data now known on the life of the men who left behind them the three aforementioned ancient settlements on the banks of the Lena and the Angara, we may reconstruct, in general features, a picture of the life of the primitive population of northern Asia. In the mountains rather considerable areas were occupied by glaciers. Rivers of ice flowed toward the foothills of the mountains. The unbroken taiga of eastern Siberia and neighboring regions, boundless as the ocean, did not exist. In place of the forests extant today in the vicinity of the modern villages of Chastinskaya, Buret, and Malta, there were treeless expanses of tundra and steppe. Only in the river valleys and on slopes sheltered from the cold winds did pitiful clumps of stunted trees grow. These were usually larches or the creeping rose willow or dwarf birch. Fig. r. Stone artifacts from Chastinskaya. I, 3, 4–scrapers; 2–chopping tool. 26

2

I

0

I

2 3cm

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

The remains of typical tundra animals—the Arctic fox and the willow grouse—found with the tools left here during the presence of Ice Age man on the Lena and Angara, indicate the purely Arctic character of the landscape. In turn, the presence of extensive grasslands is proved by the bones of steppe animals: horses, wild cattle, dzhiggetai*, and especially the saiga,' which decidedly avoid the forest. The extremely high proportion of steppe species (feathergrass, crested wheatgrass) in the contemporary flora of central Yakutia testifies to the vast spaces then covered with grass; of a total of seven hundred and fifty species of plants, two hundred and fifty, that is, one-third, are of the steppe type (Karavayev 1945: 62-76). Many more ancient steppe areas—the Suntar, Verkhne-Amginsk, Verkhoyansk, and Moma—are separated by great distances from the arterial river system of the region, which connects them with the wooded steppes of the Cis-Baykal and Trans-Baykal regions (Karavayev 1945: 73-75). These steppe areas were formed at a remote period during which there were no obstacles to the free spread of steppe plant species as well as of species of mushrooms, soil lichens, mosses, and water plants peculiar to the steppe, which now grow in Yakutia (Benua 1927; Karavayev 1945: 75; Rabotnov 5934). The absence of a forest, today characteristic of the bleak landscape of polar regions, was typical of the banks of the Angara, Lena, and Yenisey during the Paleolithic period. This is confirmed by different, purely archaeological facts—the peculiarities of Paleolithic dwellings. Excavations of Paleolithic settlements have shown the absence of a forest resulted in specific features in Paleolithic man's building technique. A Paleolithic settlement at Buret consisted, for example, of four separate houses in which the structural material was not wood, but basically mammoth and rhinoceros bone (Okladnikov 1941c; cf. Gerasimov 1931).1 The bones of these huge animals were used for the construction of those parts of the dwelling in which, from our contemporary point of view, only wood would be employed. The posts on which the roofs of the houses rested were the long bones of mammoths, primarily the thigh bones, but sometimes the tusks of mammoths (Fig. 2). The walls of the houses, or at least their foundations, were built of the skulls of rhinoceri and of other large bones, and also of flagstone and earth. Even the roofs of the houses were constructed from osseous material. Inside the houses at Buret there were many reindeer antlers. At Malta, so many antlers were found inside the houses that a report on their quantity was regarded • [Also dzeggetai, chigetai, from the Mongolian tchihitei ("long-eared"), a wild ass, a variety of the klang (Egan: hemionus). Editor, A.I.N.A.] . '1• [Sec also Gerasimov's "The Paleolithic site Malta"; an English translation of this article was published in Anthropology of the North: Translations from Russian Sources, no. 5, pp. 3-32. Editor, A.I.N.A.]

Fig. 2. The Paleolithic settlement of Buret. I–general view of the settlement; 2, 3–posts of mammoth femora; 4–floor plan of a dwelling. 28

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THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

as not entirely plausible or fully convincing. More than eight hundred antlers (that is, more than four hundred animals) were found here. This unheard-of quantity of antlers within a Paleolithic dwelling seemed especially incomprehensible from the usual archaeological point of view. Adherents of this view considered these bony remains of the Paleolithic as "kitchen refuse." Antlers are least likely to be included in kitchen refuse. Besides, the great majority of these antlers obviously had no relation to hunting, in the proper sense of the word, since the burrs were preserved intact, with the natural smooth surface with which they had been attached to the skull. Therefore, they were not obtained by the hunt, but simply picked up after the annual shedding. Clearly, such antlers could serve only as building material. The choice of antlers for the construction of roofs of Paleolithic dwellings is just as understandable as the use of mammoth femora for posts or of rhinoceros skulls for walls. Antlers are light, thin, long, and at the same time strong and elastic. Besides, they have long tines which allow a firm intertwining. In comparison with all other bones at the disposal of Paleolithic builders, antlers were the best material for constructing the frame of a roof, which took the form of a light, strong network of intertwined antlers. The latter in its turn was probably supported by a few thin poles. A basically similar building technique developed in another chronological context, far to the northeast of Baykal on the shores of the Bering Strait among the Eskimos and Coastal Chukchis, where it existed from early Neolithic times until the recent past. These' peoples, inhabiting the unforested Arctic regions of the Chukchi Peninsula, Alaska, and neighboring islands, were compelled to compensate for the absence of wood by wide use of bones of whales, walruses, and other sea mammals for the erection of walls, posts, and roofs of their houses (Zolotarev 1938: 73-87). The original forms of Paleolithic dwellings and their mode of construction are just as naturally associable with an Arctic landscape and climate, which prevailed in Siberia during the Ice Age. Sunk below the surface almost half their height and perhaps more, roofs of streamlined shape in the form of cupolas, the squat Paleolithic houses were results of special climatic conditions—the piercing winter cold and fierce winds of the Arctic, which then extended for hundreds or even thousands of kilometers further south than presently. The whole economy of Paleolithic man, including his clothes, bears the clear impress of the severe Arctic conditions characteristic of a tundra landscape. A statuette on which the clothing is represented, found at Buret, appears to be the oldest document in the world indicating the origin, even at that remote time, of the particular form of clothing which, according to ethnographers, is inseparably connected with the present-day climatic conditions of the tundra (Okladnikov 1941b). On the statuette, the characteristic features of the so-called "closed Arctic clothing" are represented schematically, but with perfect clarity of basic details, in the form of a one-piece fur suit or parka without a front opening, with a 30

The Most Ancient Traces of Man head-piece in the form of a hood sewn onto it in the rear, easily folded back and clinging closely to the face with a fur edging. Like the semisubterranean Arctic dwellings, such clothes are ideally adapted to the open expanses of the Arctic, with its snowstorms and icy winds which penetrate the most imperceptible chink in a house and any opening in the clothing, burning with cold every exposed portion of the body. The naked statuettes encountered in Paleolithic dwellings depict in their turn, although from an entirely different angle, the same Arctic way of life which existed about 25,000 years ago far to the south of the present polar zone. European travelers were always unpleasantly struck and embarrassed by the Chukchi, Koryak, and Eskimo custom of sitting inside their houses without any clothes, completely naked, or at best with only a small apron or "girdle of modesty." But it is sufficient to imagine the interior of a Chukchi yaranga or an Eskimo earth-covered dwelling of the 18th or 19th centuries in order to realize the usefulness and necessity of such a custom under these conditions. The cramped quarters, without ventilation, are densely filled with people; the air is foul with the exhalations of their bodies and the smoke of the blubber lamp. Streams of perspiration cover the skin and to sit in fur clothing would be impossible, not only because of the heat, but because, if the person has to go out of the house, his clothes, soaked with the moist vapors, will freeze and become as hard as tree bark, and will cease to bend and warm the body. The Paleolithic craftsman portrayed women in just this way—with only a narrow girdle or completely naked, but with a splendidly arranged head of hair. Despite the severe climatic conditions, nature at the end of the Ice Age gave Paleolithic man, in those places where the population was not too dense by the standards of the time, everything necessary for his existence, apparently in no less measure than it gives today to the Eskimos and their neighbors in the Arctic expanses of America and Asia. The animal world surrounding man was, as we have seen, incomparably richer and more varied, both in terms of species and in quantity, than the modern fauna of the tundra. In the tundras [of Paleolithic man] there were Arctic foxes and hares; herds of thousands of reindeer roamed about, penetrating far to the south during the cold and snowy winters. In the brush, flocks of willow grouse flew from place to place; their numbers must have been very great; at least in the animal remains from Afontova Gora [Mountain], they make up 90 percent of all the bird bones. The swampy lakes of the tundra and the river tributaries swarmed with water fowl that built their nests and raised their young there. In the spring, when the steppe areas which had reached deep into Central Asia were covered with a green carpet of young vegetation, herds of wild asses, horses, and cattle entered them from the south. Even such a characteristic steppe animal as the saiga antelope penetrated to the north, into the depths of the polar zone. The barren cliffs and mountains were enlivened by the trim figure of the mountain goat, teke,• and the mountain sheep; where the mountain • [Capra sibirica. Editor, A.I.N.A.l

31

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

slopes were covered with tree and brush vegetation, there would be encountered more frequently, in the course of time, the wolverine, the roe deer, and the maral. After the herds of herbivores there followed like a shadow, right to the shores of present-day Novosibirskiye ostrova [Islands], their constant persecutor, the cave lion or tiger, which, however, encountered here for the first time its grim rival, in the person of the Paleolithic hunter (Gromov 1932: 175; Gromov 1935: 166-67). It would seem entirely natural that Paleolithic man, who left his settlements around the village of Chastinskaya and at Malta and Buret, was by occupation primarily a hunter. In the hunting economy of the Upper Paleolithic tribes of Siberia, the hunting of gregarious animals, the ungulates of the tundra and wooded tundra—reindeer, wild cattle, horses, and asses, must have occupied first place. Along their favorite paths, especially around the fords across the swift, wide rivers of the glacial period, which in many cases surpassed the contemporary river-systems of Siberia in dimensions and volume, clusters of Paleolithic dwellings were spread, and the largest and most populous settlements built. By way of comparison, just in relatively recent times, hunting settlements of the wooded tundra and tundra of northern Asia, which lived by hunting the reindeer, were so grouped. The usual places for their seasonal sojourn were those parts of the river valleys where herds of thousands of reindeer forded the rivers. Apparently, the hunters of the Paleolithic did just the same. But the small camps of hunters in the wooded tundra of the 18th and 19th centuries should not be compared with the settlements of the Upper Paleolithic, which constituted true villages, with large, strong, and carefully built houses. In this respect such villages of the Upper Paleolithic as Buret and Malta are most reminiscent of the villages of the settled shore tribes of the Bering Sea, mentioned earlier. The hunting of sea mammals, the abundant supply of walrus meat and blubber which was gained by this activity, was the basis for the stable, settled life of the maritime tribes of northeastern Asia and Alaska. The Paleolithic inhabitants of Malta, Buret, and Chastinskaya likewise had the opportunity to obtain no less plentiful supplies of meat and fat by hunting the mammoth and the rhinoceros. For instance, the Berezovka mammoth was 3 m in length and about 2.8 m in height, and weighed more than moo kg. And mammoths could be even heavier. It is known that the skeleton of the Adams mammoth, found in 1799 at the mouth of the river Lena at Bykovskiy Mys [Bull Cape; approximately 72° N.; 129° E.], reached the height of about 3 to 3.2 m. The Bykovskiy Mys mammoth must have weighed correspondingly more than the Berezovka mammoth. The people of the Paleolithic, like the contemporary Arctic hunters, knew how to provide themselves with supplies of food for the severe winter. They must have dried meat in the sun by fire, and must have stored tallow and fats in special storage vessels made of the bladders of animals, or of the skins of geese or ducks, and kept them in storage pits 32

The Most Ancient Traces of Man dug into the permafrosted tundra. Having such supplies of meat at their disposal, the Paleolithic hunters, like the modern Eskimos and Chukchis, could settle for long periods at definite points where the hunting of pachyderms proved most profitable and man's existence safest and most convenient. Here they built their semi-subterranean houses, grouped, as at Malta and Buret, in small settlements along the banks of large rivers and their tributaries. There is no doubt that, at the low level of technical development, the primitive hunters, striving to ensure the success of the hunt, must have acted collectively, not singly, uniting the efforts of the entire group inhabiting this or that camp. In this respect, the very distribution of the Paleolithic settlements, their association with definite types of landscape, is indicative as it shows the prevalence of collective work. The site of Malta, for example, lies at a point in the valley of the Belaya [White] River where the river cuts through the Cambrian limestone and flows at the foot of the vertical cliffs which extend in an unbroken wall for many kilometers. The overhanging cliffs stretch from the mouth of the Belaya along the left bank of the Angara to another locality where the second large settlement of the early stage of the local Paleolithic is located. This is the site of Buret. Such cliffs must have served successfully as huge natural pitfalls for the herds of wild animals driven toward the river by the beaters. The animals threw themselves down in fear on the rocky projections and boulders and killed themselves or became the prey of the hunters. A group of Paleolithic hunters was bound together not only by purely economic necessity but also by the naturally-arising kin ties. It was a group of people united by blood relationship, by common descent from the same ancestors. These ancient kinships in turn cannot be understood or correctly explained if we leave aside their economic basis. They were nothing more than a specific form of organization of the collective of primitive hunters and gatherers of the Stone Age which answered an economic necessity by demanding that all unite in collective labor. The existence of this form of organization in the primitive commune was underlaid by the low level of development of the productive forces of that remote time, which did not permit other more perfect and developed forms of cooperative labor. During the Upper Paleolithic, the development of the clan was still in an early stage, in which group marriage and matrilineality arose. Engels has stated: "In all forms of group family it is not known who the father of the child is, but its mother is known. Even though she calls all children of the common family hers and bears maternal responsibility toward them, she still distinguishes her natural children from the rest. Hence it is clear that once group marriage exists, ancestry can be established on the maternal side, and therefore only the female line is recognized. So it actually was among all savages and among all peoples who are at the lower level of barbarism" (Engels 1951 [edition] 40). In a matrilineal clan women did not enter into the man's clan; rather, men were the "newcomers" from another clan, entering into marital ties with the clan to which their wives belonged. The women had charge of 33

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

the domestic economy of the clan, and they occupied a prominent and, at all events, independent, position in it. The ideological reflection of this position was the concept of superhuman beings of female sex, mistresses of a definite sphere of natural phenomena or social activity. Such, for example, were the female spirits of one of the tribes of the Arctic most primitive in its level of development, the Eskimos, whose economic system and folkways were so close to the Upper Paleolithic conditions of Siberia and eastern Europe. Concerning this, V. G. Bogoraz wrote: "In the Eskimo cosmogony, female society and female spirits decisively prevail over the male. The three fundamental spirits are all female: Pinga—the spirit of the earth; Hilla—the spirit of the air; and the chief one of all—the underwater sovereign, Sedna. Sedna is most frequently called simply `the woman' or also Kavna, `she below.' Comparably, Pinga is frequently called Rana, `she above' " (Bogoraz 1936: 249). The significance of these female sovereign spirits in the Eskimo worldview is shown by the fact that Sedna is the mistress of the sea and all its inhabitants—walruses and seals, on which the life and death of the entire Eskimo tribe depends, which fact in turn makes man dependent on the will of Sedna. Whereas the sea belongs to Sedna, the earth is presided over by Pinga, the mistress of the reindeer, and Hilla and Asiyak rule over the elements of the air: to them belong thunder and the wind. In Eskimo tales, Asiyak is depicted in the image of a deformed monster: her mouth and eyes are placed vertically and the nose horizontally. In her house everything is upside down—the oil lamp, the kettle, the water bucket. Even the benches are placed otherwise than among men, since the wind stands everything on its head. Yet, the monstrous wind-woman Asiyak, having charge of the weather on which the success of the hunt depends, is at the same time hospitable to people. Sedna, just as disfigured as Asiyak, takes the form of an old female walrus. She maintains the beasts of the sea and protects them from the depredations of human beings. Pinga, like Sedna, protects the population of the land portion of the Eskimo world which is under her charge—the herds of wild reindeer. If greedy hunters kill too many reindeer, the enraged Pinga severely punishes the Eskimos (Bogoraz 1936: 249). The entire surrounding Eskimo world and its material goods, sources of the Eskimos' existence, are thus under the charge of mythical female beings created by their imaginations. Fig. 3. Female statuettes of the Paleolithic, and representations of birds. I–Paleolithic statuette in hood and fur clothing from Buret; 2–representation of a bird from Buret; 3–figurine of a naked woman, Buret; 4–representation of a bird from Mezin in the Ukraine; 5, 6–figures of women, early Eskimo culture; 7–representation of Kyys-tangara in the Yakutsk Museum; 8–figurine of a naked woman from the Paleolithic settlement of Gagarino (on the Don). 34

4

A

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

Apparently, the Paleolithic figurines of women, found not only in western Europe and the European part of the Soviet Union, but also in Siberia, are images of similar female spirits. At Malta, such figures representing women, both naked and dressed in fur clothing, were carved from mammoth tusks. At Buret, along with bone statuettes, there was also found a miniature figurine made with great care from a light-green precious mineral, serpentine. But the Paleolithic figurines representing women (Fig. 3) must have served not so much as images of such spiritmistresses of the elements (it is characteristic that the Eskimos did not make images of them), as for another purpose immediately connected with the life and role of women. We cannot, therefore, avoid noting the resemblance to the images of later mother-goddesses, patronesses of childbirth, for example, the "mothers of gods" Cybele, Ishtar, and others. We have before us, generally speaking, one and the same traditional figure of a woman with the well-developed features of a mature and fertile mother (Yefimenko 1938: 403-24). Obviously, this similarity has deep roots in the history of ideas about the mother-goddess. Let us therefore consider some of the less remote ethnographic examples which may guide us to an understanding of the sources of the mother-goddess cult and with it to the meaning of the puzzling Paleolithic statuettes. A female deity which may be compared with the Paleolithic statuettes was worshipped in Yakutia: this was Ayyysyt, the goddess of childbirth among the Yakuts. She was known under various names—Nelbey, Ayyy, Kubey-khotun, Dakhtar Ayyysyt. According to the ancient beliefs, she lived in the eastern part of the sky, where the sun rises, and to which the shaman or ceremonial speaker at the spring festival, ysyakh, addresses himself, raising a goblet of koumiss in the goddess's honor. In the olonkho epic, the goddess is represented as an unkempt lady wearing a sable coat thrown over her breast, the edge of her hat turned up, her wolf-skin knee-stockings lowered, and the laces of her boots undone. Ayyysyt brings the soul of a boy transformed into a knife or an arrow, or the soul of a girl transformed into a pair of scissors. She safeguards the life of the parturient and furthers the speedy resolution of labor, coming to the pregnant woman seven days before the onset of labor, remaining with her uninterruptedly the entire time, and only flying away three days after the birth of the child. The figure of the goddess Ayyysyt among the Yakuts contains, of course, many late elements. But at the same time there are retained in her cult features which can only be understood by going back far into the depths of time. According to the ethnographers who observed the ceremony in the 19th century, on the third day after parturition, when the goddess was about to leave the mother, the women conducted the ceremony of farewell to her, at which men could not be present. For this purpose, a pit about an arshin in depth was dug near the hearth and an urasa—a tent made of splinters of wood, covered over with patterned pieces of birchbark—was built over it. Then, images of animals—a horse with saddlebags, a reindeer, and an elk—also made of birchbark, were placed about the urasa. Around the images and the tent sat the participating women, 36

The Most Ancient Traces of Man dressed in the same fashion as Ayyysyt is depicted in the epic poems— in their best clothes, wearing lynx or sable coats, with their hair loose on their shoulders, with tall fur caps on their heads, put on backwards, so that the round silver plate on the top of the cap faced toward the rear. In the second phase of the ceremony, one of the women, who had already borne a child, or a grandmother, lights a fire within the urasa, and at the very same moment, one of the girls present (or according to the ethnographer Sleptsov, a small boy) shoots an arrow from a small bow into the representations of the elk and the reindeer. The third phase of the ceremony consists of the women's pouring for each other a wooden spoon full of hot fat into the palm of the hand, smearing it on their faces and hair, and then beginning to laugh hard without words, stretching their hands to the fire and bringing them back to their faces. The women who laugh the most of all are considered to be deserving of the goddess's attention. It is said of them that Ayyysyt has smiled on them and it is thought that they will soon bear children (Popov 1938; Kulakovskiy 1925; Sleptsov 1885). The circumstance that all adult men are excluded from participation in the farewell to Ayyysyt is enough to indicate the ancient date of this rite, which must go to the period of the matriclan. The ritual laughter and the equally ritual gesture of lifting the hands in the ceremony of farewell to Ayyysyt, which are also noted by other investigators, confirm this. They are undoubtedly among the oldest elements in the cult of the Yakut mother-goddess, as is shown by the similarity, at first glance unexpected, between these gestures and those shown on extremely ancient representations of female deities and spirits in other countries, including those on cliffs in North Africa, which represent scenes of conjuration by hunters and women before the hunt. It is all the more interesting that exactly the same ritual pose is characteristic of some images of women from Upper Paleolithic sites in Europe (L'Ausselle in France, Gagarino on the Don), which were analyzed by S. N. Zamyatnin as representing conjurations for the bewitchment of game (Zamyatnin 1935: 74). In comparing these representations with the archaic ceremonial of farewell to Ayyysyt among the Yakuts, it is easy to see the similarity which unites them. In both instances there is developed an identical scheme of the magical killing of a reindeer, in which the hunter is only the actual executant of the will of the women casting the spell. In both instances the chief role belongs to the women casting the spell—the participants in the ceremony and the force standing behind it, exactly like the goddess Ayyysyt, represented a female form among the 19thand loth-century Yakuts. In both instances the hands of the women are raised to the face in a definite ritual gesture. This coincidence is especially remarkable because the ancient religion and cult of the Yakuts as a whole had a pronouncedly pastoral character. The connection of the cult of the mother-goddess with primitive hunting rites therefore indicates its very great antiquity and its primitive derivation. One cannot help noting in this connection that the vessel filled with fat used for the ceremonial smearing among the Yakuts (a rite no less 37

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

widely distributed and ancient than the ritual gesture noted above) corresponds to the Paleolithic representation of a horn in reliefs of L'Ausselle. Whereas among the pastoral Yakuts the ancient fertility cult is connected primarily with an abundance of milk products, expressed most clearly in the abundance of butter, among the primitive hunters the opposite is the case: with the Chukchis and Eskimos the anointing with butter is replaced by anointing with fresh blood of a killed beast, or with seal blubber, a practice entirely natural in the conditions of their life and well known from ethnographic sources. It is precisely blood which in the mind of primitive man is the basic receptacle of the soul, or, in other words, of all vital qualities and external expressions of life. Therefore, being in command of the blood of a beast, the conjuresses of the Upper Paleolithic had its life entirely at their disposal. It appears then, that echoes of the distant past—of the primitive period in the development of religious beliefs during which no conceptions of gods yet existed and only the earliest sources of the cult of the maternal origin and of fertility in the form of the worship of female ancestors obtained—were preserved among the Yakuts until our time in the cult of the goddess Ayyysyt. This cult arose in the conditions of the matriclan and was also connected with primitive hunting rituals. It is interesting, therefore, that other peoples of Siberia, akin to the Yakuts, preserved still more primitive ideas of female fertility spirits. Among the Dolgans, during difficult labor, the shaman had a wooden image of a protectress (Naady or Dakhtar ayyyta, lit. "female deity") prepared. Then the shaman said an appropriate spell over it, after which it was laid beside the patient. On recovering, the woman was to keep her protectress for subsequent childbirths. Whenever eating, she had to feed the protectress by throwing it small pieces of food (Popov 1946: 50-52). No less interesting for the history of the cult are the emegender or enekeler, the "old women" or "great-grandmothers" of the Altayans, who are remarkable because they are not goddesses but are supposed to have been women who actually lived in former times, ancestresses in the female line. They were always represented in groups. In their turn, Paleolithic female statuettes are also found as ordinary objects; at Malta more than twenty were excavated. As images of female ancestors and female spirits in general, the Paleolithic figures of women were probably also connected with the cult of the dead. We know that many peoples had the custom of mummifying corpses and making burial masks of various sorts. Similarly, the unusual cult of Kyys-tangara arose among the Yakuts. The image of Kyys-tangara (the Maiden Goddess) was the likeness of a dead maiden. According to the legends, the first Maiden Goddess was the beautiful daughter of the rich Omogoy, who had been rejected by Elley and then, out of shame and grief, ended her life by suicide. V. L. Priklonskiy took down accounts according to which, after the death of a child, the Yakuts made a doll out of the lower part of a horse's or a cow's pastern, covered it as well as possible with the fur of a valuable animal, and decorated it with silver 38

The Most Ancient Traces of Man platelets. Priklonskiy wrote that the soul of the dead settled in this doll (that is, Kyys-tangara) and had to be propitiated, lest, becoming angry, it cause much harm or even bring on the "falling sickness" (epilepsy). In order to ward off the anger of these spirits, the doll was confined in the hollow of a tree and domestic animals were sacrificed to its spirit. The image of the dead maiden-shamaness Mangyn-kyys, who caused insanity and other diseases, was placed inside the dwelling. "This idol receives the name Kyys-tangara, the maiden goddess. They place it in the yurt, in the corner of the center beam, to the north of the fireplace, where it remains from generation to generation, so honored that the smallest contact with it may provoke the anger of this fury" (Priklonskiy 1886: 132; 1891: 64, 65). The Yakut tyulftyuye—birchbark repositories for spirits—are apparently of the same origin; they are made not necessarily only for the spirits of dead girls but also for those of shamans. Paleolithic statuettes similar to the Yakut Kyys-tangara may have been made in the case of death of members of the clan, women and girls, as repositories for their souls. As such they enjoyed worship and care on the part of the clansmen, and various conceptions reflecting the matriclan system, of the same type as those mentioned earlier, were connected with them. The worship of such repositories of souls probably was not confined to the care of them alone, but was expressed also in various ceremonies connected both with the desire to increase the numbers of the clan, to raise its birthrate, and with the need for a successful hunt, an increase in the quantity of game and the multiplication of the wild animals which were the object of the hunt. In addition to female images, figures of beasts are still more widely represented everywhere in the art of the Upper Paleolithic. This corresponds entirely to the character of primitive beliefs, in which the cult of animals had a highly significant place. Siberia was no exception. For

Fig. 4. General view of the Shishkino cliffs on the Lena River. 39

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

example, representations of birds—loons and geese—have been found at Malta and Buret. On a clasp from Malta there is depicted a stylized snake, and on a small flat piece of mammoth ivory the same animal is engraved with delicate lines. One of the cliff drawings in the Lena Valley between Kachug and Verkholensk, near the village of Shishkino (Figs. 4, 5), is of great interest

Fig. 5. View of the inscribed rock at Shishkino and the Lena. It is located near the old mill of Shishkino, on the highest stratum of the outcrop, at a height of 40Ø m above the level of the river. This figure occupies a large part of the slightly overhanging smooth surface of a rather large cliff face, and is executed in red. The drawing represents a horse, indicated primarily by the wide and long tail, the form of the head, and the general outline of the torso—massive and relatively wide, almost square in its proportions, with a large, convex, and markedly hanging belly. The horse's head is small and short, outlined in one smooth and strongly 40

The Most Ancient Traces of Man convex curved line, "hook-nosed," with a softly modelled mouth, the upper lip significantly longer and larger than the lower one. The neck is disproportionately short and abrupt, with pronounced pectoral muscles. The huge proportions of the figure are striking: its length is 2.8 m; that is, almost 3 m. On the Lena and elsewhere in the forest zone of Siberia, in other ancient cliff drawings executed in red, which for the most part date from the Neolithic period or the Bronze Age, the animal figures most frequently seen are those of elk; they are depicted in a well-known, characteristic, and stylistically stable manner. No other pictures of horses, let alone of these dimensions and style, have yet been found among them. This is entirely understandable, since here, during the Neolithic, Eneolithic, and developed Bronze Age, the same taiga landscape and corresponding fauna prevailed as does today. The horse is primarily an animal of the open grasslands. In the thick coniferous taiga of the Stone and Bronze Ages on the upper Lena, as in other taiga regions of Siberia, where there were no broad meadows, the wild horse could not exist. In looking at the Shishkino drawing, we may persuade ourselves that the horse depicted in it is an image of those horses which were found in a wild state in the desert expanses of Mongolia and Tibet by the noted Russian traveler N. M. Przhevalskiy. It was just such a small and squat horse with a "hump-nosed" head that the ancient artist drew on the Shishkino cliff. Besides the subject matter, the Shishkino drawing of a horse is differentiated from the Neolithic drawings of animals, and from the Bronze Age images close to them in time, by its stylistic features. The Shishkino drawing lacks the special graphic exactitude, the mature realistic skill and artistic perfection, which immediately mark off the work of the Neolithic craftsmen from all other cliff drawings. It is executed in an entirely different style—broad and sweeping. The artist modelled the main lines of the animal's large body boldly and decisively. But he was not yet able to judge exactly the interrelations of the various parts of the body which he had depicted, to put them together on a flat surface in a more exact, realistic way. One can say that from this drawing blows the breath of the really deep past, the true childhood of art, while the works of the Neolithic artists represent the higher level which the realistic art of the ancient Siberian tribes attained in time. It is therefore not surprising that, when the Shishkino drawing is compared with ancient drawings of horses from other places, it proves to be closer to the Paleolithic images of the identical subject which had survived in the depths of Upper Paleolithic caves, where the drawings are remarkable for their realism. In this connection, the very large dimensions of the Shishkino drawing are characteristic. Many figures of animals from the Paleolithic cave paintings of western Europe are of similar dimensions. This feature of Paleolithic painting is to be explained by the desire to represent the animal as exactly as possible, in all its concreteness, in full accord with its actual aspect and even with its size. At the time of its discovery in 1941, the Shishkino drawing was unique 41

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

1

2

Fig. 6. Paleolithic drawings of horses. I, 2, 4, 5–from Western Europe; 3–from Shishkino on the Lena. of its kind among ancient drawings, not only on the Lena, but also in Siberia generally (Fig. 6). Detailed study of the Shishkino cliff in 1947 led to the discovery of two additional Paleolithic representations of animals—a bison and a horse—executed in the same style and demonstrating conclusively the presence of Paleolithic cliff paintings on the Lena. Both of these representations are done in the same technique and style, in the same peculiar, naïvely realistic spirit as the large drawing of the horse, with only the difference that, thanks to their relatively small dimensions, the ancient artist was able to reproduce the proportions of the animal's body more confidently and exactly and thus render the form of its body better. Of particular interest is the third figure—that of a bull (bison). The length of the figure is 1.12 m, its height 0.55 m. It is drawn in contour, with a wide band of red. The bull is portrayed, like the horse, in true profile, with its head pointing downriver. Its torso is heavy and cumbersome, its muzzle large and rounded, its neck abrupt[ly differentiated], its spine level, its hindquarters massive, typically bull-like. The small short legs with hooves are carefully reproduced and meticulously outlined in detail, especially the front leg and also the long narrow tail with the 42

The Most Ancient Traces of Man characteristic tuft at the end. The primitive artist reproduced vividly and persuasively not only the general form of the animal's heavy, clumsy figure but also its characteristic bearing. The bull is shown in this drawing with head lowered and stretched forward (Fig. 7). It is as if he were walking slowly and had suddenly stopped in his course, as though transfixed. The drawing radiates heavy, clumsy strength. The tail stretched out behind, the lowered head and straight spine of the animal still more clearly emphasize this impression and give the picture a feeling of internal energy and forward impetus. In its general character, the Shishkino bull is the same kind of distant northern mate of the remarkable bulls from the cave art of the glacial epoch in western Europe, as the two figures of horses mentioned earlier are to those of France and Spain. The drawings of both the horses and the bull on the Shishkino cliffs are simple and primitive in form, but at the same time profoundly realistic, like all of the ancient Paleolithic figures of animals generally. They both radiate the special freshness of immediate observation and the inexhaustible

:1

I

14.

Fig. 7. Paleolithic figures of bulls. r—from Shishkino; 2 to 5—from Western Europe. 43

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

vital force which are inseparable from the creativity of humanity's first artists. These are the first vivid works of the primitive Paleolithic craftsmen to be found not only in Asia but in our whole country—the first examples of their paintings, which appeared where they were least expected, far to the east of the Pyrenees and the Mediterranean Sea, in the headwaters of one of the largest rivers of northern Asia, which proceeds from here still farther northward into the depths of the Arctic expanses, to the bleak shores of the Arctic Ocean. Like hundreds of analogous drawings of wild animals assignable to the Upper Paleolithic of Europe, the drawings on the Shishkino cliffs, with sculptured images in bone and stone, found at Buret, characterize the world-view of the primordial population of northern Asia. The location of the drawings is in itself indicative. The great concave stretch of rocky cliffs, over the course of 2.5 km, at the foot of which the river's transparent waters rush smoothly, from ancient times must have attracted hunters because of its special convenience for the organization of collective battue hunting of hoofed animals. The hunters must have come here for that purpose even at that distant time when in place of the boundless green ocean of taiga of today there stretched under the Shishkino cliffs the equally boundless steppes and tundras of the glacial era. Ready proof of this are traces of a Paleolithic settlement at the very foot of Shishkino cliff, on the second floodplain terrace, near the bed of a small brook, now dry. Paleolithic hunters always tried to set up their camps near steep precipices and cliffs, where they could easily secure food by battue hunting. And it is entirely natural that here, on the same cliffs which served as natural traps for the beasts, they carried out their hunting rites, with the aim of casting a spell over the beast, of attracting the game to the hunter. Judging by archaeological and ethnographic data, an obligatory and necessary part of these hunting rites is the representation of the animals carried out by the most varied means. In some cases they were "live" animals represented by masked men, who, in their pantomime, craftily reproduced the characteristic poses and movements of the animals. These were the beginnings of later theatrical activity, so to speak, the mystery plays of the Stone Age. In other cases the ancient hunters drew the images of animals on the walls of caves and overhanging cliffs, outlined them in the clayey ground or sand, modelled them from clay, or carved them from wood, stone, or bone. The representations of the most important animals in the life of the hunters of the time, the wild horses and bison, must have been of just this nature. In this connection, there is one small but characteristic detail in the largest of the drawings at Shishkino. In it, the primitive artist has intentionally emphasized the mark of its sex. Besides the latter, he has placed a symbol in the form of an oval. Such symbols are found very frequently in Paleolithic drawings, and in the unanimous opinion of investigators, represent the female reproductive organ. Hence it follows that the primitive hunter, in drawing the image of a wild stallion, faced the task of showing it in combination with an animal of the opposite sex, 44

The Most Ancient Traces of Man in the act of procreation. He was not yet able to represent this subject realistically. Such a task was beyond his technical capacities. But he solved it in another and easier way, combining the customary symbol for the female element with a realistic figure of a stallion, depicted in an aroused condition. It is to be understood that there were no sexual or erotic motifs here in the true sense of this word, contrary to what some scholars frequently opine. Here we witness merely the ancient cult of fertility brought to life by the fantastically reflected economic interests of Paleolithic man in his primitive religion. The primitive "artist" believed that, by portraying this subject on a cliff, he could influence nature in the desired direction. He thought that such drawings caused the animals to multiply, increased the number of wild horses, and thereby insured a successful hunt. The traces of Paleolithic cliff drawings on the Lena are valuable not only because the world-view and beliefs of Paleolithic man are revealed in them, but also because, together with the artistic artifacts from Buret and Malta, they show how unfounded were the attempts to consider only the few regions of western Europe famed for cave art and bone-carving as centers of high culture, and how untenable were the attempts to declare the entire remaining Paleolithic populations of the Old World—especially the ancient tribes of northern Asia—incapable of high artistic creativity and independent historical development. Under identical natural conditions, and with a similar cultural and economic system, the Siberian tribes created and developed an equally realistic art, showing with equal clarity the same basic primitive-realistic style as did their Western contemporaries. One of the basic conditions which prepared the way for the full development of this art, and particularly of bone-carving and sculpture, was the abundance of an excellent raw material—fresh mammoth ivory, in no way inferior to the precious elephant ivory—the noblest material of the carvers of our time. It was under the same conditions that the characteristic art of the Arctic sculptors and carvers of our own period developed. I refer to the settled coastal tribes of Alaska and the Chukchi Peninsula, who had available inexhaustible supplies of walrus tusks. Nevertheless, the striking similarities between the Paleolithic art of Siberia and that of eastern and western Europe, both in general aspects and in particular details, is probably not explainable by similarity of economy, way of life, and technology in the vast territory of the Old World stretching from the Baltic Sea to Lake Baykal. Carved images of birds from Buret and Malta, for example, have a general similarity to those found in Mezin, in the Ukraine. (Yefimenko 1938: 499-507. For description of the finds in Mezin, see Yefimenko and Beregovaya 1941.) Female images, too, show in style, forms, and even in small details a still more complete coincidence over this entire extensive territory, a coincidence which can hardly be explained solely by similar living conditions at the end of the Ice Age. The same, traditional, en face pose is characteristic for all these statuettes. For the most part they portray a naked female figure, 45

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

of the aspect of a mature multipara—with wide hips and large pendulous breasts. In the majority of them, the hands are placed on the belly. The above conclusion is not contradicted by frequent differences between Paleolithic statuettes from Siberia and from eastern and western Europe. Such differences are completely natural and inevitable. They only confirm and strengthen the fact of a general, far-reaching similarity between Siberian and European figurines of women during the Upper Paleolithic. As is known, such differences exist even among statuettes from one and the same site, from one and the same district. In fact, each Paleolithic statuette is in detail something original and unrepeatable. It is unlikely that a comparatively small group of Paleolithic people, finding themselves in the east at the end of the Ice Age, could alone, and independent of the rest of the world, create this primitive art so surprisingly similar to that of Europe. The basic collection of stone and bone artifacts at Malta and Buret, especially the punch-like artifacts similar to those of Mezin, points to connections of Siberian Paleolithic art with the West, with those regions of our continent where the Aurignacian-Solutrean culture of the people of Kostenki-on-the-Don (both at Gagarino and Mezin in the Ukraine) flourished so lavishly. The full significance of this fact, remarkable in the remote history of Europe and Asia, becomes clear when we realize that, on the basis of most recent studies, the characteristic features of three large cultural areas had already formed in the Upper Paleolithic. The first of these included the broad expanses of the unglaciated zone of Africa, southern Europe, and Hither Asia, including Crimea, the Caucasus, and parts of Middle Asia. This was a region in which there was no rich Arctic art of bone-carving and cave-painting, where the development of technology early took the path of reduction of the dimensions and geometrization of the forms of stone tools. The second region was the glacial zone of Europe, where the Arctic culture of the Upper Paleolithic hunting tribes flourished, reaching its greatest development during the Aurignacian-Solutrean period. The third Upper Paleolithic cultural region is represented by the unique archaeological sites of southeaster and Central Asia,* and also of Mongolia and the Trans-Baykal, where the development of culture also early took its own path. Despite their territorial closeness to the last-mentioned region, the campsites of Malta and Buret belong, in their basic features, among the sites of the second (that is, European) cultural region. In the absence, in Siberia, of sites earlier than the end of the Solutrean and the beginning of the Magdalenian, this similarity may indicate that the original settlement of Siberia progressed from west to east, from the regions of the classical, long since developed culture of the Arctic hunters of the West, where it developed out of the Middle Paleolithic culture which preceded it; that is, the Mousterian. Having crossed the "Stone Belt" [Urals], the ancient hunting tribes of • [In Soviet geographical terminology, Central Asia (Tsentralnaya Aziya) indicates the territory east of the Pamir knot. Editor, A.I.N.A.]

46

The Most Ancient Traces of Man eastern Europe, who represented the European physical type in its most ancient, Paleolithic form, reached the area of modern Tomsk and from there continued farther eastward to the Angara and Yenisey valleys and finally reached Lake Baykal. From Baykal they finally spread to the Lena, arriving at the locality of the Chastinskaya campsite while the Ice Age still prevailed; that is, in the same remote period during which Malta and Buret were occupied.

47

The Late Paleolithic of Yakutia

Chapter 3

It would nevertheless be incorrect to suppose that the settlement of Siberia came only from the west, or that the cultural development of its ancient tribes went on in complete isolation from the population of the neighboring eastern regions of Asia. Even in the most ancient campsites of Siberia, mentioned earlier, we observe some essentially new features which indicate that profound changes have taken place in the culture of the first settlers of Siberia, as compared to the culture of the western tribes related to them. These features, in their full development, are found among the latest Paleolithic artifacts of Siberia, which are well represented over the whole of Siberia and include the Paleolithic finds on the Lena. The cultural remains of the Late Paleolithic settlements sometimes lie at rather high elevations, on ancient terraces, but only in their upper, most recently deposited layers. This is the case at two ancient settlements in the territory of the Yakut A.S.S.R.-one in the locality of Daban, on the left bank of the Lena, 8 km downstream from the city of Olekminsk; the other 2 km from the village of Nyuya, near the mouth of the river of the same name. The site of Daban is located on an early river terrace, with its edge marked by precipitous outcrops of limestone. On top of the limestone is a Quaternary deposit of sand and sandy loam about 4 m thick. Below the loam lies pure river sand. The culture-yielding stratum, containing traces of human activity, presents the appearance of a flat plane strewn with separate [large river] pebbles which undoubtedly once formed the hearth, since they are charred and cracked by the action of fire. Along with them were found stones worked by the hand of man—pebbles split by him, chips removed from these, flint flakes, and a few stone tools. The worked stones and tools, made from a relatively soft rock of a green tint, show their great antiquity even by their outward aspect. The form of these objects, and the technique of their preparation, indicate the same thing. The second site, near the mouth of the Nyuya, is also connected with an early terrace, deposited on a layer of greenish-gray friable limestone as a 49

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

mass of sand and loam, covered along the very edge of the terrace by a high rampart-like dune of yellowish sand, blown there during the disarrangement of the terrace by the winds. The height of the rampart is considerable—up to 5 m. In the upper stratum of loam and in the sandy deposits of the terrace, at a depth of about i m relative to its ancient surface, under a thick mass of blown sand, lies the culture-yielding layer. In its position, and in the character of the objects deposited, it is similar to the one at Daban. A third site of this type was found on an ancient terrace near the village of Dubrovina, which differs from the two terraces described above in that it is based not on solid rock, but on a thick layer of gravel, containing large boulders (up to 0.5 m in diameter) probably of glacial origin. Above this, in places, is a layer of gravel welded together with limestone cement into one solid mass of conglomerate. Above the conglomerate lies a second layer of gravel, and still higher a third of small pebbles in a red clayey loam. Above the layers of gravel lies a light yellow sandy loam. The Paleolithic finds at this site are connected with the upper horizon of the sandy loam. Thus, they are in the same geological formation as the campsites at Daban and Nyuya. Late Paleolithic remains near the village of Makarovo, contemporaneous with those already described, are encountered under different conditions. Here the bank of the Lena is formed in a series of quite distinct terraces. One of the most recent of these is a terrace which reaches a height of 6-8 m above the Lena. Like the one at Dubrovina, it is of the type not formed by cutting through the rock bed, but is aggradational; that is, formed of friable deposits deposited by the river. The terrace is covered by a layer of soil and turf, chernozem-like, black in color and friable. In it were discovered sherds of Neolithic vessels, arrowheads, and small fire pits lined with large pebbles, characteristic of the Neolithic. Under the soil-and-turf layer lies a straw-colored clayey loam, and beneath it, sand. The sand is underlaid with red clayey loam and lightly eroded blocks of red sandstone, probably carried away from the base bank by the swift mountain streams. The cultural remains of the Paleolithic lie in the clayey loam stratum, at its contact with the sandy layer. Apparently, the period of existence of this settlement is separated from that of Chastinskaya by a long geological interval, during which the ledge [step] of the ancient 20-•25 m terrace was formed, and the mass of sand, which covers the clayey loam containing the Paleolithic finds, was laid down. People arrived here at the time when the sands of the 6-8 m terrace first formed a surface, dried out a little, and had just begun to be covered with the clayey loam which ultimately buried the entire campsite. Fragments of the bones of graminivorous animals, probably reindeer, were found, along with stone artifacts in the clayey loam of this terrace. No remains of the large pachyderms, the rhinoceros and the mammoth, have yet been found here. It appears that both the rhinoceros and the mammoth had died out at this time here, as well as on the Yenisey and Angara, although their contemporaries—wild cattle, horses, and reindeer— con tinued to exist. 50

The Late Paleolithic As the geology suggests, the climate everywhere changed significantly at this time. It became drier, as a result of which the tundra definitely gave way to the open expanses of steppe, on which herds of wild horses and cattle grazed. With the tundra, those typical representatives of the fauna of the Far North, the Arctic foxes, disappeared, and the willow ptarmigans, associated with them, no longer appeared on the Yenisey at Krasnoyarsk, on the Angara at Irkutsk, or on the upper and middle Lena. The glacial period came to an end and a new one began. Although at first it differed little from the preceding epoch, with time the differences became more noticeable and definite. These changes of natural conditions at first had a rather negative character, not only for man but for the entire animal world. The slight warming of the climate did not compensate for the losses which the fauna of Siberia suffered by the death of the giants of the glacial epoch, by the disappearance of the most magnificent and striking representatives of the "mammoth complex" characteristic of it. The loss of the mammoth and the rhinoceros, and also all the profound changes in the natural conditions surrounding man, taken as a whole, must have provoked corresponding changes in his life, in his economy and the way of living inseparably connected with it. In order to imagine these changes fully, we must bear in mind that archaeologists long ago established a circumstance, incomprehensible and striking at first glance: an unexpected, profound and abrupt decline in all fields of human activity, in all parts of the culture of the Late Paleolithic of Siberia, as compared with the preceding period of Malta and Buret. It is sufficient to say that changes negative in their outward character now involve the entire material culture—the technique of tool-making, the types of artifacts, the aspect of the settlements, and the construction of dwellings—and even the field of intellectual culture: art, and graphic rendition. The technique of stoneworking in the early sites of the Upper Paleolithic of Siberia already had a fully developed Upper Paleolithic character; it was in general on a level with the technique which in Europe is characteristic of the AurignacianSolutrean and Magdalenian periods. At Malta and Buret the basic method of preparing stone tools was an extremely precise and refined technique of removing regularly shaped, elongated flakes from a prismatic nucleus [core], which required of the craftsman great precision and purposefulness of carefully calculated movements and also, of course, an excellent knowledge of the properties of the materials being worked. [In the postglacial era] there appear stone artifacts of types and forms which should have vanished long before. More than this, the Siberian craftsmen began to make things which apparently had never existed on this territory, since they were characteristic only of other remote [Paleolithic] eras during which Siberia had not yet been occupied by man. Various investigators have long since noted that the stone artifacts of the Late Siberian Paleolithic were astonishingly similar to Mousterian, or, even earlier, Lower Paleolithic ones. Actually, we find in the Lena campsites near Makarovo, Nyuya, Shishkino, Daban, and at other points of eastern and western Siberia, oval and crescent-shaped scrapers, which 51

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

in their outline are similar to Mousterian scrapers of the La Quina type. Along with them we find, in the campsites on the Angara and Yenisey, sharp-pointed instruments made from broad flakes, which were certainly taken not from a prismatic core, but from a discoidal one of more ancient type. Finally, we discover here these same discoidal cores of Mousterian type. The change in the character of the bone inventory is equally strange and inexplicable, though less abrupt; here many types of artifacts, primarily the most efficient ones, including the exquisitely shaped large needles and pins, daggers, and complex ornaments, disappear completely. They are unexpectedly replaced by a scanty and almost beggarly selection of uniform and inconspicuous objects. Simultaneously, changes took place in the way of life of the people, which were reflected in equally pronounced changes in the structure of dwellings and the general character of the settlement. The former Paleolithic "villages," consisting of a number of structures, spacious and monumental in their own way, are replaced by temporary camps made up of a few tent-like light dwellings. Typical remains of such a dwelling were found, for example, at the campsite near Makarovo, where the excavations of 1941 uncovered a hearth and its immediate surroundings (Figs. 8, 9). The Makarovo hearth constituted a very carefully executed structure in the form of a bowl made of slabs of red sandstone of relatively small dimensions (20 x 3o or 20 X 15 cm) stood on edge or resting on the flat side. In the hearth uncovered at Makarovo, there were, besides ashes and charcoal, a few fragments of animal bones, including a fragment of a reindeer bone and a fragment of a rib, probably of the same animal. Stone

Fig. 8. Paleolithic settlement near the village of Makarovo. General view of the floodplain terrace with the Paleolithic stratum and hearth. In background, the high, early terrace. 52

The Late Paleolithic

'Vou

u 11111111

■ iigsf97~~~y. dasoff emw e FiY.o ~r~iffod:,—/lifr~iYiYy/fiI/y' 000 20 40 60

1

a e

M

f

2.

Fig. 9. Paleolithic settlement near the village of Makarovo. t–cross-section of floodplain terrace: a–turf layer; b–straw-colored clayey loam; c–charcoal layer; d–fill of hearth; e–charred sand; f–sand; g–red clayey loam; h–layer of clayey loam with slabs of sandstone; a–view of hearth from above. artifacts were represented by a single scraper, excellently made and quite typical. This scraper has the usual form of Late Paleolithic Siberian scrapers—a wide, large flake, with a crescent-shaped convex working edge. Besides the scraper, two fragments of a flat and well-polished river pebble, with traces of flaking, were found in the hearth. To judge by them, the pebble was broken into several pieces, crosswise and lengthwise. In general fragments of split river pebbles are frequently encountered in the Paleolithic sites of Siberia, beginning with Malta and Buret, and are probably connected with the necessity of using this rather poor material for preparing crude stone tools, in the absence or scarcity of good raw material. 53

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

In general, the stone equipment of this settlement discloses in all its features a close similarity to the Late Paleolithic artifacts from other Siberian sites. This similarity is especially clearly pronounced in the scrapers found inside the hearth. Both in general form, and in technique of manufacture, these tools are analogous to the large scrapers from Late Paleolithic sites in other regions of Siberia. They vary only in insignificant and secondary details. The same must be said also of the material from which this scraper was made. Whatever region they occupied, the inhabitants always tried to obtain for the manufacture of large scraper-like tools the same kind of lithic material—a jasper-like or quartzite green stone obtained from river beds or ancient river deposits in the form of river pebbles well polished by the water. This was true not only on the Lena but in the Altay at Biysk, on the Yenisey at Krasnoyarsk, below Irkutsk on the Angara, and in the Trans-Baykal steppes, with the exception that when greenstone was absent or scarce and other easily worked flinty rocks were available, the former were sometimes replaced by argillite of similar quality (e.g., Verkholenskaya Gora [Verkholensk Mountain] or by pebbles of black lydite (east of Lake Baykal on the lower Selenga). One cannot help noting that wherever Late Paleolithic settlements are found, ordinary quartzite of a white or, more rarely, gray color was used just as widely as greenstone. Whenever, under suitable conditions, fragments of greenstone or white quartzite were found, on the ancient Lena or Angara terraces, after careful searching, tools of a form and technique typical of the Late Paleolithic were discovered in the same place. Bone remnants are few; they are confined to small fragments of the hollow [long) bones of reindeer or horses. So far, no remains of mammoth or rhinoceros have been found. Hearths of the same type as at Makarovo have been studied on the Yenisey at the campsite near the village of Kokorevo (Sosnovskiy 1 935). They also took the form of circular structures of slabs, stood on edge or laid flat, among which were a few cultural remains, preserved at this temporary camping place of hunters of reindeer, wild horses, and cattle. Paleolithic hearths analogous in structure and dimensions also have been uncovered in the valley of the Angara, near the village of Nizhnyaya Buret, on the right bank of the river, and near the ulaps of Nelkhay, on the left bank of the river, where they also were found in the clayey loam of the 6-8 m floodplain terrace. In analyzing the changes in the forms and character of Late Paleolithic dwellings, we can discover the key to an understanding of general causes which brought about changes in the culture of their inhabitants, and we can in principle explain the true meaning and underlying causes of the apparent decline of this culture. The changes in the structure of dwellings and the general character of the settlement should be directly connected with changes in natural conditions; that is, climate and fauna. As a result of the warming of climate and the disappearance of a typically Arctic landscape, the former necessity for building deep and sturdy semisubterranean dwellings, similar to those of the Paleoasiatics of our time, came to pass. It is entirely possible that the changes in the way of life of 54

The Late Paleolithic the people, primarily expressed in the character of their dwellings, may also be a reflection of the disappearance, first of the rhinoceros and then of the mammoth, which previously had provided large supplies of meat. The significance of these animals of the Quaternary period for the Paleolithic population of Siberia may be compared with the role of whales, walruses, and seals in the life of the maritime tribes of northeastern Asia and polar America. The sedentary life of these tribes is inseparably connected with the possibility of procuring supplies of meat in .definite places, most conveniently located for sea-mammal hunting. Something similar could have taken place in the center of Siberia during the glacial period, where the basic source of meat was the hunting of rhinoceri and mammoths, and also of ungulates. By storing dried meat for the winter or keeping it in pits, as the settled Eskimos or Chukchis did, the Paleolithic hunters were able to settle for the winter, to build their settlements consisting of a number of sturdy, long-lasting dwellings. The extinction of the mammoths and rhinoceri would have seriously affected in one way or another the procurement of supplies. Hence, it follows that the people of the Paleolithic of necessity had to change their method of hunting and adopt a new, incomparably more mobile form of hunting hoofed animals and smaller game freely moving over the expanse of the steppe. They had to leave their spacious semisubterranean buildings of previous times for lighter, portable ones characteristic no longer of settled but of nomadic or half-settled tribes. The disappearance of the mammoth deprived Paleolithic man also of fresh ivory, the ideal raw material for the carvers and sculptors of the Stone Age. With this, the ancient art of bone-carving inevitably declined; it could be replaced only in part by carvings of antler or wood, the perishable specimens of which did not last to our day. It is more difficult to explain the changes in stone-working, especially in the types of stone artifacts which reverted, so to say, [to those] of tens of thousands of millenia ago. The large scraper-like artifacts must have served, judging by the very form of their working edge and the processing of the blade, for working very coarse and refractory materials—in any case not soft skin or fur. This is indicated by the considerable thickness and massiveness of the blades. They were more convenient for chopping and cutting—primarily of bone and wood—than for shaving. Among the heavy scraper-like tools, there are clearly separable artifacts which in their features are extraordinarily close to the chisels and adzes of the Neolithic. These crude axe-like and adze-like artifacts, made from whole river pebbles of suitable rectangular form, or the same sort of natural rectangular chunks of flinty slate, have been repeatedly noted in various Paleolithic campsites in the Yenisey and Angara valleys .° A similar axe was found at the Late Paleolithic campsite of Nyuya in the valley of the Lena (Fig. io). Tools of this type appear also in the west at the very beginning of the Neolithic, where they are known under the name of macroliths, that is, large stone tools, in distinction to their predecessors, the miniature microlithic artifacts. The change in the character of the stone inventory therefore signifies not a decline of material culture, but the maturing of entirely new elements 55

The Late Paleolithic in it. This change represents a big step toward the next great phase of the Stone Age. It is characteristic that [here] and in the West, the origin of the stone axe, that fundamental tool of the Neolithic period, was reflected in the fact that in both places we observe a sort of return to longforgotten and abandoned Lower Paleolithic techniques of shaping whole pebbles. The new Neolithic technique, it would then seem, had already matured in the Paleolithic; it had developed slowly and unnoticeably, without at first changing the general character of material culture. The aspect of the bone inventories of the Siberian Late Paleolithic sites shows the same slow, progressive development. The leading forms are tools manufactured by a fundamentally different technique than previously, and one very ingenious, which allowed the maker to combine the elasticity and flexibility of bone with the hardness and sharp edge of flint in preparing cutting and piercing tools. Tools of this type consist of a bone shaft in which deep grooves are cut and sharp blades prepared from thin, knife-like flakes set into the grooves. Thus, excellent spearheads with long, sharp blades, and later large knives, which had not been available to earlier hunters, came into existence. Yet, these artifacts were direct transformations of earlier hunting weapons which had existed in the form of simple bone knives and spears during the Early Magdalenian period, and had served the same end in hunting. More importantly, at this time there appears among the inhabitants of Late Paleolithic sites the ancient hunter's true friend, the dog, whose ancestor was a domesticated wolf, as is indicated by the finds on Verkholenskaya Gora. It follows that it would be incorrect to ignore the influence of changes in natural conditions affecting the basis of existence—the hunting of wild animals—on the culture and mode of life of primitive man. Armed only with primitive stone and bone tools, Paleolithic man, because of the weakness and low level of development of productive forces, found himself in incomparably greater dependence on the elements of nature than his descendants in later epochs. Yet, for all this, he did not passively subject himself to the course of events in nature, but emerged as an active creative force. While some animals died out and others moved to regions with a climate more suitable for them, Paleolithic man did not die out and did not move to the north. He took a fundamentally different and purely human path—the path of changing his mode of life and, more important, improving his tools, inventing new methods of hunting, and creating different and more efficient hunting gear. This was not a retreat before the forces of nature but an attack on them. And thus man of the Old Stone Age emerged successfully from the difficulties facing him by lifting himself to a new level of cultural development. Yet another significant circumstance was essential in this regard. The Fig. to. Late Paleolithic tools from Lena campsites. t—axe-like tool; 2, 4, 5, 6—scrapers; 3—chopping tool; 7—flake; 8—core; 9—core tool. 57

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

changes mentioned above did not take place in Siberia only. They embraced an incomparably wider territory of Europe and Asia. However, the tribes of the west responded to these changes in their own way. They took primarily the direction of creating a new type of weapon, based in the main on the preparation of hunting gear from small flint flakes—a direction leading toward the microlithic technique of working flint. This yielded the sharp composite blades in spears, daggers, and knives, and most important, the points of arrows for the bow, which was invented at this time. Later on, they changed from the procurement of food in ready-made form, that is, from fishing, hunting, and the gathering of wild edible plants, to a fundamentally new economy, to the raising of domestic animals and plants, thus establishing early pastoralism and agriculture. The tribes of northern Asia developed in another direction. Simultaneously with the western tribes and perhaps considerably earlier, during the Magdalenian period, they created a new hunting technique and new methods of obtaining animals, which were based, as we have seen, on a change in the basis of their technology—the means of working stone and the methods of manufacture of stone tools. In order to understand fully the history of the Siberian tribes in the Late Paleolithic, we must take into account not only the changes in the general conditions of their life and in the character of their way of life, but also the cultural-historical connections and mutual influences of various ethnic groups. In the Siberian Late Paleolithic, there are many features that are common with those of the East. Late Paleolithic settlements of the Siberian type, with their astonishingly persistent and uniform inventory, extend in a wide zone from the Altay to the Yenisey, and from the Angara to the middle Lena. The Angara-Lena campsites merge imperceptibly with the settlements on the Selenga and with those still farther away, in the Gobi desert of Mongolia, at that time still fairly densely settled by man (Debets 1930: 157-58, 161-64; Sosnovskiy 1933; Auerbakh 1930). This unity of culture may be explained by the fact that the most ancient tribes who penetrated eastward from the Urals at the end of the glacial period at first lived the same type of life as the western tribes, did not lose their connections with them, and possessed basically similar cultural capacities. Then at the end of the glacial epoch, and in the postglacial period, these tribes, few in number and widely scattered over the expanse of Siberia in the process of settling its many regions, lost immediate connections with the population of the western areas. Isolated from them over the course of many centuries and even millennia, the Siberian tribes began to live their own life, and created a new culture, in many respects different from the old one, which no doubt reflected the connections of the Siberian tribes with their new neighbors who had settled the Far East and Asia's central regions. The cultural interrelationships of the Siberian tribes were now oriented not toward the Dnieper or the Don but toward the Hwang-ho and the Tibetan upland. These interrelationships may be surmised, if only by the fact that it 58

The Late Paleolithic was just in these places, to the north and east of India, at a distant time corresponding to the Lower and Middle Paleolithic of Europe, that the development of stone tools and their forms apparently took a special path. Here we almost never find an artifact so important in the inventory of the European Paleolithic as the hand chopper in its classical forms. In their place, the so-called "striking tools,"* in the form of large, crudely fashioned tools, with wide and steep-sided blades (as compared with the pointed European choppers), were richly represented in eastern Asia. They were usually made from river pebbles split in half by a hard blow, with one side of the split pebble shaped into a wide, massive blade, while the unworked portion of the original, smooth surface of the pebble served as a handle as the heel of the hand chopper did. Exactly the same technique of manufacture and the same type of large stone tools are found in the Paleolithic of Siberia, especially at Afontova Gora [Mountain], together with the crescent-shaped scrapers typical of this era. Such technique of manufacture and types of stone tools appear for the first time in the materials from Buret and Malta, where similar striking tools are occasionally found. The crude scraper-like tools which were noted earlier [page 26] when the Chastinskaya campsite was described, are of the same nature. These are prototypes of stone tools specific to the Late Paleolithic of Siberia. Subsequently there took place the aforementioned development of new techniques and types of stone tools. However, this development should not be thought of as a mere imitation of specific technical procedures and forms of artifacts. The facts indicate an evolution of material culture which was distinctive in many respects. We may judge this distinctiveness if only by the fact that in China proper and to the south of it, nothing like the classical tools of the Late Paleolithic of Siberia has yet been found. Their distribution to the east is limited by Mongolia and part of northern Manchuria but does not extend beyond these border regions of Siberia. For this reason, it is of special importance that both of the territories mentioned have much in common in topography, which determined the direction of economic development and the evolution of material culture along the same path as in Siberia. The settlement found at K'u-hsiangt'ung in Tungpei [Manchuria] may serve as a striking example. It is of the same type as that of hunters of mammoths, elephants, rhinoceri, wild cattle, and horses represented by the campsites of Chastinskaya on the Lena, Buret and Malta on the Angara, and Afontova Gora [Mountain] on the Yenisey. K'u-hsiang-t'ung is a village near Harbin, situated on the bank of a small tributary of the Sungari, the Weng-ch'ung-ho. Here, in the deposits of an ancient terrace on the right bank of the Sungari, bones of Quaternary animals have long been found. Excavations showed that there are, in the deposits of K'u-hsiang-t'ung, remains of an unusually varied fauna, consisting of representatives of • [Udarnilti in the original; perhaps best translated as "hand ax," as contrasted to a "hand chopper." Editor, A.I.N.A.]

59

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

northern, steppe, and southern faunal complexes, both extinct and contemporary. There were the bones of the mammoth, the elephant (Elephas nomadicus), a tiger similar to the contemporary Amur type, rhinoceri of three species (the woolly Siberian, Merck's, and Chinese), horse, chigetai [wild horse], caribou, maral, giant deer (Megaceros), spotted deer, gazelle, tur (Bos primigenius), bison (Bos priscus), Asiatic buffalo, camel, saiga antelope, and other animals. The bones of the ostrich and the shells of its eggs were also found at K'u-hsiang-t'ung. Stone and bone artifacts were uncovered together with the bones of Quaternary animals, indicating that a Paleolithic settlement was located here. Among the stone artifacts, large irregular flakes, large scraper-like tools, and also a sharp point of Mousterian type, made from a flake struck from a discoid core, were of note. With these artifacts there were found a core scraper of the usual Central Asiatic type, and a small flake scraper of delicate workmanship. On the whole, the stone and bone tools from K'u-hsiang-t'ung show the greatest similarity to tools from the Late Paleolithic settlements of eastern Siberia, Malta and Buret, although apparently they are somewhat older than these (Tokunaga and Naora 1936; Loukashkin 1937). Thus, the Siberian tribes, with their nearest eastern neighbors, formed, in this historical-cultural period at the end of the Paleolithic, a special cultural-ethnic region in which historical development took the same path and tempo based on close mutual connections. Its form was the same on the banks of the Lena and the Angara, in the steppes of Mongolia, and in the headwaters of the river Nonni [Nen]. To the contrary, in the West the cultural development took place in fundamentally different forms, at different rates, and under other influences—from the Mediterranean regions where the so-called Capsian culture developed. Simultaneously, under conditions of long isolation from the western tribes, somewhere in the interior of Asia and perhaps over the whole territory of Siberia, Central Asia, and the Far East, a special physical type developed. In the course of time, the characteristic features of the Mongoloid anthropological type arise and are ever more widely distributed and reinforced. In this connection another important condition should be noted. Physical anthropological studies have established that mutual ethnic relations in Europe and in neighboring regions at the end of the Paleolithic had taken place against a background of a basic division into two fundamental physical groups: Europoid and Mongoloid. When Europoid tribes moved to the north of Europe and eastward to Asia, they were met by a most ancient Mongoloid man, of the type found at Afontova Gora [Mountain], which had originated in the depths of Asia. In the opinion of physical anthropologists, this penetration did not have the character of mass migrations of integral ethnic groups but rather constituted a gradual movement of small clans, lasting many millennia, weakening from east to west in proportion to the distance from the territory in which the Mongoloids had formed. This process was facilitated by the nomadic mode of life of the Late Paleolithic tribes and the sparse 6o

The Late Paleolithic settlement of the territories occupied by them. Encountering each other, the Europoid tribes and the Mongoloids of the east mixed and interbred, forming a mixed "Lappoid" population, whose bony remains are known from the Late Paleolithic sites of western Europe (Cheboksarov 1941: 210). The confirmation of the above conclusions, which are based on physicalanthropological materials, comes from one of the oldest sites connected with the settlement of the Urals and the Cis-Ural area by man—the Upper Paleolithic settlement on the Chusovaya River, which has been named the Ostrovskiy campsite, or, after its discoverer and investigator M. V. Talitskiy, the Talitskiy campsite. At Talitskiy campsite, stone tools very close in form to those of the Siberian Paleolithic were discovered; the similarity is increased by the fact that, like the inhabitants of the Altay Paleolithic settlements and those of their contemporaries on the Yenisey, the inhabitants of Talitskiy campsite made their stone artifacts from the same kind of greenish flinty slate. They also used bone daggers with sharp composite flint blades reminiscent of the daggers with inserted blades from Afontova Gora or from the campsite near the village of Oshurkovo on the lower Selenga River (Bader 1947, 1948; Gvozdover 1952: 207-10). Taking all the above into account, we can draw the conclusion that this long process of migration of Mongoloids to the west must have already begun during the Paleolithic on the shores of Baykal, and therefore considerably earlier than in the Baltic areas. Whereas on the one hand the culture at Malta and Buret was Western in character, and definite Europoid features can be found in the composition of the Neolithic population of Siberia, on the other hand there are also data at our disposal directly indicating Mongoloid characteristics in the physical type of the Paleolithic population of eastern Siberia, which are paralleled by the "eastern" elements of the stone inventory of the Late Paleolithic. The most ancient remains of the Mongoloid type of man were discovered in the well-known Paleolithic site of Afontova Gora near Krasnoyarsk, which in geological conditions is close to Malta and Buret. The careful modelling of the faces of statuettes found in 1936 at Buret, with their characteristic "slanting" eyes and low, softly outlined, flattened noses, also produces an impression of Mongoloidism. We may therefore suppose that relatively small and isolated groups of descendants of the primeval Europoid immigrants from the west, carrying their Aurignacian-Solutrean culture to the banks of the Angara and the Lena, very early encountered more numerous eastern tribes and were almost entirely assimilated by them. Yet they were not destroyed without a trace; otherwise there would not be traces among the contemporary native population of eastern Siberia of an ancient Europoid admixture, just as there would not be undisputed signs of cultural continuity from the inhabitants of Malta and Buret. Moreover, whereas in the Baltic area we may think in terms of interaction by two sharply distinct groups of the ancient population—purely Mongoloid and pronouncedly Europoid61

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

since in the west the Mongoloids were definitely the immigrants, in the depths of Asia the case becomes complicated by the fact that we have before us a new, wider, and more complex problem—the problem of the origin of the Mongoloid physical type itself. If one follows the archaeological facts which point to the distinctive originality of the most ancient culture of southeast Asia, one could draw the conclusion that the earliest Mongoloids appeared in the south of China, or even in Indochina and Burma. However, it is here, in the south of Asia, that a different type of Paleolithic population apparently existed. It was not Mongoloid but Australoid, and its antiquity and wide distribution is indicated by its affiliation to the population of Australia proper which must have settled that continent, so isolated from the other regions of the globe, very early. At the same time, in the Late Paleolithic, events developed very differently to the south and west of the Yellow River than to the north and east of it. In the conditions of a warmer and milder climate, other economic occupations predominated over hunting of large herbivores; apparently, the primary source of subsistence was, as among the most backward contemporary tribes of southern Asia, the simple gathering of mollusks, fruits, seeds, and grasses, and the hunting of small animals. This extraordinarily low economic level was accompanied by a more primitive material culture and a simpler way of life. Here there were no spreading settlements or houses of complex construction; the rich bone-carving and the variegated inventory, for which the principal raw material in Siberia was mammoth ivory, were absent. A historical process different from that of south Asia also took place in the Ordos, in northern Manchuria, and even more so in Mongolia and Siberia; in these territories there arose and developed over the centuries that distinctive culture of hunting tribes which in the north reached the mouth of the Markhachan, in the west the headwaters of the Irtysh, and in the east the Amur basin. It was here, in this extensive Siberian-Mongolian area, under the decidedly continental conditions of the late glacial and postglacial period, that the characteristic features of the Mongoloid type must have been initiated and gradually formed: the flattened nasal bridge, the Mongolian fold of the eyelid, and certain other specific physical features. It also may be allowed that the indubitable relationship of the Mongolic, Turkic, and Tungus-Manchu languages, that is, the Altaic family or group, goes back to this distant time, since it is hardly possible that the homeland of all these languages should be one limited region of the Altay upland comprising the area of later settlement by speakers of the Altaic linguistic group. It is considerably more plausible to see this homeland, in what is from the historical point of view the basic region of distribution of the Altaic languages, in the depths of Asia, where the most ancient culture of Siberia and Mongolia, in which we are interested, also arose. The fact that the culture of the most ancient population of Siberia at first developed in the same form and direction as that of its contemporaries to the west, in the basins of the Danube, Dnieper, Don, and Volga, 62

The Late Paleolithic and then took a sharp turn in its development in another direction, is therefore not accidental and signifies really important and genuinely crucial events in the history of northern Asia. This process included, as we have seen, Paleolithic tribes of Western origin, who also made their contributions to the development of the distinctive local culture which grew up in the course of their exchange with the basic cultural-ethnic stratum, enriching it with the achievements of those tribes which had created on the Don and the Dnieper the remarkable monuments of their own culture. Thus, the history of the Siberian tribes, from its very beginnings, proves to be connected by strong threads both with the history of the other parts of Asia, and with that of the most ancient population of the European part of the Soviet Union. What has been written above leads to the realization that even in the distant past (at least 20,000-25,000 years ago), the valley of the Lena, from its headwaters as far downstream as the Vitim, had ceased to be the unpopulated "desert" which it had been previously. Over the course of millennia, primitive tribes gradually occupied the north and proceeded through the valley of the Lena, ever farther northward, closer to the Arctic Ocean, from which there moved toward them the great herds of Arctic animals that during the course of the glacial period had occupied almost all of Asia and Europe. The migration of ancient man along the Lena and into its neighboring regions certainly was long and slow. It was based not on a simple striving toward new spaces but on a gradual natural growth of the population, as a result of which people were compelled by necessity to seek new lands rich in game. In the conditions of the Paleolithic, with its low level of economic development and small population, this growth was slow. The migration of Paleolithic hunters was therefore also slow and took place primarily in small trickles, by the branching off of individual clans and tribes from those places where the population was densest. Much time had to pass before primitive man, from the southern regions of the globe, reached the Urals and then the Yenisey and Angara. A long road must have been traversed also by those who came from southeastern Asia to meet them before the former reached the banks of Lake Baykal. Still more time was needed for them to reach the upper and middle Lena. The regions in this area populated by wandering hunters were for a long time isolated islands lost in the wild and inhospitable natural environment of the north; everywhere they alternated with extensive deserted expanses. The people of Paleolithic times succeeded in occupying only a very insignificant portion of the vast territory stretching to the north of Lake Baykal and the Altay mountains. Historically, the achievement of the first settlers of the Lena region, under these conditions, was very considerable. They were the ones, veritable pioneers of the north in pursuit of mammoths and herds of wild reindeer, horses, and cattle, who opened up this new land for man. They did not succeed in fully occupying this immense territory. But even at the time of the existence of the settlement near the village of 63

THE BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA

Chastinskaya, the first paths were being trodden which led men far to the north. On the virgin soil there arose new cultural centers. A firm foundation was laid for the development of human culture in the north, and the further conquest of its seemingly boundless expanses. After a few millennia, during the postglacial period, Paleolithic man penetrated still farther to the north and into the east of Siberia. It remains unclear how extensive the Late Paleolithic sites were over this area; they have so far been traced to the [vicinity of] Olekminsk and to the Markhachan River. In any case, these campsites are the most northerly and at the same time the most easterly Paleolithic sites now known in the U.S.S.R. But however far Paleolithic hunters penetrated, the unpeopled regions lying to one side or the other of their basic migration routes— chiefly to the north of the territory occupied by man—were still immense in extent. The further conquest of this vast northern expanse therefore fell to the lot of their nearest descendants, the people of the postglacial epoch, an epoch of the bow and arrow, polished axes, and clay vessels.

64

SECTION TWO THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

Material Culture and Economy of the Population of the Middle Lena

Chapter 1

About 14,000-15,000 years ago, the great ice-cap of the last glacial period in Europe began gradually to reduce its dimensions. It melted and slowly retreated northward, constantly freeing expanses previously buried deep under a thick covering of ice. The great glacial period, against the background of which the slow, millennia-long changes in the life of Paleolithic man had taken place, came to an end. A new page in the Quaternary history of the earth began. It was marked in comparison with the last glacial period by a general amelioration of climate, which promoted the development of forest vegetation. The forests everywhere spread from their areas of refuge in river valleys and mountains ravines, out of hollows sheltered from the cold north winds; they advanced on the tundra and steppe along a broad front. In Yakutia, a new period marked by a much moister and warmer climate began, following the dry late-glacial and postglacial epochs. The unexpectedly deep penetration of forest vegetation into the North may date from this period, and also the formation of extensive peat bogs in the lower reaches of the Lena and other rivers beyond the Arctic Circle; these sometimes reach a thickness of 2-4 m and contain trunks of trees, including normally developed birches, and cones of spruce and larch. Thus, for example, even at 72° N. on the lower Lena at the beginning of the Bykovskaya Channel, 10-12 km north of Stolb Island,* on a flat plain elevated 30-35 m above the Lena and covered with small lakes and peat hummocks, there were discovered in the latter rotted larch trees and stumps. At a depth of 40 cm in the peat, a stump of woody willow 10-12 cm in diameter was found. Hence it follows that a cluster of willows once existed at the location of the fossil peat bog, which were later replaced by the less demanding larches. Analysis of pollen from the peat bog showed that it contained pollen from species such as spruce and pine, the present northern boundary of which lies several hundred kilometers to the south. Data obtained from the study of peat bogs in the vicinity of Tiksi Bay yielded an analogous picture. It is therefore established that • [Not to be confused with Stolbovoy Island at 74°, t36° E. Editor, n.t.N.n.]

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THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

trees not only existed in this now completely unforested territory along the shore of the Arctic Ocean, but also that they matured under conditions completely normal for their life cycle, since winged seeds of the larch have been found in the peat. This indicates successful propagation. The formation of these peat bogs no doubt falls into the postglacial period, when trees, including the birch, grew still farther north, on the Novosibirskiye [New Siberian] Islands, where their remains, found together with layers of compressed grass, lie immediately above the [permafrosted?] ice of the last glaciation. The formation of accumulations of compressed peat of considerable thickness on these islands also indicates more favorable climatic conditions during the "postglacial thermal maximum" than obtain now (Tikhomirov 1941;' Saks and Antonov 1945: 103-5; Tyulina 1937). At this time, apparently, no thick forest existed here, but only islands of scattered open forest, similar to the wooded tundra of today. All in all, the pronounced northward movement of the forest boundary is remarkable and striking, though not as yet fully investigated an event in the Quaternary history of northern Asia. The study of the remnants of pollen from the peat bogs on the lower Lena has also permitted us to trace in part the consecutive replacements of some species of plants by others since the time of the warming of the climate, or, as the paleobotanists say, the climatic optimum, to the very end of it. In one of the peat bog, remains of spruce were found in the lowest horizon; higher, at a depth of 25-5o cm, willow appeared, and still higher, larch predominated, which may indicate a considerable deterioration of the climate, foreshadowing contemporary natural conditions (Tikhomirov 1941). The deterioration nevertheless did not prove so considerable as to lead to another glacial period. The subsequent life of man on the territory of Yakutia south of the present tree limit takes place in the forest, against the background of the existing landscapes of this country. One cannot avoid noting that because of Yakutia's general northern position and closeness to the Arctic Ocean, traces of the natural conditions of the glacial period were retained longer and more stubbornly than in the West. Striking remnants of the past glacial period, besides the permafrost and carcasses of mammoths and rhinoceri, also include for example, fossil ice, of a thickness reaching 2o-3o m in the Yakutsk-Vilyuy basin and 70-80 m on the Arctic coast. Just as obvious traces of other than the present natural conditions in central Yakutia are the narrow bands of steppe vegetation, which are evident, for example, near the city of Yakutsk, on high dry ridges (kyrdal), and along nearby treeless slopes of the elevation on the original left bank of the Lena, the Chochur-Muraan. Here, to this day, grow plants or their closest relatives, characteristic of the distant steppes of southern Siberia, Kazakhstan, and northern Asia—wild oats, sheep's fescue [Festuca ovina L. sp. Sulcata], and shaggy feathergrass, which had been found, together with other plants, in the stomach of the Berezovka mammoth. Map 2. Outline map of the distribution of Neolithic sites in Yakutia. 66

KHAIRGA5

Al d e n SYALAAKH YMYYAKHTAKH

SINSK

() ALDAN ö0

•

NEOLITHIC BURIALS SETTLEMENTS CLIFF DRAWINGS

SHISHKINO LAKE BAYKAL

100 0 100 200 300 LEENE KM.

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

With these ancient plants, some representatives of the ancient fauna also survived, including the golden eagle of the steppes, the souslik, vole, and Mongolian bohak (A. A. Grigoryev 1930: 84; Karavayev 1945, with bibliography of 51 items). Yet these are only scattered traces of the past climate, single relics of the former glacial conditions. The people who lived on the territory of Yakutia after their Paleolithic ancestors were surrounded there by a natural environment very similar to the present one; in essence, the topography was not different from today's. Archaeologists have yet to discover traces of the gradual transition from the Paleolithic to the developed Neolithic in Yakutia. Even in the Baykal region, which has been better studied (Okladnikov I950a: 140-64), very few such finds have been made. Consequently, of necessity we must proceed directly from the Paleolithic of Yakutia to the Neolithic stage of its history. The latter is represented by plentiful and striking sites, including not only settlements but also burials and works of art. Neolithic sites are incomparably more widely distributed than Paleolithic ones (Map 2) . Large stone tools of entirely different forms and workmanship from the Paleolithic ones have long been found over the entire territory of Yakutia and the regions adjoining it. Polished axes, adzes, knives, and certain other types of artifacts of various forms were found over the whole length of the valley of the Lena from the Baykal [region] to its delta, along the Kolyma, Yana, and Indigirka, to the west of the Lena, on the Anabar and Khatanga, round the numberless forest lakes, by brooks and on watersheds. The artifacts were made from various types of stone, occasionally including nephrite. With them were found fragments of clay vessels of distinct form and ornamentation, and also stone and bone arrowheads (Fig. II). This indicates the end of the original settlement of the north under the conditions of the Old Stone Age. Now practically no unsettled areas remained, since all the best places where hunting and fishing could be carried on by people armed only with primitive stone and bone tools had been occupied in one way or another. The settlement of man over the north of Asia was based on those essential cultural achievements which everywhere marked the transition from the Old to the New Stone Age. While significant changes in the natural conditions of northern Asia as the transition from a glacial environment to the present-day one had taken place at the time Neolithic man emerged, no less profound changes can be noted in his culture and in all the facets of his life. The appearance of new elements of material culture—polished tools, pottery, the bow and arrow—show that the tribes of the north did not remain at the level reached at the end of the glacial period. From the chipped chopping Fig. rr. Neolithic pottery of Yakutia. r, 2–reconstructed vessels from the Kullaty site; 3, 6, 7–fragments of Neolithic vessels from the Kullaty site; 4, 5–paddle for applying ornament to vessels (North American). 68

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

tool of primitive type, probably used in the hand without a helve, developed the true axe—polished, with a special wooden handle which considerably increased the force of the blow and the effective action of the axe, and facilitated the labor of man. The development of the art of making clay vessels, despite the crudity of its first examples, also in many respects promoted the easing of man's struggle for existence, since the presence of the clay pot improved the methods of food preparation, made food more varied, and permitted broader use of the natural resources obtained from the surrounding animal and, especially, the plant world. But the most important outcome was the spread of the bow and arrow, the most characteristic cultural element of the Neolithic. As is known, the bow and arrow had already become the decisive weapon at the end of the Paleolithic, preparing the way to the next, higher phase of human culture (Figs. 12, 13). The role of the bow and arrow, in Engel's words, was definite because it

Fig. 12. Neolithic arrowheads from the Kullaty site. 70

Material Culture and Economy of the Middle Lena

Fig. 13. Polished tools from Neolithic sites in Yakutia. 1–shouldered adze; 2–oar-shaped axe; 3–axe or hoe with lateral protuberances. made it possible for game to become regular food, and hunting one of the normal divisions of labor. The bow proved to be a more efficient weapon, with an incomparably longer range, than the clubs, spears, and darts which preceded it. The introduction of the bow and arrow markedly increased the efficiency of the hunt with less expenditure of energy. Equipped with these tools of the Neolithic period, which had been attained by the cumulative labor of many generations, man was now able to use the opportunities offered to him by the environment incomparably more fully and broadly. Under these conditions, a change in the life and culture of primitive humanity, unprecedented in its pace and significance, took place in the course of a few centuries: over the whole territory of the Old World a process of extraordinary complexity in its various phenomena occurred, whereby the numerous and sharply differentiated local cultures of the Neolithic population of Europe and northern Asia came to maturity. Thus it was also in Yakutia. The severe natural environment of northeastern Siberia, the economic and cultural backwardness of its scanty population until most recent times, and, finally, the closeness of regions where a true Stone Age prevailed until the end of the 18th century—all this led investigators to believe in a very late growth and in the relative youth of all the local cultures, without exception. However, study of the Neolithic of Yakutia showed that this was inaccurate. The results of excavations carried out in 1950-51 at the Neolithic burial mound at the village of Verkholensk are especially significant: here, in the contents of very early burials for the Baykal region, there were found adzes with shouldered butts, typical of the Yakutian Neolithic (Okladnikov 1953a: 16-19). The burial at Verkholensk dates to the transition from the first, Isakovo, phase to the following, Serovo, one. 71

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

In terms of absolute chronology the Verkholensk burial may be dated from the end of the fourth or very beginning of the third millennium B.C. To approximately the same period, or to a slightly later one, the early Serovo phase in the chronology of the Baykal region, which in turn corresponds to the first half of the third millennium B.C., may be dated the Yakutian Neolithic sites with shouldered adzes. Finds which approximate the Neolithic sites of Yakutia to the Isakovo or early Serovo sites of the Baykal region were also made far to the north of Yakutsk—near the Arctic Circle, in an ancient site near Zhigansk, on Lake Syalaakh. Here were found fragments of clay vessels, covered with impressions of coarse netting, together with artifacts of ancient type; the fragments were the same as those characteristic of burials of the Isakovo period on the Angara (Okladnikov 1945: 88; 195oa: I66-72).* These finds show that the early Neolithic culture of Yakutia, which had developed from a common Late Paleolithic foundation, continued even later to develop similarly to the cultures of neighboring tribes of the Baykal region. However, with the passage of time in the third and beginning of the second millennium B.C., the development in Yakutia shows more and more distinctive features. A number of sites with rich cultural remains, revealing an interesting and striking picture of the life of their inhabitants, belong to this phase. One of the oldest settlements on the middle Lena so far known is the site on the Turukta River, where three cultural strata were found in the deposits of the first terrace about to m above the floodplain—Early Iron Age, Bronze Age, and, finally, Neolithic. The central point of the earliest Neolithic site on the Turukta was a hearth about which were plentifully strewn fragments of animal bones, broken and split with stones; stone artifacts and refuse from their manufacture were found with them. At points, even traces of a coloring substance, in the form of small lumps of red ochre, were preserved. Here and there the bones of animals, larger and not so much broken up, were grouped in small accumulations, as if they had been purposely gathered. Among the artifacts found in this stratum, two large, carefully made, and partially polished bone points stand out. Both of them, and the large one especially—with a massive three-sided point—could have served as excellent spearheads or dart points. Arrowheads of flint were found in the same place. They were elongated, triangular in outline, with a semicircular notch in the base, thin, and carefully retouched on both sides by typically Neolithic pressure flaking. The inhabitants of the site also made earthenware; their vessels had round bottoms and the thin but dense, well-fired walls usual for the Neolithic of Siberia. They are covered on the outside with overall hatching, and below the rim there is a wide ornamental band of deeply incised parallel lines encircling the vessel. No large polished stone tools were found, but two artifacts of white nephrite show that the art of stone• [For a more detailed account of the Lena basin and Lake Baykal sites, see H. N. Michael, "The Neolithic Age in Eastern Siberia," Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, n.s., V. 48, part z, 1958. Editor, A.1.r.A.]

72

Material Culture and Economy of the Middle Lena polishing was not only known but stood at a high level of development; a small, exquisite, needle-like point and a fragment of some object of peculiar form, probably a decoration or an amulet. It is relatively easy to reconstruct a general picture of the life of these early settlements buried in the deposits of the first terrace of the Turukta River. This was a camp situated on the sandy bank, at the confluence of the Lena with a small brook flowing from the forested heights of the left bank. The people lived in light surface dwellings, at locations where today only the ash-pits of their hearths remain. They already possessed all the fundamental achievements of Neolithic culture. They used the bow and arrow, prepared points for the latter by a most refined and precise technique—pressure flaking—and had well-fired clay cooking vessels. The height of their craftsmanship in stone-working is represented by polished artifacts of semi-precious stone—white nephrite. The occupation of these people was primarily hunting, as is shown by the bones of wild animals. The basic objects of the hunt were the Siberian roe deer, which is now absent here, and the musk deer. The roe deer lived, apparently in abundance, in the forests surrounding the brook, and the musk deer, whose characteristic curved teeth were found in the cultureyielding stratum, inhabited the neighboring rocky slopes. Fragments of the same kind of pottery as at Turukta, together with stone artifacts and fragments of polished artifacts of white nephrite, were discovered in 5944, in the course of excavations within the city of Yakutsk, between the building of the Geological Commission and the Regional Hospital. Here the Neolithic settlement was located near a dry bed of an ancient channel of the Lena, where only a few small lakes remain. The inhabitants of the settlement, like their contemporaries at Turukta, had the same material culture and led similar lives, although separated by more than a thousand kilometers. They also hunted the wild goat, as can be deduced from the bones found—chiefly of the extremities, which are frequently encountered in their original anatomical relation. A still more detailed and striking picture of the life of the Neolithic population of Yakuts develops in the following and apparently later phase of the local Neolithic, to which belong a number of sites, including one of the ancient settlements of the north most remarkable for its significance and abundance of finds—the campsite on the Malaya [Little] Munku River, near the city of Olekminsk. The campsite is located at the mouth of the small river, Malaya Munku, or Malaya Cherepanikha, flowing into the Lena from the left, 2.5-3 km upriver from Olekminsk. As often happened on the middle Lena, the Neolithic inhabitants of Malaya Munku settled not on the bank of the Lena, which is frequently threatened by floods and ice floes, but in the depth of the rather pleasant valley of the tributary, protected from the cold northern winds by the bank of a high, ancient terrace. They lived on the second terrace above the floodplain which merges gradually with the lower first terrace. Here, in a dark layer of chernozem-like soil, the signs of their stay became evident—stone artifacts, bones of animals, sherds of clay vessels, hearthstones. 73

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

The culture-yielding stratum of the site testifies eloquently, by its thickness and the abundance of finds, to the long residence of the occupants. Even though they may not have lived here permanently, they visited the site periodically at definite seasons. The general location of the site encouraged this. It was sheltered from winds, floods, and ice jams, well warmed by the sun, and hidden from the eyes of strangers by a curve in the river. The presence of fish must have been of considerable significance; the surrounding woods, to judge by the bones of animals found in the culture-yielding stratum, were rich in game. Since no traces of houses, other than small hearth ash-pits, sometimes with a few river pebbles in them, have been preserved at the site, we tend to think that the basic form of dwelling was, as before, a light, surface, conical structure of poles, covered with tree bark or skins. In the cliff drawings on the middle Lena, which perhaps date to the Neolithic, we find representations of dwellings of just this type. On the cliff Suruktaakhkhaya on the Markha River, they have the form of high cupola-like structures with almost straight sides below and a gentle rounding of the upper part. From the top of the dwelling short stakes project fan-like in all directions. Within the cupola there are [two] crossed lines forming an "x," and in one of the two drawings on the Markha a short line projects upward from the center of the "x." Below, some freestanding short stakes are arranged in horizontal rows (Fig. 14). Besides the two drawings on the Markha, two additional, excellently preserved, analogous representations of such cupola-like dwellings are found on cliffs on the left bank of the Lena, between Olekminsk and At-Dabagan, 8 km downstream from Olekminsk. They exist also between the hamlet of Bestyakh and the cliff of Mokhsogollokh-khaya, near the village of Pokrovskoye, and near the village of Yelanka, in the Ordzhonikidze rayon of the Yakut A.S.S.R. Judging by the style and state of preservation of these drawings, they date from a very distant period. The possibility that at least part of them date to the Stone Age cannot be excluded. In any case, such drawings agree closely with the way of life of Neolithic tribes and the picture of the Neolithic settlements as shown by excavations. Ethnographic data help us to understand the construction of these ancient houses, and to reconstruct them. The ancient dwelling of the Yakut in the summer was a birchbark tent—urasa—similar to the birchbark tent of the Tungus and Sayan-Altayan tribes, but more spacious. The Yakut tents were dwellings of distinctive cast. According to the earliest description left by Strahlenberg [Strahlenberg 173o], they were "round, like the top of a sugar loaf, and covered with birchbark, which they decorate and embroider in many colors with dyed horsehair."8 The basic framework of the urasa consisted of a number of vertical posts surrounded by notched bow-shaped logs, so as to make a wooden circle (orto kurdu) supported by the posts. Slanted stakes were laid with their Fig. 14. Representations of dwellings in the cliff drawings of Yakutia. I, 2, 3–cliff drawings of ancient cupola-like dwellings; 4, 5–representations of the urasa on Yakut carved bone articles from the 18th and 19th centuries.

74

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THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

upper ends against the circle, forming a basis for the walls of the urasa and surrounding the internal vertical posts. Likely, this was how the houses depicted in the cliff drawings were constructed; their conical cupola-like form is also very close to that of the "sugar loaf," and they had the same curved, convex profile. The crossed members which form an "x" within the upper portions of the drawings of the houses represent supports or frames of the orto kurdu of the old-fashioned Yakut urasa. The ends of the stakes projecting above the urasa formed a black, soot-covered, openwork funnel through which the smoke escaped. Similarly, the sticks projecting fan-like above the cupolas of the dwellings pictured in the cliff drawings obviously represent such an openwork funnel. The old-fashioned urasa decorated for festivals was depicted in just this way on the engraved combs of mammoth ivory and on the caskets of the same material made by the Yakut craftsmenengravers of the 18th and 19th centuries. The vertical marks inside the dwellings, depicted in the cliff drawings, are usually arranged in several rows and may represent the occupants. If this is so, then judging by the considerable number of such marks these were collective houses for many families. It is interesting to note in this connection that the old-fashioned Yakut urasa was rather large and spacious. At Vilyuy, they were "up to three sazhens across the base and in heights more than four sazhens" (Maak 1887: 45). According to tradition, in ancient times such a dwelling was called mogolurasa. In later times among the Yakuts, the large urasa was built only by rich men. This is understandable, since the poor Yakuts did not have it in their power to put up such structures. I suppose, however, that these buildings were at first not private, but collective clan dwellings for many households. This is indicated by the internal arrangements of the urasa: along the walls were placed sleeping benches separated from each other by patterned curtains. Originally they were probably occupied by married couples. The common clan fire burned in the center of the urasa A striking picture of the clan settlement of the ancient forest hunters, in the center of which stood similar public buildings (perhaps men's houses), is preserved in the khosun [epic] of the northern Yakuts, where, for example, it is related of the camp of the hero Chimkere or Chempere: "In the camp there was a multitude of tents. The smoke from them covered the heavens with a thick cloud, and whenever a white partridge flew through it, it would become yellow. His warriors were also numerous. Yunkeebil came at the time of some festive occasion; there were many groups of dancers. Among the tents rose two enormous birchbark houses. Inside the latter, a shaman's performance was taking place. These houses were called buoydu-d'ie" (Ksenofontov 1937: 5o9).* According to the legends, the ancient heroes, the khosuns, who were chiefs of clans, and possibly even of tribal unions, lived in such dwellings. The basic occupation of the Neolithic population of the middle Lena at Malaya Munku, and of other settlements close to it, was the hunting • [Jochelson transliterates this term huor djiyä. Editor, A.t.N.A.)

76

Material Culture and Economy of the Middle Lena of forest animals and, in part, birds. This is clear from the quantitative relationships of the stone artifacts found in the culture-yielding stratum of this campsite. Among the finished stone objects here, arrowheads are most frequently found, either entirely intact or as fragments of the points or hafts. On an area of forty square meters excavated in 1940, for example, fifty-eight arrowheads were found. With arrowheads, fragments of hunting knives, daggers, or spearheads are encountered. The remains of hunting equipment are supplemented by the osteological material of the campsite: its culture-yielding stratum abounds in wellpreserved fragments of animal bones. On the basis of paleontological analyses, the inhabitants of the campsite hunted mainly hoofed animals— the elk, the roe deer, the reindeer, and also the brown bear and the wolf. They also took the small animals which dwelt, as they do now, near the camp: the water rat and the white hare, which is caught at the present time around Olekminsk, chiefly with snares. Fishing was of considerable although evidently subsidiary importance: the bones of large fish (probably salmon trout), stone sinkers for nets, in the form of small flat pebbles with grooves in the sides, and fragments of bone harpoons were found. They caught fish with nets or seines, plaited, most probably, of willow bark or nettle threads, and also speared them with harpoons. The inhabitants of Malaya Munku did not make nets and seines only from nettles and other wild textile plants—on many of the sherds of clay vessels, one sees, along with impressions of coarse wicker netting or of individual threads, impressions of real cloth. At the present time, not one of the forest tribes of eastern Siberia practices textile-making; even the Yakuts knew nothing about it, since they had neither sheep nor camels, the wool of which might have served as the raw material. Among a number of tribes of western Siberia and the [Soviet] Far East in the recent past, local wild textile plants were extensively used for this purpose, mainly nettles and wild flax, which, when appropriately processed, yielded sturdy fibers of sufficient length. The Neolithic inhabitants of the Lena region also must have used the local plant materials to prepare their cloth. A completely unexpected find was the teeth of domestic cattle. True, one such find is little on which to assert categorically that the Neolithic tribes of Yakutia already practiced animal husbandry. But the state of preservation of the teeth from the settlement on the Malaya Munku River, which is the same as that of the other bones, the identical conditions of deposit, and the absence of any later remains of the culture at the given place force one to pay attention to this find and give the right to expect that the excavation of other settlements will support the expressed assumption of the presence of cattle in the Neolithic of Yakutia. The bones of fish and the remains of fishing equipment also point to another condition which could have facilitated a settled way of life. The inhabitants of the Malaya Munku were, in any case, if not settled then semi-settled cattle breeders and fishermen. Indeed, the care for the cattle and the fishing may have attracted Neolithic men to the mouth of the Malaya Munku; here were, as at the present, good meadow pastures; 77

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

here too, one could comfortably catch the fish as they swam upriver against the current. Yet, hunting wild animals still had considerable significance in their lives. Judging from the finds at Malaya Munku and in several other settlements contemporary to it, the culture of the inhabitants of the middle Lena reached a very high level by the time of the fully developed Neolithic, not inferior in this respect to the cultures of other Neolithic forest tribes of the Old World, and even displayed much originality. Its originality is already well expressed in the very forms and in the material of the stone tools. The ancient craftsmen on the middle Lena had at their disposal excellent and plentiful raw materials of local origin: variously-colored flint, primarily blue-white, and red semi-transparent chalcedony, black flinty slate easily yielding to polishing and retouch, various greenstone rocks, and even local nephrite. White nephrite was available to the inhabitants of the middle Lena in Yakutia, and not brought from a distance. This is shown by the samples of raw materials found in the culture-yielding strata of Neolithic settlements on the middle Lena, together with remains of fauna, ceramics, and stone artifacts. One fragment of a pebble of white nephrite, with part of the original surface remaining, was found at Malaya Munku; other fragments of this rare, semi-precious stone were found at sites at the mouths of the Malaya Keteme and the Kullaty-yuryakh [rivers]. Small pieces of white nephrite were also found at the campsites near Lake Ymyyakhtaakh in Sottintskoye and near the building of the Geological Commission in Yakutsk. The native deposits of white nephrite or jadeite in the Lena Basin, incidentally, are not yet known today, but their presence is quite probable. At least, M. P. Ovchinnikov in 1904, referring to one of the protocols of the meetings of the Siberian Division of the Russian Geographical Society, mentioned that in the basin of the Lena River, along the Vitim, and on its tributary, the Kevakhte, pieces of nephrite were found. Pebbles of nephrite were also known from the Vilyuy (Ovchinnikov 1904: 75).'0 Thus, the material out of which the stone artifacts were made determines the distinct character of the Neolithic finds of the middle Lena. The stone tools also had distinctive forms. Along with the large tools typical for Siberia, such as the "lobed axes," there were special local types of chopping tools. Such, for example, are the axes which have a narrow oval butt, a kind of handle in the proximal part. In their general form, these tools closely resemble the oar-shaped clubs of New Zealand, made of dark green jasper-like slate or New Zealand nephrite. Still more characteristic of the middle Lena Neolithic, and still more specific in their form, are the polished adzes shouldered in the upper part for better attachment to the wooden handle; these are usually made from the same material—flinty slate, as black as hard coal. Sometimes they are made from antler. By the regularity of their form, the care taken in their manufacture, and particularly by their perfect, almost mirror-like polishing, they do not yield to the best examples from the hands of the Baykal craftsmen of the Serovo period." 78

Material Culture and Economy of the Middle Lena In Yakutia there were also found polished wedges, usually convex on one side and rather heavy. Three such tools are preserved in the Yakutsk Museum. All of them are made of the same material—a dense, green slate resembling jasper. Among the notable small stone artifacts of Malaya Munku are the miniature scrapers fashioned on the ends of knife-like flakes, fine scrapers of triangular form, and gravers, which are very rare in the Baykal area. The gravers found at Malaya Munku are predominantly side-gravers, very carefully formed by retouching and with very clearly defined cutting edges (Figs. 15, 16). The abundance of gravers and the care and attention with which they were made indicate that they were of great significance in the technology of he middle Lena Neolithic tribes. Actually, various bone artifacts were found at the Malaya Munku, including fragments of the bone shaft for a composite knife, slender points, and a needle case with carved decorations. All these artifacts must have been made with the help of flint gravers. Ornaments of white nephrite are also of very distinct form. Such, for example, is the remarkable artifact of white, almost entirely opaque nephrite found in 1941 near the village of Gelgyay, upstream from Olekminsk, which has the form of a wide triangular blade with lateral projections at the top. A fragment of a second white nephrite object, also polished but of larger dimensions, heavier, and of different proportions, was found at the Neolithic campsite on the Turukta River. The distinct features of the middle Lena culture in that most plastic of materials, pottery, are no less clearly pronounced. In its basic features it is close to the Neolithic pottery of the Cis-Baykal: the vessels are thinwalled, with round, or, more rarely, pointed, bottoms, frequently with clear imprints of coarse netting on the outer surface. However, it also shows many new and special traits. Unusual, first of all, is the appearance of some vessels covered with an imitated textile pattern in the form of a continuous checkerboard pattern applied with blows of a rather broad spatula on which checkerboard squares had been carved. On some fragments there are intersecting incised hatchings, indications of patterns applied in various directions with a grooved spatula, and "fibrous" imprints. The latter may have been applied with a mallet onto which thick strings were fastened, as was done by the American Indians in making pots. The vessels were also decorated with plaited coils, usually imitating a braid. Fig. 15. Small Neolithic tools from Kullaty. 1 to 12–scrapers; 13–stone-cutting file; i4–polished knife; i5–knife for cleaning fish. Fig. 16. Small stone tools from Kullaty. 1 to 10–flakes and insert [side] blades; 11–flint points; 12, 13, 14 –gravers for working bone; 15, i6–pieces of birch sap for sealing the seams of birchbark vessels and boats. 79

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THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

The distinct and stable culture of the Neolithic tribes of the middle Lena, fully developed in all its essential aspects as known from the finds at Malaya Munku, in time slowly changes and passes over to new forms. As usually happens, these changes were initially reflected in secondary details of the material culture and then involved the very basis of the life of the middle Lena tribes and their whole economic system and way of life. The hunting economy, which at one time was the basic source of subsistence for the people of the Stone Age and later was a secondary economic occupation, gradually declines in significance and gives way more and more to fishing. Two ancient settlements newly excavated in 1944-46, yielded rich material bearing on this question; they are interesting because they are located far from Malaya Munku, near Yakutsk, which is about 70o km north from the city of Olekminsk. The first of these, the Neolithic settlement in the Khakhsyk nasleg [Yakut administrative district] on the Kullaty River, which flows into the Lena 35 km to the south of Yakutsk, despite the great distance which separates it from Malaya Munku, shows very great similarity to the latter in all essentials. This settlement, like Malaya Munku, is located near a small river, a tributary to the Lena; the site is hidden in the depths of the river valley, behind a number of channels and islands [of the Lena]. It is well protected from the southwest, north, and northeast by the high slopes of the bank, and on fine summer days is flooded by the rays of the sun. One could hardly find a better location for a camp in the general vicinity of Yakutsk. The cultural remains of the settlement are associated, as at Malaya Munku, with the thick layer of chernozem-like soil which is filled with animal bones, stone chips, knife-like flakes, fragments of stone and bone tools, and also numerous sherds of vessels. Judging by these finds, the general character of the material culture of the ancient tribes which lived here during the Neolithic was the same as at Malaya Munku, and in level of technical development the two sites were on a par. The inhabitants of the Kullaty River site knew how to cut and polish stone; they had achieved high perfection in the complex art of pressure flaking, and used the best kinds of stone—white nephrite, excellent flint of various colorings, and flinty slate of the highest quality— just as commonly as did the experienced craftsmen of Malaya Munku (Fig. 17). Their clay vessels had in general the same round-bottomed form, the same decoration and treatment of the outer surface as the pottery of Malaya Munku. Their only specific feature is an intentionally pointed bottom, ending, as strange as this seems, in the same sort of sharp point as is found in the ancient vessels of northern Europe from the kitchen Fig. 17. 1, 2, 3–blanks; 4–a striker from Kullaty. 82

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THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

middens of Denmark. In other respects, the similarity to the pottery of Malaya Munku is complete. The art at Kullaty represented not only by ornamentation on clay vessels but also by patterns on some of the bone artifacts also has common features with Malaya Munku. Especially notable is a bone object of exceptional form: a smooth cylindrical pipe made from a hollow long bone of a swan or some other large bird, covered, with openings on both sides located not opposite each other but in such a way that against each opening there is a wall (Fig. 18). By its shape this artifact is reminiscent of the primitive musical instruments like the reed pipe or shepherd's pipe known in the Neolithic of Scandinavia and other countries. The idea should not be excluded that the people who left behind this artifact also made musical instruments similar to flutes. The settlement on the Kullaty River in the Lena district represents a sort of extreme northern outpost of that rich and complex culture of the developed Yakut Neolithic which is so well represented by the finds near Olekminsk on the Malaya Munku River. The basic occupation of its inhabitants was, however, not hunting, as at Malaya Munku, but fishing. A number of special pits were found at the campsite, including one storage pit, of cylindrical shape, about a meter in diameter. Its flat bottom was completely covered with birchbark and excellently preserved fish bones: sterlet, sturgeon, and also pike and other bony fish, including specimens of extremely large size. Fish bones are also found in other parts of the camp more frequently than at Malaya Munku, and at the very edge of the settlement, facing the river, there was an accumulation of fish scales deposited in a thick layer in a special pit beneath the culture-yielding stratum, as if deliberately discarded here. This was apparently where the scales were thrown after the fish were cleaned. The bones of elk were found in another pit, and close by was a large antler adze. The general character of the finds at Kullaty leaves no doubt of the extreme importance to its inhabitants of fishing, which had been raised to the status of the basic and leading occupation in their economy. A second settlement was discovered 6o km north of Yakutsk in the Sottinsk nasleg of Ust-Aldan rayon, near Lake Ymyyakhtaakh. Both by the general character and the location of cultural remains and by its situation, this site represents a still more revealing picture of the life of the ancient fishermen at the very end of the Neolithic, on the eve of the Bronze Age, approximately at the beginning of the second half of the second millennium B.C. This also was not a temporary or accidental camp, but a permanent settlement, which existed over a long time, during which rather thick cultural deposits (up to 6o cm) were accumulated, showing clearly the intensive nature of the economy carried on here and the permanent residence of people at this place. Fig. 18. Bone and antler artifacts from Kullaty. I—flutes; 2—fragment of an ornamented needle-case; 3—fragment of a harpoon; 4—awl; 5—antler adze. 84

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2

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

The inhabitants of the settlement did not yet know metal and therefore made their artifacts of bone, stone, and wood. They did not, however, have the excellent material which was available to the people of Malaya Munku and Kullaty in the form of bluish-white calcareous flint. The material for the preparation of their stone tools consisted of small pebbles picked from the nearby old sand-and-gravel debris of the ancient terraces. The technique of working stone was also cruder. Apparently, a good pebble could not be found very often. Therefore, it was normally first treated, as revealed by the preserved materials, by blows which removed the pebble crust and the outer weathered portion of the stone. Sometimes, however, the first two or three blows were enough to determine the unsuitability of the stone for the intended purpose, and then it was thrown away immediately. Those pebbles which were suitable were apparently used in their entirety, and only the largest were broken into pieces for the manufacture of smaller artifacts of various types; blanks of these were found among the refuse. In connection with the great amount of labor required for the crude preliminary preparation of the stone, there are often found stone strikers in the form of elongated oval pebbles with much-worn areas on the opposite ends intended for this purpose. Further working of the stone was completed by means of pressure flaking. Flint scrapers (one of them retained traces of the birch tar with which it was attached to a handle), leaf-shaped knives, punches, and arrowheads were made in this way. The raw material from which at this time stone tools were made, its uniformity and coarseness, in part testifies to a decline in the technique of stone-working by comparison with the previous phase of the "flowering" Neolithic. The same impression is left by the entire assortment of stone tools of this period. The former variety of types and forms of stone artifacts is no longer. Many characteristic examples of it disappear completely; for example, the punches and gravers of both the lateral and angular type fashioned on long flakes or carefully retouched flint chips. The forms of stone tools, especially gravers, are simplified. For the working of bone, original gravers of polyhedral type were used; they were frequently made from miniature cores. These gravers, massive and crude in aspect, are considerably simpler to manufacture than the earlier flake variety. [Shafts for] composite knives and primarily short points were still made from bone; the latter no doubt served as parts of composite fish hooks. No ornamented bone artifacts were found on the site. The pottery of Ymyyakhtaakh was also incomparably cruder and simpler than the more ancient, purely Neolithic type. It is represented by a few vessels of extraordinarily uniform and simple aspect—with round bottoms and straight rims, made of coarse clay, with which a good deal of hair from some small furry animals was admixed. The same distinctive admixture to potter's clay was still used in the i7th century by the Kamchatka natives, who added hairs from sable tails; Nelson witnessed this still later among the Eskimos of the 19th century. In some cases the surface of the vessels was left entirely smooth, and in others it was 86

Material Culture and Economy of the Middle Lena covered with imprints of a checkerboard of small, deeply impressed squares, bordered around the circumference of the vessel by modelled ridges, flattened on top. The carefully executed geometrical ornaments of various types characteristic of sites like Malaya Munku and Kullaty are now no longer found. The same pattern and the same decorative scheme are repeated again and again with striking persistence and uniformity: a wide zigzag band of incised lines girdling the vessel below the rim, the peaks of the upper zigzag border culminating in round pits situated at uniform intervals on the very edge of the rim. Only occasionally is this simple scheme varied by the ornamental band taking the form of oblique lines intersecting to form crosses. To understand the conditions and mode of life of the inhabitants of this site, an examination of the bony remains is of primary importance. These were predominantly fish bones, chiefly of sterlet, pike, and carp; the only mammal bones found were those of a single elk. In the presence of a relatively small number of stone arrowheads, the fact that parts of the fish hooks were made of bone is conspicuous. Fish were the basic food. The inhabitants were primarily "ichthyophages," fish-eaters. They obviously chose this place because it offered the greatest convenience purely from the point of view of fishing, and from no other. The small quiet channel in the depths of the Lena Valley, perhaps even at that time isolated from the Lena and transformed into a lake, was considerably more convenient for them with the primitive tackle which they used than the main river with its greater depth, swift current, and great width. In reviewing the way of life of these ancient fishermen of Yakutia, living at the very end of the Neolithic and on the threshold of a new cultural-historical phase, the Bronze Age, we must not omit a secondary but characteristic detail. Among the fish bones and a few split elk bones, pottery fragments, and other kitchen refuse of the usual sort, parts of a human skeleton were found in one of the ash-pits so characteristic of the site. They consisted of pieces of the skull, with parts of the eye sockets remaining, and fragments of the hollow bones. Some of the fragments were completely charred, the remaining ones were almost untouched by the flames, but they all alike lay in complete disorder. There were no signs of ritual cremation, or remains of the grave furniture traditional in such cases. The circumstances in which these bony remains of man were found leads us to propose that the human corpse of which these bones are the remnants had not been buried but eaten by the inhabitants of the camp; afterwards some of the bones were thrown into the fire and others left beside it. Strange and unusual as such a find may seem at first glance, actually it is not surprising or out of the ordinary, as we can discern by reference to the folklore of northern tribes. The khosun epic of the northern Yakuts and their neighbors, because of its archaism, has preserved to this day clear traces of cannibalism. The heroes of the epic, having vanquished their enemies, invariably disembowelled them. In one of the variants of the khosun legends, it is related, 87

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

for example, that the victorious brothers, having killed their enemy Chimkere, immediately chopped off his shins, removed the meat, and, splitting the hollow bones, "tasted the marrow." The marrow, the legend continues, was watery and without flavor. Because of this symptom the brothers decided that Chimkere had suffered great hunger not so long ago (or, "he caught okhtubut," as is said of the reindeer). One shinbone, they decided, must go to his old mother as tyijeche, that is, the share of the game given to neighbors or accidentally present guests. Coming to the old mother the warriors said: "Old woman! We have killed a wild reindeer buck, but his marrow proved to he without flavor. Tell us at what time this happened?" The old woman answered: "Oh, you have brought me the shinbone of my child as a gift. He suffered hunger nine years ago." In other variants of the khosun legends, the heroes not only suck the marrow but eat the tongue of the enemy (Vasilev n.d., 277). Traces of such customs are also found in the traditions of the southern regions of Yakutia. In one of the legends concerning Omollon, ancestor of the Bologur [elsewhere Bolugur] and Chakyr naslegs [clans] of Baturus ulus, it is said that the spirit of the shaman from Megin, Byyat, whom Omollon had killed, "wanted the heart and liver of his murderer." But in place of Omollon, another giant was killed, and the shaman's spirit finally was satisfied, having sucked the blood from the heart and liver of the killed man (Nosov 1922: 16). Other Yakut traditions mention the same incident (Kochnev 1898; cf. Priklonskiy 1891: 149). Similar elements are expressed still more definitely and realistically in the folklore of other northern tribes, for example, the Nganasans. In the legend of "the Peeled Tree," recorded by B. O. Dolgikh, it is told how an unknown tattooed guest came to a Dolgan. Killing him, the Dolgan cut off his head and opened his chest, inside which he found two hearts, one plain, the other hairy. The end of the hairy heart, the legend relates, "the `Peeled One' cut off and ate. The head he impaled on the top of the tree" (Dolgikh, MS. 1938-46: 6, 48, 69, 211). Traditions about cannibals and hostile tribes are also known from the folklore of the Yukagirs, Tungus, Nentsy (Samoyeds), and other tribes of the north. In a Yukagir legend recorded by A. D. Popovitskaya on the Kolyma, it is related, for instance, how a young Yukagir came to take a wife among the Lamuts, who, it turned out, were occupied with hunting horned people whose bodies were covered all over with fur. When the young man learned to eat these people, the old Lamut, his wife's father, said to him: "Now thou art a good man, always eatest man-flesh, only not the flesh of men of thy own tribe, so as to be sated and not die, so as to live and give life to new people, so that the people will be the strongest of all the peoples which are on the earth."12 Such stories clearly show that in the distant past of the northern peoples, and also among other primitive peoples, there was no "Golden Age," but that it was saturated with a tense struggle for life. 88

Art, Beliefs, and World-View of the Neolithic Tribes of the Middle Lena

Chapter

2

The Neolithic tribes of central Yakutia had reached, by the time of the existence of the Malaya Munku site, a level of development of material culture which, notwithstanding earlier opinions, was unexpectedly high. They must have had, of course, a correspondingly developed non-material culture. An expression of the latter are, in first place, the ancient cliff drawings. One of the most ancient cliff drawings on the Lena which can be attributed to this period is found not very far from the place where the Paleolithic artist first used the smooth surface of one of the ledges of the Shishkino cliff and thus laid the foundation for the only "picture gallery" in northern Asia which continued to fill up over the course of further millennia. On the northern promontory of Shishkino Mountain, under which at one time Bezymyanaya ["Nameless"] River flowed into the Lena, there is another isolated cliff with drawings. On it, with almost the same type of bleached and heavily time-worn bands of color were drawn two representations of animals. The general outline, large dimensions and contour character of the drawings are in part reminiscent of the Paleolithic drawings of horses on the neighboring cliffs. Here, however, we are dealing with something quite different—with an essentially new subject for cliff drawings and one which runs like a red thread through the art of the Neolithic forest tribes of Siberia and eastern Europe. It is the likeness of an elk, or sokhatry, as the elk is called in Siberia. Remarkable examples of such drawings are known both in Karelia and eastern Siberia. The finds in Neolithic burials help to date these cliff drawings. For example, in Karelia, on Oleniy [Deer] Island in Lake Onega, in the burial ground used by the same type of forest hunters and fishermen, there were found superbly executed realistic representations of elks' heads. Several sculptured elks' heads were deposited in the graves of the well-known Tsiklodrom [Cyclodrome] burial ground on the Angara in Irkutsk. In the Neolithic burial on Zhiloy Island, on the lower course of the Angara downstream from Bratsk, there was found a unique [Januslike] representation with two elk heads turned in different directions. 89

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

Sculptured elks still more remarkable for their realistic vitality were found by I. T. Savenkov [191o] in one of the most ancient burials found in the Yenisey Valley at the city of Krasnoyarsk, near the village of Bazaikha. These sculptures, in turn, by their realistic treatment and vibrant perfection of form are close to two monumental images of moose, carved almost full size out of two large blocks of black traprock at Dolgiy Rapids and Ushkaniy Island in Shamanskiy [Shaman] Rapids of the Angara River, downstream from Bratsk. On the basis of style and technique, several of the remarkable representations of elks on Shishkino cliff may be related to the same period. One of them is especially characteristic, striking, even from a distance, both for its realistic aspect and its huge dimensions. A female elk is apparently depicted in this drawing, since no antlers are indicated. The powerful and clumsy body with a pronounced lump on its back, the stretching, sinewy, well-shaped legs, the slightly lowered, long, and heavy muzzle with the emphasized lower lip—all these distinctive traits of the moose are captured with such vividness and verisimilitude that it seems as if the beast is just about to move, leave the cliff, and, throwing its head back, go off at a sprightly trot. Similarly, in the area between Vitim and Yakutsk, there are examples of ancient drawings of a pair of moose, on a cliff near the village of Churu, which at the very first glance attract attention because of their archaic aspect and stylistic peculiarity. Like the most ancient drawing on the cliffs near Shishkino, they occupy a central place and are in their way the "leading" pictures on the cliff. They must have been drawn before other drawings existed here, and the artist had available the entire, free surface. The later drawings were placed on the unoccupied parts of the cliff which were not as convenient for viewing. The earliest drawings naturally are less well preserved than the others. The figure of one of the animals is much weathered and blurred, and has partially dissolved into a formless patch of color which had soaked deeply into the scone. Only its head is well preserved. However, the second drawing is a truly remarkable figure of an elk—the true master of the taiga. Clumsy at first glance, but agile and mighty, the animal is outlined here, with the simplicity usual in the Neolithic art of Siberia, only in its most basic parts, without small detail, but in such a way that everything essential is fully shown. The figure of the elk is transmitted with astonishing fidelity to nature in everything essential to it—both in the general outlines of the animal's massive body and in its most characteristic details. The elks are portrayed dynamically, that is, in movement. They are running at a sprightly trot, one after the other, their necks bent slightly, and their long, sinewy legs stretched wide. In the better preserved figure, even the crossing of the beast's front and hind legs during the run is rendered with the cinematographic exactness of a single frame (Fig. 19). Fig. 19. Neolithic representations of elks. I–at Churu village; 2–Dolgiy porog (rapids) of Angara River; 3–Lena River, Shishkino; 4–present-day drawing of an elk. 90

d

grew',

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

These features of the art of the forest hunters arise of themselves from life, grow up on the basis of everyday working experience, and are generalizations from the numberless observations which occupy such an important place in the content of their lives. Life in the forest, the firm hand of the hunter, and the sharp eye of the forest tracker—these form the immediate basis for the realism of the Neolithic drawings. The same basis must also have given rise to the realism of the primitive hunter's art of the Paleolithic. The naïve realism of primitive art, which was clearly expressed in the best examples of cliff drawings on the Angara and Lena, stood in opposition to the shamanistic mythological conceptions, with their grim fantastic figures. The successes of man's cognitive activity, closely connected with his struggle for existence, found their expression in this realism. Bearing in mind this most important circumstance, the neglect of which would be a direct distortion of actuality, we can proceed further in the analysis of the forest cliff drawings which interest us as relics of the world-view and beliefs of the ancient tribes of Yakutia. To determine the age of drawings such as those found at Shishkino and around the village of Churu, of much importance is the fact that drawings analogous or similar to them in style, rubbed with red ochre, are found also in other places on the Lena, including the cliff of Suruktaakh-khaya in the valley of the Markha River. The drawings on the cliff of Suruktaakh-khaya (Fig. 20) are especially valuable in that they give direct proof that these very ancient pictures belong to the Stone Age. The cliff preserves clear traces of religious worship of the pictures and of the cliff itself, which make it possible to understand more fully the intellectual content and character of the drawings. Even in recent times, sacrificial offerings have been placed there by hunters in the form of gunpowder, buckshot, bullets, variouscolored rags, horse hairs, copper and silver coins, matches, gun flints, beads of colored glass and other materials, and other objects. Most of these offerings lie on the ledge of the cliff in its lower part, at a height of about 3 m above the level of the Markha River. Above the ledge, like a medieval tower, rises the main vertical surface of the cliff facing the Markha—its principal and forward facade, where the largest and most numerous drawings are located. Between the ledge and the main surface of the cliff there is a wide crevice penetrating into the depths of the cliff. The same kind of sacrificial offerings were found in the crevice, but incomparably more ancient, and divided into three distinct layers. The lowest layer, third from the top, contained only bone and stone artifacts. There were found, more than anything else, chips of slate, chert, and flint of various colors—red and semi-transparent black—unknown on the Lena, and also the local bluish-white variety. Among the finished stone artifacts were found complete arrowheads and spearpoints and carefully retouched scrapers of various sizes and types, cutting tools, and punches. Among the bone objects stand out a large, unilaterally barbed Fig. 92

20.

The inscription cliff of Suruktaakh-khaya on the Markha River.

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THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

harpoon, a flat adze, and needles of elk bones. There were also mother-ofpearl beads of annular shape. On the basis of the types of stone artifacts, this layer of Suruktaakh-khaya may be dated to the end of the local middle Lena Neolithic. The general character and contents of the finds, therefore, leave no doubt that we are dealing with a Stone Age place of sacrifice. Comparing the Neolithic finds with the sacrificial offerings of our own day which lie on the ledge of the cliff, it is not hard to see that the composition of the gifts did not basically change over the course of millennia, and was the same in the 19th century as it had been during the Stone Age. The ancient hunters brought here, as gifts for the guardian spirit of the sacred cliff, their arrows and spears with stone points; the modern hunters replaced these with ammunition—powder, shot, rifle bullets and cartridges. The ancient women brought their ornaments, decorated with mother-of-pearl beads made from river shells, as gifts to the cliff; the colored glass beads of the 18th and t9th centuries which are preserved on the ledge of the cliff, together with shot, cartridge cases, and flints for flintlock rifles, correspond to these "prehistoric" beads. No less curious is the finding of the boxes of matches. These correspond to the wooden bow drill fire-making apparatus found in the depth of the crevice; this apparatus dates to a very ancient period, apparently the Neolithic (Fig. 21). The apparatus found at the cliff of Suruktaakh-khaya consists of two parts. The first part is a heavy wooden board covered on one side with shallow round depressions. The second part is a thick rod of denser and harder wood. One part is still lacking—the bow with a bowstring which was wound around the rod in order to give it a rotary motion. When a fire was to be started, one end of the rod was placed in the depression in the board, and then was turned rapidly with the help of the bow; a bit of tinder was placed in the depression and, as a result of the friction, a fire was kindled. The above type of fire-making apparatus was used sixty to eighty years ago by many tribes of the North, including the Kamchadals (Itelmers), Chukchis, and Koryaks. For instance, Stepan Krasheninnikov wrote of the Kamchadals: "They obtained and now obtain fire from wood by taking a board of dry wood, hollowing out a depression near its edge, and cutting through the edge of the board [to connect] with the depression. Then they place a round stick in the depression and rotate it with both hands. With turning, the depression becomes deeper and soot from the hole comes out through the cut. When, because of the rapid turning, a spark jumps out of the depression, the soot catches fire, and by the method described, they obtain fire very quickly, for which reason even to this day some Kamchadals do not buy Russian flints, but are content Fig. 21. Stone, bone, and wooden objects from the place of sacrifice at the cliff of Suruktaakh-khaya. r, 2–parts of a wooden fire-drill; 3–harpoon; 4 to 7–arrowheads; 8–graver; 9, to–scrapers; rr. 12–side blades for composite knives; 13–spearpoints. 94

12

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

with their own instruments" (Krasheninnikov 1819: 46-47; cf. Berg 1935: 222). As is known, fire-drills were worshipped among the Koryaks and Chukchis, and were included among the sacred objects of the household (Bogoraz 1939: 51-58; 1908: 70; Shternberg 1 936: 374-75). This cult of the wooden fire-drill was connected with the cult of fire and the domestic hearth, and also of the patron spirits of the family and the clan. The presence of the fire-drill at the cliff of Suruktaakh-khaya, among the sacrificial objects intended for its presiding spirit, cannot therefore be a mere accident. The spirit of the cliff received, in the fire-drill, not only what he needed, what he did not have, but also the very object which was especially close to him by the very fact of his sacred nature. The presence of arrowheads among the sacrificial offerings is no less interesting. They are present in all layers of the crevice, but in the uppermost level not only arrowheads were found, but, additionally, dozens of arrow hafts driven into the crevice of the sacred cliff, points outward. The half-rotted shafts, with remains of feathering, are preserved to this day at a greater [not easily reachable] height above the ground. The abundance of stone arrowheads is also not accidental. The custom of bringing arrows as sacrifices to the spirits of sacred cliffs or trees is a widespread element of the hunting cult among the tribes of the North. The wide distribution of this custom in ancient times in the Urals is attested to by the finds of numerous bone, stone, and bronze arrowheads in caves. This custom was also practised in the basin of the lower Angara, on the Kamenka River. The beginning of the religious worship of the cliff Suruktaakh-khaya apparently dates to the end of the Neolithic. The earliest drawings at Suruktaakh-khaya, portraying elks, which are a reflection of the same cult of the sacred cliff (or even served as the occasion for its appearance), date from the same time. In order to understand the nature and character of this cult, we must compare the Lena cliff drawings first of all with the preceding Paleolithic ones. As before, animals continue to be the chief or even the sole subjects of the drawings. However, in the past, a strict limitation in the choice of this or that species of animal was not observed. In the cliff drawings of the Neolithic, the range of subjects was sharply restricted as a consequence of the factual disappearance of the ancient fauna—horses, wild cattle, mammoths, and rhinoceri. But this was the least of it. There were other mammals widely distributed over Siberia, as the new forest landscape became established—bears, wolves, foxes, beavers, musk-deer, Siberian antelopes, wolverines, not to mention other smaller and less economically important representatives of the taiga fauna. At the same time, all of this fauna is represented in the cliff drawings by the elk alone. Wherever we find Neolithic cliff drawings in the forest zone of northern Asia, from the Yenisey to the Amur, the figure of the elk always appears in them. In place of the multitude of animal figures of the Paleolithic, an astonishing uniformity has come to the cliff art. Such an absolute preponderance of 96

Art, Beliefs, and World-View of the Middle Lena the figure of the elk in art, and, obviously, the religious conceptions of the ancient tribes of Siberia connected with this figure, had deep roots in their daily life. Various traces of those archaic conceptions and rites which were contemporary with the most ancient cliff drawings of the Neolithic period may be discovered in present-day ethnographic data. They leave no doubt that the elk actually occupied a central position in the food-connected cult of the ancient hunters and in their beliefs and rites revolving about the very foundation of their existence—the hunt. The aim of all the various rites and ceremonies connected with the cult of sacred cliffs among the Evenki and their Neolithic predecessors was the magical multiplication of the elks; they all reflected an identical effort—to further by magical means the mating of the animals; their objective was to fill the taiga with new herds of hoofed animals. A. F. Anisimov pointed out that it was with just this aim that the Evenkis organized a special rite of "obtaining luck and success in hunting," the shingkelavun. This rite lasted many days, and was carried out by the entire clan near the rock, cliffs, and trees sacred to it—the bugady. On the first day, the shaman "walked" under the sacred rock or tree (bugady) of the clan and searched for the tent of the protecting spirit of the clan lands—the dunne-mushunin (that it, the bugady-woman, ancestress). Finding her, the shaman asked for help in the hunt, but she sent him to another, this time a zoomorphic bugady, which roamed in the form of a giant female elk, or wild doe, among a herd of wild animals of the particular species. With the permission of the she-elk bugady, the shaman caught animals in her herd with the lasso. But since, on the shaman's return, the number of the animals still proved inadequate, he again visited the dunne-mushunin, and by stealth stole from her magical strands of wool which then turned into animals as soon as the shaman shook them out on the home territory of his clan. After the first part of the ceremony followed a second, in which not only the shaman but also all the males of the clan took part. In content it was a characteristic and purely magical rite, retaining clear features of Paleolithic religion. The Evenki hunters, like the Paleolithic "sorcerers" portrayed in the Trois Freres caves, wore ritual costumes, with caps made from the skulls of reindeer or elks, imitating the heads of these animals. The hunters performed a pantomime dance, portraying the characteristic movements of the animals, and accompanied it with an improvised song addressed to the beasts. The central figure of the rite was the best of the dancers, an actor-hunter. He represented the leader of the animal herd, and by his pantomime was supposed to bring all the animals of the taiga to the clan's hunting grounds, after the fashion in which he was leading his fellow dancers. At the end of the dance, the group of hunters, embodying the figures of animals in living forms and plastic movements, headed by their leader, who apparently played the part of the master of the animals, the bugady, developed a new theatrical action, different in character but analogous in aim. The hunters went into the taiga and returned laden with rose 97

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

willows and young larches, from which they built a kind of decoration representing the taiga surrounding a new clearing covered with bushes, the favorite grazing place of the elk and wild reindeer. Among the rose willows sprang up herds of elks and wild reindeer, represented by wooden figurines. Other animals and birds were to be seen in the larch taiga. Meanwhile, the old men, without pause, recited stories and legends, and to their measured, rhythmic speech, small wooden figures were placed beside the she-elks, representing their calves. The other animals also had plentiful offspring (Anisimov 1949: 177).13 There thus took place the magical multiplication of animals, and the taiga was filled with life. A necessary part of such ceremonies for the multiplication of animals during the Neolithic must have been the sacred paintings on cliffs serving as clan shrines, depicting the animals in the same positions in which they were probably represented by the hunters in the Stone Age, who performed their religio-magical pantomines before the matriarchal clan deity represented on the sacred cliff—the "she-elk," bugady. The elks are usually represented in pairs; in a number of cases, the sexes are discernible. In connection with this, one of the group paintings at Shishkino shows two elks standing almost vertically, as though covering the female. Of the same content is one of the drawings on the Yenisey, at Tuba, where the mating of elk is depicted with complete clarity (Savenkov 191o: Plate II, fig. 4)." In the Vorobyevo cliff drawings in the Lena Basin, there are also double portrayals of elk, of a somewhat different type: one animal is standing above the other; this apparently is expressive of the same idea—that of mating. The above is only one aspect of the religious acts which make up the basic content of the ancient cult of animals, or, more accurately, the first part of its ritual. The other aspect of these rites was based on the desire to secure direct success in hunting by magical means and by ceremonies of sorcery. The final act of the shingkelavun ceremony began with the hunters again going to the taiga and carefully searching for the tracks of animals. Soon the leader of the group gave the sign that the tracks had been found, and the other hunters "found" places where the animals had recently grazed. They showed by signs that they had discovered the herd, and, with the greatest stealth, crept toward it. Having approached within shooting distance, they shot arrows at the wooden figurines. Finally, several sacrificial reindeer were slaughtered, and their skins hung on long poles as offerings to the supreme deity Oshkori, the lord of all taiga. The meat was eaten by all participants. In essence, this ritual corresponded to the legend of the pursuit of the sun-animal by hunters, its killing and death, and then the sacrificial meal, Fig. 22. Figures of wounded animals. i –elk on Suruktaakh-khaya [cliff] on the Markha River; 2–bull, Western European Paleolithic; 3–young elk, opposite Toyon-Aryy Island on the Lena River; 4–stylistic representation of an elk, Lena River, locality of ChopchuBaga; 5–swans, Karelia; 6–bull, western European Paleolithic. 98

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THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

with the subsequent solemn burial of the bones and the miraculous resurrection of the buried animal. Since the basic object of the animal-hunting epic and cult among the forest tribes of Siberia was the elk, it was this animal which was pictured on the Lena cliffs as the chief object of magical action. Besides the drawings of Suruktaakh-khaya at Markha, the monumental cliff drawings at the mouth of the Sinyaya, as well as many others, portray the hunting of elk by a man armed with bow and arrow. Other cliff drawings of the middle Lena are also of great comparative interest; in these drawings the hunter is absent; nevertheless the act of killing the animal, or the result of this act, is, obviously represented. In a remarkable drawing near the village of Toyon-Aryy, there are represented in one composition two large figures of elks and a third of smaller proportions. The third figure is cut through the middle by a vertical stroke executed in the same red dye used for all the figures of the cliff drawing, and undoubtedly portrays a spear or arrow with which the animal has been mortally struck (Fig. 22). This conventional method of the magical wounding of animals is portrayed with particular clarity in yet another large drawing on the cliff of Chopchu-Baga, upstream from the mouth of the Sinyaya River. It represents an ungainly animal, stylized in such a way that at first glance it might be taken for a rhinoceros, but which is undoubtedly an elk. The animal is surrounded by a dense rain of short lines or elongated spots, frequently intersecting each other, falling on it from above, and covering the upper part of its body. Among the cliff drawings of the middle Lena, very ancient on the basis of aspect and state of preservation, there are also puzzling drawings in the form of several vertical stripes, parallel to each other and slightly slanted. Such parallel stripes constitute the most ancient drawings on the painted cliff at Badaranny, near Churan; a number of them have been discovered in the region of the Keteme River. Finally, they have been found at Kuruktaakh-khaya on the Markha, where, unfortunately, time has not spared them. The meaning of these drawings became clearer when schematic, carelessly scratched drawings, made with the point of a knife, and showing the same slanted stripes frequently intersecting in the manner of a net or fence, were found near them (Fig. 23). Within these fences were discovered equally schematic figures of animals. Consequently, they indicate the fact that animals were being captured in special fence-traps or nets. These magical drawings of corrals with stripes of red dye were also intended to secure success in the hunt. Such a constant feature of the middle Lena cliff drawings as the custom of using red dye, ochre, for drawing figures of elk, was most closely Fig. 23. Representations of animals in snares and traps. I to 3—drawings on the river Lena; 4, 5—cliff drawings of the Paleolithic, western Europe. I00

2

4

5

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

connected with the cult of the suffering, dying, and resurrected animal, as with the fertility cult mentioned earlier. Among various primitive tribes, ochre is considered an equivalent for blood, the chief element of life and basic source of youth and strength. Indeed, sometimes it is used simultaneously with blood in the same ceremony. Among the Chukchis, for instance, the drawings of animals on the magical panels which serve for their "multiplication" were formerly done with blood or ochre, since the figures were to take on vital force and genuine reality thanks to the blood (Sarychev 1802: 161). The figures of animals, men, and mythical beings drawn on the cliffs were naturally also to be brought to life, like the figures on drums, on other paraphernalia—if not with blood, then with its equivalent, the fast, red dye, ochre. It is the more important to note that this motif is found to this day in the folklore of the Lena region, in direct connection with the cliff drawings. The Lena Yakuts recount that a famed old female shaman fought with the spirit of smallpox, and after the victory over smallpox, drew on the cliff near Toyon-Aryy the image of two elks. We have given comparatively much attention to the mythology of the forest hunters and the cult of the beast because they clearly reflect the dependence of primitive man on nature, showing how false it would be to idealize his hard life, his severe struggle for existence. Yet it would be wrong to neglect another, positive, side of this life, in which primitive man, in spite of all obstacles, moved forward. His consciousness from the very beginning was not at all limited by false, distorted conceptions of himself and of the reality surrounding him. It was basically a definite and ever-growing, constantly enriched kernel of real knowledge, born in the practice of work, in the struggle with nature. It is instructive to recall, for example, how much controlled energy, technical skill, intelligence, and basic knowledge had to be expended on even the simplest and most ordinary thing, as, for example, a stone arrowhead or a spearpoint made with crude stone and bone tools. As far as spiritual culture is concerned, even the fantastic figures of primitive mythology, as we have seen, clearly bear witness to the definite cognitive demands born and developed in the practice of human labor, in man's struggle with the elements of nature, and to a high degree of creative imagination and fantasy. Even more indicative and clearer in this regard is the primitive art. The realistic precision of the best of these shows that, regardless of their religio-magical intent and in spite of it, the ancient sculptures and cliff paintings served the great and vital purpose of recognition of the world and development of man's creative forces. In depicting the shapes of animals precisely, the artist transmitted reality as it actually existed. By the same token, he reinforced the achievement of the cognitive labor of his own mind, and taught himself to see and understand the surrounding world more deeply, fully, and exactly. But this is only part of the picture. Because of certain reasons, it is primarily the examples of primitive art which immediately served the requirements of the hunting cult that have come down to us. No doubt besides these there existed a whole extinct world of primitive art, vital and 102

Art, Beliefs, and World-View of the Middle Lena full of creative force. We know with what patience, incomprehensible to Europeans, the northern carvers made their artistic works of astonishing skill and at the same time, it would seem, entirely without purpose. In his time, Stepan Krasheninnikov [1819 edition] described with amazement a chain carved from one piece of a walrus tusk, which, in his words, in purity and exactness of its workmanship no one would take for the work of a "savage Chukchi." V. G. Bogoraz also cited a vivid instance indicating the existence among the formerly most backward tribes of northeast Asia who recently lived in a stone age, not only of narrowly utilitarian but also of purely artistic activity, determined by esthetic demands. He writes that in comparison to the artistic works of the Eskimos, those of the Chukchis and Koryaks are striking in their unadaptability to any possible demand of practical life. While the Eskimo drawings and figures serve as decorations for various items of daily use, the Chukchi ones have no purpose whatever, and are stored in bags together with other odds and ends, only occasionally being taken out to be looked at. Bogoraz and Yokhelson [Jochelson] note that the art called into life by purely esthetic demands not only exists among these Koryaks but is in definite contradiction to religious art in the true sense of this term, and represents its exact opposite. "The Koryaks skillfully carve small figures of people and animals from wood, bone, and antler. This carving is striking in its realism, and in the degree to which the figures transmit movement and life. The carved objects relating to the cult are on a markedly lower level. They are carelessly made in stylized form. Often the realistic carving forms a decoration for vessels and other household objects, but frequently the Koryak sculptor also carves for the satisfaction of his esthetic feelings" (Yokhelson [Jochelson] and Bogoraz, MS, n.d.). One must not forget that beside the somber figures of the sorcerersoothsayer of the dark forces, there always stood other persons, who also were of marked significance to the life of the primitive communes. Beside the shaman-sorcerer there were always the sagacious orator, an amusing story-teller, and the inspired singer, the custodian of popular wisdom. Among the peoples of Siberia, for example, the shaman was occupied specifically with communication with the dead, of people with spirits. At the same time, the mastery of language always had its separate place and was not surrounded by the fear which enveloped the shaman's dark craft; it enjoyed general love and recognition. Among all the peoples of Siberia, the skillful smith, whose power and influence were not second to those of the shaman, stood beside and independent of the latter. The field of art in general was not limited to the activity of the shaman; the most backward peoples and tribes had their master artists, whose priceless hands decorated the life of the "primitive" peoples and elevated it. The place of women, who had their own special sphere of artistic creativity, certainly was not secondary, but, on the contrary, prominent and important. To the women in all primitive societies fell the preferential role in the beautification of everyday life. The woman sews and weaves, tailors garments, forming their pattern in a definite, established style. 103

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

The woman decorates them with simple but sophisticated designs, the preparation of which is frequently an art in itself. Such, for example, are the remarkable designs in reindeer hair on the garments of northern Asian and American tribes. With a low level of technical development, this type of labor was not an easy task. It demanded of the executant large expenditures of energy, both mental and physical. Nevertheless, despite its simplicity, its monotony and, to us, its unusually tension-producing nature, this endless labor without rest or limit was not something unbearable. It beautified and fulfilled life, exalted and elevated man.

104

Tribes of Northern Yakutia in the Neolithic Period

Chapter 3

When the Neolithic tribes of the middle Lena, gradually raising themselves in the development of their culture from one level to another, reached at last the era indicated by excavations at Munku or Kullaty (that is, they became semi-settled and even began to raise cattle), the life of their northern neighbors had early gone along different paths. The most ancient traces of these northern tribes, dated approximately to the third millennium s.c., were preserved at the polar circle, near Zhigansk, along the river Nyoyurda (Strekalovka), where there is a group of forest lakes typical of northern regions, stretching toward the Vilyuy Basin. Between two large lakes, Uolba and Zhirkovskiy, located in the middle of a low swampy plain, thickly covered by moss and underbrush, overgrown with scraggly, twisted larches, there rises a single, small oval mound. There are no visible traces of man's sojourn on its surface; it seems empty and lifeless like hundreds and thousands of similar ones in the forest tundra of the Far North. In fortuitous diggings, however, there were found human bones colored with ochre and, next to them, arrowheads. The bones were brittle and crumbled from age; the arrowheads were neither iron nor bone, as is usual in ancient burials in Yakutia, but stone. The skeleton lay at a depth of 8o-90 cm in gray sand, but around the bones the sand was red rather than gray. The skeleton's head pointed to the northeast. The stone arrowheads lay near the skull. Not far from the first skeleton lay a second, a child's, in a special grave pit, also enveloped by red sand, ochre. Besides the burial there were other traces of man on the same mound (kyrdal) near Lake Uolba which point out that it served also as a dwelling site, because of its suitable location between two fish-filled lakes in the center of an extensive lake system. That men chose this solitary mound and not a bank of one of the lakes is probably to be explained by the fact that it was the driest place in this low plain which is covered with thin moss and scraggy forest; no less important is the circumstance that a northern windstorm (nizovok)* often rages over the lake, and it is so fierce that [large] waves are formed • [Nizovok, a wind from the direction of the mouth (nizove) of a river. Editor,

A.I.N.A.)

I05

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

on it as well as along the river. In the forest which covers the mound it is quiet and relatively warm on such windy days—a definite advantage in wintertime. Stone artifacts and the remains of a dwelling left by the ancient inhabitants of the mound testify to an extended stay of man. At a depth of 30-40 cm the remains of a dwelling were found in the form of a pit. Within the pit and near it, besides the usual flakes, chips, cores, and other stone artifacts were some of strange forms unknown in the southern regions of Yakutia. For uniqueness and originality of form first mention should be made of large arrowheads, fashioned from long narrow stone flakes, with tanged bases, retouched only along the edges. Such points also were found in the burial of the Uolba kyrdal. Included with them were points of another form: in the shape of a willow leaf, and also narrow, long, threesided ones, like a triangular file in cross-section (Fig. 24).

I

2

Fig. 24. Stone tools from the lower layer of the Uolba site. I—flake and core; 2—arrowheads. With this abundance of chips, flakes, and other stone artifacts at Uolba, the absence of such characteristic finds as animal bones and fragments of pottery (if only for the Malaya [Little] Munku campsite) is striking. ro6

Tribes of Northern Yakutia Pottery is represented only by three small fragments, one of which has lines on the outer surface; the inner surface contains impressions of hard-twisted cord. Similar impressions are sometimes found on sherds from sites of the Malaya Munku type, although they are usually coarser. The above points to the considerable antiquity of the Uolba burials and of the lower culture-bearing layer of the kyrdal. The Uolba finds document one of the most ancient, if not the earliest, stages of the settlement by man of the northern regions of eastern Siberia. The plentifulness of arrowheads and the care with which they were prepared imply that the ancient inhabitants of the Uolba Lakes and the kyrdal, like the people who lived at the early campsites of the Developed Neolithic on the middle Lena, were primarily hunters. What exactly drew them here, to this kyrdal, becomes clear if we consider that along with fish, which were easy to catch with the simplest contrivances, the lakes of the Uolba group, spring and summer, abounded in every kind of aquatic bird. At that time, as now, hundreds of wild ducks nested on them; elks roved along the banks; herds of wild reindeer often passed by. Men found here not only food but also the hoped-for shelter from the severe cold and winds which drove them from the banks of the region's main water artery [the Lena] even on the warmest days of the year. It is entirely natural, therefore, that on the small hillock near Uolba Lake there are preserved not only traces of temporary hearths where the fires of primitive hunters and fishermen burned, but also remains of their communal dwelling— a semi-subterranean house. The finds, discovered in a kyrdal long forgotten among the mossy swampland and scraggy larch forests of Yakutia north of the Arctic Circle, are interesting not only because they reveal the culture of this raw and desolate land, but also because they unexpectedly indicate connections with more distant regions. As we have already seen, the burial custom as carried out on the Uolba hillock was very simple, but characteristic: a pit was dug, and the deceased placed in it with his head pointing to the northeast. The deceased lay on his back, extended, with his arms along his side. Next to the body lay the grave furniture. The corpse was sprinkled with ochre and covered with earth mixed with the same. Such burials were characteristic both of other forest regions of Yakutia (for example, the burial found at the city of Olekminsk on the river Alalayka) and of the Baykal region during the Kitoy period. But at the same period they were detected far to the west of eastern Siberia, in Karelia. Stone artifacts found in the Uolba mound, and dated approximately to the beginning of the second millennium a.c., indicate these ties, as will be shown later. The finds of the upper layer were connected primarily with a hearth depression of cup-like shape at a depth of 40 cm, covered over from above by turf. Within the pit, filled with burned sand and ashes, lay fragments of a polished slab of sandstone, a clay vessel, a side-blade from a composite knife, and also a knife of quartzite, semi-lunar in shape. With other objects from the upper layer, these artifacts show clearly the changes in the content and technology of this stage of cultural development of the local I07

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

tribes. These changes are still more completely depicted by the finds at other sites near the Uolba kyrdal, at Lake Kylarsa. The finds from the upper Neolithic stratum of the Uolba kyrdal are distinguished from those from the lower stratum by the very material which served for the preparation of the stone artifacts. In the lower stratum this material is quite uniform. Almost all stone artifacts are prepared from black flinty slate even similar in shade. River pebbles are almost never used, or are used only exceptionally; rod-like and plate-like pieces were used almost exclusively. In the upper culture-bearing stratum there are also artifacts of black flinty slate, but this material is already to a significant degree crowded out by another raw material—petrified flinty wood, and various other materials. One scraper was made, for example, of good black flint certainly not of local origin. Such flint is encountered at the Neolithic campsites of the lower Angara. The side-blade and the semi-lunar knife were made of quartzite. Local chalcedony, not adopted earlier, is now used extensively. The character of the stone inventory of both strata was also significantly different. In the upper it was more varied in form, and richer in composition, and revealed signs of further development in technology. The side-blade and semi-lunar knife are especially notable in this respect. The scrapers from the upper stratum are also different, especially one miniature scraper, reminiscent of the small round scrapers of the Baykal area. The most significant relationship between the lower and upper strata of the Uolba kyrdal is expressed by the stone arrowheads. One such arrowhead from the upper stratum was, for example, of a radically different shape, and was prepared with a different technique than that of the arrowheads from the lower stratum. It was worked by shallow retouching from both sides and was triangular in shape with a groove at its base. Such arrowheads are found in the late culture periods of the developed Neolithic of Yakutia. At the campsites near Lake Kylarsa there were also artifacts typically Neolithic in form and technique; for instance, arrowheads with one short and one long barb, which are close in form to those of the Neolithic sites of the Baykal region. , In the same layer there was a graver of a new type—a polyhedral core with a large, core-like handle. It reminds one of the polyhedral graver-drills of the Baykal Neolithic. The widespread technique of polishing stone is revealed in the fragments of a polished sandstone slab found in the upper horizon of the Uolba kyrdal. At two other sites there were fragments of highly polished tools, apparently adzes prepared from white flinty slate, also not of local origin. Significant progress in the general character of the material culture of the upper stratum is reflected by the finds of potter's fragments. In the lower stratum sherds were an exception; yet, at a later time, pottery is represented by numerous fragments of carefully and skillfully prepared vessels of the prevalent round-bottomed form. One of their characteristics which associates them with the Late Neolithic sites of southern Yakutia is the "checkerboard" (pseudo-textile) ornamentation, in the form of a rectangular net of impressed squares divided by raised bands. Ioö

Tribes of Northern Yakutia With the general progress in techniques is implied a further development of the economic structure, basically the same as in the south, and especially an improvement in fishing, which was becoming the leading economic occupation. The location of the campsites indicates the importance of fishing in the economy of the Neolithic population. They are situated in groups, "clusters," on the shores of lakes connected with each other by bright green, grassy streams. Among the lakes Uolba, Zhirkova, Kylarsa, Khårakhkhan and other neighboring lake systems is concentrated, for example, a "constellation" of ancient settlements, indicating that here a culture existed since ancient times, that a more or less constant population was present, although it stayed on the lake shores only during a specific time of the year. A second cluster of ancient sites was found on the shores of the extensive Lake Syalaakh, presenting, with all its bays and lateral lakes, a no less vast lake system than the Uolba (Fig. 25). On the banks of the main water artery of the region, the Lena, ancient settlements are very rare. Even in places where they exist they are not connected directly with the river but are near a lake [lagoon] or near the mouths of small tributaries. Essentially, the entire extensive basin of the Vilyuy and the central area of Yakutia during the Late Neolithic comprised a "Neolithic of the Lakes," similar in this respect to that of Karelia or Finland. The same, apparently, applies to a considerable part of the rest of the territory of Yakutia in its zone of northern taiga and forest tundra, where the abundance of lakes is such that it is compared with the stars in the "dark night sky." Here many of the lakes reach several dozens of kilometers in diameter, but are striking not so much by their size as by their number. This distribution allows the fishermen to complete a journey of hundreds of kilometers without difficulty, by portaging the boat from one lake to another. What significance fishing may have had in the life of the local population, living under the conditions of a lake landscape in ancient times, may be judged from facts relating to the ethnographic present. As late as the first half of the i9th century of the middle Vilyuy, in particular among the left-bank inhabitants of that river who practiced no type of developed agriculture or animal breeding, fishing was of primary importance. It was mainly carp and lake herring that were caught. Even the locations of later settlements of the Yakuts in this region confirm the pattern of distribution of the "clusters" of Neolithic sites on a plateau in the vicinity of lakes Uolba or Syalaakh, and also in the vicinity of the city of Yakutsk, where they all without exception gravitate toward the lakes and dry stream beds of the Lena Basin. Such a distribution of the present-day Yakut settlements indicates that lake fishing in the i9th century was the basic source of food for the Yakut population of these districts, who were direct descendants of the "unmounted" Yakut fishermen of the t7th century. The place occupied by fish, in particular the carp, in the life of the Yakut population (not only of the Vilyuy region but also of the central districts) can be judged linguistically, from the variety and abundance of names for the carp, depending on its age. For example, forty-three different names for 109

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Tribes of Northern Yakutia the carp are used in the Namskiy, Meginskiy, Tattinskiy Borogonskiy, Dyupsinskiy, and Kangalasy districts in Vilyuy okrug, Olekminsk uyezd, and in Abyye. Fishing took on an even more important meaning as one moved from southern regions of Yakutia to the north, northwest and northeast to the Dolgans, Tungus clans, and the Yukagirs. Here the Yakut balykyst (fisherman), who sometimes had one or two cows, replaced the "unmounted" fishermen of tundra and wooded tundra, who were completely ignorant of keeping cattle. With further penetration of man into the North, to the high plains, to the wooded tundra and tundra, he became yet more sharply differentiated in his way of life and economic system from his southern brethren along the middle Lena and the regions adjacent to it. Despite this, the wooded tundra, and even, in part, the tundra, were long ago occupied by man. The first inhabitants of the tundra possibly arrived here even at that remote time when the last of the mammoths roamed the shores of the Arctic Ocean. At least numerous hunting and fishing tribes lived in the tundra flatlands during the Neolithic, having occupied these raw and inhospitable places over the course of millennia. The Neolithic sites situated still farther downstream along the Lena, as far as Chokurovka [Chekurovka], are very expressive of this point of view. The richest and most numerous finds of Neolithic remains on the lower Lena are connected with two localities, Cape Obukh, downstream from Zhigansk, and the present-day village of Chokurovka. They are located in a wild and raw locality, extremely sparsely settled until most recent times, at the edge of the Arctic "desert," the tundra and an almost equally desert-like zone of wooded tundra adjoining it to the south. Yet, both at Chokurovka and at Cape Obukh, there were found rather numerous artifacts of stone, arrowheads nicely retouched with small flaking, flint knives, scrapers, and remains of clay vessels. At first glance these might be taken for direct testimony indicating a relatively lengthy and dense settlement by Neolithic people of both these points. In reality, however, these finds reveal a completely different picture of daily life, new to us and profoundly unique. The present-day village of Chokurovka is situated in one of the places most convenient for man on the lower Lena. To the river front of Chokurovka, which is situated on the left bank of the Lena, the bare rocky elevations of the base bank, which usually drop steeply to the water, approach right to the river. The right bank is even more desolate and grim than the left. It is comprised of a solid, perpendicular cliff, vertically cut by the narrow grooves of rocky ravines. Contrarily, the left bank, at the village proper, even from afar attracts the eye by its soft outlines, a solid Fig. 25. Neolithic finds on the lower Lena at Zhigansk. I to 3—flakes with cutting edges; 4—whetstone; 5—fragment of a flake; 6 and t i—fragments of vessels; 7—knife; 8, 9—blanks; to—fragment of the pitchcovered birchbark vessel. III

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

forest cover, and a high sandy terrace conducive to human settlement. This high sandy terrace at Chokurovka, dominating the Lena, is relatively dry, and, like the limestone elevation which rises behind it, is densely covered with forest. Large "blowouts" are visible everywhere on it, and in them there are remains of the sojourn of ancient man, including stone artifacts, sherds, and hearth stones. Finds are encountered at almost every streamlet below the edge of the terrace; the most interesting of them were made near the small streams of Chokur-yuryakh, Baataay, Khayyrgas, and Kisileekh-yurekh. At one of these points there were found excellent flakes of large dimensions, made from good quality, dark gray flint. With them were side-blades for composite knives, large flint knives, arrowheads, and chips left from the manufacturing of stone tools. The most plentiful finds were encountered at another point, in the blowouts near the village. Within one blowout hollow were found numerous chips, knife-like flakes of various sizes, mostly small, a polished knife of white slate, and fragments of a clay vessel. The latter were characteristic in their archaic appearance: all were thick and coarse, redbrown in color, with a heavy admixture of crushed traprock or granite. Similar pottery, of the same composition, is known also on the middle Lena. Examples of it have been encountered not far from Yakutsk, at Bestyakh, and near the village of Uritskoye, downstream from Olekminsk. Analogous finds recorded at five additional points north of Chokurovka yielded the same picture of the unique way of life of the Neolithic inhabitants of this locality. In order to understand it, one must bear in mind that all the artifacts found at the first point constitute one material complex belonging to one short interval of time. This is indicated by their shapes, sizes, and the material from which they were made. The best of the flakes were struck from one and the same piece of stone, as were the knife and points. All these objects were apparently preserved at the site of a temporary dwelling, a solitary urasa, whose owner produced the stone artifacts. In other places, where similar remains were found, they were also always concentrated in small groups at definite places, most convenient for human habitation. At each of them very little waste material in the form of chips, worked pebbles, or even knife-like flakes, was encountered. On the contrary, the percentage of finished, broken and discarded, or lost artifacts is unusually high. It is also not accidental that the assortment of finished artifacts is remarkably consistent—carefully worked knives predominate, followed by arrowheads, and then by sherds, usually belonging to one vessel only. All this is fully consistent with the idea of a hunting camp with a light, above-ground, tent-like dwelling which lasted for a short time, and, more rarely, several such dwellings belonging to one kin group. This is not contradicted by the presence of fragments of clay vessels, the latter not necessarily connected with a settled way of life. Pots might be carefully preserved during wanderings most probably carried out on foot, with brief stops. Or they may have remained always in one place, in special II2

Tribes of Northern Yakutia storehouses for bulky property, similar to the present-day log storehouse and the labaz* of the reindeer-herding tribes of the tundra. Other sites of the Neolithic period on the lower Lena, the finds from which are numbered not by dozens but by thousands, reinforce the general conclusions that here were involved nomadizing peoples, hunters and fishermen of the Far North. Such are the finds at Bulun, in the vicinity of Khayyrgas, near the abandoned village of the same name, on a high cliff terrace, above the wide expanse of the Lena Valley at the very foot of the desolate Khara-Ulakhskiy Range. These finds are associated with two cliff promontories of an early terrace, falling steeply into the Lena (Fig. 26). On the flat summits of the promontories was found an unexpected number of stone artifacts for the Far North. On one of the summits, with an area of less than twenty square meters, there were more than r t,000 chips and not a single finished object. Even the knife-like flakes, always plentifully represented in even the smallest settlement, numbered only thirteen. Cores were represented by a single example—a blank not yet put to use. Everything else found here represents only scraps remaining from the first working of the stone, several blanks for making scrapers, knives, arrowheads, and also the characteristic striking-pebbles. But even the working of stone in these workshops was confined to a few simple operations. Everything was limited just to the testing of the stone for a definite quality and a preliminary dressing of it; that is, to a rough preparation of the coarse raw material from which in the future anything might be prepared, the dimensions of which would be limited only by the size of the pebble. Thus, the workshops of Khayyrgas were sharply distinguished from those in camps of the usual type, where, having everything necessary at hand, and being settled for a long time, the craftsmen did not roughly prepare the raw material, as at Khayyrgas, but made things in final form. Rough, primary blanks appear relatively rarely in the usual workshops, and when they do, one can, without special difficulty, recognize in them the contours of the object which the ancient craftsman intended to prepare. The ancient craftsmen of Khayyrgas chose the place for their work very fortunately. They worked here in summer, when along the entire lower Lena region winged insects swirled, the air was thick with clouds of blood-sucking mosquitoes and swarms of still fiercer midges. Sitting at the very edge, high above the bank, along which a fresh wind always blows and carries the insects away, the craftsmen could conduct their affairs unhindered, with their faces to the Lena, toward the wind. Besides, the people must have been attracted to the very edge of the cliff's summit by its dryness, the absence of the moss cover eternally damp under northern conditions. The river presented the raw material for their workshop in plenty, by way of the pebble accumulations where one could always find smoothed pebbles of flinty slate—an excellent material for the making of stone tools. On the other hand, the abundance of chips and the crude blanks testify • [Special storehouse of Siberian tribes, raised above ground level on poles. Translator.]

113

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Tribes of Northern Yakutia to the fact that, as a consequence of especially favorable natural conditions and geographical location, this site was visited by wandering hunters more often than others. They first collected on the bank of the Lena the necessary quantity of raw material—the pebbles of the most suitable kinds of stone. Then they roughly worked the collected pebbles, carefully removing the water-smoothed surface and irregularities, making them in this way more convenient for carrying to distant places. Similar preliminary working of stone had a very important meaning in the circumstances of the wandering life of primitive hunters, who could hardly have moved other than on foot, burdened with their wretched belongings. Also, this was a preliminary selection, "refinement," of raw materials on the basis of quality. Then the ancient craftsmen again took up the endless circuitous route of their wandering existence in the forested tundra, taiga, and tundra of the Arctic. (For details see: Okladnikov 1946: 79-1e2, 144-47.) On the basis of their physical aspect and geographic location, the most convenient localities, such as the promontory Obukh-Kestyuryuyungke, and especially Khayyrgas, the area around Bulun, the mouth of the river Chubukulakh, were significant as points where wandering groups of primitive hunters and fishermen most often stopped. It was just here, on the boundary of tundra and forest, on the dry sands at Chokurovka, or on the stone ledges of the ancient high terraces at Khayyrgas, that they set up their light tents (tordokh). After preparing the blanks, once again they went on into the desolate regions of the Arctic. Their movements were closely connected with those of the wild animals, principally with the migrations of herds of wild reindeer. Following the herds, the hunters carried with them in the swampy lowlands and to the icy shores of the Arctic Ocean, where there is no suitable material, the blanks which they had prepared earlier. Archaeological data, testifying to this ancient way of life of the hunting tribes of the forested tundra and tundra of the Far North, supplement ethnographic materials nicely, and show that it was preserved to our time. As early as the first half of the 18th century, Khariton Laptev described in detail the peculiarities in the lives of the hunters of the tundra and forested tundra in the region of the Khatanga River, who, in his words, "are supplied not only with fish (of which, compared to [peoples living on] other rivers, they catch few) but even more with reindeer which they hunt on the river, in autumn, when the reindeer go from the sea to the forested places, and in spring, when because of the mosquitoes they go from the forested places to the sea and Lake Taymyr, to the `clean' tundra places" (Laptev 1851: 39). In his ethnographic sketch rich in valuable facts, Stepanov writes of the Kolyma Yakuts that they live in winter in the forested tundra and in the forest. "In summer, in July and August, they go away to catch birds in the treeless tundra, where the birds lay eggs, hatch chicks, and moult. At this time almost all the animals roam on the tundra (escaping the mosquitoes which are absent on the tundra) : the bears, the wolves, Fig. 26. General view of the workshop site, Khayyrgas.

"5

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

foxes, reindeer, elk and so forth, and to hunt these animals people from almost the entire region gather here, and this [otherwise] dead barren strip of land, covered with lakes and swamps, suddenly becomes alive and populated by both men and every kind of animal. Yet, in this limitless tundra, people, even though they come from almost the entire region, are in their numbers almost unnoticed. The hunting camps are separated one from another by enormous expanses. Most of all, the dogs are in evidence here, always moving and barking, chasing after beasts and game day and night with indefatigable activity (nights here then are light and short).... At the end of July and beginning of August, when the mosquitoes disappear in the wooded places, the animals come back from the tundra southward into the forest, and after them move the people to their [winter] dwellings" (Stepanov 1862; Khitrov 1879: 69-70). The ancient workshops and campsites of the lower Lena, and also the similar Neolithic sites in neighboring regions, for example, on the Khatanga and its right tributary, the Popigay, correspond most closely to the sites of summer hunting camps, where the so-called pokolka* of the Nganasans took place generation after generation. At these places, besides reindeer, fish were also taken. Here the women, children, and old people remained when the men and youths went off to hunt. The preparation of various tools, requiring considerable experience and practical knowledge, was the business of the oldest members of the clan, who were thereby of great benefit to their fellow clansmen. These elders, the keepers of ancient technical traditions and experiences, also clearly concerned themselves with stone-working in the workshops of Khayyrgas and in the vicinity of Bulun. Still more archaic features of daily life are preserved in the traditions about the half-mythical tundra tribes, the Mayats, recorded by B. 0. Dolgikh from the Nganasans [Dolgikh, MSS., 1938-46]. According to these traditions, the Mayats stored dried and smoked reindeer meat in selected places in the fall, distributing the stores in such a way that each was separated by a distance which could be traversed on foot in one day. Then the Mayats nomadized over the tundra all winter from store to store, staying in the warm turf huts until the meat was exhausted; they then moved to the next store and lived in this manner until spring. The tales concerning the disappearance of the Mayats, the death of this half-mythical tundra people, are rather unusual: when the Mayats angered the spirits of the tundra by their irrational ferocity in the extermination of wild reindeer, the spirits punished them with death by starvation. This occurred, according to the legend, in the following manner: the Mayats caught a reindeer and skinned it, releasing it in this condition. When during the following winter they came to a labaz, where the dried meat was kept, the labaz began to move farther and farther away from them, until finally the Mayats lost their strength from fatigue and hunger and died. * [Pokolka, the spearing of wild reindeer from boats, usually at the ford of a river. Editor, A.I.N.A.1

116

Tribes of Northern Yakutia Despite the legend, the Mayats did not disappear without a trace. As Dolgikh has shown, on the basis of preserved archival data, Mayat clans have survived to the present day among the tribes of the Far North. The tale of their death is remarkable in that it reflects, like a mirror, the constant threat of death and the fear of the grim forces of nature on which the fate of the primitive hunters of the tundra and forested tundra depended. Whereas unmounted hunters—probably the ancestors of the Nganasans and the half-mythical Mayats—must have lived on the lower Lena, and to the west of it as far as the Taymyr Peninsula, to the east lived other, although closely related, tribes, apparently the ancestors of the Yukagirs and, in part, of the Paleo-Asiatic tribes which later adopted reindeer herding. It is, therefore, evident that the culture of lake fishermen of the North, and of their wandering fellow tribesmen of the tundra, was not limited in its distribution to the lower Lena only. The wide scope of the migrations of unmounted Neolithic fishermen and hunters is shown by the remains of an ancient settlement found in 1950 on one of the islands in the delta of the Indigirka. On a bare sandy place on the bank of one of the tundra lakes, Tatyanin Lake, where, even today, the reindeer herdsmen always stop with their herds, not far from the bank of the last [westernmost] or Kolyma channel of the Indigirka, there were found traces of an ancient hearth in which ashes and coals were preserved. Around the hearth were found fragments of a round-bottomed clay vessel, covered with a pseudo-reticulated imprint in the form of a small-celled rhomboidal network. There were also flint chips, a fragment of a spearpoint, a scraper, and a large quantity of worked bones. Among the bone objects there was a spearpoint of mammoth ivory with flint side-blades, a spearpoint of walrus ivory, a javelin point, and a dagger made from the shinbone of a reindeer. Judging from the animal bones found with the stone artifacts, the inhabitants of this settlement in the Indigirka delta lived by hunting not only reindeer and bear, but also sea-mammals. In the valley of the Kolyma, there are a number of sites reminiscent, in their character and in the finds made in them, of the Neolithic sites of the lower Lena. In a locality near the village of Pomazkino there were found stone artifacts very close in appearance to those found in the lower stratum of the kyrdal on Lake Uolba; they included a fragment of a distinctive arrowhead of large dimensions. In turn, here, and in a number of other places (Kresty Kolymskiye, Petushki, Labuya), were found various objects analogous to those characteristic of the upper stratum of the Uolba kyrdal and other sites on the lower Lena contemporaneous with it. These were small arrowheads with hafts, miniature points on flakes, multihedral core gravers, and sherds with checkered pseudo-textile ornamentation. The only difference between the materials of these sites and of those of the lower Lena consists in the abundance of artifacts of a semi-transparent obsidian, an indispensible material for the manufacture of cutting instruments and weapons where an extremely fine cutting edge was required. But even this difference depended entirely on the I17

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

presence of the local raw material widely distributed in the Kolyma ranges, rich in volcanic glass, and not on any basic peculiarities of the culture. In everything else the similarity between the finds of the lower Kolyma and lower Lena, separated from each other by a distance of a thousand kilometers, is striking. It shows convincingly that during the Neolithic there existed between the Arctic Circle and the shore of the Arctic Ocean a basically unified sub-Arctic Neolithic culture of northeastern Asia, and that tribes related to each other by culture lived there. Relics of a Neolithic culture have lately been found still farther east in the central part of the Chukchi Peninsula. There, in the basin of the Amguema River, on the Yakitikiveyem River, typically Neolithic prismatic cores have been found, and also bilaterally retouched arrowheads (Fig. 27). The finds on the Yakitikiveyem River are distinguished as the

Fig. 27. General view of the site of a Neolithic settlement on the Amguema River. oldest known relics of human activity in the depths of the Chukchi Peninsula, antedating, to judge by their aspect, the spread along the shores of the Chukchi Peninsula of the villages of sedentary hunters of sea-mammals. The most ancient of these probably do not antedate the 5th century a.c. and are the first proof of settlement of the depths of the Chukchi Peninsula by man, the basis of whose life must have been hunting wild reindeer in the interior and fishing in the streams and lakes of the tundra. This man must have led a wandering life in his pursuit of the herds. He knew how to make, by a pressure flaking technique, core knives excellent for that period, and bilaterally worked arrowheads finished with a fine "creeping" retouch (Fig. 28). He consequently stood, in point of Fig. 28. Stone artifacts from the Neolithic campsite on the Amguema River and from the Kolyma River. I—core; 2—arrowhead; 3, 4—flakes; 5—blank; 6—stone adze from the Kolyma River. I18

I

3

..101111101,

5 6

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

culture, on the level of the Neolithic or the Early Bronze Age, on the scale of neighboring Yakutia or the Amur District (Levoshin 195o; Okladnikov 195ob). Unfortunately, finds on the Yakitikiveyem River, despite their considerable value, are quantitatively so limited that by themselves they can tell us nothing more. In order to form a clearer generalized picture of the life of these ancient inhabitants of the northeast, one must turn to the Yukagir traditions which portray the life of their distant ancestors long before the arrival of the Russians. The Yukagirs retain in poetic form a memory of that distant time when the Yukagir campfires were "as many as the stars in the sky on a bright night," and when the Northern Lights were only the reflection of their light in the heavens, and when the birds flying overhead disappeared in the smoke of their fires. At that time, according to the traditions gathered by V. I. Yokhelson [Jochelson], their ancestors had only stone and bone tools [Jochelson 1933]. They did not yet know any domestic animals other than dogs, and lived exclusively by hunting and fishing, taking fish only in the summer, in seines made of creeping willow. All winter, for nine months, they lived on the meat of animals which the men had slaughtered, and on plant foods gathered by the women. The Yukagir tribes in the northern taiga and wooded tundra lived chiefly by hunting elk. The herds of wild reindeer were of extreme importance in the life of the population of the tundra. Twice a year the reindeer make lengthy migrations. At the end of May they leave the forest and go northward into the tundra in search of better feed. In August and September they again leave the coastal tundra and go back to the forest. This is the period of the most profitable and successful hunting, which takes advantage of the moment when the reindeer cross the rivers in herds of many thousands. Such a reindeer hunt was seen and vividly described in the mid-19th century by the well-known traveller Matyushkin: For crossing, the reindeer usually go down to the river along the bed of a dried-up or shallow stream, choosing a place where the opposite bank slopes. At first the whole herd presses itself together into a dense group. Being sure of safety, the front reindeer leap into the water, and after them the whole herd, and for some minutes, the entire surface of the river is covered with swimming reindeer. The hunters then throw themselves upon them, having been hidden in their boats behind stones and bushes, and usually downwind from the reindeer; they surround them and attempt to hold them. Meanwhile, two or three experienced hunters, armed with long spears and clubs, break into the herd and with incredible speed dispatch the swimming reindeer. An experienced hunter kills a hundred and more reindeer in less than a half hour. Other hunters seize the slain reindeer and attach them with thongs to the boats (Vrangel 1948 edition: 22I).

The basis of the social life of the ancient Yukagirs was the matriclan, I20

Tribes of Northern Yakutia traces of which were retained among them until the end of the 19th century. The first place in the clan belonged to the shaman (alma), and to the best, tireless hunter, the khangicha, who slaughtered the most animals. In the spring the tundra tribes came together for the spring tribal festival and games, where they passed the time in song, dancing, plays, and contests. The alma shamanized and sacrificed to the spirits. The warriors told of their military and hunting exploits, and the young people occupied themselves with their love affairs. To get to the meeting places the Yukagirs built rafts on which they floated to the mouths of rivers, where the tribal gatherings took place. Yet the hunt was not always successful. The hunters lost their strength, the starving clans did not come down their streams, people fell sick and died, and mothers killed their children. Terrible times came to the tundra... . Lost at the edge of the world, and isolated for millennia from the progressive regions of Asia, the tundra tribes exhausted their strength in a desperate struggle for life. They were oppressed by the fierce Arctic environment. Later, to this elemental oppression there was added the unbearable exploitation of the destitute and dying tundra dwellers by the traders who represented the oppressive policy of czarism. It is therefore not surprising that not only in the distant past, but even some fifty years ago, there were retained living traces of a Stone Age culture. Investigators of the 19th century could find here a true stone and bone age and could observe the remnants of most ancient beliefs and of a matriarchal system.

I2I

The Connections of the Neolithic Tribes of Yakutia with the West and the East

Chapter 4

For all the indubitable peculiarities in their culture, the Neolithic tribes of Yakutia were of course not isolated from other Siberian tribes who created their own cultures, and particularly not from their closest neighbors. The ties of the tribes of the middle Lena, and, in part, of the upper Lena, are already traceable to the distant period when the first Paleolithic settlements appeared on the Lena. Their inhabitants used similar tools and led the same life. These ties continue in the subsequent periods, and testify to a definite initial similarity of the historical development of the population of the Lena region, to the identical direction of its cultural development, and, obviously, to the continuing ties of the population of the southern and northern divisions of this territory. Down the Lena, from Kachug to Olekminsk, the character of the Neolithic finds changes gradually, and at first glance imperceptibly, and, at the same time, much remains in common between the Neolithic of the Baykal region on the one hand, and the North, on the other. From Ust-Kut in the south, [downriver] to Vitim, there is a transitional zone on the archaeological map where cultural indices characteristic of the Baykal Neolithic are mixed with individual elements of material culture of the Neolithic tribes of Yakutia. But even far to the north of Vitim, where traits characteristic of the Yakut Neolithic prevail, we constantly discover certain features connecting Yakutia with the Baykal region. In the burial ground at Verkholensk [immediately west of Lake Baykal], so remarkable for the richness and variety of finds, large polished adzes of dark gray flinty slate, typically Arctic in aspect, were found among the early Serovo artifacts; these adzes are distinguished by indented, shouldered, butts, and have not yet been found to the south of the headwaters of the Podkammenaya Tunguska and the Vilyuy. As far as Zhigansk, at Lake Syalaakh, and probably still farther north along the Lena, one finds pottery typical of the Baykal region, represented by vessels of very simple form, with pointed bottoms, and covered on the outside with impressions of a small-meshed net made from a fibrous plant. On the middle Lena, not only the general form of these vessels and the treatment of the surface with net impressions, but also the 123

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

method of manufacture, are repeated. There is also the minor but persistent characteristic of this very old Baykal pottery in the horizontal band of a number of round indentations [punctates] at the very rim of the vessel. The presence of this detail cannot be explained otherwise than by its diffusion from one and the same region, the Cis-Baykal. It proves its early appearance in the North and is found also in the campsites which date to the developed Yakut Neolithic, for example, in the upper (Neolithic) stratum of the settlement on the Kullaty-yuryakh [River] in the Khakhsyk nasleg of Ordzhonikidze rayon in the Yakut A.S.S.R.* With this pottery, we can trace in Yakutia other types of stone artifacts, pottery, and household equipment which usually accompany it in the Baykal territory. These include arrowheads with barbs of unequal length, decorations in the form of short transverse grooves or notches on bone objects, stone "axes" or, more accurately, hoe-like tools with lobes, common in Yakut campsites and distributed as far as the Chukchi Peninsula to the east. The character of the settlements and the construction of the dwellings, to judge by the results of studies of such settlements as Malaya [Little] Munku, also reveal considerable similarity with those of the Cis-Baykal. In this regard, the Neolithic of the middle and lower Lena, as well as that of the Cis-Baykal, is sharply distinguished from the Neolithic of the [Soviet] Far East, the Maritime District, and the Amur Valley, where dwellings of a different type prevail. These are in the form of sturdy, semi-subterranean structures with the foundations deep in the ground, covered by a dome-like roof with an opening which served at once as a chimney and as an entranceway. The Neolithic pottery of the Amur tribes is striking in its peculiarities, and differs basically from that of Yakutia and the Baykal region. On the Amur, the bottoms of vessels are flat, the ornament not sparse and geometric but rich, imaginative, and curvilinear. Here, pottery was apparently introduced on a different basis and had as its prototype not the travelling net or basket with a pointed bottom, characteristic of [those of] the wandering hunters and gatherers, but the high cylindrical woven storage basket with flat bottom, similar to those made by the settled fishermen on the islands of the South Seas at the present. We may therefore assert with confidence that the Neolithic tribes of Yakutia not only were in constant contact with the tribes of the Cis-Baykal, but also had a common origin with them. There is nothing surprising in this if we recall the common Upper Paleolithic culture out of which both these Neolithic cultures grew and the fact that they were always connected by one and the same natural route leading from south to north, thus facilitating the intercommunications among the tribes of the Lena Valley. Nevertheless, even a cursory acquaintance with the Neolithic of Yakutia reveals features which indicate connections not only with the Cis-Baykal ' [The site of Kullaty is located some 3o km south of Yakutsk. For a detailed description of it in English see H. N. Michael, "The Neolithic Age in Eastern Siberia," Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, n.s., v. 48, part 2, 1958, Editor, A.I.N.A.I ~~4

Connections of Yakut Tribes with the West and East but also with the Far East, northeastern Asia, and possibly even North America. As we have already noted, the presence of remains of horned cattle at the campsite of Malaya Munku may be explained by ancient ties with the tribes of the Trans-Baykal, Manchuria and Mongolia. Completely unexpected was the find, in 1952, of a massive shouldered adze typical of the Verkholensk burial ground in central Yakutia, in the upper part of the Amur Basin, on the river Shilka, in a cave near the village of Shilkinskiy Zavod. This adze was found together with the bones of a man and a large quantity of stone and bone tools analogous to the Neolithic artifacts of Eastern Siberia.* It reproduces the adzes of the Lena region not only in form, but also in material, which is the same dark gray, almost black, flinty slate. These connections are still more clearly expressed in the pottery. Even many of its minor characteristics—for example, the wide use of ornamental fillets imitating twisted string, the pattern of vertical zigzags grooved with the short teeth of a comb, and several varieties of incised linear patterns, bring the pottery of the middle Lena Neolithic close to that of the Amur Neolithic. Even greater clarity is manifested in such a characteristic and widely distributed feature of the ceramics of the middle and lower Lena as the custom of covering them solidly with checkerboard impressions. This technique of treating the surface of vessels apparently originated initially in China among the first agriculturalists of the Far East. Here it appears with the polychrome painted pottery of the Yang-shao culture and then can be traced in other countries of the Far East adjacent to China. The same impressions on vessels are widely distributed at the end of the Neolithic on the Amur, following a more ancient pottery decorated with spirals and variations of a complex geometrical pattern. From the Amur, the pseudo-textile decoration passes to the northern neighbors of the Amur tribes, including the tribes of Yakutia, who were living under the conditions of a terminal Stone Age, and had only just begun in some places to use bronze. Tracing the further diffusion of this type of pottery, we find pseudo-textile pottery, of the type present at Malaya Munku or the Uolba settlements, in other places on the lower Lena and at the very northeastern corner of the Asiatic continent. Here, it is found in excavations of ancient Eskimo settlements of the Bering Sea phase. Such pottery was also found on St. Lawrence Island and is known from Eskimo settlements on Norton Sound and Nunivak Island. Unlike the ancient Chinese pottery, where similar impressions cover flat-bottomed vessels, on the Chukchi Peninsula, these vessels, as in Yakutia, have rounded bottoms (Rudenko 1947: 93t) . The Neolithic • [For a detailed description of these finds in English see H. N. Michael, ed.: The Archaeology and Geomorphology of Northeastern Asia: Selected Works. Anthropology of the North, Translations from Russian Sources, no. 5, 1964, pp. 112-80. Editor, A.I.N.A.] '} [Rudenko's work has been translated into English as "The Ancient Culture of the Bering Sea and the Eskimo Problem," Anthropology of the North: Translations from Russian Sources, no. T. University of Toronto Press, 1961. Editor, A.1.N.A.]

125

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

pottery of Yakutia resembles the ancient Eskimo pottery also in other features, for example, the addition to the clay of hair and vegetable fibers. According to the report of Vladimir Atlasov, such a clay mixture was used at the end of the 17th century by the inhabitants of Kamchatka: "But they say that many sables have no tails because they, the Kamchadals, cut the tails from the sables and mix them with clay and make pots in order to bind the clay with the hair" (Alkor 1935: 28). The Eskimos in the 19th century did the same. The ancient Eskimo culture of the Chukchi Peninsula was a segment of a general Eskimo culture distributed on both sides of the Bering Strait and in Alaska, where it was in contact with the numerous ancient cultures of the American continent—primarily the cultures of the Northwestern Indians and the forest-dwelling Indians. It is not surprising that here we also find round-bottomed vessels which in many respects approach those found in Yakutia. Thus, we have before us new evidence of cultural ties of this region with North America, at least two or three millennia before the annexation of Siberia to the Russian state and the appearance of Europeans in the New World. In the light of these connections, the Neolithic tribes of Yakutia show closeness to the peoples of America in a number of cultural indices and, at the same time, [act as] intermediaries between the northern parts of the New and Old Worlds. This should be especially emphasized, because even our Soviet historical literature does not always pay due attention to America in antiquity, a continent which had its profoundly unique cultures and separate historical path interrupted by the invasion of European conquerors. These ancient cultures of "redskin" America were mercilessly plundered and trampled on by the conquistadores, Cortez and Pizarro. The population of America was barbarously deprived of land and freedom, enslaved, driven into reservations, and, finally, physically exterminated by the colonizers. The conquerors destroyed the marvellous monumental structures and the cities, the literature, and art of the conquered peoples of Central America, liquidated the distinctive cultures of the agriculturalists and gatherers of North America, and placed an iron heel on the throat of the savage but freedom-loving dwellers in the Far North. The majority of these tribes left only a few names and designations and the remarkable folk tales and legends which inspired Longfellow to compose one of the best poetic works of his country, the "Song of Hiawatha." It is even more interesting for us to know that this bygone country of the Maya, Aztecs, Algonkians, the Indians of the Northwest, the Eskimos, and hundreds of other tribes, was from ancient times connected by old and deep ties to the Far North of Asia, and that its first inhabitants came in the distant past from Siberia across the Bering Strait, and that, even in later Neolithic times, they had not lost touch with the tribes of their original homeland and were subject to numerous influences from them. From what has been said above it follows that, being a complex and 126

Connections of Yakut Tribes with the West and East distinctive whole, the Neolithic culture of Yakutia occupied a special place in world cultural history of the Stone Age as an intermediary between the oldest cultures of the Old and New Worlds. Additionally, it is here, in the northeast of Asia, that we should seek the source of many phenomena characteristic of early American cultures; it is from here that various progressive influences, inventions, and discoveries came, as a result of which the originally related cultures of these tribes drew closer and became more similar and akin. From here, across Bering Strait, new settlers must have gone into America, carrying with them new technical discoveries and inventions. That this was in fact the case is shown by the history of the Eskimos, who, investigators believe, were first formed ethnically on the mainland of Asia within the limits of its northeastern portion, and then went to America, occupying its northern shores almost to Labrador, and finally coming to the coast of Greenland. We cannot therefore help dwelling on certain other facets which place the old problem of the relationships between the ancient tribes of the west and east in a new light. There are data which indicate that the influence and connections of the Neolithic cultures of northeastern Asia extended not only eastward across Bering Strait, but also far to the west along the shores of the Arctic Ocean and even to the northern Baltic. A study of the Neolithic sites on the lower Lena brings us to the conclusion that there is a significant coincidence between the cultures of the local tribes and of the ancient population of Karelia, or in general of the north of western Europe, which is especially clearly expressed in the burial ritual of the eastern Baltic (Okladnikov 1946: 137). This similarity is not limited to the burial ritual alone, but includes all the religious concepts. If the figure of the elk occupied a primary place in the beliefs of the forest tribes of Yakutia and eastern Siberia, the same relation to the elk may be presumed also for the inhabitants of Oleniy ostrov [Deer Island], who buried their chiefs and shamans with marks of their rank, with excellent sculptured images of elks, or, like their Siberian contemporaries, incised the figures of elks on cliffs (Ravdonikas 1936-38; Bryusov 1940: 93, 118, 119; Linevskiy 1940: 35; 1949). The oldest stone arrowheads from the Neolithic sites and burials of Yakutia, which find no analogues in the Neolithic sites of the Cis-Baykal or the Amur Valley, show nevertheless a striking similarity to the arrowheads of northern Europe (Fig. 29). Such, in principle, are the arrowheads from the burial on Yuzhnyy Oleniy ostrov [South Deer Island] in Lake Onega. To the same class belong the arrowheads from the passage graves of Scandinavia and adjacent regions, where the "leading forms" are flaked arrowheads of archaic form—tanged, and with partial retouch. Stone arrowheads of another type, found in the north of Yakutia in the form of large points, triangular in cross-section, retouched all over and of the appearance of three-sided files, are also known in Scandinavia, where they were widely distributed after the period of "passage graves," during the era of single burials in slab-lined pits, about 1500 s.c. It is therefore of added interest that skeletons from Neolithic burials on Yuzhnyy Oleniy ostrov in Karelia have, along with Europoid physical features, pronounced 127

PIMA-NOYM

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Connections of Yakut Tribes with the West and East Mongoloid ones; that is, in the final analysis, Siberian (Okladnikov 1946: 137; Zhirov 1940; Debets 1941: 18). The above is confirmed by materials from other Neolithic burials in the European part of the Soviet Union. Mongoloid features in the population of the Baltic region could appear so far to the west only as a result of diffusion of Mongoloid tribes from the east, from Western Siberia. The penetration of representatives of Siberian Neolithic tribes to Karelia and northern Europe is not, therefore, as surprising as it might appear at first glance if we keep in mind that the beginning of this process goes back to a yet more remote Upper Paleolithic period. The penetration to the west of individual groups of the ancient population of interior Asia, which had begun at the end of the Paleolithic, therefore did not cease in later times, but, indeed, became stronger during the Neolithic, and took on more definite forms. While one of the routes over which these exchanges took place was the southern one, along the border of forest and steppe, the parallel northern path, proceeding along the border of two other major vegetational zones, the taiga and the tundra, was of no lesser and perhaps even of greater importance. That part of the Neolithic population of the lower Lena which brought stone and bone tools and other elements of its culture to the north of European Russia and Scandinavia may have reached these territories by following the herds of wild reindeer as they moved along the wooded tundra and tundra of northern Asia. The diverse archaeological sites, campsites, workshops, burials, and cliff drawings show that the people of Neolithic times, the closest descendants of the Paleolithic hunters who had penetrated into Yakutia at the end of the glacial age, in time had occupied the vast reaches of the northern taiga, the wooded tundra, and in part the tundra, which had, so to speak, formed before their eyes. This occupation became possible primarily because of important technical advances—the diffusion of the bow and arrow, the appearance of polished tools, pottery, and a multitude of other minor inventions. Actively adapting themselves to the variegated natural conditions of the vast area, they formed two distinctive, original cultures which testify to the existence of two related but autonomous ethnic groups in the local population. The first of these, the southern group, developed faster and more effectively. At least at Olekminsk, it had learned from its eastern neighbors to keep horned livestock, and thus had passed in part from a primitive extractive economy to a productive one. At the same time, the realistic art of the cliff drawings blossoms here, manifesting the rather complex intellectual Fig. 29. Stone artifacts from Uolba compared with Karelian and Scandinavian artifacts. r to 9–stone arrowheads; r, 3, 7, 9–from Uolba; 2, 4, 6, 8–from Scandinavia; 5–from Karelia, Oleniy ostrov; ro–stone striker from Khayyrgas; rr–striker from Scandinavia; i2–stone knife from Uolba; 13–stone knife from Scandinavia. 129

THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

culture of these tribes of northern Asia and their rich mythology; manifesting, in fact, the beginnings of a kind of primitive natural philosophy. On the second group fell the major burden of the struggle with the Arctic climate and all the difficulties of settling the wild expanses of the Far North. But it nevertheless solved these problems satisfactorily, and fully completed the colonization of the North on a hunting and fishing basis, begun by its Paleolithic ancestors, reaching almost to the Arctic Ocean in the north and to the Kolyma River, and perhaps even beyond it, in the east. Because of the especially severe conditions of the northern territory, this part of the Neolithic population could carry on only hunting, gathering, and fishing. For the rest, its culture did not in any respect lag behind that of the southern group, as is strikingly shown by the easternmost traces of its diffusion. The arrowheads and other obsidian objects from the lower Kolyma, made with the care of a jeweller, might serve as outstanding pieces for the best collections of the middle Lena. The Neolithic inhabitants of the Kolyma at this time were as skillful in polishing and cutting stone, in making strong clay vessels and many other things, as were their southern brethren at Olekminsk or Yakutsk. Also, there is no reason to deny them the presence of the same type of culture as existed among their neighbors living between present-day Vitim and Yakutsk. The differentiating point is that northern sites, equivalent to the cliff drawings in the south, either have not yet been found (although we have heard of some) or have not been preserved for us because they were made of wood or other perishable materials.

130

PART II THE TRIBES OF YAKUTIA IN THE AGE OF METAL

SECTION ONE THE TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

The Discovery of Bronze

Chapter

1

In the past of the forest tribes of Yakutia, before their entry into the Iron Age, lay a long, and, in its own way, eventful history. True, the events in their history which are known to us are reflected for the most part in the gradual changes of material culture, in a transition from crude stone tools to metal ones, from the technology of the Stone Age to metallurgy and a kind of "artistic industry" of the Bronze Age, and, finally, in a very slow maturing of new forms of social structure and culture. But it would be unjustifiable to underestimate the historical importance of such events. We know what high significance the founders of MarxismLeninism attributed to mankind's successes in the development of the productive forces. We also know how important, from a Marxist-Leninist point of view, is the history of the people themselves—their achievements and labor, and their struggle for a better life—compared with the history of individual rulers, commanders or conquerors. It is therefore entirely natural and appropriate to pay special attention to such an important event in the economic life of the northern tribes as the transition from stone to metal. The appearance of metals, copper and bronze, in the main cultural centers of the Old World, was of immense importance in the life of humanity, and not only from a purely technological point of view. It encouraged the further development of trade, economic, and also cultural ties between various parts of the world—metals are not found everywhere —and it was especially tin which often was brought over hundreds or even thousands of kilometers from distant countries. With the occurrence of this, peoples who acquired metals sooner than others rose high above others who remained in the Stone Age. When did the tribes of the North enter into the number of these peoples? Did they in fact become one of the progressive peoples of the world who laid the foundation for the primary processing of metal and thereby blazed new paths in the development of technology and in all of human culture, or did history in the Bronze Age bypass these bleak northern countries bound by the permafrost? This question long ago enticed those who were interested in the history 133

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

of the northern Old World in general and of Yakutia in particular. It arose even at the time when Russian archaeology had only just begun to develop as an independent discipline. It had been known long ago that copper and bronze objects of unique and often beautiful form were found in the north. These included swords, knives, axes, and spearheads, very similar to Bronze Age objects of indubitable antiquity from other countries. Such objects have been found on the upper Lena at Kachug and Kirensk, on the middle Lena at the village of Macha near Olekminsk, at the mouth of the Markha River, where it joins the Lena downstream from Olekminsk, in the basin of the Vitim, on the Aldan and the Vilyuy, and even in the far northeast, in the basin of the Kolyma on the shores of the Arctic Ocean (Map 3). Because of their unusual form, they attracted the attention both of the local indigenous peoples, who often surrounded these objects with religious worship, attempting to explain their origin by various legends and traditions, and of a few scientists who visited these parts, so remote from the main cultural centers of Russia at that time. The majority of investigators came to the conclusion that just before the arrival of the Yakuts on the middle Lena and in the regions adjacent to it, metal objects made in other countries penetrated from time to time only as exceptions; actual production of metal was absent, and Stone Age technology prevailed everywhere. However, more recent archaeological investigations on the Angara and the banks of Lake Baykal have shown that a special Bronze Age culture was very widely distributed in the taiga regions of eastern Siberia, and had passed through a long period of development. In the first half of the second millennium B.c., during the Glazkovo period, copper first came into use on the Angara and middle Lena, and, after it, bronze. After the Glazkovo phase of the local Bronze Age follows a second, the Shivera, synchronous with the Late Andronovo and Karasuk west of the Yenisey. By the first millennium s.c. there was in the AngaraLena taiga, in the Cis-Baykal area, a little-studied but distinct local culture of the "developed Bronze Age," one of whose major indices is the roundbottomed clay vessel with a characteristic pattern of applique ridges. Today we know that at this time there existed a special Bronze Age culture to the north of Lake Baykal, in Yakutia, which extended to the shores of the Arctic Ocean. We also have learned that this Bronze Age culture traversed a rather long path of development. Let us begin with the earliest sites of this culture, which resemble the Glazkovo sites of the Cis-Baykal, and may be close to them in time. The first find which indisputably documented the presence of a Bronze Age culture in the very heart of Yakutia, near Yakutsk, was a burial, found in 1940 in the village of Pokrovskoye, the center of Ordzhonikidze rayon. With the remains of a skeleton found here, there were positioned various stone and bone objects, including a stone scraper, flakes, and an awl near the skull. At the skeleton's left shoulder were fragments of a composite Map 3. Bronze Age finds in Yakutia. 134

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ALDAN

ö BRONZE VESSEL

1 BURIAL FOUNDRY I CELT f SPEAR POINT i SWORD ‘\ \\ ORE DEPOSITS

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TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

knife with bilateral side blades. By its right elbow was a heap of bone and stone arrowheads, originally probably in a quiver. Besides these arrowheads, there were charred fragments of wooden arrowheads and shafts, distinguished by their relative fineness: the shafts were no thicker than a pencil. The remains of similar burials are known from other places in Yakutia. One, not far from Pokrovskoye, was located near the road to Yakutsk, at the mouth of the Kullaty-yuryakh [River]. It was found on a rather high ledge of the southern promontory of an ancient terrace, at a point where the river joins the Lena. The burial had been disturbed due to slippage of the friable clayey sandstone strata of the terrace. Nevertheless, a significant part of the skeleton was found in situ—almost the entire left side, including the vertebrae and the thoracic cage. To judge by the position of the bones, the dead man lay on his back, with his head pointed westward. With him were preserved composite arrowheads in the form of bone rods split at both ends, with inserted retouched stone points of very precise and skillful workmanship; there was also a bone point of a special type, in the form of a long cylindrical rod with a broadened blunt point and a split base. There were also fragments of a bone representation of a man, and of a handle of a bone dagger, covered with ornamentation. A third burial was found near the village of Khatyn-tumul on the left bank of the Lena; a fourth burial of this type on the middle Lena was found in 1890 by M. Ovchinnikov. In 1942, during archaeological investigations on the lower Lena, burials of this type were again discovered, this time far to the north of all the others, beyond the Arctic Circle. One of them was found at the mouth of the small river Ichchileekh, which is a left tributary to the Lena, one kilometer upstream from the village of Govorovo. Here, with the remains of two skeletons, there was preserved a needle case of antler, of exceptional dimensions and ornamentation, holding two bone needles and a small blade of transparent chalcedony, an ornamented rectangular small plate of antler, and a large number of perforated mother-of-pearl discs (Fig. 30).

1

3

Fig. 3o. Bronze Age ornaments. 1-ornamented plate of antler, Ichchileekh; z-ornamented antler plate from campsite in Yakutsk, at the shooting range; 3-bronze pendant or button from the Bronze Age layer of the cliff Suruktaakh-khaya. 136

The Discovery of Bronze The skeletons from Ichchileekh had not been charred, but, like the others, were accompanied by small bits of charcoal. Another lower Lena burial, found on the right bank of the river, downstream from Zhigansk, near the mouth of the river Bugachan, was one of the richest and most interesting burials of this type (Fig. 31).

Fig. 31. Bronze Age burial on Bugachan River.

The deceased was dressed in fur clothing, which, to judge by the remnants preserved, was sewn with sinew threads and made from skins of small furry animals, probably squirrels. Arrows with composite points of bone with stone blades lay to the left, in a quiver. Next to the pelvis lay a large stone knife of triangular shape, which had been placed in the right hand, and a needle case. The latter may have hung from the clothing or been placed in a special bag. To one side lay two knife-like blades. All these burials are sharply differentiated from the more ancient Neolithic ones by the absence of ochre in them, and by another general 137

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

feature which is always present: the graves contain remnants of fire, made directly in them or somewhere in the vicinity of the burial pits, in which case only broken charcoal is thrown into them. While it is true that, as previously, we find in these graves various artifacts of bone and stone so numerous and so well made that the first impression of them might lead to the conclusion that they date to the Neolithic, this impression is deceptive. In the Pokrovskoye burial, besides stone and bone objects, there was a solitary but highly characteristic metal artifact: a small tetrahedral point of copper or bronze, a kind of massive awl. In the burial on the river Ichchileekh, there was found a thin copper disc, evidently a decoration. In the burial on the river Bugachan, several small copper discs were found, apparently decorations for clothing, and a bone needle case with a copper needle among twisted lengths of wellpreserved sinew threads. Thus, the people who had buried their dead in this manner had used stone and bone tools profusely, having mastered the art of fine pressure flaking. But they were also well acquainted with metal, and had used in everyday life several metal objects. True, these were still very scarce and small in number—their weight may be expressed in grams. Yet, this was an altogether new, marvellous material, previously unknown on the middle Lena, testifying to the transition from the Stone Age to a new epoch—the age of metal. The insignificant size and weight of these objects point them out as indisputably primitive, very ancient types similar to those usual in the oldest sites of the Bronze Age in other regions. These are needles, awls, and the simplest decorations, earlier than the larger and more complex artifacts of the later stages of the Bronze Age—axes, daggers, spearpoints, and sizable decorations. The constant occurrence of these objects with stone, their small dimensions, and their archaic forms—all this testifies to the fact that with their appearance on the middle and lower Lena, and also in the neighboring western and eastern regions of Yakutia, the local population had become acquainted with metal for the first time. It should be noted that in the graves of the Glazkovo stage, in the Cis-Baykal proper, there occurs the same linking of stone and bone objects with the simplest type of copper and bronze objects, including needles and decorated flat pieces. The bone, dagger-like object from the Bugachan burial, which is covered with fine incised markings, is in form very similar to the large, although unornamented, dagger-like objects from the inventory of Glazkovo graves on the Angara, Selenga, and upper Lena rivers. Fragments of a bone dagger from a burial at Kullaty, but decorated with a rich, incised pattern, are of the same kind (Fig. 32). The ornamentation of these daggers consists of fine and narrow but deeply incised straight lines, surprising in their exactness in spite of their considerable length. The character of these lines is such that they could hardly have been executed with some crude tool with a thick blade, for instance a stone knife, or even a burin. Here one needs a fine and straight-cutting blade of metal, which can penetrate deep into the bone without broadening the upper edges of the groove. The ornamentation of the bone needle 138

The Discovery of Bronze

Fig. 32. i —small idol; a—fragment of a dagger from a Bronze Age burial at Kullaty River.

cases, and of several other objects, among them the composite, grooved handles for metal knife blades found on the upper Lena, in the valley of the Angara at Irkutsk, and in the lower reaches of the Selenga, possess these features. A still clearer example of the similarity of the early Bronze Age cultures of the middle Lena and the Glazkovo of the Cis-Baykal are figurines of people, made of bone. Such figurines, carved from flat pieces of mammoth ivory, were found on the Angara both in the burial grounds of the Glazkovo period at Ust-Uda and at Bratskiy Kamen, and also on the upper Lena at Staryy Kachug (Fig. 33). The head of one such figurine was found also at the road leading from the Cis-Baykal to Yakutia in the Late Neolithic burial ground on the right promontory of the river Ilga, where it joins the Lena. In Yakutia, a remarkable specimen of such a figurine turned up on the middle Lena, in a burial on the river Kullaty; the figure was an almost exact replica of one of the Glazkovo period from Bratsk on the Angara. 139

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The Discovery of Bronze During the Glazkovo of the Cis-Baykal, there are found bone arrowheads similar to the Lena ones, that is, split at the base for fastening to a shaft, and also stone ones with straight bases, similar to those found at Bugachan (Fig. 34). They are indicative of the first spread of metal on the upper and lower Lena. The mother-of-pearl perforated flat discs found at Ichchileekh, and at the sacrificial place of Suruktaakh-khaya on the Markha River, are in no way distinguishable from the more widely distributed decorations for clothing on the Angara, Selenga, and upper Lena. The same type of small, white discs, but made of stone (pyrophyllite), was one of the distinguishing features of the material complex of the Glazkovo burials in the Cis-Baykal. The noted coincidences have analytical significance in determining the cultural and historical position and development of this entire group of ancient sites in Yakutia. They definitely show that the burials at Ichchileekh, Bugachan, Olekminsk, Pokrovskoye, and Khatyng-tumul are, in any case, very near in time to the burials of the Glazkovo type. The latter date basically to the middle of the second millennium B.c. Like many Glazkovo ones, the ancient Yakutian burials mentioned above should be dated to the second half of the second millennium B.c.; that is, they are not less than 3,000 years old. On the basis of traditional views, such an early origin of metal, not only in the southern regions of Yakutia but also farther to the north, far beyond the Arctic Circle (as the finds at Govorovo village bear witness to), could not be conceived. Of course, it is to be understood that the first spread of metal, the simple acquaintance with it, does not mean its local working or the acquisition of it from local ores. The latter is usually considered the basic feature in the establishment of a true Bronze Age culture; that is, when people become acquainted with all the properties of the new material and have completely mastered the technique of working it. The finds made in 1943, still farther north of the river Ichchileekh and Govorovo village, closer to the Arctic Ocean, at the old Cossack village of Sikteekh [Siktyakh] on the lower reaches of the Lena, have decisive significance for clarifying this most important question of the beginning phase of the Bronze Age in Yakutia. Here traces of the presence of man are concentrated at two points near small streams on the far and near (in relation to present-day Sikteekh) promontories. The most plentiful and interesting finds were made on the nearer promontory, where there was found an unexpectedly thick and, for the North, unusually rich stratum of cultural deposits, divided into a number of different layers. The finds in the lowest cultural layer gave a very clear Fig. 33. Anthropomorphic figurines. r—from a burial of the Early Bronze Age on the river Kullaty; 2—from a Glazkovo period burial in the Bratskiy Kamen burial ground on the Angara River; 3—from a Glazkovo burial on the Angara River at Ust-Uda; 4—from a burial of the Early Bronze Age on the Lena River at Ust-Ilga. 141

The Discovery of Bronze idea of the stone inventory used in that distant time by the inhabitants of the settlement. All tools were made primarily of black flinty slate, more rarely of a whitish, siliceous flint. The finished stone artifacts, or fragments of them, found in the lower layer are few but typical. They are cores, core gravers, scrapers, arrowheads, one large knife, and one point blade (Fig. 35). Pottery was represented by smooth-walled sherds, the external surfaces of which were covered with impressions of a large-meshed, pseudo-textile net. Both sides of the sherds contained marks of some kind of thin hairs. The same hair marks were noted within those sherds which had separated into flakes. This indicates that, as in the Neolithic, an admixture of animal hairs was still widely used. The materials of the lower layer of the ancient Sikteekh settlement, being for these places at considerable depth and in distinctive conditions of deposition, as well as the artifacts found on the Bugachan River and in burials at other points contemporaneous with it, could at first glance be dated to the Neolithic, and perhaps, judging from the types of some of the stone artifacts, even to the Early Neolithic. Nevertheless, along with stone and bone artifacts of an archaic type, there were, on the same level with them, in the same layer and in the very same cultural complexes, finds indicating that metal was already very well known to the inhabitants of the settlement at that time. The cultural remains of the lower layer were grouped most thickly near the hearths. The largest hearth was most interesting in construction. In its center, together with stone tools, there were found fragments of a casting ladle and splinters of bones and antlers. The remains of the ladles, and pure metal in the form of congealed droplets, and the remains of the crucible in which copper or bronze was smelted, testify to the presence of foundry-workers in Old Sikteekh. These people still used widely the old types of stone and bone artifacts, as their Neolithic predecessors did. They could distinguish accurately the properties of the various minerals which they used in preparing stone tools and objects of ornament. Also, they remained masters of the finest pressure flaking techniques. These were the master jewellers of the Stone Age, capable of making a chef d'oeuvre of their art, expressed in the hundreds of finest knife-like flakes of usual form, fine arrowheads and spearheads, and splendidly retouched large knives. But, along with this, the craftsmen were already well acquainted with metal. They had copper tools, that is, they knew not only how to use them, but also how to make them. The inhabitants of the Sikteekh settlement buried their dead, as did those of Ichchileekh, Pokrovskoye, and Bugachan, with metal needles, awls, and decorations made in their own miniature workshops. True, in appearance these ancient copper objects from the middle and lower Lena are primitive. In particular, they closely resemble the very simple objects which in the i8th and t9th centuries were still used in Fig. 34. Arrowheads from a Bronze Age burial on the Kullaty River. 143

2

The Discovery of Bronze regions of North America rich in native copper; here, also, material culture was in general agreement. In 1763, the Chukchi Khekhgitat related that the Americans from the "Great Land"—the Eskimos (Kykhminets)made their clothing from skins. "And for sewing this clothing they had needles of red copper, and the copper they take in their land, only how they work this copper, he, Khekhgitat did not know. And they have no sort of iron things with them, but instead of iron axes they have axes of jasper, with which they cut wood and do whatever is necessary with them" (Anon. 1937: 185) . Analogous information was also reported, in 1765, by Nikolay Daurkin, who was visiting the Chukchi and to whom they said that "there is still in the north country a reindeer people whom they, the Chukchi, call krakhey, and those people have copper spears and knives, and their copper is red" (Gelmersen 1876: 462; cf. Berg 1935: 118-20). These reports, relating most likely to the Indians of the northwest coast and to their nearest neighbors, the Eskimos, generally depict the same rough and simple metal inventory as that which the inhabitants of Old Sikteekh and the rest of their contemporaries on the lower and middle Lena had at their disposal. Yet there is one highly significant and basic difference. The inhabitants of the Sikteekh settlement no longer simply hammered natural copper into shapes, as the Eskimos or northwestern Indians did, but processed it by a completely different method. They already knew how to melt metal first in special crucibles of fire-resistant clay, and then to give it the desired forms in skillfully prepared molds. The basic difference between the new material and the old was already perfectly clear to them, and they were fully in command of all the new technical methods connected with the use of the new. After the Glazkovo period of the Cis-Baykal, to which correspond the early bronzes of Yakutia, there follows a Bronze Age culture fully mature in all its essential features. It is not surprising, then, that close to the Baykal region, to the north of the upper Lena, downstream from Kirensk and Vitim, we find a simultaneous development expressing the same mature Yakut Bronze Age culture. As we have noted, copper and bronze objects of ancient form are found at various places in Yakutia: right-angle socketed celts, knives, daggers, swords, and spearheads, all of which typologically belong to the fully developed and Late Bronze Ages. In type, these artifacts in a number of cases come close to the Karasuk artifacts of the steppe regions of Siberia, and to the Shivera ones of the forested Cis-Baykal. They can, consequently, be dated to the end of the second millennium a.c. and to the beginning of the first millennium, that Fig. 35. Objects from settlements and burials of the Early Bronze Age period. 1—arrowhead from the Bugachan River burial; 2—two arrowheads from a burial at Pokrovskoye; 3—retouched knife, Sikteekh; 4, 5—fragments of vessels with pseudo-textile ornamentation, Kullaty River; 6 to 8—fragments of a vessel with comb-impressed ornamentation, Kullaty. 145

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

is, roughly the 13th to 8th centuries s.c., not excluding the lag which took place in the most distant, northern regions of Yakutia. A bronze sword found at the end of the last century on the Vilyuy, one hundred and fifty versts [west?] from Vilyuysk, on the bottom of the dry lake-bed Silgumdzhe (Syuldyumdya), has received wide publicity. The Vilyuy sword was made of excellent gold-colored bronze with a high percentage of tin, places on the surface having a thin layer of metallic tin. The length of the sword is 72 cm (Fig. 36). By its size, proportions, shape, and careful finish it is an unique example of the founder's art in Bronze Age Siberia. Indeed, its equal in size and in elegance of finish, as far as bronze swords go, has not been found, not only in Siberia but in the entire forest belt of the Soviet Union. The sword sits beautifully in the hand; it is light and well balanced for both cutting and thrusting motions. It could have served equally well in personal encounter or in a battle. In 1868, a bronze knife-like dagger was found 25 km downstream from Olekminsk, at the Solyanka River. It was about a 1/4 arshin* in length and had the shape of an ordinary hunting dagger. Another bronze sword or dagger was found rather close to the borders of Yakutia, at Krivaya Luka on the Lena, near Kirensk (Ovchinnikov 1912b). A technically excellent short bronze sword was found in 1943, at the settlement of Ukulan, on the bank of the river of the same name, a headwater tributary of the Aldan. The next group of ancient bronze artifacts from Yakutia are bronze wedge-shaped axes with sockets—celts. They are found repeatedly in Yakutia on the Kolyma, Vilyuy, in the vicinity of Olekminsk, and along the Vitim. On the latter, near the river Proninnaya, 66 km upstream from the city of Bodaybo, four bronze celts were found in a cache (Nikolayev 1912: II-15; Izmaylova 1926; Fedorov 1941). Bronze spearpoints were also encountered. They were found at the mouth of the Natara River on the Aldan and at the mouth of the Markha River [on the Lena], where one celt and two spearpoints also were found, one of them preserved, the other quite damaged. All these objects have characteristics which are few in number but are sufficient to make them strikingly distinctive from those of the steppe regions of Siberia, for which it was known already in the 18th century that they had possessed Bronze Age metallurgical centers. Such characteristic traits were most clearly expressed in the large celts. They are exceptionally long and narrow, with rectangular contours, sometimes slightly narrowing toward the blade, with a socket rectangular in crosssection. Usually they are symmetrically convex; more rarely, their profile is unilaterally but symmetrically convex.t Lugs are always lacking. • [i arshin = 71 cm = 28 inches. Editor,

A.I.N.A.] t [A shoe-last celt is probably being described. Editor, A.t.N.A.]

Fig. 36. Bronze artifacts of Yakutia and China. 1–bronze sword, Vilyuy River; 2–bronze knife, North China; 3–nephrite knife with bronze handle, China; 4–nephrite knife with inlaid handle, China, Yin period; 5–bronze sword with inlaid handle, Ukulan on the Aldan River. 146

oi Q

,~

F

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

The ornamentation is just as characteristic for these celts, namely: (a) straight vertical and horizontal relief bands; (b) a relief zigzag; (c) relief eyelets, often nucleated, sometimes combined with rays coming out of them; and (d) relief triangles, inscribed one inside the other, with the points toward the blade. The spearpoints known from sites in Yakutia are also markedly distinguished from all the others found in Siberia by their unusually large dimensions: their size is just as exceptional as that of the Vilyuy sword. They are two or three times longer than the usual steppe points, which, as a rule, do not exceed 25-30 cm in length. Such large bronze points as those found, for example, on the Markha River (one reaching 61 cm) are unknown anywhere else in Siberia, despite the latter's reputation for the development of local copper and bronze deposits. With the exceptional size of such articles also come exceptional proportions: there is an unusual relationship of the sizes of blades and sockets. While sockets of points from the [southern] steppes are usually not distinguished by length, the sockets of points from Yakutia are always very long, usually 1-1/2 to 2 times longer than the blades of the points. The ornamentation of these points, transverse bands at the base of the socket and inscribed triangles placed above them, is as close to the ornamentation of taiga celts as it is specific for this region's group of bronze spearpoints. It is worth noting that spearpoints, very close in size and general proportions to those from Yakutia just described, are also encountered to the west of the Yenisey, not in the steppe but in the taiga regions—for example, on the Keta [Bolshaya Kheta], where the presence of a special, local center of Bronze Age culture is indicated. Some of the ancient bronzes are distinguished by additional external traits which testify to their local preparation. Thus, for example, a spearpoint in the Yakutsk Museum (No. 431) was only partly worked after casting; its surface was not completely polished, as was usual, and the cast seams were not smoothed. Another point (No. 421), apparently from the same casting form as the first, was defective, and was intended for resmelting. Both these objects may have been part of a cache of the ancient craftsman, or were materials from his workshop found near the mouth of the Markha. Evidently the celts from the Proninnaya River also had not been used, because they contained the remains of the clay center of the casting form. Finally, at the present in Yakutia, remains of the very shops where the Bronze Age casters worked are known. They were found at two points on the middle Lena—at the settlement of Pokrovskoye, and in Yakutsk. The latter was discovered between the buildings of the Geological Trust and the Regional Hospital. Here, in an area of 1-1.5 sq. m., under a thin layer of turf, lay rather numerous pieces of heavily burned clay. Judging by the shape of the clay pieces, mostly flat or slightly concave, and smooth on one side, they were remains of the lining of a smelting pit, the foundations of which reached deep into the sand, which was heavily charred. With these remains, there was found a fragment of one of the halves of a casting mold for celts. To judge by 148

The Discovery of Bronze the remains of the mold, the celts were rather small (about 8-10 cm in length), and slightly narrowing toward the base. They were decorated by only one ornamental band, situated near the proximal edge of the celt, in the form of a raised band with three protuberances. The crosssection was hexagonal, rather than rectangular as in other cases. These traits bring them close to the celts of the Ananino and Karasuk periods. Close to the remains of the hearth were found clay objects in the form of fragments of rods rounded in cross-section, and of "plugs" (cores). It is quite probable that these "rods" served as separators in the casting of socketed spearheads. Similar rods were found, for example, in the ancient Late Bronze Age dwelling on Cape Balanbash, in the valley of the Belaya River (in the Bashkir A.S.S.R.), together with crucibles, ladles, and other traces of the manufacture of bronze tools (Golmsten 1941: 131). It thus appears that at the campsite near the Geological Trust both bronze celts and spearheads were made. As at Pokrovskoye, there was found here a ladle used for pouring the liquid metal into the mold. The existence of copper foundries and excellent metal articles of local origin presupposes also the presence of adequate supplies of raw materials, which is possible only if local sources are widely distributed. On the Lena, copper ore deposits are actually present and in fairly large quantity —relative to the requirements of Bronze Age people. At the beginning of the 18th century, local deposits on the banks of the Lena between the villages of Zhigalovo and Vitim were already widely known. Along a stretch of 850 km, through the length of this immense territory, layers of coppery sandstone of the so-called Ust-Kut formation crop out on the banks of the Lena. They include two ore-bearing horizons—an upper and a lower—the thickest and richest in copper content being the lower (Yagovkin 1934).15 The Lena copper ores have long been utilized as a source of metal. In studying the Paleozoic sedimentary deposits in 1891-92, V. A. Obruchev discovered and described various traces of ancient mining operations for copper ores within sandstones of the Ust-Kut formation, and also included data extracted from the works of earlier writers—Gmelin, Erman, Slovtsov, and others (Obruchev 1892; cf. Gennin 1937: 609; Grigorev 1916) . The first direct indication of the early use of these ores is the find, near the village of Ichora [Ichera; 58° 32' N.; 109° 47' E.], of a rather large piece of slag, or a fragment of the facing of a small hearth for smelting metal, with large inclusions of pure but entirely oxidized grains of copper; the light green coloring distinguishes the oxidized copper from the dark background of the fragment. The fragment was found within a small part of a site which had survived erosion, and was accompanied by potsherds dating to the Bronze or Early Iron Age. Besides the Ust-Kut ores, the bronze-founders may have had other sources of metal at their disposal on the immense territory of Yakutia. Traces of copper ores are known in localities to the north of Ust-Kut, on the middle Lena near Olekminsk, where the Paleozoic sandstones contain green and blue copper stains (Dravert 5908: 2; 1922: 63.) Similar traces of copper ores and of native copper have been discovered on the Vilyuy, and had been already known to R. Maak (Maak 1887: 43, 149

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

note 3; Dravert 191o: 8; Grunvald 1927). The Vilyuy copper deposits are part of a vast region northwest of the Lena in which native copper, associated with lava beds, occurs frequently. It is also known in the lavas of Greenland, North and South America, and on the Komandorskiy [Commander] Islands. The region of the Great Lakes in the United States is especially notable in this regard; here are found rich deposits of native copper which play a significant role in the world's copper supply. Native copper is also found in the lavas of northern Siberia, where the average copper content is even higher than that in the traprocks of the Great Lakes. Thus, there is nothing surprising in the fact that, like the North American Indians who before white man's arrival made wide use, especially in the Great Lakes region, of native copper for the manufacture of very simple metal objects, the inhabitants of Yakutia and neighboring regions of the north could regularly use these local supplies for their own manufactures, beginning even in the Early Bronze Age. They also used the copper ores to the east of the Lena, in the Amga Valley. These facts are extremely important, since they place in a new light the history of all of northern Siberia in the Bronze Age, and the development of the culture of the tribes inhabiting it. The metal-founders of Yakutia had already reached a comparatively high level in their art by the beginning of the first millennium B.c. Their manufactures—swords, spearheads, daggers, and celts—in technical perfection and finish are not inferior to the articles issuing from the steppe foundries of southern Siberia. The origin and development of the art of metal-smelting could not but lead to gradual but very considerable changes in the life of the local population. The copper or bronze celt-axe constituted an incomparably sturdier and more efficient tool for woodworking than the old stone axes, which "gnawed" rather than chopped the wood. The bronze knife cut better and more quickly than the stone one, and was at the same time markedly sturdier than its predecessor. Tools of the new metal saved time and lightened labor; life became easier, and work more productive. Similar changes were also felt in the fields of hunting and warfare. Swords of excellent workmanship and technical finish, daggers of equally refined form, and sturdy spearheads could not be compared with the earlier stone and bone artifacts. The warrior and hunter were now equipped with excellent and truly fearsome armament—when skillfully used. Yet, it does not follow that stone and bone entirely ceased to serve as materials for tools and weapons on the middle and lower Lena. On the contrary, stone flakes and various stone artifacts found at campsites show that the technology of stone-working was still, as in all Early Bronze Age cultures, on a rather high level. Nevertheless, stone and bone tools and weapons gradually lost their former significance in the taiga of northern Siberia. They now retreated into the background, giving place to bronze chopping and cutting implements and bronze weapons. Arrowheads were the only exception. They 150

The Discovery of Bronze were frequently lost, and were more efficiently made from stone and bone than from metal. The general progressive change also involved other elements of material culture. These are most clearly reflected, as always, in artifacts made from the most plastic material—pottery. The clay vessels, as before, have rounded, hemispherical bases. But their forms and essential details become markedly more complex; new structural elements appear in the form of necks, which divide the rims of the vessels from the convex bodies and the bases. In the methods of decorating the vessels, there is still much that is archaic. At the same time, here, too, new features appear. Small applied ridges, horizontally girdling the vessel, are more and more frequently used. A new form of stamp ornamentation appears, in the form of short "s-shaped" impressions applied with a comb-like stamp, as well as in other forms. The pseudo-textile impressions covering the outer surface of the vessel usually take on a rather different character than formerly—the mesh becomes larger, but the technique of application remains the same, that is, using a paddle with a checker pattern carved into it. It is still difficult to divide the Late Bronze Age of Yakutia into separate chronological periods, and to proceed on this basis to trace in greater detail the development of the local tribes. Only a few instances may be cited which show further development. Let us consider one. We have already mentioned the unique Vilyuy sword of Karasuk type, and also that in 1943 there was newly acquired by the Yakutsk Regional Museum a remarkable bronze specimen: a short sword of unusual form found in the valley of the Aldan, in the vicinity of the settlement of Ukulan. The Ukulan sword is cast of excellent bronze. The casting is technically masterful, without flaws. A characteristic feature of the technique of manufacture of this object is that its blade and handle are cast separately. Not satisfied with the ordinary types and forms of bronze tools, the craftsman who made this artifact showed great ability as a forgeman and "combiner." He invented and masterfully cast an article of unusual type, since it combines in itself two objects—a sword and a spear. Its upper part has the form of a spearhead with a wide, foliate blade and a narrow haft, and the lower part presents the appearance of the hilt of an ordinary sword. On the sword handle there are deep grooves filled with a black, resinous material. This appears to be birch gum, which to this day is used by the forest hunters of Yakutia for sealing birchbark dashes and boats. The Aldan sword, decorated in this unusual way, had a distinctive and stylish appearance. The polished bands, similar to precious dark wood, stood out against the bright yellow background of the gold-like metal. The use of birch gum for such finishing of bronze articles, and for this type of incrustation of their surfaces, is not known elsewhere. Despite the highly distinctive character of the Ukulan sword, it is close in dimension to the short swords of the steppe tribes. However, the character of its handle, with a crosspiece formed by two rods projecting

'51

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

to the sides and ending in spherical knobs, is foreign to the artifacts of the Karasuk period. Crosspieces of similar type become widespread only in later times, when the previous short wedges and projections separating the blade from the handle disappeared. The Ukulan find may consequently be dated with a certain amount of probability to a later period of the local Bronze Age, and most probably to the second half of the first millennium B.c. It is also of interest that M. P. Ovchinnikov brought to the Irkutsk Museum, from the vicinity of Ust-Kut, a bronze arrowhead of typically "Scythian" type, with a long, hollow shaft. The Ust-Kut arrowhead is at present the most northerly such find east of the Yenisey. It may be assumed that other finds also belong to this period; that is, the 8th to 3rd centuries B.C. These are primarily bronze axes or celt-adzes, differing in shape and decoration from the long celts decorated with "eyes" in relief and with "hanging" triangles, inscribed one inside the other. As a whole, the Bronze Age culture of Yakutia naturally had much that was distinctive and that set it apart from the other Bronze Age cultures of Siberia and neighboring territories. This expressed itself not only in the forms and types of metal equipment, or in the minor details of ornamentation of pottery vessels, but also in more general and more significant features of culture and daily life. The distinct character of the developed Bronze Age culture of Yakutia may be discerned without difficulty if we compare, for example, the pottery characteristic of it with that of the Siberian region closest to it

Fig. 37. Fragments of Bronze Age vessels. Vicinity of Yakutsk. 152

The Discovery of Bronze (and furthermore, connected to Yakutia by such an important waterway as the Lena), that is, the pottery of the Cis-Baykal (Fig. 37). Although the general form of the vessels is similar in both cases, their ornamentation is radically different: to the south and to the north of the Vitim, we meet entirely different techniques of applying the pattern and quite dissimilar ornamental motifs. The Bronze Age culture of Yakutia, together with the closely related Angara, or Bronze Age culture of the forested Cis-Baykal proper, is especially sharply differentiated from the steppe cultures—including the Minusinsk culture, which is the richest and best-studied of them. In the way of pottery, the most typical [pieces] for the steppe pastoralists and cultivators of the Late Bronze Age were thick-walled vessels with flat bottoms, suitable for the storage of grain and dairy foods, and well adapted to being placed for a long time on the flat floors of dwellings and on shelves, and also suitable for cooking food over permanent hearths and on the stoves of turf or log houses. In the taiga of Yakutia, there were completely different clay vessels, with round bases and often distinguished by a remarkable thinness of walls. It is quite probable that this unusually archaic form of pottery was connected with the structure of a dwelling inherited from Neolithic times—a light lean-to, covered with skins, birchbark, or larch bark, within which there was a hearth made of stones, to which the pots were adapted. A more striking distinction between the Bronze Age cultures of eastern Siberia and [those of] the steppes is revealed in the burial ritual and the type of the grave. Indeed, it was the absence of mounds and large stone structures which led investigators to conclude that a local Bronze Age culture was absent in the taiga. In the unforested steppes, it was entirely natural to build grave structures of stone, which is almost immune from the action of time. But, in the taiga, such structures were most conveniently made from wood—a perishable but plentiful material. Also, farther north, the conditions of the permafrost do not allow the disposal of the dead in the earth, but on top of it, in boxes suspended from trees, or resting on stilts (aranga), as well as in aboveground timber structures. These distinctive local features are no less clearly visible in the art of the northern forest tribes.

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Chapter

2

In the conditions of the Bronze Age in the taiga there continued to exist and develop, in its own peculiar ways, a completely independent art, distinct from the art of the steppe tribes, and arising directly from the local Neolithic specimens. In the Bronze Age of the steppe regions of Asia there arose and flowered a wonderful animal style with its peculiar variety of subjects and original facets of decorative stylization. Examples of this style are well known in the regions bordering Yakutia, the populations of which were undoubtedly in constant association with the inhabitants of the steppe regions of the Trans-Baykal, the Angara region, and also with the inhabitants of the Yenisey Valley. Not far from the Lena region, in the valley of the Ilim, there was found, for example, a remarkable crest of cast bronze typical of the steppe regions of Siberia and Mongolia in early Scythian times, depicting the mountain goat—teke (Borovka 1931; Teploukhov 1929: 48). In the Lena Valley proper, near the settlement of Biryulskoye, at the hamlet of Otonkon, there was found a remarkable cache, consisting of numerous bronze horse-trappings and other artistically executed objects of the 5th to 4th centuries B.c., of steppe origin. True, chronologically this cache [belongs to the Iron Age, that is,] falls outside the Bronze Age in the true sense of the term. Indeed, in the Black Sea steppes iron was known even earlier, as it was in the Altay. Also, iron objects were now and then encountered at that time in the Trans-Baykal steppes. But stylistically the objects from the Otonkon find represent in full measure the stylistic traditions and technology of steppe art, having roots in its archaic epoch, in the time of the flowering of artistic bronze-casting, in the 8th to 6th centuries B.C., if not earlier. These are, first of all, stylized representations of birds of prey—crested gryphons—seemingly repeating the gryphons from the famed Pazyryk kurgans [barrows] in the Altay, and also gryphons, but without crests, characteristic of developed Scythian art in the Black Sea region (S. Rudenko 1953; S. Rudenko and N. Rudenko 1949; Kiselev 1951 : 249, 383; Okladnikov 1946 a; 1950a). The same may be said also of another upper Lena find, in the locality of 155

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

Loktay, on the Manzurka River (upper reaches of the Lena), where a bronze disc depicting the struggle of a tiger or panther with a mountain goat was found. The Loktay disc is also a very close parallel to the Pazyryk representation of fighting animals—almost an exact copy. The presence of these objects was not the result of a simple accident, or of the importation of finished foreign things, but testifies to the existence of ancient, deep, and close ties of the inhabitants of the forested Cis-Baykal with their steppe neighbors. This is confirmed by the fact that on one of the Shishkino cliffs there is an excellently preserved ancient drawing, executed with red coloring and depicting the very same long-fanged fantastic monster, with a wide-open mouth, which so often decorated the articles of the steppe artisan. Nearby, on the same cliff, is the image of a fallow deer with head turned back in exactly the same manner as the fallow deer and reindeer in countless examples of the art of the steppe tribes of Asia—from the Ordos to the Black Sea. And this is completely understandable: the inhabitants of the upper Lena had only to cross over the Baykal mountains to land on the shores of Baykal near Olkhon Island, where in the pleasant valleys the majestic slab tombs made of long gneiss slabs have been preserved to the present time. Here, in the cliff drawings engraved in the white marble of Cape Sagan-Zaba, is pictured a real Scythian deer. And still farther [east], on the other side of Baykal, on the Uda and Selenga, lived numerous pastoral tribes who left in the Trans-Baykal steppes many hundreds of such slab tombs. Here, in the Trans-Baykal steppes, originate those features which are found on the upper Lena. Further downstream on the Lena, however, similar artistic monuments of the Bronze and Early Iron Ages are no longer encountered. Here a different artistic world begins—a vast region not only of other artistic traditions but of quite another artistic outlook, of other ideas. Whereas in the animal style of the steppe tribes, in the first millennium B.c., a central place was occupied by representations of gold-antlered "sun deer"—the reindeer or red deer, the mountain goat teke —and also by predators, the panther or bear, in the art of the forest regions of northeast Siberia, beginning with the Neolithic, the old representations of the elk run like a red thread, as before. In the northern taiga there is no other animal which in distribution and resplendence could be compared with it. Completely lacking in taiga art are subjects, so plentiful in the steppe regions of Siberia, as beasts in combat; also, there are no signs of spiral ornamentation, no scrolls or plant patterns. But it would be incorrect to suppose that the art of Yakutia had no connection whatever with that of the steppe tribes, or that it had stagnated. Direct testimony to the influence of steppe art on that of the taiga is provided by the drawings of two elks on a high cliff near the village of Toyon-Aryy, on the left bank of the Lena. These are well known to the local population on account of their large size and imposing aspect (Fig. 38). 156

Bronze Age Art in the Taiga

Fig. 38. Cliff drawing from Toyon-Aryy. These representations are clearly visible not only from the road which passes below the cliff, but also from the river. They are excellently preserved and were executed with care by a skilled and experienced hand. In confidence and exactness of line this drawing does not yield place to the earlier Neolithic ones, if, indeed, it does not exceed them. The elks are a male and a female. The drawings at Toyon-Aryy show essential differences from the more ancient representations. The figure of the elk is striking in its incongruity: the muzzle hangs down like a hook; two pointed tusks of some kind stick out in front; behind them, the wide blades of real elk antlers are indicated, but they are disproportionately small. Tusks are absent in real elk, and therefore they constitute here a purely fantastic detail, which is in part reminiscent of the habit of Scythian, Classical, and ancient Oriental craftsmen of depicting fantastic beings by arbitrarily combining parts belonging to real but completely different animals. Such a naive but extraordinarily expressive method was directed toward a definite aim: in place of images of ordinary beasts, there 'appeared figures of fantastic monsters, who, in the opinion of their creators, possessed supernatural qualities and great power. Numerous figures of such fantastic monsters are known, both from chance finds and from the artistic objects found in the famous Pazyryk barrows of the Altay. [In these drawings] the former feel for concreteness of form and liveliness of action has been lost. Only two of the legs of the beast are depicted. Although both are bent, and the front leg is thrown forward, while the rear leg is thrown back, as in the elk at Churu, the feel of a true flying gallop is not achieved. The animal is nailed down and frozen in a definite pose, which only conventionally depicts movement, only recalling it slightly—with a niggardly gesture. The general composition of the drawing is also new. The elks are depicted as before, as a pair, but they no longer follow one another in the same direction, as in natural movement along a trail, but stand facing each other. Another small but typical detail of the elk figures on this cliff deserves attention. Both animals are striated with vertical bands, which may be a 157

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

conventional rendering of their hairy coverings, or perhaps also of their ribs. For determining the age of such cliff drawings in the Cis-Baykal region and neighboring areas, a fact of great importance is that the "lattice-work" figures of elks on the painted cliff at Sagan-Zaba [Bay], on the shores of Lake Baykal, are combined in the same composition with a characteristically stylized drawing of a Siberian stag. This stag is lying down, with its legs bent and its heavy antlers thrown back on its back, just like the deer on the well-known "deer stones" of the Trans-Baykal, or on the Scythian-type metal objects from the barrows of Siberia and classical Scythia. Also important for the dating of these cliff drawings is the coincidence between their stylistic features which we have noted and those of the metal artifacts whose age can be more precisely determined. Among the various objects connected with the Minusinsk center of Bronze Age culture, there are artifacts decorated with engraved figure drawings, the figures being "filled" with the same kind of straight or slanted transverse bands as on the Toyon-Aryy cliff drawing and on others close to it on the Lena, Yenisey, and Angara (Fig. 39). (Radlov 1894: Vol. i, No. i, p. 27, Plate iv, Fig. 13; No. 3, p. Io8, Plate 19, Fig. 3.) Whereas in the steppe regions of Siberia this method of rendering scales, hide, and ribs is used for metal images of fish or of beasts of prey, in the taiga areas it is found in representations of elks on analogous metal articles. Such, for example, are the numerous objects of "openwork casting" from the taiga regions of western Siberia, common among which are representations of elks with straight, slanted, or angular lines across their bodies (Myagkov 1927, 1929; Yermolayev 1914). In a collection gathered 5o km to the north of Achinsk, on the Chulym River [in the southeastern corner of western Siberia], there were found, in addition to open-work, also steppe artifacts of this type, together with articles of the Ural types and Chinese bronze mirrors of the Han Dynasty, 2nd century B.c. to 2nd century A.D. (Yermolayev 1914). Still more revealing is a bronze spearhead from the valley of the Ket River [about 200 km north of Achinsk], which in its proportions approximates the spearheads of Yakutia. It contains quite similar schematic representations of elks, with bodies transected by transversal bands, as if they were transferred directly from the cliff drawings. This detail suggests a direct connection between the Toyon-Aryy drawings and the works of the southern artists of the Late Bronze and Early Iron Ages. It is from here, in the south and during the Scythian period, that the new position of the elk in the Toyon-Aryy cliff drawings—which is foreign to the ancient art of Yakutia—originates. This is no longer the former realistic scene of a male chasing a female, Fig. 39. Bronze Age representations of animals. I–cliff drawing of an elk, Lena River, Yakutia (near Tiit-Aryy); 2, 3–cast copper representations of elk, Narym kray; 4–decoration on a bronze celt, Minusinsk kray; 5–representation of an elk on a bronze disc, Narym kray; 6–decoration on a bronze hatchet, China. 158

3

2

4

5

5

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

but is an entirely new symbolic pattern of the "animal fight" well known from the specimens of steppe art of the Bronze and Early Iron Ages, beginning with the period of the developing Scythian type of culture (7th to 5th centuries, B.c.), and ending during the first two centuries A.U. Still more essential from the historical-cultural point of view are the profound general changes in the art of the Bronze Age forest tribes which reflect the shifts taking place, not only in style, but also in intellectual content. The remarkable drawings which crown the high cliff hanging precipitously over the river Sinyaya (Siine), near the point where it joins the Lena at the village of Sinskoye, are of great interest in this regard (Fig. 40).

.411r ;ritiN Fig. 4o. Cliff drawings at the village of Sinskoye, Yakutia. These drawings have been preserved only partially. They previously extended in an uninterrupted band at least 6 m long and 1 m high. But even in its present condition, the remaining portion of the drawing, 3 m in length, makes a strong impression. This is one of the best-executed and most typical examples of local cliff art on the middle Lena. To the right, beyond the remains of some large figure—probably that of an animal—a male elk is depicted. Beside it stands a human figure with a bow, with its face turned toward the elk. Near the man is a circle with three or four small human figures, two with outspread arms with fingers open (three fingers on left hand, two fingers on right). These humanlike beings probably represent shaman-sorcerers, whose spells assure success in hunting. On the far right there is a large figure of peculiar outline: it represents a fantastic man-like being with three heads, of a triple nature, so to speak. The other figure, in which the head was not completely preserved, may have represented the same thing. Apparently these are not mere spirits, but are incomparably more mighty mythical beings—true gods, and anthropomorphic rather than zoomorphic. This deity, it is true, still retains some elements of his former bestial nature, such as the horns crowning his head. Similar horns are described in the account given by the Tavgi shaman Dyukhadiye of the mothers of the reindeer who dwell, like the bugady of the Evenkis, within a high hill. Dyukhadiye related: When I came in I saw on the left two seated naked women. Both of 16o

Bronze Age Art in the Taiga these women had branching antlers on their heads, and the antlers of one of them were of iron. They were both covered with hair, like reindeer. One of the women who was sitting closer to the doors turned to me: "What is there to be afraid of, little friend? Come closer to me. I am pregnant. Hear me, little friend: now there will issue out of me two fawns. One of these fawns you must use as a sacrificial animal for the needs of the forest people (that is, the Dolgans and Evenkis—Author) and the other for the needs of the Tavgi." And, in fact, that woman gave birth to two fawns, and sent them my way. Then she said: "But there you are, still waiting for me to give you something for hospitality. You have borne many torments on the road, preparing yourself to become a shaman; take this wool and put it in your mitten"—and she gave it to me, tearing some long hairs out of herself and saying: "You will be a lucky shaman for reindeer; that is why I give you this." The other woman also gave birth to two fawns. "I give birth to these for all people," said she. "Let them be food both for men and for animals" (A. Popov 1936). The elk now occupies a secondary and passive position; it is entirely under the control of its mother or of the patron spirits. The active role is here played not by the beast but by its divine mother. The beliefs of the people who left their drawings on the cliff may have stood at this level. It is even possible that they went further, to the concepts which existed [until recently] among the Yakuts, who imagined the forest spirit Bayanay as a true lord of the animals. Hence it follows that the content of the cliff drawings suddenly becomes richer and more complex. On the cliff there is recorded a narration of a mythical tale, only partly comprehensible to us, and at the same time one of a ceremony. The participants are no longer two elks of different sexes but are animals and people—hunters with bows, sorcerers at whose backs there stand the bearers of mysterious and mighty otherworldly powers: deities, or perhaps a divine couple. Simultaneous with the enrichment of the intellectual content of the drawings, their fantasy and symbolism become stronger. The confused takes the place of the clear; the complex and inscrutable takes the place of the simple. Scenes in which the real, vital theme is perceptible become ever rarer, and otherworldly subjects, mythological figures and fantastic beings, appear more frequently. In one of the most complex drawings on the cliff of Suruktaakh-khaya on the Markha, probably not distant in time from the Sinskoye cliff drawings, there are depicted, instead of the usual hunting scenes, three anthropomorphic beings, heads downward, going along some sort of Linea path. They must be descending like shamans into the lower world, the nether world. Close by stands a strange figure, whose body only distantly recalls that of a man, and whose arms are raised aloft and end in branching shoots similar to stylized tree branches, but more closely resembling the tines of antlers (Fig. 41). On some cliff drawings, for example at Badarannakh (near Krestyakh on the Lena), one can trace in all only a fantastic interweaving of curving lines, whose hidden meaning is forever lost. Thus, together with the animal—the object of magical acts—and with I61

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

Fig. 41. Drawing on the cliff at Suruktaakh-khaya. the anthropomorphic deities—the givers of food—which now appear, we more and more often see the figures of the intermediaries between the worlds of gods and men: sorcerers and shamans, those keepers of the religious traditions and mysteries. The antlered or feathered headpieces clearly show their mixed, half-human, half-animal nature. It is remarkable that metal representations of shamans were made at this time on the Lena. One such figurine in the Yakutsk Museum came from the upper Lena, near Kirensk. It has the form of an oval disc surmounted by a crown and provided with side handles at the level of the eyebrows; below, there is a short handle. The crown consists of straight, pointed, parallel rays. Similar representations were found near Nizhne-Ilimsk, that is, on the road from the Lena to the Angara, on the Angara "in an abandoned Tungus yurt," near Chadobets, and also in the Ket Basin, on the lower Ob, and on the Yenisey. The Angara and Lena disc-like figures depict shamans, or, more accurately, only their heads, and are "shaman representations" in the literal sense of the word (Fig. 42). In this respect they are not alone, since very close analogies are found in the numerous cliff drawings of the taiga regions in the same territory east of the Yenisey; in the center of these 162

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Fig. 42. Bronze representation of a shaman-ancestor Ilim River. drawings the shamans often stand in their horned headdresses and characteristic religious costume (Agapitov 1882; Adrianov 1913; Okladnikov 1941a). And this is understandable, since in the past among the forest tribes of Siberia shamans occupied an exceptional position as intermediaries between the world of spirits and that of people, as possessors of supernatural power, and as mighty defenders of their clan. Not only the welfare but the very existence of the forest people depended on their activity. At the foundation of the animistic concepts and religious cult among the Tungus, for example, lies the ancestor-cult, although not that of ancestors in general, but that of shaman-ancestors. The shamanistic pantheon among the Tungus is made up basically of ancestor-spirits who were shamans while on earth. Only with their collaboration, and through the use of their supernatural powers and abilities, can the shaman work miracles, overcome the innumerable difficulties, defend his fellow clansmen from the pressures of hostile forces, and preserve the welfare of the entire clan. Dying, the shaman himself becomes one of the protecting spirits (Suslov 1931). Both of the facts noted above—the ousting of theriomorphic deities by anthropomorphic ones, and the development of the shamanistic cult in forms close to the present one—bring us to the third and most 163

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

important phenomenon in the ideology of the ancient tribes of Yakutia revealed by the cliff drawings. Engels wrote that whereas at the dawn of history the forces of nature are the objects of fantastic reflection in religion, "soon, along with the forces of nature, there also appear social forces—forces which oppose man and are just as foreign to him and originally just as inexplicable as the forces of nature, and, like the latter, dominate over him with the same kind of apparent natural necessity. The fantastic figures in which at first only the mysterious forces of nature are reflected, now take on social attributes as well, and become the representatives of historical forces" (Engels 1953 [edition] : 299). This phase, Engels declared, precedes monotheism. It is probable that the replacement of zoomorphic by anthropomorphic spirits and deities itself signified the transition from the cult of nature to a new one in which we see reflected historical forces and social phenomena. The cult of theriomorphic deities, as we have seen, attained its highest development with the flowering of the matrilineal clan, in whose ideology it occupied a very significant place. The decay of this older cult must be indirectly associated with the decline of matrilineality, which is the more probable since such transformations in the social base, as we know, precede, or at any rate keep pace with, the advances in the human consciousness which reflects them. That this happened in the given case, and that consequently even in the distant north the matrilineal clan in time gave way to the patrilineal, is shown by yet another significant fact, which is partially described above. The ancient representations of shamans on cliffs usually have a clearly depicted manifestation of maleness, and on the casts of idols with headgear usually a beard is visible. This also leaves no doubt that male figures, and not female, are represented. The leading role in the religious cult and pantheon of the forest tribes must therefore have passed over at this time from women to men. But since, under the conditions of a clan society, the gods are inseparably connected with the clan and are made up in significant part of its former members—ancestors and progenitors—such a replacement must have been accompanied by realistic transfer of the leading role in the clan from its female to its male portion. At the same time, the division of labor between female sorcerers and male hunters is replaced by one between male shamans and male hunters; this is in radical opposition to the social order of the preceding epoch. The general conclusion of the changes mentioned above is supported by the ethnographic data which had been cited earlier, and by other numerous examples from the religion and folklore of Siberian tribes, which clearly reflect the process of transition from matrilineal clan to patrilineal, and the long struggle connected with it, ending, in Engels' words, in "the world-wide historical defeat of the female sex" (Engels 1951 [edition]: 57). This significant step forward in the realm of clan structure in turn 164

Bronze Age Art in the Taiga formed a firm base for the progressive changes which, during the Bronze Age, embraced the technology, economy, and entire productive life of ancient man, which were described in detail above. The changes, then, were primarily the result of the development of productive forces, in which the decisive role was played by the discovery of means of smelting metal and of making tools of production from it. They were [also] the result of a general progressive development of the economy and daily life of the forest tribes, which was expressed in the growth of intertribal contacts, exchange and trade, and, finally, in the ever-increasing accumulation of wealth in the hands of individual clan members. The relics of the Late Bronze and Early Iron Ages thus for the first time give us, even though indirectly, an idea of that aspect of life of the forest tribes of Yakutia that has so far escaped the historian's observations—their social structure, the origin and development of the ultimate patriarchal forms of the clan, which have already matured here in the Bronze Age to a point where they were reflected in the most conservative area of culture—the world of religious ideas and cult. All this is especially interesting in view of the fact that the Russians in the i7th century found the patrilineal clan in fully developed and mature form among the Evenkis and Kets and forest hunting tribes of Siberia, and in that the rudiments of this form of clan can be discerned in the Cis-Baykal even at the terminal phase of the Neolithic, the Glazkovo period of the second millennium B.c. It will be the more important and interesting to acquaint ourselves more closely with the question of the external circumstances and contacts which must have furthered the aforementioned progressive development of the social structure of the forest tribes of the Far North at such an early period.

165

Connections between the Bronze Age Culture of the Middle Lena and Cultures of Other Peoples

Chapter 3

In the data described earlier there were revealed the general contours of the historical course traversed by the forest tribes of the north who inhabited Yakutia and the neighboring forest regions of Siberia in the Early and Late Bronze Ages, beginning in the middle of the second millennium B.C. and ending approximately with the 3rd and znd centuries B.c. However limited and fragmentary these data may be, they reflect with complete clarity the indubitable distinctiveness of the culture of the northern tribes during that distant period. The culture of the forest tribes of the Lena district, living both on the upper and, particularly, on the middle Lena, and in the regions of Yakutia bordering on it, was thoroughly different in all its basic features from the culture of their steppe contemporaries. There is no doubt of the distinctive character and local origin, not only of such elements of their material culture as pottery, or of the hunting cult of the elk and the worship of shaman-ancestors in the field of ideology, but also of certain details of their metal artifacts. While it reveals specific features, the ancient Bronze Age culture of the middle Lena at the same time has many points of contact with the cultures of other areas—and not only in the field of art. Consequently, its bearers dwelling in the seemingly limitless taiga of Yakutia were not, even then, isolated from the rest of the world or cut off from contact with tribes of other and sometimes very distant territories—a fact which in general must have had great significance for their historical development. Indeed, there is reason to suppose that these contacts grew ever more profound and significant for their cultural development. Indubitable contacts of the population with the Cis-Baykal region, as we have already noted, have been shown for the earliest phase of the Bronze Age in Yakutia, the Glazkovo. These were reflected in the types of bone and stone artifacts (flint arrowheads with straight bases, bone points with split bases), in ornaments (the white nephrite ring found in the upper stratum of the Kullaty campsite, the perforated mother-of-pearl discs from Ichchileekh and from the sacrificial place at the cliff of Suruktaakh-khaya), and in art (the flat bone idols with pointed heads, the incised linear decoration of dagger-like blades). 167

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

These contacts may not have been one-sided, although the overall cultural priority of the more advanced Cis-Baykal region is doubtless. It was from here that the first metal artifacts penetrated to the north. On a higher level, it is of interest that the oldest contacts of the northeastern tribes of Asia with the north of the European Russia and the neighboring Baltic regions were not cut off even in the Bronze Age, nor probably in the Early Iron Age. Whereas the burial ground of Oleniy [Deer] Island in Lake Onega shows some sort of mutual influence between the Neolithic population of the Baltic region and Yakutia even in the third and early second millennia B.G., the ancient burial ground on the other Oleniy Island in Kolskiy [Kola] Bay [north of Murmansk on the Kola Peninsula], which dates from the Bronze Age, confirms the presence of the same mutual influence at a later time. The same influence is shown by the plentiful finds from a still later period—the Early Iron Age—discovered during excavations of a site on the small island of Kelmo in Varangerfjord [northwest of Murmansk, bordering on Norway] and the tombs of the northern shore of this fjord. In the most ancient of these sites—the burial ground of Oleniy Island in Kola Bay (Shmidt i93o)—the graves took the form of shallow pits in which the skeletons lay covered with sand, and sometimes weighed down by a few stones. Coals were also found in the pits. The same thing is observed on the Lena. The next feature of the burial ritual which brings the burials of Bronze Age Yakutia close to those of Oleniy Island is the presence of certain objects, not near the skeleton itself but somewhat above it. The dagger-like bone artifacts of the Oleniy Island grave inventory reveal a similarity to the Lena artifacts. The latter are decorated with a geometrical pattern located near the handle, the pattern being considerably richer than that of Oleniy Island and occupying the major part of the surface of the artifact. Also, the bone arrowheads from Oleniy Island resemble those from the Pokrovskoye burial. Certain arrowheads from the island of Kelmo, in Varangerfjord, are particularly close to those of Yakutia. They have the appearance of long shafts of triangular cross-section, with wedge-shaped, sharpened hafts. Points with [widely] split bases were also found here. In this characteristic these points approximate the T-shaped artifacts which are supposed to be drumsticks for a shaman's drum. The splitting of hafts of bone artifacts in order to attach them to wooden handles or shafts is one of the most distinctive characteristics found in the burial inventories of Early Bronze Age Yakutia, and to some extent of the Glazkovo period of the Cis-Baykal. The short bone pipes, made from tubular bones, which were found on Oleniy Island, may have served as needle cases or repositories for the sinew used for sewing, or for other small articles. They are complete analogues to the Glazkovo needle cases and the bone container from Bugachan, inside which was found a ball of sinew thread and a copper needle. This similarity is the more obvious since the bone pipes of Oleniy Island, like the Glazkovo needle cases from the Selenga, Angara, and upper Lena burials, are covered with a fine geometrical incised pattern, whose stylistic 168

Connections between Bronze Age and Other Cultures elements have much in common with the decoration characteristic of the Oleniy Island bone artifacts. The final and most vivid brush stroke which completes the general picture of similarity between the sites of northern Scandinavia and the Kola Peninsula on the one hand, and northern Asia on the other, is pottery. The remains of a patterned clay vessel found on Oleniy Island resemble the vessels of Yakutia, with the "matting ornament," already described. This is a pseudo-textile pattern, executed by means of light blows on the moist surface of the pot with a paddle in which deep crisscross grooves have been cut. Also, among the sherds found within an Oleniy Island burial, there were the fragments of a thin-walled vessel with a smooth surface, on which numerous trace marks of short hairs were clearly visible; these are of the same kind as those on potsherds from Yakutia and the neighboring northeastern parts of Asia (Okladnikov 1953b)• The cliff drawings of northern Europe also show great similarity to the remarkable ones of the middle Lena. Scandinavian investigators who have studied the cliff drawings of northern Sweden and Norway, which are remarkable monuments of the most ancient art of the European North, long ago established that they fall into two basic groups, according to the technique of their execution. To the first belong drawings pecked, or cut with sharp instruments, into the smooth natural surface of the cliff. The second includes cliff representations filled in with ochre. Both groups are sharply distinguished both in style and characteristic details and in subject content. The characteristic features of the cliff drawings of the second group bring them close to those of the eastern regions—beginning with the Urals and western Siberia and extending to the more distant regions of the east, as far as Yakutia. Like the eastern cliff drawings, those of the west are executed in bloodred ochre, or, more rarely, in orange color. Their basic subject, as in the drawings of the Pyshma, Chusovaya, Yenisey, Angara, and Lena, is the elk. With the figure of the elk there appear, likewise, schematically drawn small human figures and conventional symbolic signs. It is especially interesting that, like the anthropomorphic figures of the eastern cliff drawings, these human images sometimes have antlers on their heads, and the animal figures are characteristically divided by partitions, exactly as in the "openwork" images of Suruktaakh-khaya on the Markha, the Toyon-aryy drawings of two elks, and many other Yakutian paintings already described. The forms of all of these Scandinavian figures are stylized in exactly the same way as on the eastern cliffs, and are marked by just as characteristic a combination of conventional handling of the subject and primitivism of style, with fresh realistic features to render the contours of animal and human bodies. Such, for example, are the remarkable drawings at Jämtland [Jämtland Sikås?] (Sweden) and in Telemark (Norway), which were carefully studied by Hallström [1938] and other investigators (Figs. 43, 44). In general content these drawings are essentially distinguished from the complex, multi-figured compositions, made by the pecking technique, which are based on an ancient agricultural I69

III•

Fig. 43. Cliff drawing in red ochre, Scandinavia.

fill

stes

Fig. 44. Cliff drawing in red ochre, Suruktaakh-khaya on the Markha.

Connections between Bronze Age and Other Cultures religion—the cult of a suffering and reborn vegetation-deity, worshipped by the Bronze Age farmers of Scandinavia. The red-colored drawings of Arctic Scandinavia, like the cliff drawings of northern Asia related to them in style, reveal to us the spiritual world of the ancient hunters, and perhaps reindeer herders, of the North. The basis of these drawings of the European Far North are figures of animals and hunting ceremonies associated with the multiplication and capture of animals—chiefly, the elk and reindeer. The cause of such a similarity in relics and cultures in the North of the Old World was not limited, apparently, merely to common natural and economic conditions which brought about an identical course of development. Rather, we must think in terms of numerous contacts that existed already in the early phases of the Stone Age in this vast territory, between the tribes of wild hunters inhabiting it, and the fishermen and maritime hunters living in certain places where walruses and seals abounded. These contacts were not interrupted during the Early Bronze or the Early Iron Ages. They also were carried out along the old routes established by the hunters and fishermen of the Stone Age and in the same direction—from east to west, and not the reverse. As far as the connections of the Yakutian Bronze Age culture with the cultures of the extreme northeast of Asia and Arctic America are concerned, we also see certain new concurrences which indicate the special significance of the ancient culture of Yakutia proper in the formation and development of Arctic cultures. Its role was not limited to that of a mere intermediate link in the exchange of cultural achievements. In 1952, archaeological remains were discovered which quite definitely show the settlement of ancient tribes of Yakutia, at the beginning of the Bronze Age, deep within the Chukchi Peninsula, in the basin of the Anadyr River. There, in the region of Lake Chirovoye on the Anadyr Plateau, at the top of a hillock (bulgunnakh) located at the eastern shore of the lake, N. A. Grave discovered the bones of a reindeer lying in carbonized earth, at a depth of from io to 5o cm, under a layer of turf and meadow [tundra] soil.* These bones, in a number of places (particularly near the surface), were broken into small bits and collected in a heap. With the bones were found brittle, blackened sherds and stone artifacts made from obsidian and other rocks, including an arrowhead of the usual Neolithic type, worked bilaterally, and having a notched base. The technique with which this artifact was made shows long experience, and a fully developed craft of stone-working by the methods characteristic of the Neolithic and early phases of the Bronze Ages. The finds at Lake Chirovoye set before us a definite picture of the life of tundra dwellers, wandering reindeer hunters, who paused for short periods, but usually at definite places most convenient for hunting and fishing near the lakes and rivulets of the tundra on dry hillocks and elevations. By the standards of the period, they were in complete command of the craft of stone-working; they had bows and arrows with stone • [This site was reported on in English by Krader in 1952 (q.v.), who drew the information from the work of N. N. Levoshin (1950). Editor, A.I.N.A.] 171

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

points, and knew how to make clay pots in which they cooked their food (Okladnikov 19536) The objects found at Lake Chirovoye are remarkable not only in that they reveal this picture of the daily life of the tundra people in a time distant from us, but also because they allow us to connect them with other tribes of the same period. Pottery, as always, is of decisive importance. The clay vessel from Lake Chirovoye is the first find of ancient pottery in the interior of the peninsula. It is quite different from the pottery of the old Eskimo maritime settlements, now well known to us. In them, the pots were crude and massive, covered with characteristic imprinted ornamentation. At Lake Chirovoye, the vessels were thin-walled, with hair marks on the surface, and with clearly pronounced necks and round bases. All these features bring the Lake Chirovoye pottery close to that of the ancient settlements of polar Yakutia, dating to the end of the Neolithic and the Bronze Age, and also to analogous settlements in the Kolyma Valley, where we see the same shape of vessels and all the other features characteristic of the Lake Chirovoye pottery, including the traces of hair on the outer surface of the sherds. The technical level of the manufacture of stone tools also does not contradict such a conclusion. In form and technique, the arrowhead from Lake Chirovoye is analogous to many others known at sites of the Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age of Yakutia and the Kolyma region. It resembles those from the Kolyma, especially in its lower reaches, on the Labuya and at Petushki, also in the material from which it is made. Obsidian has long been in wide use on the Kolyma for the manufacture of arrowheads (Okladnikov 1947a). From the above, it follows that the ancient hunting culture in the deep interior of the Chukchi Peninsula originated within the continental parts of polar Yakutia and the Kolyma region, and that, therefore, the settlement of the Chukchi Peninsula took place from the west. To judge by the finds at Lake Chirovoye, representatives of the tribes which at this time were living on the lower reaches of the Kolyma and Lena appeared here as early as the end of the Neolithic and the Early Bronze Age. They may have been the ancestors of the Yukagirs. At any rate, they were not the tribes which spread northward along the seacoast to the north of Sakhalin and the mouth of the Amur, and with whose movement the origin of the settled sea-mammal hunting culture must be connected. However, the discovery of this ancient culture in the interior of the Chukchi Peninsula, one closely connected with the culture of the tribes inhabiting Yakutia during the Early Bronze Age, is vitally important for the explanation of those events which took place in the coastal part of this territory inhabited by the maritime hunters, the ancestors of the Eskimos. A few examples which confirm the possibility of direct influence by the Bronze Age continental tribes will suffice to persuade us of this. Investigators of the ancient Eskimo culture in Alaska and the Chukchi Peninsula have established the wide distribution, since most ancient times, of arrowheads of a special type. They were compound, with a connecting bone rod, the lower end of which was joined to a wooden shaft. The upper 172

Connections between Bronze Age and Other Cultures end of this rod was split for the attachment of a stone arrowhead. The oldest dated remnants of arrows of this construction are so far known only from the burial grounds at Pokrovskoye and Bugachan in Yakutia. Such connections may also refer to art. The oldest ornamentation on art objects made by the ancestors of the Eskimo tribes was curvilinear. Later, these were replaced by straight ones, and the pattern became simplified and schematized. Investigators of the ancient Eskimo sites assumed that the replacement of the curvilinear style by a rectilinear-geometric one took place as the result of strong influence from the continental Siberian culture, apparently even during the local Early Iron Age. Yet, it is quite possible that this took place because of the influence of the decorative style represented by examples of Bronze and Early Iron Age art from Yakutia. The connections of the ancient population of Yakutia with southern regions during the Bronze Age must be given special consideration. Connections with the steppe regions of southern Siberia, with the TransBaykal, and also with China—one of the important world centers of the progressive development of mankind during the Bronze Age—were most highly developed during the "developed" Bronze Age of Yakutia. Let us begin with the simplest and most obvious facts. In the collections of the Yakutsk Museum there is a bronze kettle of archaic appearance, found in the headwaters of the Markha River in the Vilyuy Basin; it has the form of a large hemisphere resting on a [truncated] conical base (Fig. 45). This bronze "urn" is an exact replica of ordinary Scythian kettles of the steppe regions of eastern Europe and Middle Asia, both in its general form and in such characteristic details as the nail heads on the bow-shaped handles and the twisted cord girdling the exterior wall of the kettle. However, as analyses have shown, the most important center for such kettles was the steppe region of Minusinsk, where a hundred and sixty-five examples of such kettles have been found since 1913, whereas within Scythia proper—on the Don and in the Black Sea region—their number is limited to only a few dozen. The Vilyuy bronze kettle, like other finds in the taiga belt, was undoubtedly made by the hands of the steppe craftsmen, or cast in imitation of their work, after an imported model. It belongs among imported steppe artifacts, and thus to a relatively late period of the Bronze Age; yet we must note the significant similarity of other copper and bronze objects of local origin to artifacts from the steppe regions, which date to a very early period—the "Middle Bronze Age" of Minusinsk kray. The excellent bronze sword from the Vilyuy belongs, by all its features, to the large group of knives, and in particular to the daggers, of the same Karasuk type. The specific figures which they have in common are: (1) a rounded handle; (2) on the obverse side of the handle there is a longitudinal groove, and the handle is hollow; (3) the handle is decorated with transverse depressed lines between which rounded ridges are left; (4) the handle ends in a nail-like or hemispherical stud; and (g) symmetrical joint tongues are placed on both sides, at the place where the handle meets the blade (Gryaznov 1929). 173

Connections between Bronze Age and Other Cultures At Lake Andreyevskoye, near Tyumen [in western Siberia], a remarkable sword very similar to the Vilyuy one was found in 194o (Fig. 46). The spearheads in the collections of the Yakutsk Museum also resemble the Bronze Age spearheads from the steppe regions of Siberia, eastern Europe, and certain neighboring countries (Fig. 47). The general form of the points from Yakutia, their leaf-shaped blades with central ridges, socketed bases, and decoration in the form of linear bands and triangles, invites a comparison with artifacts typical of the so-called Seyma culture in the west [of the Soviet Union] and of those [cultures] contemporary with it. In ornamentation they may be compared also with the Karasuk artifacts of Siberia. In this connection, the casting mold from the campsite near the stadium in Yakutsk may also be compared with the latter. Special interest arises from the fact that the bronze objects from Yakutia as a rule show the greatest similarity to the Karasuk artifacts. Articles of Karasuk and similar forms are thus found over an immense territory— if not from Hungary proper, then at least from the Kama River to the Hwang Ho [in the east] and to the Vilyuy [in the north]. The finding, near Yakutsk, of a clay mold for the casting of celts, of the traces of an ancient foundry near Pokrovskoye, and of the presence in Yakutia of the aforementioned ancient copper and bronze objects, with indubitable signs of local manufacture—all these confirm the supposition that there were a number of separate centers, or, to be more accurate, local foci, where objects of Karasuk form were made, including those of the new and northernmost Yakutian type. The considerable similarity of these artifacts is to be explained by the relations between the tribes, which levelled out the form of metal articles made in different places according to definite, more or less uniform models of the most efficient type. But certain characteristics could exert an influence against this general common background—definite local features and technological traditions characteristic for each area. However, these do not violate the general unity of the inventory, and its generally consistent aspect. The existence of a number of local centers, where articles of Karasuk types were manufactured, does not obviate the question of the origin of objects of identical style and type, of the place where the Fig. 45. Bronze vessels of the Scythian period and a Yakut choron. 1–Yakut carved wooden vessel for koumiss (choron); 2–bronze vessel from the Vilyuy Basin, Upper Markha River; 3–Scythian bronze kettle from southern European Russia; 4–bronze vessel from Minusinsk kray; 5–bronze vessel from North China (Ordos). Fig. 46. Bronze sword from Lake Andreyevskoye. Fig. 47. Bronze Age spearheads. 1–China, Yin Dynasty; 2 to 4–Yakutia, mouth of Markha River and Aldan River; 5–silver spearhead from Bessarabia; 6–detail of same; 7–detail of spearhead 3. 175

Fig. 46.

2

Fig. 47•

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

most refined and earliest models might have been developed and become standards for the first metal-workers in this immense territory. This latter question is especially important for the study of distant periods of the past of Yakutia, since the solution of another more general question is directly connected with it—that of the historical conditions which underlaid the development of a true Bronze Age culture in northeastern Siberia. At first glance, it would be difficult to suppose that so early, and at the same time so considerable, a development of local metal-processing could have occurred in the depths of Yakutia. This territory, from which blows the icy wind of the Arctic, lies too far to the north of the advanced countries of antiquity, and too close to those unique districts of the Asian continent where, as recently as two or three hundred years ago, the Stone Age still reigned. A comparison of the bronze artifacts found in Yakutia with the bronzes of the south Siberian and Trans-Baykal steppes significantly facilitates the understanding of the question. But with this there arises yet another question of no less importance—that of the relation of ancient Yakutia to Bronze Age China. At the present, the connections of the Bronze Age cultures of the steppe regions of Siberia with those of China are generally recognized even for a very early period of these cultures. Therefore the question of these connections may be put in still broader form—its relationship to the taiga regions, including Yakutia. When the geographical position of Yakutia and the contacts of its ancient cultures with the surrounding world are considered, we always recall initially (apart from the steppes to the west and south) the bleak polar regions washed by the Arctic Ocean, whence leads the major waterway of the district, the Lena. At the same time, it is often forgotten that there is also the region to the east, to which the same Lena is connected by a number of eastern and southern tributaries: the Vitim, the Olekma, and the Aldan. These lead into the system of the other great Asian waterway, the Amur, where a new cultural area begins. One archaeological datum reminds us of this with great force: in the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences, there is preserved a cast bronze vessel found on the Vilyuy (Fig. 48). This vessel was found during the first half of the Igth century (that is, more than a hundred years ago) but it remained unknown. Yet it bears clear witness to ancient ties of Yakutia and China. It is a small vase with a rather wide upright neck, a convex body and a flat base. The form, decoration, and technique of manufacture of the vessel leave no doubt that it belongs among the typical Chinese artifacts of the Chou period (8th-4th centuries B.c.). At this time a Bronze Age culture was flourishing in China. However, the Vilyuy vessel might be considered a chance find which had found its way there at a later time. But we are in possession of other and still more important data, which relate to an even considerably earlier period—the end of the second millennium B.C. 178

Connections between Bronze Age and Other Cultures

ir

Fig. 48. Yakutian vessels compared with ancient Chinese ones. 1–bronze vessel of the Chou period found on the Vilyuy; 2–Yakut choron (wood); 3–Chinese bronze vessel of the Chou period; 4–Yakut clay vessel from Vilyuy rayon. As it turned out, the celts found during the investigation of one of the Yin Dynasty capitals near the present village of Hsiao-t'un, and which have no analogues in the west, reveal a similarity to the Siberian taiga celts (Fig. 49). The Yin period in China (17th-12th centuries a.c.) is characterized by a celt of a special type—of rectangular outline, narrow and long (16-2o cm), almost completely reproduced in its proportions by the Siberian taiga celts, and, like them, symmetrically wedge-shaped, or slightly tapered toward one wide side, with the same rectangular cross-section. The decoration of the Chinese celts, both in character and in placement, also shows great similarity to Siberian celts. In the lower half of the celt there are often placed hanging triangles, inscribed one inside the other, as on the Siberian celts. The upper part is occupied by decorative lines which constitute the stylized figure of a mythical monster, "the Glutton," or T'ao-t'ieh. 179

4

Connections between Bronze Age and Other Cultures All these details of the Yin celts were formed from different variants of the image of the mythical monster Tao-t'ieh, the "cicada," "toads," and other creatures. Later, when this stylized and geometrically simplified form became fixed and took on a definite and consistent appearance— probably long before the 13th—lath centuries B.c.—it was borrowed by the forest tribes, together with the general form of the Chinese celt. The latter tribes, however, could not entirely reproduce the precise symbolic pattern of the Chinese drawing, which was meaningless to them, and therefore limited themselves merely to its external framework and general compositional scheme. They retained the division of the ornamental field into two halves—upper and lower—leaving the former purely Yin relationship between them—the upper was always shorter and the lower longer. The forest tribes transferred from the Yin artifacts to their own axes the hanging triangles in the lower part of the pattern, and the horizontal band dividing them from its upper part. Even the eyes of the T'ao-t'ieh were transferred to the taiga celt in the form of two symmetrically placed nucleated circles. Thus the "original" large celts of the taiga regions of eastern Siberia are a metamorphosed form of the ancient Chinese models of the Yin Dynasty. Besides celts, there were in Yin China also socketed spearheads with wide leaf-shaped blades, whose sockets continued in the form of gradually narrowing cones extending to the point proper. On them, as on the celts, we sometimes see the Yin geometrical pattern in the form of triangles with their peaks turned toward the point of the spearhead, inscribed one inside the other and with bases resting on a band of parallel belts in relief, under which is placed a stylized mask of the T'ao-t'ieh. The character and placement of the decoration on bronze spearheads from Yakutia is entirely analogous; here, as on the taiga celts, only the T'ao-t'ieh mask is lacking, but the band of lines in relief girdling the haft, with the bases of the triangles resting on them, are retained, and the peaks of the triangles are pointed toward the point of the spear. Even the Bronze Age artifact from Yakutia which is most unusual in form—the Ukulan sword, which has no analogue in the West—recalls one more group of articles characteristic of the Chinese Bronze Age. Among the Yin objects, we find peculiar daggers with wide leaf-shaped blades of excellent dark green nephrite set into metal handles decorated in the Yin style, or inlaid with turquoise. In principle, despite certain individual differences, these daggers are prototypes of the Ukulan sword. Certain details of the Ukulan artifact which directly connect it with the Chinese daggers are especially indicative. In this artifact, the method of joining the blade with the handle, for example, deserves attention. In the Yin daggers, the leaf-shaped blade is set into a special depression in the handle, a socket, as is entirely natural in combining the brittle stone Fig. 49. Bronze celts from China and eastern Siberia. t, 3—China, Yin Dynasty; 2—Proninnaya River in Vitim Basin; 4—casting-mold for making celts, village of Sokolovo on the Angara; 5—Yenisey Valley. IAI

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

with tough and sturdy metal. In the Ukulan sword, on the other hand, hilt and blade are alike made of metal, but, despite this, they are also united by means of a specially-made opening in the handle, a socket which is not found in the artifacts of the steppe cultures of Siberia and eastern Europe, and which has no technical utility whatever. Another feature of the Ukulan sword is no less specific—the presence of inlay in the ornamental openings of its hilt. This feature, in turn, sets it sharply apart from the steppe artifacts of the Bronze Age, where we do not even know of anything similar, and at the same time puts it alongside analogous Yin objects whose handles are covered with inlay. The difference here, however, lies in the fact that the ancient Chinese artisan used a precious mineral, while the founder from the taiga used for the inlay a local material, with which he was accustomed to caulk his birchbark boats and to cover the seams of sewn birchbark vessels. Despite this, the artifacts which he made had in their own way a stylish and even imposing aspect. A number of peculiarities of the Ukulan dagger, it is true, indicates its more recent origin relative to the Chinese prototype of Yin times. But this does not deprive them of signs of mutual similarity, which show that, even in the course of further development, the features borrowed from archaic China were not obliterated and did not completely disappear, but were transformed, and appeared in combination with certain new indices. On the basis of what has been presented above, we may draw certain general conclusions. The first phase of the development of Yakutian Bronze Age culture must be considered in connection with the mutual relations which developed between the local tribes and their nearest neighbors, the people of the Glazkovo period dwelling on the upper Lena and their kinsmen on the Angara and Selenga. The first metal artifacts of the simplest form, in all probability, came to the Yakutian territory from these tribes; the rudiments of metallurgy and metal-working technology were diffused through them to the north. But as the contacts of China with the surrounding barbaric tribes expanded, in the middle or toward the end of the Yin Dynasty, Chinese influence also penetrated toward the north. The signs of similarity of the bronze objects of Yakutia with the Yin articles—not to mention such indubitable imports (in the true sense of this term) as the Chou-style vessel from the Vilyuy—are a clear expression of this. We should also note the fact that the connection of the most ancient copper and bronze metallurgy in the east with the Chinese is also partly reflected in linguistic data—in the common origin of terms denoting tin, copper, bronze, and artifacts made from these. The Chinese word for coin (chou) (P. Popov 1879) has an analogue in the Yakut chaa, "copper oxide," and d'es, "red copper" (Pekarskiy 1907-30; #3586). The Chinese designation for tin, ch'ina, and the Yakut chan, "bronze," are close to these terms. Developing, of course, with the mediation of numerous other tribes, 182

Connections between Bronze Age and Other Cultures and under some influence of the higher culture of archaic China, where the state had already come into existence and where writing was developing, the Bronze Age culture of the northern tribes was by no means a mere repetition of finished models. It was the consequence of creative reworking of these. More than this, it combined, in its later development, ancient Chinese and many other influences which penetrated to it from the neighboring forest tribes of western Siberia and the Cis-Baykal, in immediate contact with the pastoral tribes of Mongolia, the Minusinsk district of western Siberia, and eastern Europe. This was an extraordinarily interesting period, in a cultural-historical sense, during which a basically uniform culture of Scytho-Sarmatian type was formed over vast steppe territories, among steppe tribes differing in language and origin; this culture combined profound influences of Iran, the Near East, and the Graeco-Roman classical world (Kiselev 1952; S. I. Rudenko 1953). In the culture of the taiga tribes, on its true native foundation, there were laid down, therefore, various traces of influence and of interaction with the inhabitants of the steppe, and, through them, with more distant neighbors. These cultural contacts enriched the culture of the forest tribes of the north and promoted its progressive development. It is no less important that the dwellers in the North did not limit themselves to their own territory, but sometimes went outside it (as they had done earlier during the Stone Age) to a broader arena, and somehow or other, as far as they were able, participated in the course of historical events taking place in other parts of the Old World, particularly in the northern and northeastern ones. Consequently, we must not exaggerate the primordial character and primitiveness of the forest tribes. Their culture is certainly very archaic in many respects, but, as a whole, it is by no means as simple or as primordial as might be supposed at first impression. Archaeological data relating to the remote antiquity of the tribes of distant Yakutia thus demonstrate again and again that not only was there no absolute isolation of certain peoples from others, but also that the acquisition of world culture is a common achievement of all humanity and not the exclusive achievement of certain "chosen" races and peoples.

183

SECTION TWO THE SPREAD OF IRON ON THE MIDDLE LENA

The Appearance of Iron on the Lena

Chapter 1

Over the course of many centuries, humanity knew only one basic metal from which weapons and tools were made: copper; and, later, its alloy with tin: bronze. In the long period following the discovery of copper and bronze, men discovered in full the qualities of this material which were useful under their [cultural] conditions and took comprehensive advantage of them. Much time passed before iron began to be used in Egypt for the making of swords and spearheads, and before it entered into daily life as a tool metal. The same was the case in other advanced countries of the East. The wide use of iron begins in the major cultural centers of the ancient world only in the 12th-14th centuries s.c. Iron penetrated to the remaining countries later. It appeared in western Europe not before the IIth century B.C. In eastern Europe, in the steppes of southern Russia, on the Volga and Kama, it became known two to three hundred years later, and ancient China became acquainted with iron even later than eastern Europe, by at least two or three hundred years. The first mention of the wide distribution of iron artifacts that we find in Chinese historical writings dates from the third century s.c., only about twenty-two hundred years ago. About the same time, iron "conquers" bronze in the Minusinsk district on the upper Yenisey. If iron spread so late in Europe, in the southern steppes of Siberia, and even in China, long famous for its high and ancient culture, what must be said of the regions located in the north of Asia—to the north and east of the Yenisey, the Selenga, and Lake Baykal, in the taiga of the Cis-Baykal, on the upper Lena, and particularly in the Yakutian taiga, in the forested tundra and tundra along the shores of the Arctic Ocean? According to a view which, until recently, was widespread, even on the Cis-Baykal adjacent to Yakutia, where cultural development took place under more favorable conditions and at a more rapid pace, the transition from stone to metal was severely delayed, and as a consequence of the absence of a local Bronze Age culture, was reflected in the immediate replacement of stone tools by iron ones. Such a leap across 185

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an entire cultural-historical epoch was called forth, so it was alleged, by the appearance of a new population in the Cis-Baykal region. It was supposed that some horde of nomads, as the result of a bloody struggle with other victorious hordes,. was pushed to the north, and brought with it the knowledge of how to extract and work iron. The native Neolithic population, in turn, was partly exterminated and partly pushed deeper into the forest, or was assimilated by the newcomers; it was subjected to their power, was combined with them, and, as a result, adopted a new culture. All this was supposed to have occurred not earlier than one thousand to fifteen hundred years ago. However, such a viewpoint was not supported by arguments of any weight, and was subsequently refuted by new investigations on the Angara and upper Lena. The results of the latter are now highly significant for the solution of the question of the original spread of iron to the north; most probably it penetrated into Yakutia from the Cis-Baykal, down the Lena Valley. How it actually happened is shown by some remarkable archaeological sites of the upper Lena, which place the history of the spread of iron in eastern Siberia in an entirely new light, and along with this the daily life and culture of the local population in the Early Iron Age. In 1928, there was accidently dug up, at the village of Kachug, an ancient burial covered with stones, similar to those of the Neolithic. The surviving grave furnishings included bone objects, among them pendants of boar tusks for horse-trappings, similar to the Scythian harness ornaments from the Altay, an angular pipe of bone which served as a bridle ornament, and a Scythian bone psalia1° [curb bit], of archaic type, which can be dated to the 7th-5th centuries a.c. This find dates from a very early period, when iron had only recently appeared in the south of Russia, in the Black Sea steppes, and when the early Scythian Bronze Age culture prevailed over the entire territory of Siberia, including the Altay, and iron objects probably penetrated only occasionally into Siberia. Yet, it is nevertheless interesting, because it clearly points to contacts between the forested Cis-Baykal and the Scythian or Scytho-Sacian cultures to the West from whence spread the acquaintance with iron into Siberia. These contacts continued to develop and strengthen in the succeeding period, when iron spread everywhere in the steppe regions of Siberia, shown by the relics of art considered in the preceding chapter. Most of these relics, as we have seen, date from the period when iron was gradually becoming the basis of technology in the advanced regions of Europe and Asia. In the north of our country, we must assume, the Bronze Age was still in force at this time, and, still farther north, toward the shores of Bering Strait, the Stone Age prevailed. Another burial, also discovered in the vicinity of Kachug, at the village of Belousovo, dates from the same period. It is remarkable in that, contrary to the usual idea about the backwardness of forest tribes, it testifies to the wide distribution of iron, not only among the steppe pastoralists, but also among the forest hunters of the Cis-Baykal taiga. The burial was under a small accumulation of stones, which took the 186

The Appearance of Iron form of a double ring of red sandstone slabs placed on edge. The skeleton of an adult man lay on its back in a folded position, that is with knees bent. The skeleton's head was turned toward the southeast. With the skeleton, there were found bone plates which had served as braces for a composite bow: one central, of crescent form, and four terminal, with grooves for the bowstring, a pair for each end. In shape they represent a further development of the older braces from burials of the Late Bronze Age on the Angara. Also, the Belousovo braces are closest to analogous artifacts from burials of the first few centuries A.D. in Kirgizia and eastern Europe, and to western sites contemporary with them. Identical finds have been made to the east of the upper Lena, still closer to the Belousovo burial, in the Gunni [Kung-ni, Kuni] burials and slab graves of the Trans-Baykal. In its construction, the Belousovo bow is the same as the ScythoSarmatian one described by Ammianus Marcellinus.* This bow, "being on all sides surrounded by antler, is similar to the moon in its last quarter," while in the center, as in the Belousovo bow, "there are a straight and a round plate" (Latyshev 1904: 328; Anuchin 1887; LappoDanilevskiy 1887). The typologically characteristic bone arrowheads also correspond to the composite bow from the Belousovo burial. One of them reproduces accurately the usual Scythian arrowheads cast from copper or bronze. The Scytho-Sarmatian arrowheads closest to it are absent during the period of the development of Scythian culture in European Russia, from the 7th to the end of the 6th century B.C., and attain wide distribution only at the end of the 6th and in the first decades of the 5th century (Grakov 1930: 49). After the beginning of our era, points of this type disappear, giving place to arrowheads of entirely new types, well known in eastern Siberia from the Gunni burials of the Trans-Baykal. These are still narrow, heavy, three-sided points; however, they are no longer of bronze or bone, but of iron, and hafted rather than socketed (Bernshtam 1935: 231, 232; Fig. lo). Contemporaneously, the same kind of replacement took place on the Volga and Don. The button, or pendant, with a transverse bar inside for suspension, cast from light-colored golden bronze, which was found near the skeleton, also shows close similarity to the steppe artifacts of the Bronze and Early Iron Ages. In Siberia, Mongolia, and northern China, such pendants are known as early as during the Karasuk period. They become common later in the burials of the developed Bronze and Iron Ages in the Altay, Minusinsk kray, and in the Trans-Baykal. They are equally widespread at this time to the west, in eastern Europe and the Caucasus. In the grave at Belousovo there were also found foreign glass artifacts, in the form of two beads of dark blue glass. But the most remarkable object among the ornaments is a large round bead of stone incrusted with glass and paste. By its general character, this bead is most reminiscent of the ancient Chinese beads from Lo-yang, the capital of the Late Chou * [Ammianus Marcellinus (ca. A.D. 330 to ca. A.D. 400, Roman historian known for his social history of the Later Empire. Editor, A.I.N.A.]

187

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period, dating to about 25o e.c. Even though these beads were made in China, their prototypes are found to the west, in the Mediterranean region, and especially in Egypt. The only iron object in the burial—a knife, or dagger, 25 cm long— also points westward. Its dimensions and position—not in the pelvic region but by the side of the skeleton, on the right thigh, as if in a belt—recalls the Scythian short sword, the akinak. Among the Scythians, the akinak was usually located on the right thigh and was turned with its blade toward the left thigh. Arrowheads in the graves of the Scythians also are positioned on the left side of the skeleton. They are represented thus on Scythian statues (A. Miller 5925). Such is the position of the weapons in the burial at the village of Belousovo. There is nothing accidental about this astonishing coincidence between whole artifact complexes (and not just certain individual chance finds) from ancient burials discovered on the upper Lena, and the classical sites of Scytho-Sarmatian times (not so much in Siberia as in the very heart of the culture of the Scythians and Sarmatians in the south of Russia, on the Don and in the Black Sea region). It is clear that these were not Scythian steppe dwellers who had emigrated to the upper Lena. The man buried here was not even a steppe pastoralist, like the inhabitants of the Altay, the Minusinsk district, and the Trans-Baykal. His equipment and the structure of the grave show pronounced local elements deriving from the distant past of this forest region. The bow has as its prototype the bows from the slab-lined graves of the Trans-Baykal and from the burial on the river Tsepan in the Angara taiga; some of the arrowheads derive directly from analogous artifacts in the aforementioned burial. The stonework atop the skeleton may be regarded as a further transformation of the very ancient grave structures found everywhere in the Neolithic of the Cis-Baykal. The burial ritual, and, in part, the inventory accompanying the dead man, reflect, as before, features of an ancient and distinct way of life, which is probably still that of unmounted hunters and fishermen, and which is well known from materials in sites of the local Bronze Age and the Neolithic in all its phases. Yet, there can be no doubt that the Scythians, or, more accurately, the Scytho-Sarmatian culture of southern Russia and the neighboring regions of eastern Europe, directly or indirectly exercised some influence on the distant forest tribes of Siberia, tribes entirely unknown to Herodotus and his local informants, who lived on the shores of the Black Sea. This influence came by way of the inhabitants of the mountainous Altay, who were in contact with the Scytho-Sacian cultural world. This influence was so profound that the forest tribes of the Cis-Baykal acquired armaments of Scythian type and the same type of ornaments as could easily be found among any steppe tribe of the Black Sea region. Even such common objects as arrowheads, made by them from local materials—bone and antler—were fashioned according to established Scythian models, not departing from them by a hair's breadth, even in details. The local population of the taiga regions immediately adjacent to 588

The Appearance of Iron steppe areas quite probably felt a still more profound influence of the steppe tribes in the field of art and esthetic tastes. This is indicated already by early objects, apparently horse-trappings, from the burial at Staryy [Old] Kachug, and also by the later bronze objects (already mentioned) from the cache found near the village of Biryulskoye [Biryulka], upstream from Kachug. There is one more remarkable find—a large sword from the region of Kirensk, exceptional of its type for its perfection of form and richness of finish, and also for its dimensions. Its length is 76.5 cm. The iron blade of the sword is separated from the bronze handle by a crosspiece. This is heart-shaped and represents one of the variants of the characteristic butterfly-shaped crosspieces of the Bronze or Early Iron Age daggers of Siberia. The massive hilt of the sword, flat and wide, is decorated with incised linear ornamentation. The butt of the Kirensk sword represents a metamorphosed form of the common butts of Scythian swords, which took the form of two heads of birds of prey or figures of beasts facing each other. But on the Kirensk sword they are in such stylized form that the original model can no longer be determined. The ornamentation of the sword hilt reveals close similarity to that of the Scythian sword (Fig. 5o). Iron swords of Scytho-Sarmatian type, with bronze butts, are also known from other places in Siberia, including the taiga regions to the west of the Yenisey. They have been found, for example, in the trove of Ishim, in Achinsk rayon of Krasnoyarsk kray. However, the sword from Kirensk is older than the swords or daggers from the Ishim trove; its crosspiece, and the general outlines of its blade, directly reproduce the swords from Kanev and Zhuravka, and other typically Scythian artifacts of this kind, dating from the 5th and 4th centuries B.c. Swords with this type of hilt constitute a special group; they are very widespread—from the lower Dnieper to the middle Volga; they are also found in Orenburg oblast, and it is here that they reveal the greatest similarity to the swords and daggers of the Minusinsk district. The closest analogues to this sword, found far to the north and east of all other representatives of this group, are thus not the Minusinsk finds, but the western ones of southern Russia. This similarity is so great that the Lena sword must be considered the handiwork of Scythians of southern Russia, brought thence to the Lena, or at the very least [must be] an exact copy of one of the southern Russian Scythian swords of the 5th and 4th centuries B.C. All these facts, indicating the spread of artifacts of purely Scythian type in the north and east of Siberia, as far as the middle Lena, obviously find their explanation in the rather profound and intensive contacts that were already taking place between the local population and the ScythoSarmatian tribes of the Urals and eastern Europe, and, through them, with Iran and the Mediterranean. The contacts with another cultural center of antiquity, namely China, strengthened only at the beginning of our era. As shown earlier, China had a significant influence on the Bronze Age cultures of eastern Siberia. 189

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.1

9

Fig. 50. Iron swords of the Scythian period. i—Scythian iron sword with bronze handle, southern Russia; 2, 2a—iron sword with bronze handle, Lena River near Kirensk; 3, 4—handles of Scythian swords, southern Russia. The role of the forest tribes in these contacts was determined by the fact that they supplied the steppe dwellers with the chief wealth of their bleak regions—valuable furs. This is indirectly shown by all the later written sources, which tell of traditional contacts between the steppe pastoralists and their neighbors, the taiga hunters, who brought from their forests the precious furs of "black sables" and "blue squirrels." The contacts of the Lena tribes, by way of the tribes of western Siberia and the Altay, with the Scythian West, that is, eastern Europe, began in very early times, when Scythian culture had traversed only the first and most elementary phases of its development. These contacts continued without weakening, and at times even grew stronger, during a later 190

The Appearance of Iron period, up to the time to which the Belousovo burial dates. The obvious preponderance of elements of Scytho-Sarmatian culture in the inventory of this burial indicates that this site precedes in time the later reinforcement of contacts with China, which date to approximately the and century B.C. This dating is confirmed, and established more precisely to the turn of the 3rd century B.c., by arrowheads and other objects from the Belousovo burial. This period is a chronological boundary, the [upper] limit of which marks a new industrial era, that of the complete dominance of iron tools and weapons on the upper Lena. As in the neighboring steppe regions, these tools still imitated the old models inherited from the Bronze Age, but now were made completely of iron, and by the methods of the new blacksmithing technology. In this connection, it is especially important that now the iron artifacts were not only brought in from outside but also were fashioned on the spot from local iron ores. Traces of ancient workings and foundry furnaces show that the obtaining of iron from local raw material was now being developed for the first time on the Lena, just as in the Altay and the Minusinsk district. For example, not far from Kachug, at the village of Anginskoye [Anga], there are numerous traces of iron ore mining pits, and also traces of foundries. Near the pits there was found an iron dagger of archaic type, having much in common with similar artifacts of the Early Iron Age in the Minusinsk district and the Altay. The celts—wedge-shaped iron axes, socketed for handles, reproducing exactly the traditional forms of bronze celts—must belong to the same period. One of these iron axes turned up at a campsite near the village of Smolenshchina, near Irkutsk. In connection with everything which has been said above, let us recall the find of the horse harness at Staryy Kachug. The latter find was so unexpected that, at first, there was an attempt to explain it as a part of a reindeer harness, but it later became clear that this was not so. From the above it follows that the riding horse appeared early in the taiga nearest to the steppe. However, early acquaintance with the horse and with riding must have had considerably greater significance for the forest tribes in an entirely different connection. There is reason to suppose that, although the Kachug burial contained horse rather than reindeer trappings, the find nevertheless bears an extremely close relation to the question of the origin of reindeer-herding in the taiga. In their constant clashes with mounted steppe warriors, the forest dwellers could be easily convinced of the superiority of these over archers on foot. At the same time, the forest tribes, imitating the steppe dwellers, could pass over gradually, under these conditions, to the acquisition of their own riding animals, even more swift-footed than horses, and, at the same time, ideally adapted to movement through the taiga. Such an animal proved to be the reindeer. Available data testify to the relatively late origin of saddle reindeerbreeding and to its genetic connection with horse-breeding, and confirm that this most important event was consummated in the zone of contact 191

THE SPREAD OF IRON ON THE MIDDLE LENA

between the forest hunting tribes and the steppe pastoralists, most probably in the region of the Baykal Mountains and the Sayan Upland, and probably not before the penetration of iron into these areas. The widespread acquisition of iron, and the probable origin of reindeerbreeding in the taiga, are the most important events which took place in the Early Iron Age among the forest tribes of eastern Siberia, and were destined to call forth further profound consequences in their lives. To understand more fully the historical conditions under which the first acquaintance of the forest tribes with iron took place, and the paths by which it penetrated northward, we must pause to consider a most recent archaeological discovery in the Cis-Baykal region, near the road leading out of the Angara Valley to the headwaters of the Lena River, the old Yakutian Highway. In 1952, while inspecting cliff drawings and a fortified site on Mankhay Mountain, I discovered structures unusual for the forested Cis-Baykal. These consisted of vertical slabs of red sandstone, sunk into the ground in the form of rectangular boxes or enclosures, very close in construction and form to the slab graves of the Trans-Baykal. Two such structures are located on the flat top of Mankhay Mountain, at its very edge; others are found on its slope, in a small saddle at the foot of a steep talus slope, formed from the destruction of the cliff-like ledge of the mountain. Here there were found about ten structures of similar type. Mankhay Mountain is located in the picturesque steppe valley of the Kuda River, not far from the village of Ust-Ordynskiy [about 75 km north of Irkutsk]. Its slopes descend precipitously on the west to the Kuda River. To the west of the Kuda, there are wooded elevations; to the east, beyond the Murin River, lie the Onotskaya Heights and the Baykal Ranges, which divide Lake Baykal from the Kuda Valley with its steppe lands—an oasis, lost in the limitless taiga. Up to this time, the nearest graves similar to the slab graves of the Trans-Baykal were known only from Olkhon Island and the adjacent parts of the western shore of Lake Baykal, in Elantsy rayon near the village of Tyrgan, where they were first excavated in 1881 by Kopernitskiy, under the direction of N. I. Agapitov. He found nothing but disturbed bones of a man, charcoal, and a perforated piece of mica (Agapitov 1882: 18; Khoroshikh 1924: 24). In 1922, P. P. Khoroshikh found such graves in the same rayon, near the ulus [village] of arma (Okladnikov 1937: 283, Fig. II)." Excavation of t.le rectangular slab structures on Mankhay Mountain showed that they actually are analogous to the slab graves of the TransBaykal. Their ex:avation makes it clear that in the 3rd century B.c., or at the very beginning of the 2nd century s.c., when iron arrowheads of the Gunni type—three-sided, with hafts—were already widespread in the Trans-Baykal steppes, there were people living in the Kuda Valley, around Mankhay, who had the same material culture and the same pastoral economy as their contemporaries beyond Lake Baykal or on its shore, near Olkhon Island. They raised horses and sheep, used the distinct pottery of Trans-Baykal shapes, wore on their clothing hemispherical bronze 192

The Appearance of Iron plaques with flat borders ornamented with notches, had bows with bone braces, and bone and iron arrowheads similar to those of the TransBaykal (Fig. 55).

•

Fig. 51. Objects from the slab graves on Mankhay Mountain. i, 2, 5–bow-braces; 3–iron shaft of a point; 4–bone arrowhead; 6–cast bronze button. The most important point is that these people buried their dead in carefully constructed rectangular graves, delimited with vertical slabs of red sandstone. Just as in the steppes of Mongolia and Soviet TransBaykal, their cemeteries had the appearance of chain-links stretching from south to north, with the deceased oriented in the same way as in the Trans-Baykal—with heads to the east. As in the Trans-Baykal, these slab graves were built on the flat surfaces of elevations and at the feet of talus slopes. Thus, unlike the Belousovo burial, whose ritual features show that the person buried there was a representative of the indigenous population of the Cis-Baykal, the Mankhay Mountain burials show that they were left by a new immigrant tribe which appeared here from beyond Lake Baykal, or from its shores. They were clearly steppe pastoralists, kinsmen of those who left the Bronze Age and Early Iron Age slab graves in the steppes of Mongolia. It may be that the builders of the Mankhay slab graves brought with them to the west, to the Kuda Valley, not only their system of economy 193

THE SPREAD OF IRON ON THE \FIDDLE LENA

and daily life and their ancient customs. It is not impossible that, together with animal husbandry, they brought from east to west the seed of a typical steppe grass, darisun [feather grass], which gives such a characteristic appearance to the landscapes of the Trans-Baykal outside the limits of the taiga forests. We do not know what caused the migration of this colony of TransBaykal steppe dwellers of the Early Iron Age into the Kuda Valley, through the mountain passes and swamps of the Baykal Range, what compelled them to go out of their native valleys to the northwest, into the country of .the forest tribes. It may have been the demand for new pastures which brought them there, the pastures on the bleak shores of Lake Baykal being insufficient for their rapidly increasing herds. Against this solution of the problem stands the fact that additional ancient slab graves of the Bronze Age have not been discovered in the Kuda Valley. The appearance of slab graves in the Cis-Baykal region, dating to the beginning of the Iron Age, points to yet another cause connected with the political events of this period, that is, the end of the 3rd and the beginning of the 2nd centuries B.C. As we know, great changes were taking place at this time in the territory of Mongolia and the neighboring regions of the Trans-Baykal. These were brought about by the rise of the Gunni and the development of their aggressive activity, including that directed northward to the Cis-Baykal. This period may have proved so difficult for the Selenga Valley tribes (probably the ancestors of the Uygurs), that some of them may have left their native nomadizing territories and gone further north under the pressure of the invaders. This event occurred most probably at the time of the greatest northward expansion of the Gunni hordes under the Shan-yueh Mo-teh, when apparently there arose the fortified Gunni settlement on the Ivolga River, near present-day Ulan-Ude, which served as their northern outpost. In any case, one thing is clear: at the very end of the first millennium s.c., the ancient pastoralists, who left behind them in the steppes of the Trans-Baykal such characteristic monumental structures as the slab graves, overcame all the obstacles standing in their way, and migrated into the Kuda Valley, together with their animals. This advance was undoubtedly prepared for by previous connections of the steppe tribes with the CisBaykal, and by the fact that these tribes must have had some idea about this region, and perhaps had already been there. The appearance on the Kuda, and perhaps even farther west of Lake Baykal, of natives of the Trans-Baykal steppe lands, would not have been without effect on the subsequent destiny and culture of the native population of these parts.

194

The First Blacksmiths on the Middle Lena

Chapter

2

Since iron first became known on the upper Lena, around Kachug and Verkholensk, it is natural that it soon penetrated farther to the north, into those regions where a distinct Bronze Age culture had long ago developed, and where general methods of metallurgical production had become firmly established; this provided the medium for transition to a new stage of metal technology. In fact, we now know that the ancient tribes of Yakutia, in the first millennium B.c., did not remain at the level of the Bronze Age. During a survey in the vicinity of the Sangary coal pits and the workers' settlement of Sangary near the mouth of the small river Yuyuke, there were discovered several ancient settlements, or, to be more accurate, separate accumulations of cultural remains. Each of these isolated points constituted a temporary camp of wandering hunters and fishermen, probably from a neighboring urasa The finds are most frequently encountered on a bend of the Yuyuke, half a kilometer from its mouth, on the left bank. They are scattered on both sides of a small ravine which descends to the valley of the river, and are distributed in three or four spots where the tents of the ancient inhabitants of this temporary settlement may once have stood. Here there were found fragments of clay vessels similar to those found at the campsite near the village of Pokrovskoye and dated to the end of the Bronze Age. With these, there turned up occasionally small stones— river pebbles with traces of chipping—reminiscent of the fact that to the very end of the Bronze Age stone scrapers, arrowheads, and knives were made on the middle Lena. (Fig. 52). However, together with these finds of very ancient appearance, there also were found a few pieces of slag—a resulting from the smelting of iron. At the very edge of the 10-12 m floodplain terrace, along the precipitous and constantly eroded bank of the Lena, was discovered still another settlement, and, in its culture-yielding stratum, fragments of clay vessels. On the smooth surface of some sherds one can see short hatchmarks located perpendicularly to the ornamental bands. In a number of cases • [Urara, a tent village of the Yakuts. Editor, A.I.N.A.]

195

The First Blacksmiths these hatchmarks cross each other. These marks were made by striking the exterior surface with a special grooved paddle. The forms of the vessels were the same as in the Bronze Age: they had round bases, convex bodies, and rather pronounced, narrow necks. Their ornamentation was also very similar to that of the Bronze Age. A small flat pebble of green jasper-like slate was found nearby, from one side of which a part of the natural surface had been removed by a few purposeful and technically careful blows. This means that the technique of working stone had not died out, but had retained its already ancient methods of primary processing, purely Neolithic in their sophistication. One additional find was all-important: with the chipped pebble and the potsherds there was found a small iron artifact—a small awl. However modest these finds may be, their significance for the history of the culture of the northern tribes is very great. They show that at the mouth of Yuyuke River, as in other places where similar objects were found, there lived people whose culture in many aspects dates to the very end of the local Bronze Age. But they already knew iron, and knew how to forge it, and even how to smelt it from ore. These were the first smelters of the Lena iron ores, and the first blacksmiths of Yakutia. The Early Iron Age culture in Yakutia is consequently of a rather early date. It probably started soon after the first appearance of local iron artifacts on the upper Lena, about the ist century A.D., that is, at least one thousand years earlier than was previously supposed. In any case, iron appeared among the northern tribes on the middle Lena long before the arrival of the first representatives of the Turkicspeaking tribes. This is also shown by the difference in the designations for this metal. All Turkic-speaking people, not excluding the Yakuts, call iron by the word temir or timir (Radlov 1893-1909: III, [ 19o5] 1134) Among the Tungusic tribes, iron is called by a completely different name, sel or khele (Vasilevich 1934: 82).18 The Yukagirs also have their own terms for iron (ludul), the blacksmith (lundun nuyl choromo, that is, "a person who works iron"), and the bellows (nyyne, "blowing-things"). It is quite probable that not only the Evenkis and the Evens, but also the ancient Yukagirs, were to some degree acquainted with iron, and had mastered the technology of working it at a relatively distant time, probably when they were still living on the middle Lena. Another circumstance is no less important: just as in the Cis-Baykal, the local Iron Age culture in Yakutia developed directly out of the Bronze Age culture. Here the Bronze Age people were also the direct descendants of the local tribes of the preceding epoch and the heirs to their culture. Having become acquainted with iron through their southern neighbors, they rather quickly mastered the methods of obtaining this metal from ore, and mastered also the art of smithing. In any case, in the earliest phase of the Iron Age, about the middle of the first millennium A.D., the Fig. 52. Finds on Yuyuke River. i, 3 and 4 to 9–pottery; 2, iron awl; to–chipped pebble. 197

THE SPREAD OF IRON ON THE MIDDLE LENA

art of smelting iron from ore, and of forging it, was diffused not only close to the southern borders of northern Yakutia, but also far to the north, reaching to Bulun and Chokurovka on the lower Lena. In 1941, near the village of Mukhtuya, close to the bank of the Lena, there were discovered the remains of the dwelling of an ancient smelter who extracted iron from ore and processed it in his workshop. The furnace, of which only the remains of the lining were preserved, was of very small dimensions; in shape it resembled a large round-bottomed pot, in which ore reduced to powder was put in layers interspersed with charcoal, and fed with air from hand-bellows. The iron accumulated on the bottom of the furnace in the form of a lump of pig iron with a flat upper surface and a convex lower one. Such pig iron, broken into pieces as a result of improper smelting, lay around the remains of the furnace. To judge by the miniature size of the pigs, which are several times smaller than the Yakut pigs, called bolguo, no more iron was smelted in one firing at the Mukhtuya foundry than was needed for the making of a few arrowheads and knives or one spearhead or axe. With the pig iron fragments there were found finished examples of the blacksmith's skill—three iron arrowheads, one of them intact. Further excavations at Mukhtuya turned up flint chips, and one large flint arrowhead of Neolithic type, worked on both sides, in the form of an equilateral triangle with a concave base. Stone arrowheads of ancient type, as well as scrapers, were retained longest and most stubbornly, because people preferred to use metal for cutting and chopping tools. Thus they survived until iron points became widespread. The inhabitants of the Mukhtuya camp, founders and blacksmiths, must have been at the same time rather skilled craftsmen in stone, and must have remained in command of the ancient technology of the Stone Age. Something similar could be observed in the northeast of Siberia in most recent times (Bilibin 1934) . At Paren (a settlement of the maritime Koryaks, on the road from Gizhiga to the Anadyr [River], Kamchatka, and the coast of the Bering Sea), one could see, until recently, local blacksmiths, who furnished their products, chiefly knives, to the area around Penzhinskaya Guba [Bay], as far north as the Anadyr and the Kolyma [rivers]. Yet the same Koryak households used a large number of stone tools—scrapers, spear and harpoon points made of fine-grained diabase. The Koryak elders explained that stone harpoon points and spearheads were used, despite the presence of iron and the knowledge of how to forge it, because of their special qualities, which metal points do not possess: a stone spear, with its fractures and barbs, inflicts a more Fig. 53. Finds in Mukhtuya and Sikteekh. I, 3—iron arrowheads, Mukhtuya; 2— fragment of clay vessel, Mukhtuya; 4—clay vessel; 5, 7—fragments of clay vessels, Sikteekh on the lower Lena; 6—kuochay, (a stone scraper), Sikteekh. 198

1

iv

THE SPREAD OF IRON ON THE MIDDLE LENA

dangerous wound than a smooth iron spear; a wound from the latter was supposed to get filled with fat. In distinction from the Koryak smiths, the inhabitant of the Mukhtuya camp worked not with imported raw material, but with his own; he was a full and independent master of his craft, carrying out personally the smelting and subsequent processing of the metal. The arrowheads that he made were no worse than similar artifacts made at that time in other parts of Siberia (Fig. 53). Such artifacts were found at the ancient sacrificial place near the village of Ishimka, in the former Achinsk uyezd, together with three-sided bronze points of late Scythian form (Yermolayev 1914: Plate 2, Figs. 6, q, 12). The Ishimka finds are dated by the artifacts of late Scythian type, the Chinese mirrors of the Han Dynasty, and objects of the Pyanobor type, brought from the Urals. All are datable approximately to the ist and 2nd centuries A.D. The iron arrowheads of this kind, discovered near the village of Pokrovka in Tyukhtetsk rayon (also in the Achinsk region), in a "trove," apparently at a sacrificial place, date to a considerably later period than those of Ishimka. The absence of bronze arrowheads, the new types of three-sided iron ones, the decline of figured castings, and the presence of the single-bladed palash [broadsword]—a predecessor of the later sabre which replaced the ancient swords—all indicate a date of the 6th to 8th centuries A.D. The date of the Mukhtuya finds is close to this period. Together with the more ancient Ishimka specimens, the iron arrowheads from Mukhtuya and Pokrovka are undoubtedly the original models, from which there developed with time the arrowheads of refined outline, frequently covered with a fine, stamped pattern, which were widespread, up to the t9th century, among the forest tribes of Siberia. The Mukhtuya settlement is [not] the only one on the middle Lena, nor the northernmost one of its time on the territory of the present-day Yakut Republic. A whole series of such settlements, reaching to the Arctic Circle and still further north, up to 7r ° N. latitude, to the contemporary fishing village of Chokurovka, already mentioned in describing the Neolithic sites of the Far North, is being discovered. This is the area within which is situated the northernmost group of ancient settlements in the Lena Valley. One of the most interesting settlements of this type in the Far North of Yakutia was found near the village of Sikteekh, with which we are already acquainted (Fig. 54). The local reindeer-herders have long gathered at Staryy [Old] Sikteekh in the spring, for fishing and the hunting of migrant aquatic birds. Staryy Sikteekh was one of the most important centers of temporary settlement for the local population on the lower Lena. Also, Staryy Sikteekh was the starting point of the main trail from the Lena to the Olenek, and farther westward. As late as the i7th century, the service gentry and traders preferred to cross to the Olenek overland from Sikteekh. To do this, they sailed down the Lena to the mouth of the Moloda [Molodo?] and thence crossed on sleds over the Fig. 54. Early Iron Age pottery from Sikteekh on the lower Lena. 200

MI1 ile4

THE SPREAD OF IRON ON THE MIDDLE LENA

mountain range to the Olenek, the trip taking ten days (Bakhrushin 1926: 129). The significance of Sikteekh in this regard is also reflected in the local folklore. According to one of the variants of the legend of the fight between the khosun Yunkebil and his rival, Chempere, Yunkebil's brother came to Sikteekh from the Olenek to find out about the Nuchalar (that is, Russians) who had appeared on the Lena, but was caught and detained there. Surprised and dismayed by the loss of his brother, Yunkebil himself came to Sikteekh and saved him. But during this time, Chempere appeared at Yunkebil's camp on the Olenek, and killed the brother of the Olenek khosun and smith, who had remained there.19 Archaeological finds have confirmed the importance of Sikteekh (attributed to it by the folklore data) in the life of the ancient population of the northern districts of Yakutia. Here were found traces of the activity of such Far Northern smiths as the legendary brother of the khosun Yunkebil. These finds may perhaps date from the period when the "khosun epic" developed in its original form, striking in its primitiveness and in the archaic features of life and world-view of its heroes. Remains of an Early Iron Age culture have been discovered at Staryy Sikteekh, at the same place where traces of an earlier Bronze Age culture were found, but at a considerably lesser depth of 35-40 cm from the surface. They were here connected with two special residential complexes. The first consisted of a number of small sandstone slabs, located in a semicircle in one horizontal layer. With the sandstone slabs, there were potsherds and fragments of round charred stakes, similar to the poles of an urasa, and pieces of birchbark rolled into tubes. All of these may have remained at the location of a temporary dwelling, an urasa: the stakes made up its frame, and the birchbark was the usual covering for such a dwelling, while the stones protected it from beneath, pressing the birchbark to the ground. At another place, a different complex was seen—the bones of animals and fish lay in a solid stratum in a small hollow. The central place among these was occupied by the skull and other bones of a reindeer. Here there were also found fragments of the long leg bones, chongku. Some of them bore 'traces of blows, delivered not by a blunt stone implement but by a sharp metal one. Among the fish bones, which made up the basic mass of the accumulation, there could be discerned the bones of a large pike and a sterlet. Besides bones, the accumulation contained pieces of birchbark, sometimes sewn and covered with birch resin at the seams. Individual accumulations of the hollow bones of birds, swans, or wild geese, were distributed over the entire territory of the settlement. They were deposited very thickly, as if they had been carefully laid in a small pit dug for that purpose. Similar accumulations of bird bones were found at Mukhtuya, near the Early Iron Age settlement. Other than fish and reindeer bones, numerous potsherds were found at Sikteekh. The pieces of birchbark which were found in the culturebearing layer were preserved in a thick deposit. Almost all of them have holes of irregular form and of differing size, and are apparently remnants of the birchbark coverings of dwellings. Other pieces of birchbark, 202

The First Blacksmiths coated with birch resin, may be the remains of birchbark vessels used to keep liquid, or of the covering of birchbark boats. Of special interest are the stone scrapers found here. They are of a special type, made from massive chips, split by a powerful lateral blow from the pebble, and not modified by later reworking. As a consequence of long use, their blades are much blunted and smoothed. Crude tools of the same type are used even at the present time in the north of Yakutia by the local Yakut reindeer-herders and Evens (Lamuts). They are made by splitting from a fresh pebble, with a strong lateral blow, a fragment of suitable size and shape. Further working is not necessary, and the tool is put to use immediately. Sometimes it is held directly in the hand, with the thick end pressed hard into the palm. In some cases, special wooden handles are used, in the form of short rods with a longitudinal groove. Such scrapers are called kuochay. They are used to scrape the flesh and sinew from the hide, and also to soften the hide (Levin 1936: 68). To the west of the Lena, such scrapers were retained in daily use by the Avam Samoyeds up to the middle of the t9th century (Middendorf 1878: Part II, sec. IV, 543). To the east of the Lena, this scraper has been noted among the Chukchis and Yukagirs. Among the Chukchis, it was the most important tool of the Stone Age after the hammer, and lasted until the end of the 19th century (Bogoraz 1899: 47). Among the Yukagirs, there was the kerdie, used by women for preparing hides—an instrument of the Stone Age, made from a flat sharp stone, set into a bent stick (used for scraping off fat, remains of sinew, and flesh). Whereas the Mukhtuya site gave us the first idea, both as to the character of metallurgical production and metal-working, the study of the settlement of Sikteekh thus introduces new data which reflect significant details of the material culture and way of life of its population. The settlements of this period, located along the Lena from the southern boundaries of the Yakut A.S.S.R. to its northernmost points, Sikteekh and Chokurovka, are distinguished over this whole immense distance by astonishing uniformity and stability of the finds, especially of pottery. In order to see this, it is sufficient to compare the materials of two sites—the camp of Mukhtuya and Staryy Sikteekh, located at opposite ends of the Lena Basin, one in the south, not far from Vitim, and the other beyond the Arctic Circle, on the approaches to the Arctic Ocean. In these sites, we observe not a mere similarity, but an almost complete identity of pottery, whose locations are separated from each other by a distance of 2,000-2,500 km. Brittle clay vessels could hardly have been transported over such long distances and have been the object of exchange. From this follows the conclusion that the inhabitants of the southern and northern districts of Yakutia in the Early Iron Age were connected by unity of culture and common origin. The inhabitants of all these camps occupied themselves chiefly with hunting and fishing. Along the lower reaches of the Lena, the chief game was the wild reindeer, but, at certain seasons of the year, fishing took on decisive importance (as is shown by the accumulation of fish bones at 203

THE SPREAD OF IRON ON THE MIDDLE LENA

Sikteekh), as did the hunting of aquatic birds. In such places as Staryy Sikteekh which were most convenient for fishing and wild fowl hunting, there existed a few camp settlements of a more permanent character; yet these were only seasonally occupied. Other settlements, as in the long-past Stone Age, constituted only points for the temporary halting of individual wandering groups of hunters of the taiga and forested tundra, moving about in endless "circular" routes in search of the wild reindeer, fish, or birds. This way of life fully corresponds to the remains of dwellings, discovered at Sikteekh, in the form of stone facings and coiled rolls of birchbark sheets, often with holes at the edges. The wandering hunters built light aboveground dwellings of the urasa or tent type, covered with birchbark, which could be taken easily from the stake frame of the dwelling, coiled into a roll, and carried along over great distances. This projection of a nomadic way of life is not contradicted by finds of clay vessels, since pots could be kept at the permanent halting places and seasonal camps, in special storage structures of the type of the modern log storehouse, or the more ancient labaz on piles. Or they could even be carried along. In any case, clay vessels, according to early [European] travellers, were present only two hundred years ago even among the wandering Tungus reindeer-herders, who do not possess them at the present time. Such vessels were used by them as smudge pots. The existence of clay vessels among the Evenkis in the recent past is confirmed by linguistic data: the native word boltoruk, meaning "clay pot." Like present-day forest hunters, the inhabitants of camps of the type of Sikteekh or Mukhtuya had a special attitude toward the animals and fish they bagged. At Staryy Sikteekh, the bones of fish and animals were found concentrated in one place, in a dense accumulation in which the vertebrae of the reindeer can be singled out. Obviously, the latter were laid out on purpose in anatomical order, along with the skull of the same animal. Similar accumulations of the bones of birds at both of the most important Lena sites of this type had the same character. These were not chaotic piles of "kitchen refuse," but the carefully buried remains of respected animals—true burials of game beasts and birds, the result of very ancient beliefs and magical ritual, whose sources lie far beyond the boundary of the age of metal, in the depths of the Stone Age. This character of the culture is strongly retained in later times, as is shown by the subsequent sites of the Iron Age in the Lena Valley, for example, in the locality of Chabyyda, south of Yakutsk, near Oktemtsy, in the locality of Ichchileekh, and at Chokurovka on the lower Lena. A distinguishing feature of these sites is the pottery represented by fragments of thin-walled clay vessels, decorated with sharp-edged slanting ridges, no longer imitating, as previously, tightly coiled ropes, but smooth ones. However, the form of the vessels remains round-based, as before. Iron tools have not yet been found in the sites of this phase. This means that iron was not thrown away, but was treasured, as it is now. But in determining the place of iron in the technology of the forest tribes of Yakutia in this period, considerable importance attaches to the circum204

The First Blacksmiths stance that, unlike the earlier sites of the type of the Mukhtuya encampment, all traces of large-scale working and use of stone for the manufacture of tools and weapons are lacking here; that is, there are neither flakes nor blanks. Stone had already been completely ousted at this time by a new universal material—iron. From now on, iron, and the technology of forging, permanently take over the central region of Yakutia and that part of the territory beyond the Arctic Circle, and near the Lena adjacent to it. The Stone Age continued, as before, only to the east of the Indigirka, and particularly in the coastal zone of the northeast; but, even there, individual iron tools began to appear occasionally during the Punuk and Birnirk phases. On the middle and lower Lena at this time, iron was not only worked with the hammer by the local smiths, but was smelted from local ores. Such relics of local metallurgy are the miniature smelting furnaces like those found on the Beris River and in the locality of KEstyuryuyungke, where the remains of blacksmiths' forges, built of several slabs and coated with clay, were also found. Such smithies existed recently, according to some scholars, among the Tokminsk Tungus and other Tungus groups of eastern Siberia. "In an auxiliary fashion, some Tungus engage in blacksmithing. The smithy is of the most primitive sort, in the open air near the yurt, and, among the Russians, two slabs and a forge are laid under an awning, and charcoal glows in a pit at the same place. The `blacksmiths' have little bellows, and each person has his own set of smithing tools. Every Tungus can provide for his own needs, but only a few can rebuild weapons or make vessels, and these who are called blacksmiths earn money through their work. Some know rather well how to make rings and earrings from copper and iron."20 About one hundred and fifty years ago, these blacksmiths, and the way of life with which they were associated, were excellently described by Afanasiy Shchekatov: Among the forest Tungus, there are smiths, but there are no other craftsmen of any kind. The anvil, hammer, file tongs, for which they barter as [they do] for the iron itself, with old fur clothes, with the Cossacks who gather the poll tax; the bellows of sealskin similar to ours, not excluding the bag of coal itself, do not usually weigh more than half a pud. Wherever it is necessary for them to work they put in one place several pieces of stone, and make a chimney out of clay for the bellows and forge sitting on the ground, spades, points for arrows, fire-strikers, knives, files, spears, tin idols, and the like, better than one would think possible (Shchekatov 1808: Part VI, 468; cf. Laptev 1851: 56). Blacksmiths' work of similar character existed during the 18th and 19th centuries among other northern tribes, not excluding the Entsy and Nganasans, the Ostyaks Khante, the Kets, and, finally, the Yukagirs (Latkin 1892: 123; Middendorf 1878: Part II, sec. IV, 667; sec. VI, 643, 777). Both the techniques, which, by their primitive nature, determined the general level of metallurgy, and the other features of the culture and 205

THE SPREAD OF IRON ON THE MIDDLE LENA

everyday life of the ancient settlements, including the round-bottomed pottery of archaic form of the Early Yakutian Iron Age, show that this population still retained uninterruptedly the traditions of preceding centuries and even millennia. The appearance of iron, and its widespread introduction into the life of the northern tribes, made little or no change in the basis of their economy and culture. Iron did not play the same revolutionary role which it did in many other countries of the Old World, where the appearance of the iron axe, plowshare, and sword led to important progress in the economy and the social structure (Tolstov 1946: 28, 29). The reason lies in the fact that the inhabitants of the bleak northern regions of Asia were not agriculturalists. The application of iron among them was limited to a far narrower sphere of productive processes. They did not build log houses, but lived as previously in their birchbark or skin tents, whose remains were found at Sikteekh. Iron tools did not, therefore, yield, in their case, perceptible and effective results. The early appearance of the iron sword on the Lena also had no important consequences. We know what significance iron weapons, and primarily the sword, acquired among the more advanced peoples of the world, where their heroic age was, in the words of Engels, the epoch of the iron plow, the axe, and also the sword. But in the taiga there were no riches which could excite the greed of peoples among whom the pursuit of wealth had already become one of the most important aims of life. War could not become, in the taiga of eastern Siberia, a "permanent occupation," as it was among the Greeks of the Homeric period or among the Germans (Engels 1951 edition: 168-70). The tribes of the North continued to live under the conditions of the patriarchal clan system. But from this it does not follow that the general cultural development of all the northern tribes was halted, or that nothing new took place here. It has been noted earlier that it was probably at this time that reindeer-herding arose. Without doubt, progressive changes took place in other areas of culture as well. In this regard, the cliff drawings of the middle Lena are once more of great interest to us, this time those which can be dated to the Iron Age.

206

Changes in Art and Beliefs and the Birth of Ideographic Writing

Chapter 3

Apart from the cliff drawings of the Neolithic and the Bronze Ages, we can distinguish on the middle Lena a large group of cliff drawings which are set apart from all others, both by a number of particular details and by the simplified schematic handling which is common to them. These are entirely conventional schematic signs and very simple geometrical outlines. The latter include variations of the following basic forms: a combination of dots with a short line; straight and slanted short lines; angles and zigzags; combinations of horizontal and vertical lines; curvilinear signs connected with straight lines; curves, circles, and stylized figures (Fig. 55). After inspecting such drawings, some investigators have considered them simply conventional signs, while others have attempted to see in them the symbols of the ancient Turkic runic writing, brought from the south by the ancestors of the Yakuts. On attentive inspection, however, the signs reveal a similarity not only to the runic script of the ancient Turkic peoples, but also to the livestock brands of various peoples,21 the conventional symbols of carved wooden calendars, and also to the most varied alphabetic and pre-alphabetic symbols occurring in many countries of the world. Hence, the meaning of these pictures consists not in their connection with the ancient Turkic script, but in something else. It is apparently the most primeval and embryonic form of pictorial writing—a kind of pictography analogous to that known from ethnographic data collected among various tribes. Thus viewed, one drawing on the cliff near the village of Yelanka is of great interest. It is executed on a small limestone surface and consists of four parts, closely bound together by unity of action. The center of the composition is occupied by the very crudely executed figure of an animal, apparently an elk. To the left and right of it, two dogs, their muzzles turned toward the beast, are just as primitively depicted. Around the dog on the right side are seven short vertical strokes. In order to understand this drawing, it is necessary to recall the hunting of elk with dogs, on crusted snow, and then it is easily deciphered as a record of an actual event, an elk hunt. A second drawing, similar to the one described, was found near the 207

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Changes in Art and Beliefs mouth of the Sakhabyt River, at Besteekh [Bestyakh]. At a great height relative to the level of the river, about 40 m, there is represented an elk, with a dog at either side, muzzles facing the elk. In its general crudeness and color, the drawing does not differ from the one at Yelanka. Only the vertical strokes, representing the age of the beast or the number of hunters, are lacking. The meaning of the drawing is approximately as follows: "Near this place, we hunted an elk with two dogs. The dogs cornered the beast." In other instances, as, for example, on the cliffs near the mouth of the Suruktaakh-Aartyk (Suruktaakh-Aan), there are only figures of elks, a single one or a pair. The images of these animals are accompanied by vertical strokes, representing a shorter message: "Here an elk was killed. Its age (or that of the hunters) was such and such." The same sort of "animal signs"—a variety of pictographic writing connected with the cult of animals, particularly the bear—have been retained among the native peoples of Siberia to our own day. The Khanty, until recently, on the occasion of the bear festival made use of a stick, on which they recorded with notches how many songs had been sung, and on what night. The Khanty hunters now record on the bark of trees the kind and number of game bagged. First, they register with notches the number of hunters participating, and, underneath, the number of dogs. If a wolverine or bear is taken, they carve a picture of the animal in the bark; if an elk, they depict its leg and hoof; and if squirrels are shot, they merely record the number of them with notches (Kuznetsov 1887: 746; Chernetsov 1937: 168). The Evenkis, after the ritual burial of the skull and bones of a bear (by hanging them from a tree after they had been put in a container made of birch switches), made a notch in the trunk of the tree on one side, in which they drew perpendicular lines with charcoal. Such a bear cemetery is found near the village of the settled Evenkis of the Shologon clan, in the neighborhood of Sayylyk on the Markha River (Lena district). In reply to questions as to the meaning of the lines on the trees, the Evenkis explained that the old men made them at the burial of the bear in order to record the age of the beast killed and buried there. Such pictographic records are especially highly developed among the Amur tribes. For all the variety of the animal signs listed, they have much in common with each other and with the cliff drawings. Like the cliff drawings, the Gilyak or Khanty pictographic records tell of the same event—the killing of an animal and the events accompanying it. When such signs are connected with the killing of a large and esteemed animal, especially a bear (or, in the cliff drawings, an elk), it is depicted quite realistically, but even with such specimens the conventional symbols remain. On Gilyak ladles, one can see "tracks" of the hunter's skis, or an equally conventionally depicted "stockade" in the form of perpendicular strokes, from which project sideways three additional strokes, representing guns. On the Lena, the group of conventional signs undoubtedly was derived from drawings of the entire human body, or of separate parts of it. The Fig. 55. Cliff drawings on the middle Lena, Chasovnya cliff, Toyon-Ary. 209

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sign in the form of a trident, with the handle upward, is the image of a man from the waist up, with arms hanging downward; the sign in the form of a trident with the points turned down, from the "handle" of which emanate two bow-like forks ending in circles, could signify a shaman with antlered headgear, shown from the waist up, or at full height. Very well shown also are those changes to which the drawing of the main part of the human body—the head or face—undergo. In one case, the face of the man is still depicted with complete clarity, with eyebrows and a long wide nose with two emphasized nostrils, and two round spots of "eyes" on both sides of it, but the oval which would outline the face is lacking. Conventional figures of animals are known in various forms. One curvilinear form, for example, is represented by figures like bows (the "body"), to which a slanted "tail" is added at the back. From en face are also shown the "ears," and, below, one front leg; one end of the bow represents the back leg, its other end the muzzle of the animal. Conventional straight-line figures of animals are also known. There are schematic signs representing birds, snakes, circles, the sun, drums, arrows, nets, and boats with people. Signs in the form of bows with small lines projecting under them, and a small transverse bow crossing the main one, may depict the type of round-roofed structure made of stakes and covered with bark or sod. The many short, straight strokes are also apparently a transformed image of a real being—a man standing with his arms next to his body. Sometimes the straight or diagonal stroke signifies only one part of the human body, the finger—most important in counting. These certainly include the counting signs in the form of strokes, each being of different significance, which permit the construction of complex sentences with precise information on the number and relationship of various types of objects. Counting signs developed out of the practice of counting "fingers" for individual units, "hands" for fives, "two hands" for tens, and "a person" for twenties. This is how the northern tribes counted until recent times. Of all the signs and drawings on the middle Lena, these counting signs constitute the overwhelming majority; there is not one painted cliff where, along with other drawings, we do not find at least a few strokes. In some cases, the entire content of the inscription is limited to rows of such strokes. All this indicates that the rudimentary script of the middle Lena had already attained rather considerable development and complexity. This ancient script was certainly not limited to cliffs alone. Birchbark, wood, and other materials, which have been destroyed by time, must have been used to an even greater extent. Symbols of an ideographic nature, therefore, must have been much more plentiful in ancient times than those that survived to our own day. However, what is important is not only their number but also the fact that they appear not in isolation but in groups, and sometimes even in lines. There is a certain order in their combinations, a regularity in the placement of individual symbols. This order must not be equated 2I0

Changes in Art and Beliefs with the order of placement of alphabetical signs. But it already bears witness to the complex content of these inscriptions, which, as before, were not designed only for religious purposes, but also for a kind of "reading." As in the pictorial script of the contemporary Siberian tribes, so here the central theme was the old idea of the suffering and dying animal— the cult of the elk. In this case, even the prosaic counting had a special character: despite the customary taboo on counting the killed game, or anything else, the age of the killed beast or the number of hunters was here solemnly recorded. This was a part of the ritual of the primitive hunter, sanctified by hoary antiquity, since the same kind of strokes accompany the most ancient representations of elks on the Angara and Yenisey: for example, on the Tesin cliff drawings, which are datable to the Neolithic (Savenkov 191o: Plate III, i). The second theme of the Lena drawings was the idea, closely connected with the first one, of the solidarity and mutual ties of the clansmen, expressed in the concrete form of the collective dwelling—the center of the clan fire and of public worship. Besides the very ancient drawings of cupola-shaped dwellings, with small lines inside conventionally representing their inhabitants, this idea also finds expression in the considerably later incised cliff drawings on the Lena, which no longer depict individual houses, but entire camps, with their herds of domesticated reindeer. The third theme is an "historical" one, connected with the activity of specific persons: ancestors and great shamans, the so-called "culture heroes." Faint echoes of purely historical events expressed in the cliff drawings may perhaps be found in some legends and traditions connected with the drawings. It is said of the drawings on the cliff of SuruktaakhAartyk that they were made by an ancestor, the progenitor of one of the Kangalasy clans, Khromoy Sabyya, on the occasion of a victory over his enemies. Having routed a hostile clan, Sabyya depicted himself and his vanquished opponents on the smooth face of the cliff. He showed himself in his usual position, head upwards, and his enemies, heads downwards, thus conventionally signifying their death and descent into the underworld. Concerning two large figures of elk, depicted on a cliff near the village of Toyon-Aryy, there exists a tradition that they were drawn by a great female shaman of ancient times, in memory of her battle with the spirit of smallpox. According to this tradition, the female shaman and the spirit of smallpox, having transformed themselves into two huge elks, fought until the spirit of smallpox was vanquished. In sign of her victory, and as a memorial to her descendants, the shaman drew on the cliff two elks standing face to face. All these narrative drawings, which go beyond the limits of the notations connected with the hunting cult, including the purely historical ones, were certainly intended to serve practical ends: they were supposed to confirm certain results of human activity, or to secure these. The depiction of collective dwellings or camps was intended to secure the well-being of the members of a given clan, or to defend them from 21I

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threatening misfortunes; this, as we know, is one of the major functions of shamans, and the aim of their rites among all Siberian tribes. A direct analogy to such images is found, in particular, in the buildings, sometimes rather extensive, which were set up by the Evenkis at their festival of the revival of nature, the ikonipka, in the "clean tents" of the Taymyr tribes, and in the ceremonial tents of the Yakuts at the spring festival of ysyakh. We may also judge of the character of various human representations in the cliff drawings on the basis of ethnographic data, which reveal the significance of human figures carved on trees, noted repeatedly among the peoples of Siberia. One of these was found in the taiga during a journey to the banks of the Ayan by A. Stefanovich, who succeeded in getting an explanation of its origin from the local Tungus. He wrote: On the way back, at last finding an escape from the dark, dank ravine to the light of day, I turned my attention to an image of a human head in its natural size, cut into a thick tree trunk. The image was covered along the line where it had been cut, with much-hardened resin, and is visible only from close by. It is a "portrait" of a killed Tungus. According to the statement of my guide, he had repeatedly come across such portraits in the taiga. The old men explain their origin in this way. "In ancient times, when the Tungus were not yet baptized, there were internecine clashes and murders among them. The man who had killed his enemy, in order to save himself from disturbance and persecution by the soul of his victim, carved his face in a tree trunk, which, as it were, fastened the dead man to the tree, and deprived him of the capacity to follow the murderer and do him harm" (Stefanovich 1896: 1 45-46). The small figures of enemies, with heads thrust forward, depicted by Khromoy Sabyya, must have had a similar meaning (Kulakovskiy 1923: 56). Such, then, are the basic subjects of these cliff drawings. It is interesting that the Yakuts and Tungus believed that the cliff drawings actually constituted a form of writing, filled with profound and significant content. (Vitashevskiy 1897: 287). This conviction is reflected in the very names of such cliffs. The Yakuts call them not "cliffs with drawings," but "cliffs with writing," or "with inscriptions," suruktaakh-khaya. The Olekma Yakuts and Tungus told Vitashevskiy that on the Olekma, upstream from a point where the river Nyukzha empties into it, was depicted the whole sir-kaartata; that is, a map of the whole earth, the whole universe. It included the phases of the moon, from two days old to full, the sun, and the Great Bear (Aran gas Sulus). These drawings, in their opinion, were made by the khaya-ichchite himself—the presiding spirit of the place—and the images depicted appear and disappear from time to time (Kyakshto 1931).22 No less interesting is the circumstance that the Yukagirs, one of the most backward tribes of northeastern Asia, had, until the 19th century, their own extremely distinctive form of writing, with conventional and not pictorial symbolic signs. The credit for the publication of these 2I2

Changes in Art and Beliefs Yukagir pictographic signs, which reflect various aspects of their public and private life, is due to V. I. Yokhelson [Jochelson]. It is entirely possible that the Yukagir writing was a direct continuation of the ancient script whose remnants survived here and there on the Lena cliffs. In this connection, we must emphasize that besides the samples of religious, or, more accurately, magical notations in pictographic script, which have come down to us on the Lena cliffs, there existed everyday realistic inscriptions, certainly much more plentiful, and incomparably richer in form and content. For instance, the purely historical pictography of the North American Indians, whose wampums represented a pictographic chronicle and a sort of historical archive telling of past battles and peace treaties of prominent leaders and of important events of Indian life, are of this nature. In turn, pictographic signs showing the paths of migration and the directions of hunting paths, warning of traps and pitfalls set in the neighborhood, and transmitting various news of forest life, have lived, and continue to live, in the taiga to this day. Hence, it becomes clear how wrong those students were who, given inaccurate interpretations of the significance of pictography in the life of ancient mankind, have attempted to limit this simple conventional language of hunting, war, love, and all the vitally important human activities merely to sorcery and religion, and who have declared pictography to be only a religious script, created by magicians and priests, deriving the pictography existing in real life from this "religious writing." In actuality, like everything else of vital importance in the culture of primeval man, pictographic writing was created not by sorcerers and priests but by the people themselves, and the sorcerers only tried to use it for their own ends. The pictography which served the needs of real life was not derived from magical signs, but vice versa: the latter used the entire wealth of conventional symbols employed by the forest tribes in the everyday practice of their work. As a result of the people's creativity, as a manifestation of the lifeaffirming power of the people, its intellect and inventiveness, the ancient pictographic writing of the Far North, whose embryonic forms have been preserved (in our view) on the cliffs of the Lena, represents, despite its primitiveness, one of the manifestations of the further progressive development of the culture of the northern tribes. In dealing with the cliff drawings of a pictographic nature, we must not neglect the question of the art of the taiga tribes, in the proper sense of the term. Their art undoubtedly continued to exist and develop, although its remains have not come down to us, or have not yet been found by archaeologists. As to what this art must have been like, we can judge from the presentday ethnographic art of the forest peoples of Siberia, in which, along with conventional schematic ornamentation, there exists a realistic art, whose basic subjects are animals depicted in as dynamic and life-like a manner as in the best drawings and sculptures of the distant Neolithic past. There is no doubt that the popular artistic tradition of our day is indissoluably connected in its origin with the ancient realistic art and rich ornamentation 213

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of the past; and the connecting link between them is the household art of the taiga population in the early period of the Iron Age, which remains unknown to us—the ornamentation, carving, drawing, and sculpture of that period, which for millennia embellished the life of the forest people, accompanying them from cradle to grave.

214

The Ancient Tribes of the Arctic Coast

Chapter 4

Until now, we have dealth with the ancient history of the population of the continental part of the North, the subarctic expanses which include the zone of the present-day northern taiga and forested tundra. We have only partially touched upon the past of the enormous expanses of tundra lying farther to the north, along the coasts of the polar seas. However, the history of the northern tribes who settled the territory of Yakutia proper and the neighboring regions of the northeast would be incomplete if we left aside the settled inhabitants of the coastal regions. The history of such settled tribes, the ancestors of the contemporary Eskimos and Chukchis, long ago attracted the attention of scholars, if only because these were the very tribes whose achievements were noted with astonishment by V. G. Bogoraz, F. Nansen, and other investigators also, as an example of the unusual courage and staunchness of the northern tribes, as an expression of the superiority of man over the dazzling but dread elements of the raw Arctic climate. The culture of the inhabitants of the far northeast of Asia is interesting also for the fact that the region of its diffusion, lying on both sides of Bering Strait and along the Arctic coast of Asia as far as the mouth of the Kolyma River on the west, was one of those few places on the Asian mainland where, as recently as three hundred years ago, at the time of the first appearance of Russian explorers, the technology of the Stone Age was in full flower, and where, even for a long time afterward, stone tools were widely used. Here, at the very "edge of the world," it seemed that there should exist in unaltered form the culture of "primitive peoples" and the most archaic features of life. This land, it seemed, should represent the real country of "living fossils," the region of first beginnings. In actuality, with a deeper and more careful study, there unfolds here a markedly more complex and interesting picture. The researches of Soviet archaeologists have brought much that is new and interesting to the resolution of this problem, both on the Chukchi Peninsula and in the neighboring regions of Yakutia, as well as in Kamchatka, on the shores of the Sea of Okhotsk, in the Primorye [Maritime region], and in the Amur region. 215

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As concerns the Chukchi Peninsula, the central question was that of the origin and early history of the Eskimos and their culture (Rudenko 1 947; Okladnikov 1951b). In studying this complex problem, the investigators came up against a genuine Arctic "marvel." They discovered the unexpectedly rich and complex Bering Sea culture, which dated to distant antiquity and at the same time was, in some respects (for instance, art), more advanced and richer than the more recent Eskimo culture of the 18th and 19th centuries. One of the most ancient settlements of the maritime hunters of seamammals, the ones who laid the foundations of later Eskimo cultures, was found near the contemporary settlement of Uelen. Similar settlements, we must suppose, existed in many other coastal regions. Even in this distant time, the basic source of livelihood for the inhabitants of the shore settlements was the hunting of sea-mammals. Yet, a no less important role in their lives was played by hunting for reindeer and polar bears, bagging fowl, and fishing. Therefore, the tools of these people constitute a richly developed hunting arsenal. The hunter was armed with bows and arrows, the tips of which were made of hard stone, and which were very close in type to the excellent arrowheads of the Late Neolithic in the continental regions of the mainland. He also used special darts for bird-hunting, with a number of inverted sharp barbs, and simple and complex traps for the catching of large salmon. Sea fish were caught with fishing rods, from which the heavy sinkers and bone barbs of composite fishhooks have survived. Their complex harpoons for the hunting of sea-mammals are well known... In spite of the development of a complex and well-equipped special technology for the hunting of marine animals, the Uelen people preserved in their lives and culture many ancient features. Their dwellings were shallow and poorly dug pits in the earth. They did not have the [later] typical storage pits for keeping food stores of meat and sea-mammal fat. Their large settlements thus resemble ancient hunting camps. The people prepared stone tools almost exclusively by the most ancient type of percussion and pressure flaking; polished objects of slate are very rare. The ancient way of constructing bone artifacts was especially widely used, mainly in equipping harpoon heads and knives with stone side-blades or points. The art of the Uelen people was limited to realistic but very simple human figures, animals, and equally simple ornamentations of straight or curved incised lines. The descendants of the Uelen people, of the so-called Old Bering Sea stage, also remained within the bounds of the technology and culture of the developed Neolithic. The Bering Sea people knew no other materials for the preparation of their tools and household gear than stone, clay, and organic materials—bone, wood, baleen. They, like their predecessors, knew how to polish slate, but the majority of the stone tools, as before, were prepared by striking and flaking. • [Detailed description of Eskimo harpoon omitted. Editor, A.I.N.A.] 216

Ancient Tribes of the Arctic Coast Nevertheless, they had progressed in many things, and their culture was already markedly distinct from the Uelen one, particularly in the development and perfection of sea-mammal hunting, which became their primary economic base. The sea now completely provided food for these inhabitants of the Arctic coast. Meat and fat of sea-mammals was used as food, from their skins were sewn clothes and household utensils, and various hunting snares were prepared. When there was not enough driftwood, bones, especially the jawbone, spine, and ribs of the whale were used, not only for making tools but also as a building material. Walrus and seal fat, burning in lamps hollowed out of stone or made of clay, warmed and lighted the interiors of these dwellings. While the Uelen people had developed a means of hunting seals in winter through an opening in the ice, with the aid of the toggled harpoon head, hunting of sea-mammals was now conducted in summer on the open sea. There developed artfully constructed skin boats—kayaks and ummiaks. The ummiak was a large open boat capable of transporting many people. The kayak was adapted for one hunter and was tightly sealed on top, so that, even when it was turned upside down, the hunter could, without harm to himself, regain his former position without risking the leakage of water into the interior of the boat. Sea hunting, connected with definite locations most convenient for it, led to yet more stable and prolonged settlement. In places rich with seamammals and water game, on spits jutting into the sea, on islands and bays with plentiful driftwood, were scattered the numerous settlements of the Bering Sea people, from which the foundations of dwellings dug in the earth and caved-in pits for storing meat have been preserved. The remarkable abundance of artistic objects from the Bering Sea period is connected to a significant degree with the exhaustingly long polar night; in these artifacts, the lively creative fantasy and thirst for activity, peculiar to the strong, clever, resourceful hunters of the Arctic, found its expression. In these artifacts were reflected the persistence and firmness in reaching a goal which is peculiar to these people, because to carve with a simple stone point sculptures of animals, or a fine ornament, on a hard piece of walrus ivory or mammoth tusk is quite difficult. Much time and patience was demanded for this. The ancient Bering Sea people put their centuries-old technical experience in working bone, their stubbornness, and their talent into artistic carving. They created an original and unique ornamental style; they worked out an astonishing curvilinear ornamentation which generously covered even the commonest artifacts; above all, the points of harpoons. The ornamentation of the Bering Sea period consisted of deeply incised smooth curved lines bordered with raised ovals or circles, often nucleated. The ornamentation was always closely tied to the form of the object and subordinated to its outlines, but the ancient master placed the details of the drawing, based on the circumference of the object, with complete freedom. He styled with great decorative feeling representations of face masks and animals. A most unusual impression is created by the contrast 217

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of completely realistic figures of animals; for instance, a polar bear completely covered by abstract curvilinear ornamentation. The unique art of the Bering Sea people was so complex, and so completely their own, that some investigators entertained the idea of its alien origin. They proposed a theory, for example, which would have the art originate far to the south, in Polynesia among the Maori, or even in China during the Chou epoch. However, there is another, more probable, explanation of this riddle. Long before, in the second or third millennium a.c., such curvilinear ornamentation developed among the Neolithic tribes of the Amur region and neighboring islands of eastern Asia. In remote antiquity, it could have spread from here to the north, into Eskimo country, where the Uelen people had completely prepared the soil for it. It is still more interesting that the nucleated ovals and circles, so characteristic of Bering Sea ornamentation, are in the same degree typical of the art of the Indians of northwestern America; that is, Russian America of the 18th century. Among the Haida, Tsimshian, and Tlingit, the same "eye" ornamentation is known, in which the same motif of a stylized eye is rhythmically repeated. The ovals and circles on artifacts of the Bering Sea period should apparently be considered depictions of eyes, simplified because of the technical difficulties of carving in bone. Just as among the northwestern Indians, so here the "eye" ornament must have had a definite internal meaning. "Eyes" carved on a harpoon, or on some other object, animated it, gave it life in the eyes of the hunter, and, consequently, a special power, and, at the same time, made the hunter himself the possessor of this mighty and mysterious force, which he could use in his own interests and to his own ends. The harpoon with this pattern carved on it was no longer a mere inanimate object, but was a living and reasoning being, sometimes acting even on its own volition. In this connection, let us recall that the central place in the Eskimo religion was occupied until recently by ideas of female patroness-deities. One of these Eskimo goddesses ruled the sea, the source of sea animals; another had charge of the earth and the dry-land game living on it; the third controlled the air and had charge of the winds. The female deities of the Eskimos are an obvious reflection of the former matriarchal clan in the mythology of maritime hunters, and are one of the proofs of clan matriarchy among them in the past. In the course of time, the development of hunting on the open sea and the growth of barter led to social changes. [Heralding these changes,] special whaling harpoon heads became widespread. Whalebones were used more and more frequently as construction material for dwellings, indicating that incomparably more effective methods of whale hunting were developing. Finally, the first signs of the use of iron appear. At first, the iron was probably of meteoritic origin. However, even at a considerably later date, iron was a great rarity and was considered highly precious, since it had to be brought from far away. At the same time, hunting weapons were improved. In place of simple bows, we find composite ones reinforced with sinews. Special wrist guards were devised, so the bowstring would not injure the wrist on the rebound. 218

Ancient Tribes of the Arctic Coast New types of arrows, and bolos for bird hunting, appear. Flaked tools are replaced by polished ones, more refined in workmanship and made primarily of slate. Art becomes rather simplified. The fantastically rich curvilinear ornament gives way to simple geometrical patterns: straight lines and dotted circles. During this so-called "Punuk" period, there appears bone plate armament. This calls to mind the ancient Eskimo legends, which tell of intertribal encounters and wars, and also of cautious exchanges of goods with armed peoples of other tribes who were always on the verge of a quarrel. According to the traditions, during trade transactions between the Chukchis and the Eskimos, both sides appeared at the trading place in full armor, and offered each other wares on the ends of spears, or held a bundle of skins in one hand and an unsheathed knife in the other, fully ready to begin fighting at the slightest alarm. The struggle of the old and the new is vividly reflected in the religious customs and mythology, including the myths about Sedna, patroness of the sea. Although Sedna remains, as previously, the arbitress of life and death for the Eskimos, inasmuch as she rules the sea animals, a new and highly indicative direction reveals itself in the ideas concerning her. She is depicted, from this point on in the myths, in a repellant and repulsive aspect. She is given monstrous physical and moral traits. Sedna is a man-hater; she does not wish to marry a man, and enters into connections with evil spirits, or with a domestic dog. Her own family and her father passionately hate Sedna and desire her death, and even try to kill her, but Sedna overcomes them, and herself exterminates her kin. V. G. Bogoraz rightly considered that these ideas about the ancient female deity were a reflection of the "struggle of men and women" (Bogoraz 1936). As yet, we have at our disposal no data which could help us to date with confidence the ancient Eskimo artifacts. It is possible that the earliest of them may date to the end of the Yakutian Bronze Age. In any case, such artifacts as the bone arrowheads with an inserted stone point and a split base, and also rectilinear, geometric ornamentation, closely resemble the artifacts of the Yakutian Bronze Age (the finds at Pokrovskoye and especially in Bugachan and Ichchileekh on the lower Lena). Excavations on [Bolshoy] Baranov Cape, east of the mouth of the Kolyma, have revealed a sketch of the life of the westernmost group of these settled maritime tribes, which is interesting in that it dates to a time when iron was already well known in the vicinity. It must therefore be dealt with separately. More than one hundred and fifty years ago, at the end of the 18th century, the attention of the Russian mariner and investigator of the Arctic, G. Sarychev, was attracted by the "collapsed earth yurts" in one of the caves near Baranov promontory. With the bones of reindeer and sea-mammals, he found here, on July 22, 1784 (Old Style) "shards of broken clay pots" and two stone knives of crescent shape ([Sarychev] 1802: 96; see also Okladnikov 1945: 120). A search for the place of Sarychev's excavation brought us, in 1946, 219

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to a small cove actually located to the north of the high table mountain which crowns Baranov Cape. This mountain was the famous Baranov Rock of the 18th-century visitors, and the cove actually recalled the valley described by Sarychev, which was, in his words "the best place on the whole Arctic Ocean." On the gentle slope of the hillock were the ancient earth yurts noted by Sarychev, one of which he had excavated. The excavation, in 1946, of two such ancient dwellings located on "Sarychev Bay," and a third on the next bay to the east, yielded plentiful and varied finds (Okladnikov 19470. All of these "yurts" represented the remains of distinctive wood-andearth structures, erected on natural elevations. Their roofs were covered with a thick layer of earth, and their walls were built from thin slanting stakes driven into the clayey soil, and adjoining each other closely to form a "stockade." The builders left on them traces not of a sharp metal axe but of a blunt stone one. Such structures, on the nearby Medvezhi [Bear] Islands, were found and described in the 18th century by Sergeant S. Andreyev,* in whose picturesque phrasing the wood was "gnawed with teeth," rather than hewn in our sense of the word. Nevertheless, the ancient inhabitants of Sarychev Bay had succeeded in building with their stone axes rather imposing dwellings for that period; one of them exceeded one hundred square meters in overall area and consisted of the dwelling proper and two outbuildings situated on both sides of a tunnellike entranceway. Inside the dwelling, not counting the innumerable animal bones, there remained hundreds of various objects—household utensils, hunting equipment, and weapons. In the 1946 excavations, just as one hundred and sixty years before, the largest category of finds consisted of potsherds. The inhabitants of Baranov Cape made large and heavy clay vessels with very thick walls. The bases of these vessels were round, and their walls were covered on the outside with wide grooves and strokes, which sometimes formed characteristic patterns, in the form of arcs inscribed within each other. The fragments of slate and the polished knives, of which Sarychev wrote, are equally numerous. They are of two forms: lunate for women's domestic work, and dagger-shaped men's knives for hunting. There were also many stone scrapers for working skins, of a type (that is, the kuochay) still used to this day, here and there in the North, and stone adzes or axes. Among the most remarkable finds in all this multitude of objects are the completely preserved heavy wooden handles for stone and bone axes or adzes. Among the bone objects, outstanding are the toggled harpoon heads of the Birnirk-Thule type, with sharp stone side-blades. Lastly, we must mention one additional group of unusual finds—a miniature bow with bowstring and arrows, and trough-shaped dishes, and also a spinning toy top. These are artifacts of toy dimensions, and actually must have served as toys for children. • [Stepan Andreyev, whose dates of birth and death are unknown, was a cartographer attached to the Anadyr Fort. He discovered, in 1763, the five islands near the mouth of the Kolyma River which were subsequently named Bear Islands. Editor, A.1.N.A.] 220

Ancient Tribes of the Arctic Coast Almost all the finds on Baranov Cape, without exception, reveal similarities with artifacts of the same type and technique found in Alaska, and on the Chukchi Peninsula around Bering Strait. This was a culture purely Eskimo in all its distinguishing characteristics. It is very important in this regard that the very first finds on Baranov Cape in Sarychev Bay were of rather ancient date—from the Birnirk period. When the third dwelling, located in the next cove to the east, was uncovered, even more ancient things were found. Among them were two harpoon heads, with very fine incised ornamentation like that of the artifacts from Eskimo settlements of the Old Bering Sea stage of Alaska and the Chukchi Peninsula. In the same house was preserved yet another object remarkable for its artistic form—the sculptured figure of a polar bear, carved from walrus ivory. Similar realistic images of polar bears are also known in the classic sites of the ancient Eskimo culture. It is especially interesting that, during excavations at Sarychev Bay, two bone knife handles were found, in the grooves of which were inserted iron blades. These blades were of small size, and were attached just like stone side-blades. Hence we see that iron was known to the inhabitants of Baranov Cape, and was highly valued by them. One glance at this varied assortment of remains sufficed to make it clear that sea-mammal hunters lived here. Seal and walrus bones were lying about everywhere. At times, the inhabitants of these settlements also used whale meat. In one dwelling, the vertebra of a whale was found; in another, a whale rib, replacing a truss or beam. In all the dwellings were encountered pieces of baleen and objects made from it. Consequently, in the lower reaches of the Kolyma, at the beginning of the Iron Age, two tribal groups, different in culture and origin, were encountered. One of them had occupied from most ancient times the forested tundra of Yakutia. They were wild reindeer hunters and fishermen. Later, along the coasts and on the islands, in the coastal expanse which had been empty until then, hunters of sea-mammals, the ancestors of the Eskimos and Coastal Chukchis, began to arrive from the east. When they appeared in this region they already had a thoroughly evolved culture based on sea hunting. It is also characteristic that in many cases, because of the lack or scarcity of the customary raw material, walrus ivory, these people were forced to replace it with similar material, mammoth ivory. Such tools as the heavy picks, and also the figurine of the polar bear, were made from it. Hunting for the wild reindeer also had greater significance here than in the region to the east, which abounded in walrus and seals. The presence of iron artifacts at Sarychev Bay shows that iron appeared early among the most westerly representatives of this culture, having penetrated, to all appearances, from regions lying to the south and west of the Kolyma, that is, from those places where lived the people who founded the cultures of the early Yakutian Iron Age. Thus, in the first millennium A.D., the inhabitants of the southern region and of parts of the northern region [of Yakutia], having kept their 22I

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ancient way of life, mastered the use of iron, while at the same time their northeastern neighbors were primarily using stone and bone tools. In these tribes of the coastal regions of the north we must see the ancestors of the present-day Eskimos, Chukchis and Koryaks. The more progressive inhabitants of the central regions of Yakutia at that time, as will be shown later, were very likely the ancestors of the Yukagirs. In itself, the fact of such an early, rapid, and unexpectedly wide dissemination of the iron-smelting technology and of blacksmithing in the north of Asia is of extreme interest from a historical point of view. We have already seen how much the connections with other areas, and with peoples of neighboring countries (and primarily with the neighboring regions and peoples of what is now the European part of the Soviet Union), meant for our Asiatic North. The first men settled these immense spaces moving from west to east— from the banks of the Don and Dnieper to the valleys of the Yenisey and the Lena, from the Black Sea to Lake Baykal and the Pacific. The ancient tribes of Yakutia developed and enhanced their culture in close contact with the tribes of western Siberia and eastern Europe, even at the later periods of the Neolithic and Bronze Ages. These contacts reached their greatest scope and force during the period when the remarkable culture of the Scythian tribes was flourishing in the steppes of the Black Sea region and the areas adjacent to it. In the light of these connections, which are so plainly and vividly documented by archaeological facts, the rapid dissemination of iron in the north of Asia appears in a new light. We have already seen that almost the entire material culture of this period, and all its most characteristic details, indicate that the model and leadership in metallurgical matters were furnished for the northern tribes by the Scythian steppe world. The last centuries of the first millennium s.c. were marked, in the steppes of middle Asia, by the complete replacement of copper and bronze by iron, and, simultaneously, by the coming into being of a union of steppe tribes, created by the Huns [Gunni] (Kiselev 1952). For all its primitiveness, conditioned by a backward but extensive pastoral economy and by the extreme strength of clan traditions, the Hunnic tribal alliance was no longer a mere confederation of free and equal tribes, as was the Iroquois Confederacy. Among the Huns, there were rich people and poor people, and also a patriarchal clan aristocracy, masterful and greedy of others' goods. Its representative Mo-Teh seized the power of supreme chieftain in 208 a.c., and subjugated by force of arms a number of Middle Asian tribes. Afterwards, the history of the Huns was marked by uninterrupted plundering wars with neighboring tribal states. The whole history of the rise of the Huns and of the fate of their tribal alliance thus represents an admirable supplement to the history of the decay of the clan system traced by Engels from the examples of the Greeks, Romans, and Germans (Engels 1951 edition). In the south the Huns moved against agricultural China, and in the west against the ancestors of the Yenisey Kyrgyz—the Yüeh-chih, inhabitants of Chinese Turkestan 222

Ancient Tribes of the Arctic Coast and the Altay. In the north, the objects of Hunnic aggression were the Tinlin [Dinlin] tribes; that is, the population of what is now the northern Trans-Baykal and neighboring regions. As a result, great changes occurred not only in the ethnographic map of southern Siberia, but also in that of our own North. The most definite reflection of these great movements, and of the cultural influence of the nomadic-pastoral tribes, is found in northwestern Siberia, where, as early as the first centuries A.D., mounted tribes of Ugrian origin descended to the Ob Valley (Chernetsov 1941). Certain shifts in the distribution of tribes to the east, in eastern Siberia, should be dated to this period. Such were, primarily, the movements of the Samoyedic tribes from the Sayan Plateau to the north of western Siberia, caused chiefly by the development of reindeer-breeding and the demand for new pastures. In extending their migration routes farther and farther, the Samoyedic reindeer-herders must naturally have reached, in the end, the best areas (from the reindeer-herder's point of view) along the shores of the Arctic Ocean, with its limitless expanses of tundra covered with moss. It is entirely possible that the dissemination of the Samoyedic tribes to northwestern Siberia was also affected by the policy of the steppe pastoralists, who strove to exploit the woodland dwellers. The settlement of the warlike Samoyeds between the Yenisey and the Urals must have permanently put an end to the former centuries-long ties between the northern tribes of Yakutia and the inhabitants of the European North. Northern Yakutia was probably at this time isolated from the west. This isolation must have furthered the slowing of the cultural-historical development of the Yakutian tribes (particularly in the extreme north) and the long retention by the local population of obsolete forms of economy and of life pattern. The fact that the material culture of the population of northern Yakutia in the Early Iron Age no longer shows such striking common characteristics with the culture of the tribes of the northern part of European Russia and Scandinavia, as existed during the Neolithic and the Bronze Ages, is probably to be explained by the wedging penetration to the north of the Nentsy reindeer-herders. It is probably correct to connect with the stormy events of this period, and with the ever-increasing pressure by the steppe tribes on their forest neighbors, the intensified settlement of another reindeer-herding group among the ancient tribes of Siberia, this time from the Cis-Baykal and the forested Trans-Baykal. These were the Tungus, who moved in the opposite direction, toward the northeast of Asia. Finally, the appearance in the Cis-Baykal during the Iron Age of new tribes, which were Turkic in language and culture, deserves attention. The appearance of these tribes, to be described presently, did not constitute something unexpected and catastrophic. The ground was prepared, as we have seen, by the existence, in the Angara Valley and on the upper Lena, of Early Iron Age people arriving from the steppe lands of the TransBaykal. And the steppe pastoralists of Turkic origin, the descendants of the indigenous Bronze Age population of the Trans-Baykal steppes (who 223

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probably belonged to a Uigur tribal group), evidently penetrated more and more into those parts of the Cis-Baykal suitable for a pastoral economy. In any case, the dissemination of a Turkic language, a runic script, and a characteristic type of art in the Cis-Baykal would have been unthinkable without the penetration there of a new and rather strong Turkic-speaking group who assimilated the local tribes, merged with them, and gave them its own language and culture. That part of the local indigenous population who escaped the influence of the newcomers, the reindeer-herders and hunters of the Cis-Baykal taiga, apparently retreated further northward, into the depths of the limitless green sea of the taiga. They were probably the ancestors of the reindeer-breeding Tungus, most likely the Evens (Lamuts). Moving northward and northeastward, these last, in their turn, expelled and assimilated their predecessors on the Lena, and to the east of it; to judge by all the data, these were the ancient Yukagirs, who at that time were settled considerably more widely to the west and south than they were in the 17th and 18th centuries. The last link in this chain of events in northeastern Asia was a change in the ethnic map of the North. This change was called forth by the appearance of southern immigrants, with whose arrival the formation of the modern Yakut nationality on the middle Lena is connected. These newcomers proved to be a Turkic-speaking group which continued and completed the movement of Turkic-speaking tribes northward from the steppes, begun on the upper Lena and Angara during the Early Iron Age by the builders of the Mankhay slab graves.

224

PART III THE EARLY HISTORY OF THE YAKUT PEOPLE

SECTION ONE THE ORIGIN OF THE YAKUT PEOPLE

Introduction The attention of scholars, and, in general, of the educated public interested in the peoples of Siberia and their past, was long ago drawn to the question of the origin of the Yakut people and its distinctive culture. It was first raised by 17th-century authors, who wrote about Siberia as a new and almost completely unknown vast borderland of the Russian state, abounding in valuable furs and populated by various pagan peoples. Among these peoples, the Yakuts were the first to become known, at the end of the 1620's—the only ones among all the peoples of Turkic speech who were found so far north, at the very shores of the Arctic Ocean and on the Kolyma. The Yakut language is distributed, as we know, north and far to the west of the Lena, in the depths of the Taymyr Peninsula. Such a distribution of the Yakuts, and of the Dolgans, who are linguistically akin to them, becomes still more surprising if we look at the map and compare their distribution with the area of settlement of other tribes and peoples of the same Turkic linguistic group. The Turkic tribes closest to them live in the Sayan Mountains, on the Yenisey, and in the Altay. The Yakuts are separated from these by immense expanses of Siberian taiga and by the greatest river systems of Asia—the Lena, the Yenisey, the Ob. Tribes of different languages surround them on all sides. To the north and northeast, there are the Amur tribes, the Paleo-Asiatics (the Chukchis and the Koryaks), and also the Tungus-Lamuts; to the west are the Samoyeds, to the south more Tungus tribes, the Evenkis, and on the shores of Lake Baykal, the Mongols, represented by the Buryats. The entire culture of the Yakut people, which is based on the raising of horses and cattle, occupies an equally isolated position in the Far North. Separated from other pastoral tribes of Asia, the Yakuts culturally represent an isolated island standing out sharply against the background of an immense area of cultures of Arctic reindeer-herders, dog-breeders, seamammal hunters, and unmounted hunters of wild reindeer. The differentiation of the Yakuts by language and culture from their nearest neighbors, and at the same time their closeness to the pastoralists of Siberia and of Central and Middle Asia, was so obvious that, in the first 227

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detailed reports on them, a guess was made that they had come from other countries situated far to the south of the middle and lower Lena. This idea was shared by all scholars of the i7th through igth centuries, without exception. They derived the Yakuts and their culture from the south, disagreeing only as to the time of the actual route of the migration taken by the Yakuts' ancestors. And, in fact, indubitable traits of southern origin, which could not have arisen in contemporary Yakutia, are clearly visible in all features of the life and culture of the Yakut nationality, in their material culture, economy, social structure, language, beliefs, intellectual culture, art, and, finally, the physical aspect. These traits led students of the history of the Yakuts to some other country, with relatively mild climate and a much richer natural environment than their present homeland. As we know, the Yakuts, in their own traditions (on which earlier authors, who maintained the southern origin of the Yakut people, mainly depended), derive their ancestors from the south. In reviewing the relevant facts, we may gain a better understanding of the ancient southern culture whose traces are preserved among the Yakuts in our own day, and attempt to reconstruct retrospectively its aspect and the general conditions in which it once existed. Once this is done, we may then reconstruct, in some measure, the general contours of the life of the ancestors of the Yakuts at that stage of their past of which no direct written traces survive. Comparing all this material, especially that derived from folklore, with the written sources relating to neighboring regions of Asia and to peoples related to the Yakuts, it will be possible also to approach an understanding of the conditions under which the ancestors of the Yakut people penetrated to the north, and of the course of this migration itself.

228

Ideas of the Yakuts about the South

Chapter

1

At the beginning of the 19th century, there lived, on the Kolyma, an eighty-two-year-old Yakut, a "godson" of Lieutenant Laptev who had participated in the Great Northern Expedition (1734-43). He asserted that "the Yakuts once lived in countries lying far to the south of here, and proved his opinion by the fact that the ancient folk songs and traditions mention gold and precious stones, lions, tigers, and other things which are completely unknown to the present-day Yakuts dwelling in the polar countries" (Vrangel 1841: 66). Even earlier, at the end of the 17th century, the statements about their ancient homeland, by people versed in Yakut lore, had been recorded, in abbreviated form, and published. These transcriptions are valuable in that they are the earliest summary on this point of Yakut folklore data. They date to a period in which the ideas of the Yakuts about their past were undoubtedly more complete and precise than later, when detailed transcriptions of their historical legends and traditions began. The Yakuts said in the 17th century that "they would rather live in their former homeland than in an extremely cold country where they are compelled to spend three-quarters of the year in underground caves" (Alekseyev 1941: 529). The same feeling of homesickness for the warmer country left far away is clear even today in the epic poetry [olonkho], the roots of which reach into the distant past. S. Yastremskiy wrote: Stepping into the enchanted world of the olonkho, full of poetry and strong colors, we at once feel a homesickness for a warm country where the sun shines brightly and burns hotly. A man forgets himself as in sleep, dreaming in the olonkho of magical lands where there is no winter but eternal summer, where birds forever frisk and sing, where everything flows with cream, butter and oil (Yastremskiy 1929: 3). In the olonkho, the Yakut singers in fact draw vivid pictures of a marvellous country—the homeland of the epic heroes, where "the sun never set, the moon never waned, the cuckoos never ceased cuckooing, the grass never yellowed, the trees never shed their leaves, and the white cranes never 229

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flew away" (Yastremskiy 1929:3). The fact that such a mythical country of eternal spring or endless summer, described in the olonkho, is not entirely an artistic figment or myth is also shown by other ethnographic and linguistic data. In the Yakut vocabulary, there are proper names for animals and plants which do not exist in Yakutia or in the northern regions of Asia which border on it. In the first place among such terms is the name of some fierce beast of prey, baabyr, which E. Pekarskiy translates "leopard" or "tiger" (1907-30, art. 366; see also Kulakovskiy 1929: 18). In other cases, this term is transformed into bar or bar-kyyl, which is interpreted by the storytellers to mean a monstrous being, often of mythological nature. In the fairy tales and epics, for example, a bar-öksökis is mentioned—literally, a bar-bird, "with claws like scythes and of the size of a new saddle blanket, with a beak like a forged ice-axe" (Khudyakov 1890: 253; see also Gorokhov 1885: 57). The Yakut term bar, and its variant baabyr, coincide with the analogous designation of the tiger, panther, and lion among other peoples of the more southerly countries of Asia where these animals lived or had long been well known. Here belong the Mongol terms, among them the 15thcentury western Mongol pars, the Bait and Derbet bar, bara, and the Khalkha bar, bara, baras. Among the Turkic [Turk] peoples there is a term bars, designating the leopard, tiger, or panther. All these, supposedly, go back to the Iranian pars or fars, "panther" (Vladimirtsov 3925: 332). Closest to the Yakut term is the Altayan mars, "tiger," and the Karagass bar, which, according to Kastren [Castren], designates the lion23 Another term signifying the lion proper is khakhay (Pekarskiy 3907-30: art. 2414).24 According to the ideas of the Yakuts, the khakhay has the aspect of a fierce fanged beast with sharp curved claws. In the folk tales, the heroes (diabolical and human) are transformed into two male lions (atyyr khakhay) with sharp fangs, tightly curled fur, and curved claws. The storytellers depict the khakhay as "a strong agile beast with an unruly mane on its neck and breast, with a long resilient tail having a tassel at the end." The title of the highly revered Yakut fire deity mentions his lion-fur coat, khakhay saoyyakh. The idea of the lion's menacing roar is reflected in the name of one of the famous Yakut shamans, whose grave on the river Bayaga was revered, until recently, by the Yakuts. The shaman's name was Kakhayar, which means "roaring, lion-fashion," "he roars like a lion." In the folk tales, the most sacred first pillar of the hero's hitching post is also called khakhayar. The ancestors of the Yakuts, consequently, in one way or another, were acquainted in antiquity with southern beasts of prey like the tiger, panther, or leopard, and perhaps also the lion, under the same names as are used by various tribes of southern Siberia and middle Asia. The real aspects of Fig. 56. Representations of lions on saddles and a belt. 1–bow of an old Yakut saddle, Yakutsk Museum; 2–bone bow of an ancient Türk saddle, from the Kudyrge burial ground in the Altay, State Hermitage Museum; 3–buckle of an old Yakut belt, Yakutsk Museum. 230

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these animals were afterwards forgotten, but their designations were still preserved in the Yakut language, even though only as names of mythical monstrous beasts, whose images are found on old artifacts (Fig. 56). Perhaps even more indicative from this point of view is another element of the Yakut vocabulary, testifying to former acquaintance with the animal world of the Middle Asian steppes and plateaus—the word kulan. In the everyday Yakut language it is preserved with the meaning of "playful," "lively," (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 1202). In the lexically most ancient language of the shamanistic songs and ceremonials, the drum as the shaman's imaginary horse is called kulan-horse, kulan-at (personal communication, S. I. Bolo), and the most important part of this instrument, in which the guardian spirit of the drum is frequently located, in the opinion of the shamanists, is called kulan-byaryk (Troshchanskiy 1902). Finally, Betlingk's [Böhtlingk's] dictionary [Böhtlingk 1851] gives the meaning "wild," "unridden," for the term kulan. In the Mongol and Turkic languages, the word khulan or kulan signifies "wild ass." Thus, the shaman's drum, as his steed, is called not simply a horse but a kulanhorse, wild and unridden as the ass of the steppes. The name of this swift-footed inhabitant of the Middle Asian steppes, the kulan, became a synonym for playfulness and liveliness. In this form it was preserved even when the immediate contact of the Yakuts' ancestors with the animal world of the steppes was completely broken off, and the real kulan of the steppes was forgotten. With the same surprising persistence, the ancient designation of a domestic animal of Middle Asia, the camel, unknown to the Yakuts on their present territory, was preserved in the archaic language of the epics. The indications of the past acquaintance of the Yakut pastoralists with the camel are very clear and definite. While all other tribes of the north, including the Tungus, lack their own term for the camel, it exists among the Yakuts. The Evens call the camel [R. verblyud] by the corrupted Russian verblud; the Yakuts, along with the borrowed terms mörbölyyt-kyyl or mörbölyyt-saar, use another word, tebien, which among all Turkic and Mongol tribes stands for "camel" (Turkic tebe, tebe, Lave, Lava; Buryat temeehe; Mongol temegen) (Pekarskiy 1907-3o: art. 2611; Kulakovskiy 1929: 19). That the tebien of the Yakuts is really a camel, and not some other animal, is indicated in Yakut folklore. The epics mention a monstrous heroic horse, khoro-tebien, with two crests, that is, humps, on which the champions hostile to the Yakuts ride. The word khoro-tebien may also mean a "southern" beast, and an animal belonging to the Khorolors, an ancient people of Yakut folklore (Khudyakov 1890: 54). Three ancient proverbs which mention the camel are known also. One of these proverbs reads: tebien saya khara sanaataayar työn saya yryrj sanaa orduk, that is, "a bright thought with the työn (a conical piece of tinder which is laid on the sore place of a muscle and then lit) is better than a gloomy thought about a tebien" (Kulakovskiy 1926: 86). Another proverb mentions the ring which is put through the camel's nose (Kulakovskiy 232

Ideas of the Yakuts about the South 1926b: 32), a third emphasizes the particular rarity of camel meat: aata,

tebien kyyl ete buollaya, "Well, this is hardly camel meat." This is said when someone too highly prices something which should not be so priced (Kulakovskiy 1926: io). In all these cases, as in the legends which mention the monstrous Khorolor horse with two crests (khoro-tebien), the Yakut name for the camel corresponds exactly to the analogous steppe term. In pre-revolutionary Yakutia, sheep herding did not exist among the native population. Some Yakuts living to the north of Yakutsk had never seen sheep. But there was a time when their distant ancestors knew sheep well, shown by an old and obscure proverb, mentioned in the technical literature: khoy baha tyl, where the word khoy is the steppe term for "sheep." In E. K. Pekarskiy's literal translation, this expression means: "A proverb used when a word or a proposition is heard which has absolutely nothing to do with the matter at hand" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3439). According to Ye. I. Ubryatova's interpretation, "historically this expression meant: `a word (like) a ram's head.' "25 Its meaning thus corresponds, in the specialized literature about the Yakuts, to the [Russian] abusive expression baranya bashka ["ram's brain"]. The mountain goat teke, distinguished by its arched massive horns, bent backward and covered with corrugations, is not found in Yakutia. The figure of the teke occupied a very important place in the ancient art and beliefs of Middle Asia and the Near East. And, among the Yakuts, on the outer side of the rim of the shaman's drums, there are special protuberances or knobs which are called horns, muos kuraakhtaakh (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 1635) 26 These horns imitate, in generalized form, the corrugated bow-shaped horns of the teke, or the mountain sheep arkhar (Troshchanskiy 1902: Plate 1). Among the Altayans they are also interpreted in this sense. The Altayans call them "horns"; that is, by the same name as the Yakuts do (Potanin 1883: 42). Among the forest-dwelling Evenkis, such knobs on drums are called by an entirely different name, sar (that is, "ears"), and on the Podkammennaya Tunguska they are called surkakil, "tusks." That the Yakut and Altayan terms coincide with each other, and not with others, indicates their common origin, as does the shared conception of the "horns" of a drum corresponding to those of a mountain goat or an arkhar. In addition to the survival of words signifying animals foreign to the country of the present-day Yakuts, we also find in the Yakut vocabulary designations for animals which were lacking or very rare in those places where the southern ancestors of the Yakuts once lived. For the northern animals and plants [which they encountered] they were compelled, in some cases, to borrow directly the established terminology from the languages of the indigenous population. For example, the most widespread Yakut name for one of the most typical inhabitants of the tundra and forested tundra, the snow partridge, khabdy, is taken directly from the native tribes of Arctic Asia. Among the Nentsy, the snow partridge is called khabel-kho, and among the Chukchis, khabel (Prokofyev 1940). 233

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Another name for the white tundra partridge among the Yakuts, yallak, is of Tungus origin (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 3676, 3740). Reindeer moss (lichen) is called by Yakuts and Tungus alike libykta (Kulakovskiy 1929), and the dwarf or spreading cedar, bolbukta. One form of taiga horsetail is called by the Yakuts not by a Turkic but by a Tungus-Manchurian term, sibikte (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 503, 2201). Also for peat, so widely distributed under northern conditions, the Tungus term yteeuki is used (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 3192, 9193). In other cases, the Yakuts proceeded in a completely different way. Such a typical animal of the Arctic zone as the polar fox is named differently by different tribes of the taiga, tundra, and forested tundra. The Yakuts, however, in this case did not borrow any of the established words in use by other local tribes, but escaped from the difficulty simply by using one of their own old terms which had become superfluous under the new northern conditions. The ancient name of another purely steppe animal of the same family, the steppe fox, korsak, was transferred to the polar fox (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 1491; Kulakovskiy 1929; Potanin 1883: 15, 156; Potanin 1889: 161; Przhevalskiy 1946 ed.: 329; Przhevalskiy 1883: 193). A. F. Middendorf already noted that "the word kyrsa, which among the Mongols signifies the steppe fox, the korsak, but is used by the Yakuts of the Far North for the tundra inhabitant, the Arctic fox, whose home is more than 15° of latitude distant from the places where the korsak dwells" (Middendorf 1878: 769). The ancient calendar of the Yakuts also does not correspond to the climatic and economic conditions of their country, to the tempos and periods of calendrical phenomena. March, among the Yakuts, is called kulun tutar ["the foal he catches"]* which means "the month in which the colts are kept tethered so that they do not suckle from the milch mares." But this name "does not now correspond to reality, since, in March and April in Yakutsk District, the mares are not yet milked" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 1220; Sleptsov 1885: 128-29). The discrepancy between calendrical and actual periods amounts to almost two months, since the mass milking of mares now does not begin until June. The Yakuts themselves have called the attention of scholars to such a sharp lack of correspondence between the traditional calendar and the actual course of economic life at the present time. They were surprised that mares formerly began to be milked so early (Ionov 1913b: 23) The following month, buus ustar (muus ustar) ["the ice drifts"],* corresponding to April, is termed "the ice-breaker" (Maak 1887: 113, 183)27 But it was so at some ancient time, said the Yakuts; "now in this month the frost often brings tears to the eyes." Finally, in the language and folklore of the Yakuts, there are preserved the remnants of general geographical terms connected with landscapes of more southerly regions. Former acquaintance with true steppe landscape and fauna is testified to, other than by the name of the kulan (wild ass) and the camel, by a number of Yakut geographical terms. Like the * [These are Jochelson's translations. See Jochelson 1933, P. boo. Editor, A.I.N.A.]

234

Ideas of the Yakuts about the South majority of steppe tribes, the Yakuts call the steppe syhyy or taala, taalakhonuu, although there is no true steppe in Yakutia. The concept of wholeness or inviolateness is transmitted by the word chol or chuluu, which in Middle Asia means the whole and inviolate steppe, the virgin land (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 2496, 2533, 2565). For the concept "broad, spacious," they have retained the old steppe word salaijyalarj (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 2041) 28 The Yakut language also preserves other geographical terms connected with landscapes usual in more southerly regions: syyr, syyrt, "elevation"; tacky!, "barren hill"; töbö, "summit of a mountain"; tya, tan a, "taiga" (Pekarskiy 1907-3o: arts. 2175, 2596, 2758, 2929).29 These terms are now indissolubly connected with the mountainous regions of the Sayan and Altay, and at the same time lead into Kazakhstan, Kirgizia, and still further to the southwest, to the countries of the ancient pastoral culture of the nomadic tribes of Central Asia. Thus the Yakut folklore and language, in full agreement, show that the ancestors of the Yakuts once lived in the south, in places where the climate was considerably milder and warmer than the climate of present-day Yakutia. In that country, there were true steppes along with expanses of taiga, mountain ranges, and elevations like the taskyl—the bare peaks of the Sayan-Altay system. Living there, the ancestors of the Yakuts knew about lions, tigers, and leopards, and had an idea about the wild ass (the kulan) and the steppe fox (the korsak), but were not acquainted with such inhabitants of the Arctic as polar foxes or ptarmigans. In their former country, the spreading cedar and reindeer moss, characteristic of the highland taiga and the Arctic regions of Siberia, did not grow or were of no [economic] importance. The general landscape and geographical conditions sketched above, which have been reflected in the Yakut language, accord well with the most important features of the economic way of life, with material and intellectual culture, and also with the socio-political system of the Yakuts, which cannot be explained on the basis of modern Yakutia. By considering these features, we may to some degree reconstruct a general picture of the life of the Yakuts' ancestors before their migration to the middle Lena.

235

Steppe Survivals in the Economy and Military Technology of the Yakuts Chapter

2

Animal husbandry has been, from time immemorial, the chief source of subsistence of the Yakut people and, at the same time, the chief mark of their culture. It separated the Yakuts from a number of backward northern tribes, the reindeer-breeders and wandering hunters of [wild] reindeer, unmounted fishermen and dog-breeders, and sedentary sea-mammal hunters. The heroes of Yakut epic poetry, embodying in themselves, through the storytellers' skill, the most fundamental characteristics and peculiarities of national character, are typical pastoralists. Having completed the cycle of heroic deeds predestined by fate, the ancient champion starts a peaceful life, with the herds belonging to him, in the free expanses of his fortunate country. He fences off the spacious horse yard, stretches a rope for the foals, builds cowsheds, places the well-fed animals in the stockade, and kindles the sacred fire of the domestic hearth. Such, in the traditional similes of the olonkho, is the representation of the entire Yakut country, where huge horse yards are laid out everywhere, twisted ropes for tethering foals are stretched, the smoky corrals are built close to each other, and the byres saturated with the sweat of cattle pressing against each other.... Everywhere is heard the neighing of fertile mares and the mooing of fertile cows (Yastremskiy 1929). Reviewing the Yakut terminology of this facet of their culture, which determines all the remaining elements of culture and way of life, it is not difficult to convince oneself that pastoralism among the Yakuts arose and developed under conditions of the prolonged and close contact of their ancestors with the ancestors of the present-day steppe tribes of southern Siberia and Middle Asia and, of course, not in the north, but in the south. Domestic livestock in general is called by the Yakuts syöhy (Kyrgyz, syuyyus). "Herd," "nest," is denoted by the word yön, known among the Mongols and Buryats (Pekarskiy 5907-30: arts. 2399, 3145)." Horses, which occupy first place in the pastoral system of the Yakuts and in their whole life, are designated by the term sylgy (Altayan, jylky, chylky); a brood stallion by the term atyyr (Altayan, aygyr) of 237

THE ORIGIN OF THE YAKUT PEOPLE

the same derivation; a mare, bie (Turkic, biä, Altayan, pe); a colt in his second year, tyy (Altayan, tay, Chuvash, tyyga). The best running horse, the trotter, is called seliik, from the Turkic yelekh, "trot" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 202, 452, 2158, 2446, 2667, 2934). The southern, steppe provenience, not only of the equine terminology but also of the horses themselves, is shown by the data of zoologists, who believe that, despite the probable presence of native admixtures, particularly in the north, the Yakut horse derives from Middle Asia (Lipping 1937: 29).3' Such a peculiarity of the Yakut horse as the marking d'ayyl, "great spot, usually brown, on the shoulder blades and the neck," which covers the horse like a net, also supports the same thesis. Such a lattice pattern on the shoulders is usual in Mongol horses; it is also found in the Bashkir horse and, more rarely, in the Kyrgyz ones. The Mongols, like the Yakuts, call such a marking dzhagal (Rumyantsev and Voytyatskiy 1936: 235). All of the basic names for cattle, sheep, and goats are also of steppe origin: "bull," oyus, known in this form from the most ancient times, and in the earliest specimens of the runic script; "cow," ynakh (Turkic, inek); "calf," torbos. Similar terms are used by the Yakuts for the dog, yt, and the puppy, ynyges. But the Yakuts do not have such domestic animals, important in the economy of the steppe tribes, as the camel and, especially, the sheep. It is, therefore, the more interesting, as we have already seen, that the Yakut language gives proof of the existence of these animals among the Yakuts in the past. The colorings of domestic animals are denoted by Turkic and, in part, Mongol words: "bay," turayas; "spotted," chuoyur; "white-sided" or "dappled," ala; "gray," "dun," stir; "cream-colored," "yellowish," "light chestnut," khoyor, khoyor; "gray," or "blue," "ash-colored" or "red-bay," ulaan; "light bay," sier (yegren, yeren). (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 62, 1525, 2192, 2359, z839, 3489, 3491, 3667, 3688.) Other terms relating to domestic livestock, and describing its condition or behavior, or a part of its body, are of analogous character: suri, "wool"; sie'1 (siel), "mane"; chaqkyrchakh, first stomach of a cow; subay, "dry" (of cows; barren) ; tuyakh, "hoof"; mooynokh, "dewlap in cattle"; kharta, "large intestine," etc. (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 35, 65, 1375, 1582, 1611, 2000, 231 3, 2337, 2565, 2591 , 2796, 3445, 3571, 3575, 3814). The pastoral technology of the Yakuts attracts attention by its archaic character and also by its closeness to the pastoral methods of other peoples of the more southerly parts of Asia. For instance, the method of maintaining horse herds in the old days—summer and winter under the open sky, feeding them solely on growing fodder—was extraordinarily primitive, the same as among the contemporary steppe pastoralists of Middle Asia. The Yakut terminology connected with hay-making is close to the corresponding terminology of other Turkic and Mongol tribes. Haying was reflected in terms common to them, derived from the original term ot, "hay," "grass"; "to cut hay" is ot ottoo; "pasture" is ottuk (cf. Turkic ot, 238

Steppe Survivals in Yakut Economy "plant," "hay"; ottoo, "to eat hay and grass," "to graze"; ottag, otlok, "pasture"). (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 1891-97.) Among the Yakuts, the month of July is called of yya, literally, "month of grass," that is, the month of hay-making; this corresponds to the name of the same month among the Altayans, otay. Among the Kazakhs, the month of May, the first month of the summer half of the year, bears this name (Kuftin 1916: 135). The term signifying dry old grass, khagdan, is derived from Mongolic (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3223). The Türk-Mongol word kharbaa denotes, among the Yakuts, "to rake in," "to rake around" (cf. Turkic mogul, bugul, "stack of hay," "rick"). (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 1616, 3350, 3435, 3534, 3538.) Close to the Mongol words in derivation is the name of the Yakut scythe, khotuur, and the word khadyy, "to mow." According to Ye. I. Ubryatova, there is in the Mongol language a verb khodu, "to mow," from which is formed the word for "sickle," khadugur. In the Buryat language there is also the word kadur, signifying a scythe of the hump-backed type, which is still closer in meaning and form to the Yakut designation for the scythe. The preparation of the hay meadow is expressed by the term örtöö, "to burn over" (Turkic, örduo, "to burn a hayfield," "to burn last year's dry grass"). (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 1958.) Methods of maintaining livestock are reflected in common terms signifying the enclosure for stock, kyryö (Turkic kora, Buryat, khure, kure); khaarchakh (Chuvash karda, "cattle yard," "byre," "corral"); byre, khoton (Turkic kotan, koton; Buryat khoton, "byre"); unheated lean-to, byre, khahaa (Turkic kaza, "shed," "yard in front of the yurt"; khasha —"yard for enclosing horse-herds"). (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 1336, 2656, 3367, 3383.) The hitching post is called by the Turkic word orguur, and the Mongol one serge (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 1958, 2171). (Fig. 57.) Especially interesting is the term toyot, "snow crust," relating to the pasturing of livestock under the open sky, when they must obtain food from under the snow and the hard crust which sometimes covers it in spring. This term approximates the corresponding terms of the SayanAltay tribes, the Karagass (Tofalars), Teleuts, and Sagay Tatars (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 2731). Another Yakut term is even more to the point: suut, "hunger," "lack of fodder," "lack of hay," "death of livestock and famine," "calamity and adversity." It corresponds to the Turkic dzhut, yut, chut, signifying deep snow in spring or frost after a thaw, as a result of which the snow becomes covered with a layer of ice, and gramnivorous animals are unable to reach the grass. The result of dzhut in the steppes of southern Siberia and Central Asia is usually "the death of stock, a bad year, a famine." The impress of common character with the culture of the steppe tribes of Asia is also seen on all objects and, indeed, on the entire material culture of the Yakuts, which immediately serves the needs of the pastoral economy. The Yakut saddle, which sometimes represents one of the most costly and beautiful objects in the economy, is similar to the saddles of other 239

Steppe Survivals in Yakut Economy steppe peoples; it is basically the same saddle used by the nomadic tribes of Middle Asia and Siberia—one with a high bow, and widely disseminated throughout the entire nomadic world. In the steppes, it is found in the same traditional forms, with the same horse trappings which had persisted over the course of many centuries (Rudenko 1926a; Maak 1887: Part III, 153; Plate IV, 1). It is, therefore, not surprising that the designation for the saddle shows the same uniformity over immense distances and among numerous peoples: Yakut, yt)yyr, Turkic, ytjyrchakh, yijyrshakh, ygyryak. In the form of its forward and more richly decorated bow, and in the way in which it is decorated, the Yakut saddle is closest of all to the ancient Buryat saddle, which was a little larger than the present ones and was decorated with iron, silver-plated, and often ornamented with round discs. The same type of silver-plated discs usually decorated the saddles formerly made by the Yakut craftsmen. The Yakut name for the pack saddle, khaokha, reveals a similarity with the term kanga, "cart," among the Shors and Uygurs, with kangaga, "stick," "pole," among the Tobolsk and Kazan Tatars, and also with the Mongolian name for the pack-saddle (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3314). The same connections exist in the Yakut terms denoting parts of the saddle—the bridle, the curb-bit, and other parts of the harness. Thus, Yakut uod'ugan, "bit" (Turkic yyugen, "curb," "halter"; Kyrgyz zhugen, "curb"); Yakut tehiin, "halter," "bit" (Turkic tiskin, tizgin; Kyrgyz tizgin, "bridle," "reins"); Yakut kychym, chapparaak, "saddle blanket" (Osmanli kichim, "horse armor"; Sagay kedzhim; Altayan kachim, "saddle-blanket," Osmanli chaprak, "covering for a riding horse and saddle"). (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 1454, 2603, 2640, 2649, 2776, 3126, 3464, 3574, 3829.) The concepts "to saddle," "to load," "unsaddled" (sybydakh) are also expressed by Turkic terms (Pekarksiy 1907-30: arts. 2430, 2653). Of great interest are the coincidences in designations of devices relating specifically to cattle and their use in the economy. Thus: anal, "ox-yoke" (the same in Mongol and Buryat). (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 130.) Buryamld'y, buulaya, the ancient phrase "yoke for a bull," "ox-yoke" (Buryat bulga). (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 541.) Dörö (Mongol), "wooden ring or bow passed through the septum of draft oxen," whence the verb dörölöö, "to pass through" or "to insert a bull's dörö," that is, "nosering," "to furnish someone with a ring for a bull or with a thong serving as an ox-rein" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 742, 3425). Such specific terms, connected with the handling of cattle in dairying. as the calf-collar or muzzle, are called by the steppe tribes tomtoruk and yryö, the very same [as in Yakut]. (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 1728, 1967, 2729, 3189.) Food products obtained through animal husbandry are designated primarily by Turkic and partly by Mongol terms. By themselves, the terms "milk" and "to milk" are of Türk-Mongol origin. Yakut ya, "to Fig. 57. Hitching-post (serge) of the Yakuts of the Sottinsk nasleg. 241

THE ORIGIN OF THE YAKUT PEOPLE

milk"; Turkic, sa, say, sag; Kazakh, say; Kyrgyz, saa; Buryat, saa; Mongol, saga; Chuvash, su. Yakut, yam, "milking," "yield of milk"; Osmanli sagym; Kyrgyz Saat (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 3737, 3742). In Yakut, "milk" is yyt. Among the Türk tribes in general it has the designation sut, sud; in particular among the Kyrgyz, sut. "Colostrum" in Yakut is uohakh, among the rest of the Turks us, os, uhus (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3190). "Sour milk" in Yakut is suorat, and in Turkic, chort, yohurt, yuhurt (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 347; compare Radlov 1893-1911, No. 18: 2020). A drink made of sour milk in Yakut and Buryat is ymdaan, "beverage," in Mongol ymdagan (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 3089, 3791). "Sour milk stored for the winter" in Yakut is tar; in Buryat, torak; "sour milk curds" in Mongol, azaga; "sour cream" in Buryat, tana. "Cream" and "milk-skin", designated in Yakut by chöchögöy, yuyme, syögey (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 2564), in the languages of the other steppe tribes are called by related names: Mongol, chochugey; Turkic, yuryume, yurugme; Buryat, yurme; Manchu, oromo, oromu (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 1975, 2394, 31 77, 3675). "Curds," "[cream] cheese," in Yakut is syymekh; in Kazakh, sezmo (sieved soured milk, curds); in Mongol, azaga; in Buryat, eege ("cheese from sheep's milk"). (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 392, 891.) "Butter" in Yakut is aryy; "food made of butter," khayakh; in the Turkic languages of Siberia, kayak, yyach; in Teleut, sary, saryy (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 154, 354). Among the dishes prepared with milk, one should note especially fermented mare's milk, kumiss; this is, among the Yakuts, not only the most important kind of milk food, but also a sacred drink which was offered to the gods during the ysyakh [kumiss libation festival]. The Yakuts call it by the same words as do all the Turkic tribes of Siberia; kymys (Turkic, lumys, kymyz) and saamal kymys, fresh kumiss (in the Kyrgyz language, with the same meaning, saumal). (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 86o, 1394, 1457, 1912; Adrianov 1909: 492; Radlov 1893-1911: No. 18, 1847). There is still another of the milk beverages, the preparation of which was forgotten long ago by the Yakuts, but which was once known to them—wine from milk. Among the Yakuts, there is a word arygy, in the sense of "wine," "intoxicating drink," analogous to the Türk-Mongol argy, with the same meaning. Still more expressive is the Yakut word chykyr, "rinsings"; that is, that obtained as a result of rinsing an empty flask in which there had once been vodka. "This word is related to the Turkic chagyr, chakir, `vodka,' `wine" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3711). Yet observers in the i8th and 19th centuries categorically insisted that the Yakuts did not know distilling. Thus, the Yakuts must have by that time lost the skill of preparing wine from milk, but must have kept its ancient designation, along with the word which had earlier meant only wine rinsings and nothing else, but now designates "rinsings" in general. The Yakuts also retained the words for a set of dishes for milk foods and for meat. These are the Yakut terms choroon and ayakh. The first of them corresponds to the Turkic chara (Radlov 1893-1911: No. 18, 1861), and to the Altayan chara, "great bowl." Among the Bashkirs in the i8th century, there were wooden vessels in domestic use, the ayaki, large and 242

Steppe Survivals in Yakut Economy small, corresponding to the Russian cups [Tatishchev 1909]. Among the Altayans, wooden cups are called to this day by the same name, ayakh. Skin containers for milk, made of smoked leather, are called among the Yakuts, as among other steppe dwellers, tursuk (Turkic, torsuk, tursyk, torsyk). (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 2844; Levshin 1832: 212.) A skin intended for the preparation or transportation of kumiss while [one is] travelling is called simiir. Among the Buryats, the word hiber, or chiber, denotes a wooden vessel into which the milk is poured after milking (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 2227). The form of the Yakut kumiss-skin container is the same as that of analogous kumiss vessels among the Bashkirs (saba or haba). (Rudenko 19266: 80, 94.) This is a "small bag" of black, speciallyprocessed mare hide—a container which is flat, prismatic, narrowing toward the top and ending in a very narrow neck (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 2227; Maak 1887: Part VI, Plate IV, Fig. 72). For the transportation of liquids while travelling, it was closed, like the Yakut simiir, with two sticks which pinched together the opening (tylbyy). (Maak 1887: Part VI, 50.) Even such a specific appliance in the dairy economy of the Yakuts as the churn staff, used in preparing the dish kyörchekh* from whipped cream, is known under similar names among some steppe peoples (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 1320; Troshchanskiy 1908: 443; Ostrovskikh 1895: 31). All that has been said about the coincidence between the basic elements of the Yakut dairy economy and that of the steppe tribes of southern Siberia and Middle Asia applies entirely to the use of the meat, skins, and wool of domestic animals. For example, in the past there existed, among the Yakuts, a special method of slaughtering livestock. "When a horse or a cow is slaughtered, its legs are tied with a strap, and it is laid on the ground, after which the abdominal cavity is opened with a large knife, and the heart and main blood vessels are seized with the hands and pressed, thus killing the animal." This traditional method was used among the Buryats during sacrifices at the taylagan (Maak 1887: Part III, 53). Among the Altayans and the Khakas, this method was also used in slaughtering sheep. The methods of processing leather for the making of kumiss vessels and, above all, footwear, were the same, in all the basic phases, among both ancient and modern steppe peoples. Among the Yakuts, leather vessels and footwear are waterproofed by smoking the hide. William of Rubruck in his time [13th century] called attention to this method of processing among the nomads: "From the hides of bulls," he wrote of the Tatars, "they make large wineskins, which astonishingly they dry out in the smoke." In this form wineskins were encountered until the 18th century among the Bashkirs (quoted in Georgi 1799: Part II, 96). The processing of hides among the Yakuts was the same in all details as among the Altayans in the 19th century (Verbitskiy 1893: 24). The Altayan footwear of smoked leather is called sagyr. This term constitutes a variant of the word saryy. Yakut footwear of smoked leather is also • [A hot drink made with honey, milk, and spices. Frappe. Editor,

A.I.N.A.]

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THE ORIGIN OF THE YAKUT PEOPLE

called saary (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 308, 963, 1955). Also preserved among the Yakuts was the old method of producing ropes, saddle-girths, sweatcloths, girths, and doormats from horsehair, which, in technique of manufacture and in decoration, are very close to the Buryat doormats and sweatcloths. However, since they had no sheep, the Yakuts were not acquainted with weaving, and did not know how to spin woolen thread and make felt. In the Yakut vocabulary there are, nevertheless, words which indirectly indicate acquaintance with materials of camel's hair and with the production of felt. Such is the word örbökh, which now denotes a coarse fabric, properly a bag or sack, but in the Kyrgyz vocabulary means "material, fabric of camel's hair" (ormok, whence the Russian arm yak [peasant's cloth coat]). Another word, ihigey, ehegey, literally "tousled," "tangled," "interweaving hair and mane," is similar. Apparently it has been retained in its original meaning among the Mongols, where the term ishigei means "felt" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 1955). For the use of domestic animals as a means of transport, and for the corresponding equipment, along with the terminology of horseback riding, we note only the designation of a sled, syanya; the Mongols, Koybals, Sagays, and Buryats use the same term. Animal husbandry, as the basic occupation of the Yakuts in the past, determined their whole way of life. In their language there are terms reminiscent of the mobile wandering life of the steppe dwellers: surt, "camp"; sayylyk, "summer dwelling"; kystyk, "winter dwelling"; otor, "pasture," "temporary autumn dwelling"; orduu, "stopping place"; suol, "road"; khonuk, "overnight stopping place"; yte, "food for the road"; yhyk, "road supplies"; kos, "a measure of length (of the road)." (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 1435, 1864, 1996, 2032, 2342, 2365, 3192, 3483, 3836; Maak 1887: Part III, 183.) The Yakut term yrgyö, yrgyö d'ie means: "the putting into order of a yurt into which the father and mother of the groom and the relatives come on the second day after their arrival, in which they share the meat brought by the latter, and into which no one else comes." This is the festally decorated wedding yurt, and by its special holiday character, and by name, it corresponds to the Türk yurge, örgö, "palace," "pavilion," "yurt of the epic heroes," and to the Mongol orguge, "headquarters," "a princely or khan's palace"; among the nomads, it was simply a felt yurt. The Yakut yrgyö d'ie thus means, in its original sense, the ancient dwelling of the steppe people, while yrgy means the festive felt yurt (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3172). In connection with the above, it may be noted that the designation for "window" in the contemporary Yakut dwelling is tynnyk (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3899). The Kazakhs use this term not for the usual window in the European sense, but for a four-cornered blanket for covering the smoke hole which replaces the window in the felt yurt, the shangarak (Kuftin 1926: 26). In turn, the Yakut term champanyk, now known in the sense of "any projection," "projecting arch with canopy," "canopy"; d'ie champaryga, 244

Steppe Survivals in Yakut Economy "the canopy of a house," and also "rim," finds an analogy in the Kyrgyz chantgarak, "the upper circle of the wooden framework of a yurt" (Pekarskiy 1907-3o: art. 3567; Kuftin 1926). Thus, in the language of the Yakuts, traces are preserved of a former acquaintance, both with the smoke hole of the steppe nomads' felt yurt and with its wooden latticed frame. But there is more. As in the felt yurt of the steppe nomads, in the Yakut house, benches for sitting and sleeping are called oron, the door, khalgan, the basic post of the dwelling, bayana (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 226, 1870, 3188, 3264). The stamp of the mobile ways of the steppe nomads also is revealed by the names of the utensils completing the interior of Yakut houses. Among its various old pieces there are the unique wooden boxes, in the form of parallelepiped, narrow and long, often sewn with leather thongs, having unusually light and thin walls. Their origin and cultural-historical significance are tied to the needs of a nomadizing population. In their kibitkas [light tents], all things were adapted to the small dimensions and to the frequent necessity to transport equipment on the backs of animals. Therefore, in width they are, compared to their length, absurdly narrow. Such Yakut wooden boxes, the chests of the present, have, over centuries, kept with unexpected firmness and fidelity to their original steppe form. This small, and by far not complete, enumeration of Yakut pastoral terms and ethnographic examples, sufficiently characterizes the ancient pastoral culture of the ancestors of the Yakut people in relation to the culture of other steppe peoples. From all that has been said, it follows, first, that the period of separate existence, when the Yakuts were isolated from other steppe peoples by vast forest expanses and by tribes speaking completely different languages, was preceded by a time of group solidarity and close contact with other like groups. Second, that the ancestors of the Yakuts, with other steppe tribes, created a general pastoral culture in very deep antiquity. They mastered domestic animals (the horse and the cow), they formed and perfected the necessary equipment (the saddle, bridle and other trappings), they worked out a practical way of preparing various satisfying foods from the products of animal husbandry and learned to conserve milk products (curds, cheese and butter), and, along with this, to store hay for the winter, to build corrals, barns, and cowsheds for keeping stock in the winter cold and the "hunger" time. The adduced examples lead us, in the last analysis, to that epoch when, as a result of the long hard work of many generations, there took place an event of the greatest significance: the primitive economy of hunters, fishermen, and gatherers, which had prevailed over the course of hundreds or thousands of years, gave way to another, completely new, incomparably higher system of economy, which called forth no less profound progressive improvements in all the other areas of the life of ancient man, including the social structure of pastoral tribes. Third, in studying the vocabulary of the Yakut language, one must realize that the ancient pastoral culture, created by the steppe tribes of that distant epoch, achieved significant development well before the ancestors of the Yakut people separated from it. 245

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In the conditions of the north, many facets of this pastoral culture had to be altered. For instance, some of the domestic animals disappeared, as did those rudiments of agriculture which were already present in the southern Siberian steppes. The climatic conditions of Yakutia were simply unsuitable for practicing agriculture with the primitive technology of the past. Up to the moment of the arrival of the Russians, the Yakut economy remained basically pastoral. Nevertheless, in the living popular speech of the Yakuts there are, to this day, archaic terms which testify that the ancestors of the Yakuts knew the basic grain plants of Middle Asia and called them by names common among the steppe tribes of Siberia. In distinction to names of grain plants clearly borrowed from the Russians, like d'ehimien [Russian yachmen], "barley" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 1720, 2067), there are preserved with surprising stubbornness a number of ancient names for grains. In the exalted language of popular poetry, there is preserved a figure of speech (archaic, and therefore incomprehensible to the modern Yakut in its literal sense), a saying: "it dispersed and scattered like taraan; it multiplied like yöreen" (Taraan buolan taryammyt yöreen buolan yrdlibit). One speaks thus of something incredibly widely dispersed, quickly multiplied. Hence the expression, taraannaakh kuhu—"a man with much progeny."32 In order to understand the original sense and origin of these archaic expressions, we must recall that the word taraan, in its various variants among the majority of the Turkic and, in particular, the Mongol-speaking tribes of southern Siberia and Middle Asia, has the meaning of "grain" in general, and also of "millet" (Radlov 1893-1911: No. 3, 846, 851, No. 18, 1621, 1627; Rudnev 1911: 24; Podgorbunskiy 1909: 204). The concept of abundance may quite naturally be connected with the little millet grains, and with the rapid multiplication and luxuriant growth of millet in general. No less interesting is a second term in the adduced proverb, the word yöre. Among the Yakuts it means soup, porridge, or soup made with fish, larch, or pine sap-wood, edible grasses or chopped meat, and so on. Among other Turkic tribes, this is "soup of small groats," "liquid porridge" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 2148). Taraan-yöre of the Yakuts, in its initial sense, means, consequently, "millet," "porridge," that from which one makes "millet porridge" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 2157). The word charba, meaning, in the Yakut language, "pine shavings," "groats," "chips," is genetically connected with the Turkic charba, "groats" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3583). Just as staunchly preserved in the Yakut language are terms connected with the ancient agricultural technology, beginning with the primary working of the soil and ending with the harvest, with threshing and winnowing the grain, thus expressing the entire cycle of the tillers of soil. The term taraa, "to rake," in one of its meanings corresponds to the Turkic tara, "to rake the earth"; the same applies to the term tarba. The Yakut taryy, literally, "to rake," "to rake away," accords with the Turkic Lary, "to plow" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 2564, 2569, 2585). 246

Steppe Survivals in Yakut Economy In the ancient argricultural technology of Middle Asia, a special stone or wooden cylindrical roller was used to smooth the plowed and raked earth after the sowing. The expression lokh, taken from one of I. A. Khudyakov's texts [Khudyakov 1890], testifies to this special way of working plowland: loyuyar lokh työrtygen, that is, "crushed-packed into a constant mass"; in Osmanli, this term (loy) means "stone cylindrical presser"; such, to this day, are used by the agriculturalists of the East (Radlov 1893-1911: No. 17, 1468; Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 1477; Grum-Grzhimaylo 1926, 237). Among the Türks, the gathering of the yields, the harvest, is designated by the word or. Among the Yakuts, it is found with the related meaning "to cut a circle." This is reminiscent of the fact that the Uryankhays (Tuvin), and also other Middle Asian tribes, did not harvest grains with a sickle, but cut the ears with a knife ss The Yakut terms designating the concepts "to thresh," "to beat," sokh (from the Turkic sok, sttk, "to best," "to strike"), are distinctively of steppe origin (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 2355) . Among the Altayans, the wooden mortar for pulverizing grain is called soko. "To take grain and winnow it in a sieve," "to sow the field," in the Yakut language are sakhsyy, siksyy; in Buryat, shikshi, "to sow with a sieve"; in Mongol, sigsi, "to winnow" and "to screen"; Buryat, hakshi, "to sow"; Mongol, sakchi, "to screen." The same distinctive origin applies to the name of the sieve for winnowing grain and separating the grain from straw, atykay (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 198, 2138). Thus, when the Russian peasants of the 17th and 18th centuries first introduced grain-growing on the Lena at Yakutsk, on the Amga, and near Olekminsk, the Yakuts were not compelled to take over from them their agricultural terminology in its entirety. At this time, many distinct native terms, which already existed as living fossils and as survivals of an old way of life, were reborn in the popular mind in their previous literal sense. Southern elements, which formed part of the world of another and higher culture, are clearly visible in other areas of economic life, everyday existence, and material culture of the Yakuts as well, including the fields of hunting, armaments, and transport. As far as the latter are concerned, one variant of the legend of Elley, progenitor of the Yakuts, who is supposed to have sailed down the Lena on a boat made of leather, is of particular interest (Middendorf 1838: 763; Radlov 1908: 78). Elley's boat, according to this legend told "around the fire in the primeval forest," is not a figment of the storyteller's imagination. Such "boats," made of the skins of animals, existed in the distant past among the steppe peoples of Middle Asia, eastern Europe, and the countries of the Near East. They took the form of bags filled with air. Among the Turkic peoples of Siberia, rafts made of such bags inflated with air are called chala. The Yakut word aal, "raft," "vessel," apparently constitutes a metamorphosis of the word chala, which has only lost its initial sound. Among the northern Altayans, the raft is used to the 247

THE ORIGIN OF THE YAKUT PEOPLE

present day and is called sal. Among the Kyrgyz, the raft is called by the same name. No less vivid proofs of the connections of the ancient culture of the Yakuts with completely different conditions of landscape and way of life are provided from the areas of hunting and of military affairs, which occupied such an important place in the life of the steppe tribes; this importance applies primarily to their hunting with falcons in the past. Falconry, alien to the forest tribes, was widespread among the nomads of Central and Middle Asia, beginning in distant antiquity. Hunting for steppe game with the "blue-colored" falcon was one of the greatest pleasures which the intimates of Genghis Khan could imagine. It exists to this day among the Kazakhs and Kyrgyz in the Tien-Shan. At the present time, the Yakuts have no hunting birds, and falconry does not exist among them. Falcons are not even preserved in traditions. Nevertheless, the Yakut language and folklore preserve evidence, as indisputable as it is unexpected, in favor to this proposition. In the Yakut vocabulary there is an archaic term, yeten. Pekarskiy recorded it with the meaning "the name of a certain bird." In other Turkic languages, this word signifies "a kind of kite," and "a hunting bird" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3162). Another Yakut word, sitim, which now means a long thread, a cord, among the Mongols means a long cord or thread on which one teaches hunting birds to hunt. The expression sitimne, which comes from this word in the Mongol language, means only "to nurture (hunting birds) on a string" (Pekarskiy 1907-3o: art. 2253). The fact that both these terms could have been used by the Yakuts in antiquity, in precisely the given sense, is evident from the Yakut saying: yytar kyyrdym, teber mokhsoyolum, "my untethered gerfalcon and my striking falcon." The patron speaks thus of his favorite trusted servant or son. A. E. Kulakovskiy was correct in observing: "Judging from the literal meaning of this saying, the ancient Yakuts knew falconry" (Kulakovskiy 1945: 93). Other elements of the ancient culture of the Yakuts, in the fields of hunting, fighting equipment, military affairs, lead to the south. The Yakut names for bow, okh-saa and saa, go back to one of the most ancient terms common to Mongol, Turkic, and Ural-Altayic languages (Pekarskiy 1907: art. 2008; Radlov 1893-1911: No. 18, 1923; Dyrenkova 1940: 429). The Yakuts call the arrow by a term known from the runic texts, okh. At a rich Yakut's home in Suntar, Maak saw an old quiver with arrows of different types: some with three-edged points and others with wide and flat ones, whose points were put through a bone casing made in the form of a ball, hollow inside, and with several openings. These arrows were used in order to get birds, flying rather high, to come down. This was done as follows: "When birds (for instance geese or swans) were flying high, the hunter sent such an arrow above them; the arrow produced a sound similar to the cry of a falcon, which the birds tried to avoid, and they flew toward the earth, where the Yakuts killed them with ordinary arrows" (Maak 1887: 163, n. 9).84 One example of the "singing" arrows, perhaps from the same quiver 248

Steppe Survivals in Yakut Economy which Maak saw, survived to our day and is kept in the museum of the Toybokhoy secondary school on the Vilyuy; the length of the arrow is 75 cm, the bone ball has half-moon slits, and the iron arrowhead is rhomboid (Fig. 58, i) .

Fig. 58. Old Yakut equipment. i–head of a whistling arrow from the Vilyuy, Toybokhoy school museum; 2–spearhead from an old Yakut grave, Yakutsk Museum; 3–old Yakut quiver; 4, 5–ancient helmets found in the region of Lake Myuryu. Whistling or singing arrows of this kind were, from the most ancient times, an important part of the armament of steppe nomads. But one cannot say this of the inhabitants of forest regions. In the forest zone of Siberia not a single archaeological find is yet known which would show the past use there of singing arrows, as there are also none in the ethnographic materials collected among other forest peoples of northern Asia— except the Yakuts. Only in southern Siberia are these singing arrows preserved among the northern Altayans (Shors and Tubalars). One must, therefore, admit the justice of Maak's thought that "these arrows were known to the Yakuts at the time that they lived in the Trans-Baykal, neighboring the Buryats," that is, to the south, together with other tribes related to them in language, economic life, and culture (Maak 1887: 168). The offensive and defensive military arsenal of the ancient Yakuts was more varied than that of a later date, and also revealed the most immediate connections with the armaments of the nomadic steppe warriors. 249

THE ORIGIN OF THE YAKUT PEOPLE

Such was the battle-hatchet, reminiscent in form of the aybalt of the Kyrgyz (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 2378), a kind of hammer which was previously used as a weapon, the syld'yges or sylyges, "something like a kind of feathered mace, a club with a heavy end" (Pekarskiy 19o7-3o: art. 2389) . In the same category are swords, daggers, and knives. Besides the usual name for a knife, byhakh (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 633), the following terms deserve attention: kylys, "old-fashioned knife"; "saber," analogous to the ancient Türk and Turkomen kylych, klych, "saber" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 1389) ; and especially another name for a side-arm, a cutting weapon common to the Yakuts and the steppe peoples, bolot. According to some informants, the bolot is an ancient short sword, a two-edged weapon, a sword, a saber; others say, "a two-edged blood-stained red bronze weapon of large dimensions" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 494). It is supposed that this Yakut word, which is characteristic only of the archaic epic language, goes back to the Iranian (that is, also Central Asian) term f ulad, or pulad, "steel," as is the case with analogous terms known to the Chinese and in Central Asia, in the language of the Polovetsians, Komans, and Mongols, and also in the ancient Russian tongue (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3132). The Yakut name for spear, yyyy, is also analogous to the Turkic name for this weapon, seyu. S. Ye. Malov (1951: 416) compares this Yakut name for the spear with the ancient Türk one. Armor of the usual east Asian type, of small iron discs sewn on leather, known from folklore and partly from archaeological data, is called by the Yakuts by the Türk-Mongol term kuyakh (Pekarskiy r9o7-30: arts. 386, 1199). Incidentally, similar armor for warriors, like the Yakuts', was possessed by other tribes of the North, the Evenkis, Evens, and Samoyeds (Nentsy). But they did not have such clearly expressed details of defensive arms as did the armor designated for the protection of the riding animal, in this case the horse on which the warrior rode. Such horse armor, "iron plates," is certified by Yakut legends and by Russian-written historical documents of the 17th century" (Ionova 1945: 27; Tokarev 1945: 154-55). Horse armor was known to other steppe peoples, but quite far to the south and to the west of Yakutia. In the Osmanli and the Djagatay [Dzhagatay] languages they are called chukal. The ancient Mongols also used them in the r2th and 13th centuries (Plano Karpini [John Plano de Carpini] 1911 edition: 27-28). Both the horse armor and the kuyakh went out of use among the Yakuts as a result of the consolidation of Russian power and the liquidation of bloody internecine wars. With them dissappeared the metal helmets, remembered in the epic tales, which mention the golden-helmeted heroes (Yastremskiy 1929: 98, 99). These helmets, although not gold, but in any case decorated with silver inlay and ornament, are known from archaeological finds (Fig. 58, 5, 6). These are the typical medieval helmets of the warrior steppe tribes of southern Siberia and Middle Asia, with the usual stem on top into which the plume was placed. The entire military pursuit of the ancient Yakuts corresponded to the 250

Steppe Survivals in Yakut Economy complex and various military equipment of steppe type. As a mounted people, in distinction to the unmounted forest hunters and reindeerbreeders, the Yakuts, right up to the appearance of the Russians, preserved steppe cavalry tactics, the mounted fighting system of Asiatic nomads (Tokarev 1945: 155). In one of the legends of the internecine struggle of the Tatta people with the Bayagantay, we are told how the Bayagantay contrived, at the moment of the first attack on the Tatta people, to leap on the enemy camp with shouts and whooping, in order to frighten enemy horses and to create a commotion. "This they did considering that the Tatta people were vainglorious, and therefore their horses should be fat and poorly trained" (G. M. Vasilev: 1945; compare Levshin 1832 : 77, 78.) Therefore, it is not surprising that the Yakuts have kept the specifically military term serii, "troops" (from the Turkic cheri, serig, cherik, cheru; Buryat, serik; Mongol, cherik, "military forces," "troops," "army"), along with a word common also to the Altayans, Mongols, and Tungus-Manchu: mergen, or bergen, meaning "archer-warrior" (Pekarskiy 1907-3o: art. 2174). Here, too, is included the word baayr, or bootur, meaning, in the steppe languages and dialects, a daring warrior, a hero, a bogatyr [Russian, "epic hero"] Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 410). In general, as Ye. I. Ubryatova remarked, in the language of the Yakuts there are preserved nearly all the Turkic and Mongol names for a bogatyr: bukhatyyr, bootur (bbayr, yöyö (Malov 1951: 373), bergen, alp. This is clearly seen in the names of the heroes of the olonkho. Such are, for example: Työne-bukhatyyr (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 578), N'urgun-bootur, N'urgun-yöyö (Pekarskiy 1907-3o: art. 1515), Ölböt-bergen (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 434), Alyp Khara-bukhatyyr (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 88).

251

Southern Elements in the Clothing of the Yakuts

Chapter 3

Surveying the southern elements of the material culture of the Yakuts, it is impossible to pass by such traits observable in the national costume. For it is clothing, with this or that characteristic cut, with the different varieties of its basic forms, with specific decorations and ornaments, that especially clearly reflects the definite conditions of landscape and climate in which the different tribes live, their economic life, and their esthetic tastes. With these, it is clothing that testifies with the greatest force both to the cultural-historical influences and connections with other peoples and to the nature of historical path traversed by its wearers. From a historical-ethnographic point of view, great interest is presented by the ancient costume of the Yakuts, both men's and women's (the sayyyakh) which in the past had a significantly greater distribution than at the end of the r9th century. One may judge the important role of the sayyyakh), in the ancient culture and life by the fact that the dead were buried in it, young people were dressed in it for weddings, the bridegroom's mother presented the sayyyakh as a wedding present, and, finally, the northern Yakutian shamans performed their mysterious ceremonies in a woman's sayyyakh in cases where a special vestment was lacking. The antiquity of the sayyyakh is also borne out by the fact that, as long ago as the r8th century, an unknown Russian informant told V. N. Tatishchev that the clothing of the Yakuts "with wings sewn on the back is called sanayak" [Tatishchev, MS, n.d.]. These wings are, evidently, the same as the traditional part of the Yakut dress, the khotoydookh son, "the fur coat with the eagle," "the fur of a large forest animal cut in the shape of an eagle," sewn on the back of the costume (Nosov, MS, n.d.: r r) and (Fig. 59).3° The indisputable connection of the image of an eagle on the ancient Yakut sayyyakh or khotoydookh son with the cult of the eagle, generally known for the Yakuts and already noted by Witsen and Strahlenberg, reinforces the idea of the profound antiquity and basic significance of this male costume, which, however, gave way to the shorter jacket, son, and became an exclusively female costume. The most important distinguishing characteristics of the male costume at the beginning of the r8th century were its considerable length and width. These 253

Southern Elements in Yakut Clothing relate the sayyyakh not to the costumes of the nearest forest neighbors of the Yakuts, the nomadic reindeer-breeding and hunting Evens and Evenkis, but with the full-length costumes of the steppe pastoral tribes of Siberia and Middle Asia. To this provenience we must assign the slit at the back of the sayyyakh, made "for the sake of facility in horseback riding" (Arkhiv MVD, YaASSR 1785: 15; see Anon. 1948, p. 43). This last feature (completely unlike the Tungus costume with its specific threesided tail in the back of the "coat") directly points to the origin of the traditional Yakut fur coat, to conditions where the pastoral way of life prevailed, and to the connection of this custume with horseback riding. The sources often mention yet another distinct, primarily female form of outer garment, the taygalsy, known like the sanayak, from 18th century descriptions (Bakhrushin 1927: 287). These are "long fur coats covered with red cloth which is embroidered with Chinese spangles of various colors and hung with silver' and copper discs. In those ancient times when the Yakuts were not yet baptized, the best clothing was thought to be the woman's fur coat, embroidered with patterns and called ked'ine tayalay. This fur coat was long, with fur outside and in, with various patterns and decorations. The fur coat had a striped back and skirts, similar to those of a chipmunk" (S. I. Bolo, personal communication). Such a decorated, stylish fur coat, particularly for a woman, took a very long time to sew, and a good seamstress might finish it in three years. In this connection, a saying arose among the Yakuts about a person who could prolong some task: "Don't sew a ked'ine tayalay fur coat." This was told by the ninety-year-old D. Khabarov-bnön of the locality of Toyon-Ugalaakh on the Indigirka, a remote and isolated corner of the north, where remnants of the archaic way of life were retained longer than in other places (Bolo 1946). The tayalay was in ancient times an obligatory garment of the married Yakut woman. In the 1760's, wealthy Yakuts strictly observed the custom according to which the daughter-in-law should not, for the first three years, show herself at all to her father-in-law, and, after three years, only while wearing the tayalay (Arkhiv MVD, YaASSR 1785: paragraph 6). The name and general character of this female garment of the Yakuts, which is ritual in the nature of everyday use, leaves no doubt of its southern origin. Among the Turkic peoples, for example, a similar term, dagala, is known, which denotes "an outer dress embroidered with gold" (Radlov 1893-1911, No. 18: 1659; cf. Arkhiv MVD, YaASSR 1785: paragraph 5).37 Among the Buryats, this costume is called dygyl. A second variety of women's dress was described by Georgi. In his words, when the Yakuts dressed up, "they wore a padded jacket without sleeves, which is almost a span shorter than the kaftan on top of it." (Georgi 1799: 186; see also Shchekatov 1801-09: 361-62; also Fig. 6o). An example of such a "padded jacket," contemporaneous with Georgi's description, was found in Olzhelunsk nasleg [village], Churapchinsk Fig. 59. Yakut woman in old-fashioned sangyyakh with wings on the back (after Maak). 255

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Southern Elements in Yakut Clothing rayon on the Amga-Lena plateau, during excavations of the grave of the famous Bolugur Ayyyta (Mariana Dyachkovskaya), the daughter of Prince Omoruy, known among the people as an awesome black female shaman, syydam syralaabat abaahy 38 A padded jacket of the same cut, under the name kessiechchik, only somewhat shorter and without decorative details (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 2468), survived in Yakut life until the beginning of the loth century, when it was sewn primarily of colored silk and bordered not with fur but with lace. In order to evaluate the significance of this ancient Yakut female dress, we must remember that neither among the taiga peoples of Siberia nor among its maritime tribes is there found anything similar to the Yakut padded jacket. Further, sleeveless female garments of entirely idertical type are widespread among the primarily Turkic-speaking steppe tribes of Eurasia. Such is the woman's sleeveless silk jacket of the Kachinets, the sigedek (Ostrovskikh 1895: 317), or the completely analogous Bashkir sleeveless jacket (this one worn not only by women but also by men). (Rudenko 1926b: 137.)3° Thus, the Yakut woman's sleeveless jacket also belongs with all the examples of garments of various steppe tribes disseminated, in the same basic form, from the Caspian Sea to the banks of the Yenisey. A somewhat special position in the ancient female costume of the Yakuts is occupied by the breastpiece, tyhylyk (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 2925). It was first noted in Lindenau's manuscript as an external mark of maidens, distinguishing them from women, who, upon marriage, are forever deprived of this article of costume. At the same time, Lindenau pointed to the striking similarity of the Yakut breastpiece (which, according to him, was embroidered with glass beads) to the [pinafore-like] apron worn by Tungus women. Actually, the Yakut breastpiece, which disappeared during the 19th century, is nearest not to the Tungus apron but to the analogous article of female attire among certain other Turkic tribes, including the Siberian Turks and the Bashkirs (Rudenko 1926b: 143-46; Ostrovskikh 1895: 317). In connection with the apron, which is among the most ancient elements of female costume, we must also consider the characteristic neck ornament, consisting of a twisted metal ring with various complex metal ornaments made of chains and discs hanging from it on the breast and the back, the whole forming a broad openwork rectangle; this is called the kyld'yy (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 1390, 2225; Maak 1887: 62, 65, illustration on p. 67 [top], Plate II, 1, 4; Shchukin 1833: 211; Strelov 1937: 92). It is known among the steppe tribes from as early as the Scythian period, in the form of a griuna.* Another detail of the Yakut costume, this time having a practical rather than an esthetic or religious significance, is the well-known shoulder piece, made from squirrel tails tied to each other in one long thread— the mooyturuk. Intended to protect the face, throat, and lungs from the • [A large, ornamented neckpiece in form of a collar or choker. Editor, A.I.N.A.]

Fig. 6o. Yakut woman in the 18th-century costume (after Georgi). 257

THE ORIGIN OF THE YAKUT PEOPLE

burning cold of the Arctic, it would seem natural if it belonged to the small number of purely Arctic elements of costume. However, the true aborigines of the Far North, the Paleo-Asiatic tribes, do not have such an article of costume, and do not need it; what is more, "shoulder pieces of fox fur," entirely identical in character to the Yakut inooyturuk, were known to the inhabitants of the steppes, and, in itself, the term denoting them among the Sagay and Koybals is analogous to the Yakut one (Maak 1887: 65n; Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 1583). No less archaic than the breast and neck garments of the Yakut costume, and just as closely connected with the southern past of their ancestors, is the traditional Yakut headgear. The Yakut sharp-pointed hat is quite similar to the fur hats of the Kyrgyz and Kazakhs, and to the headgear of the ancient Orkhon Türks. The Yakut pointed hat is reminiscent of a bashlyk [Russian for "hood"], and is the same for men and women. This hat was only rarely found in the 19th century. It was called a chompoy. Yet, before this, the Yakuts constantly wore such hats with long side-flaps or wings. The son of the old woman Suottu, ancestress of the present Sottinsk nasleg of the former Borogontsy ulus [administrative district], received the nickname Segir, "overhanging," on account of this high, conical hat with long flaps, which he bent to stick out and down so that they appeared to be overhanging (Anon. 1893: 313). In all its variants," this hat in its basic form is actually very reminiscent of the fur, felt, or cloth hats of the bashlyk type, widespread among many steppe tribes, and having a high peak and flaps covering the back of the neck and ears. The tall headgear of Yakut women (Rudenko 1926b: 62, 97, 109, 126), which have the appearance of high conical hats made from expensive fur and cloth, and which are surmounted by a pyramidal, richly decorated cowl, are characteristic in their general similarity to those of the steppes. The ancient date of these hats and their importance in daily life are shown by the fact that they were worn by the shamans during a kamlaniye [shamanistic performance], if the shamans did not have special shamanistic garb. The same sort of hats were worn during religious ceremonies, not only by the shamans but also by the young men who served them at the moment when the shamans addressed the spirit of the domestic hearth (aal chot uchchite). The woman's tall hat was also worn by those persons of the male sex who participated in the ceremony of invoking the gods at the Yakut ysyakh [kumiss libation festival]. These hats, however, have become an exclusively female headdress only in very recent times; up to the middle of the 19th century, one could find, in places, old men who continued to wear [what are today] women's hats (Pripuzov 189o: 38). An important appurtenance of women's festive hats among the Yakuts were the round silver discs, tuohakhta, on account of which, according to Maak, they were called hats with tuohakhta (tuohakhtalaakh bergehe). (Middendorf 1838: 769.) A round mother-of-pearl plate, irindzhin-tobchi, in the center of which a silk tassel, zala, was attached, was an inseparable part of the expensive festive hat of the Buryats (Maak 1887: 64). The 258

Southern Elements in Yakut Clothing patterned tops of the Yakut women's hats were called by the same name as the Buryat ones, irindzhin-tobchi, chopchuur, perhaps from chopchu ("a round button"). (Pekarskiy 1907-3o: arts. 3646-3647.) Another particular and typical coincidence is interesting, relating to the material from which the hats were made. The hat most favored by a Yakut male was one made of fox paws, in distinction to the reindeer-skin hoods of the tundra dwellers. In the first half of the 19th century, the Kazakhs also considered hats sewn from fox paws to be especially stylish (Finsh and Brem 1882: 155). Fox paw hats are also characteristic of the southern Altayan pastoralists. Aside from the ones for common headgear, the Yakuts also preserved terms denoting the various types of hats; these, again, were identical with other Turkic and Mongol terms: khalpaak (Turkic, kolpak), melgekey (malakhay), d'abaka (among the Altay Teleuts). The most general and widely distributed name for a hat, bergehe, is in its turn related to the Turkic boruk, bork, and in particular to the Kyrgyz beruk, whence also the Bashkir kur'k (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 764, 3269, 1551). A special place is occupied by the distinct Yakut horned hat, muostaakh nuogaidaakh bergehe, which had completely disappeared from daily use at the beginning of the past century, but which is well known both from folklore and from written sources of the 18th and early 19th centuries 41 These hats, both for men and for women, have been found during excavations of old graves in Churapchinsk rayon. They had bases in the form of round cowls, to which conical structures of furs were attached. The latter served as a foundation for a fan made from the wings or tail feathers of a bird. To both sides were sewn small projecting horns made of squirrel tails (Novgorodov and Bolo n.d.: 7). On the men's hats, as Lindenau noted, the feather plume is lacking. What relation do these hats, so distinctive and almost fantastic in form, have to those of other peoples of Asia? At first glance, it might appear that they have nothing at all in common with the costume of the steppedwellers, and are closer to the horned hats of the Tungus, Yukagirs, or even the Chukchis.92 Again, an attentive search reveals a closer analogy to the hats worn in the Asiatic steppes. Among the Kazakhs in Georgi's time, "the daughters of the nobles and princelings ... were distinguished from common folk by having the semblances of horns wound in their hair and by their comely necks like those of herons" (Georgi 1799: 131). As early as the tith century, a hat with horns was worn by the men and chieftains among the Turkmens. The Yakut hats with horns and feathers, found chiefly in the graves of noble and wealthy families, go back, consequently, to the distant past of the steppe nomads, and constitute one of the most archaic elements of the total cultural heritage from remote antiquity, retained among the Yakuts most fully and integrally by virtue of their general conservatism and long isolation from other peoples. The southern connections are shown with the same clarity in the maidens' diadems and hair ornaments noted by Miller, Georgi, Shchukin, Shchekatov, and other authors ([Miller 1761]; Georgi 1799: 186; Shchukin 1833: 290; Shchekatov 1801-9: 362) . 259

THE ORIGIN OF THE YAKUT PEOPLE

In old Yakut graves, there is preserved an accessory to the traditional Yakut female costume which is called bastyya, from bas, "head." One of these, especially rich in its finish, is a diadem set with pearls from the sides of which strings of pearls connected to each other, and alternating with large silver coins, fall onto the breast and the back." These Yakut bastyya fillets are analogous to the girls' and women's ornaments of the same type used by steppe peoples (Katanov 1908: 385). Buryat brides previously wore a ritual crown, narkhinsak, which was closest in form to the bastyya billet 44 No less indicative is the decoration of girls' braids among the 18thcentury Yakuts. "The young girls braid their hair and let down on the sides small strings of spangles with trinkets, and at the rear hangs a ribbon, of a palm's breadth, embroidered with various patterns and also some with spangles."45 The Bashkir women braided into their hair long strings, with coins or tassels at the ends, and also special pendants, sulpa. Girls, on the other hand, attached to their braids strings of varicolored beads, coming together at the top in one cord and ending at the bottom in silk or woollen tassels of various colors (Rudenko 19266: 150-51). Analogous decorations are used to this day by Turkmen girls. The Kazakh women had a forehead ornament sewn with otter fur and decorated with hanging gold or silver discs, pearls, coral, and sometimes even precious stones. Levshin wrote: "Threads with these decorations hung to the cheeks, to the shoulders and breast, to the waist, and sometimes even to the ground" (Levshin 1832: 46). The antiquity of such decorations is emphasized both by the presence of them among peoples of Asia and eastern Europe quite distant from each other at the present time, and by archaeological finds. An important part of dress and its decoration among the Yakuts was a thonged belt (kur), hung with metal discs, which men and women wore. The very same sort of belt is characteristic for other steppe tribes; for example, the Buryats. Wonderful examples of them were known many centuries ago in the burials of the ancient Turkic aristocrats. They often appeared on the grave memorials accompanying such burials, the so-called "stone women" (Kiselev 1936, 3943: 301; Yevtyukova 1941; Radlov and Melioranskiy 1897: 9). A comparative historical analysis of Yakut outer dress, headgear, and women's head and neck ornaments thus clearly reflects the branching and quite various ties reaching far to the south of the Kolyma, Zhigansk, and Yakutsk, in the world of the culture of the steppe nomads and, in part, of their neighbors in the forested steppe regions of Eurasia and reaching just as deeply into their past. We must also consider indisputable the fact that the southern ancestors of the Yakuts in antiquity knew about silk, gold, and perhaps even about precious stones. Reviewing Yakut terminology relating to material culture as a whole, we can find in it indications of connections with distant, more progressive countries of the East—those of Central Asia, Iran, and China. From them, as we have already seen, were derived terms denoting weapons (bolot), 260

Southern Elements in Yakut Clothing wine (chakir), and silk (khampa, toryo). The term uus (Pekarskiy 1907-3o: art. 3704; Malov 1951: 439), meaning blacksmith, jeweller, artisan, is also remarkable from this point of view. S. E. Malov noted the term uz, with the meaning "skillful craftsman," among the ancient Turkic peoples. There is basis for supposing that the term enters into the Central Asian usta, ustad, "craftsman," "artisan." And this is completely understandable: skillful Central Asian craftsmen, especially blacksmiths and jewellers, were well known to the steppe tribes. Their products were not only highly prized articles of daily use, but also models for imitation by local steppe craftsmen. Therefore, the Central Asian designation of a craftsman became the designation for the craft in general, and also for the skillful blacksmith, the virtuoso artisan.

261

The Yakut Epos (Olonkho) and Its Connections with the South

Chapter 4

It seems evident that the entire intellectual culture of the Yakuts' ancestors ought to be in regular correspondence with their material culture. In order to be convinced of this, it should be sufficient to become acquainted with ancient Yakut culture, if only with parts, such as their language and epos. Those should give the finishing touches to the picture of the cultural level and general conditions of the southern ancestors of the Yakuts before they settled on the middle Lena. Let us begin with the epos. We know what great importance the epos has for an understanding of the history of the culture and past of any people. In this respect, the remarkable value of the Yakut epos, the olonkho, is in its richness and variety of plots, in its abundance of clear details of daily life, and in general artistic merits. In the olonkho, fantastic invention and majestic images of the ancient myths fancifully combine with vital realistic pictures. Well turned and yet bizarrely complicated, drawn out by various inserted episodes, the plots of the olonkho unfold in grandiose epics of tens of thousands of verses. The Yakut storyteller, the olonkhosut, recited his heroic poem in the course of many evenings. The famous Upper Yana olonkhosut Manchaary said that he knew an olonkho that would take a month to tell. One monumental poem, recorded from the words of a famous contemporary storyteller, the illiterate old man Govorov (1938), made a book of twenty-five printed leaves (Govorov, 1938). This richness of the Yakut epos is explainable by the distinct historical circumstances in which the Yakut people found themselves for centuries. The heroic epos was preserved as a cultural inheritance of the distant past longer and more completely among the peoples of Asia who lacked their own writing and who were only weakly connected with the progressive cultural centers of the East, where a rich literature had developed ages before. Among these peoples, the basic conditions, which called to life the traditional forms of the heroic epos, and on the basis of which its further growth proceeded, existed longer and more firmly. Besides, here there was neither writing nor literature, factors that could have had a corrupting influence on epic creativity, acted on it, changed its content, 263

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and wholly displaced epic works by more sophisticated and complex literary models. Thanks to this circumstance, the Yakuts retained a broad assortment of epic productions valuable not only for their artistic significance but also as a historical source. From the historical point of view, the question of the origin of the olonkho and its place in the ancient cultures of the southern ancestors of the Yakuts is of especial interest, as is the question of the antiquity of the Yakut epos and its relationship to the epos of their southern and northern neighbors. As regards local elements, the olonkho does in fact contain some northern elements of indisputably local origin. These are primarily local geographical names—the rivers Olenek, Sitta, and Kamchatka—and various features of the landscape, economy, and way of life. One of the olonkhos, for example, describes with a profound feeling of reality the country where its action takes place: To the north of the dwelling, As it were nine hundred Dignified elders bunched together, Stood with peaks projecting Tall-trunked larches. To the east of the dwelling, Like yet strong old women Gathered in a bunch, Dancing together, Appeared the pine-grove. To tell further, To the left of the house, Like princesses In festive attire, Hand in hand And walking in rows, Were seen the clumps Of dense-leaved birches. In the high heavens The winged creature The snow-white crane, Seven days and nights Without rest, Cutting the air with its wings Would not reach that border, Such broad steppes, Dry and well-drained Stretch out there. The black crow, Child of the frosty sky, In three days and three nights Would never cross From border to border The dense depths of the taiga, With chasms, with ravines. 264

The Yakut Epos But there amidst the forests The many-branched, Tender herb Cleared a path for itself. Here and there on the drifted Red sand, On the settled Greenish silt, The nine-branched Herb, the horse-tail, Grew up. As it were spread With the skins of light-bay horses, The bright-misted meadows Could be seen, Gay with flowers. As if covered With the skins of grey horses, The vertical peaks Projected forth From the dark border Of the larch-forest. The trees were adorned With hanging branches; The fine stems Were intertwined, Thickening the pattern. The dark-streaming river Flowed between steep banks.* Any narrator could describe all this without going outside his tent. Even the limitless, wide steppes of which he sang may be a mere hyperbolic reflection, in the mirror of poetic fantasy, of the broad alas [meadow and steppe] expanses along the Lena. On attentive observation, one has no difficulty in discovering in the olonkho certain signs of similarity with the folklore of the indigenous peoples of the North: in external form, in technique of execution, and in content—in individual motifs or plots. In the "oral literature" of the most ancient tribes of the North (the Paleo-Asiatics), just as anonymous as that of the Yakut epos, we also find rather broad epic compositions and storytellers who can continue "one and the same story for a whole night, or even over a number of nights, after the manner of Sheherezade." Their compositions are not only "rich in grandiose figures and fanciful adventures, but also raise themselves to the level of heroic epos" (Bogoraz 1919: 54). Among the mythological figures of Paleo-Asiatic folklore, there are some which are close to those of the olonkho; for example, the world-tree standing in the midst of an ocean, like the Yakut Aal-luuk tree, or "Birdgates," beyond which lies the "Country of Bird Happiness." Here the • '(Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR. Lenskiye pesni, n.d.)

265

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edge of the hard sky falls on earth and bounces back with such rapidity that the birds cannot fly away, and the heavenly snare slams down behind the procrastinators. An analogous conception of the edge of the earth as inhabited by man existed among the Yakuts (Bogoraz 1919: 53), according to whose beliefs the edge of the sky and the earth knock against each other like the jaws of an enraged stallion. During the performance of the Chukchi tales, "the listeners coalesce into a chorus, which supports the storytellers' inspiration by its silent sympathy and, in the most dramatic passages, urges on the story by "answerexclamations" of an established type: "yeah," "true," "verily," "so it is" (Bogoraz 1919: 52). Nor does the audience of the Yakut olonkhosut remain passive. His listeners echo their chorus leader in friendly fashion with short cries of no. Cases are known, in the literature, of a collective performance of the olonkho by groups of singers, including renditions by four singers performing in sequence. Frequently, the heroes of the Chukchi epos are depicted with the same characteristic features as the Yakut bogatyrs; they are usually the same sort of warriors and champions. But, as a whole, these productions represent two different cultural and ethnic worlds. One is revealed as the distinct world of sea-mammal hunters, and of the nomadic reindeer-herders of the tundra, who are spiritually akin to them, and the other that of semi-sedentary pastoralists, indissolubly connected in the past with more southerly lands and the more highly developed pastoral cultures of Middle Asia. Vivid examples of this difference are provided not so much by this or that concrete feature of daily life relating to the actual ethnographic and natural background against which the events depicted develop, as by the general figures, motifs, and details of the plot themselves—such as, for example, the aforementioned figure of the world-tree. Among the Yakuts, this is a sacred tree which connects the three worlds of the universe. From its branches drips the life-giving dew of plenty. At its foot spreads a milk-white lake, the symbol of the world-ocean. When the interior of the tree is revealed, the beneficent goddess-mistress of the universal grove appears in it, bestowing her blessing on the hero. This tree is a bright image of celestial bliss, happiness, and plenty. In the Chukchi epos, on the other hand, the image of the world-tree is depicted quite differently. It stands in the middle of a cold ocean. In its center yawns a black hollow. In the hollow lives an evil spirit. The branches of the tree are studded with sharp thorns and twigs. With every tide, the tree lies on its side and dips down into the deep. When the tree rises, it is all white with fish. The Yakut epos cannot be directly connected with the folklore of his nearest neighbors on the north—the former Tungus, who have forgotten their native language, but who have retained their ancient way of life and their reindeer-herding economy; that is, the "northern Yakuts" on the lower Lena and to the west of it. This khosun epos of the North consists of simple historical legends and 266

The Yakut Epos traditions concerning ancient warrior-heroes, the khosuns, and dealing chiefly with their wars against the khosuns of neighboring tribes (Vasilev 1908: 363, 370). These tribes are distinguished from each other by almost nothing except petty details of daily life; for example, individual varieties of tattooing. Their epos depicts in relief the simple life of hunters and reindeer-herders in the forest tundra. It is expressive, but depicts simply, and without particular exaggeration, their mutual relationships, and tells of events which undoubtedly took place at some time or other. These events are somewhat embellished, and contain an admixture of mythological tales of very ancient date and of universal plot-motifs, but their actual kernel always remains in its place. This is a kind of oral chronicle, and is not the result of free epic creativity, as are the Yakut bogatyr poems. Their heroes are also not conventional figures created out of whole cloth by the popular fantasy, but are most probably actual warriors of the past. Thus, in the Yakut olonkho, the same basic southern stratum which can be traced in the other areas of Yakut culture is clearly visible. From this, however, it by no means follows that the Yakut epos contains nothing peculiar and original. On the contrary, all investigators have recognized the sharply pronounced originality of the Yakut epos—its distinctive and inimitable aspect, in comparison with the other examples of epic poetry of the backward peoples of Asia known to us. Like any other epos, the Yakut epos reflects in logical fashion the peculiar aspect of the people who created it, the special features of its cultural development and of the course of its history. Nevertheless, we may find in the olonkho features which will lead us again into the world of specific steppe tribes and peoples, already familiar to us, who are nearest and most closely related to the Yakuts in their culture. Even in its very name, the olonkho is directly connected with the BuryatMongol epos, the ontkho (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3521). In content and form, the Yakut epos likewise has common features with the epos of other tribes of southern Siberia and the Middle Asian countries related to the Yakuts (Pekarskiy 5934: 924). The olonkho usually begins with a traditional introduction, a prologue, which takes the place of the scene and the stage setting for the epic drama performed by the singers, and also serves as a general background for the unfolding action. As with the usual stage settings of our theaters, the listener, so to speak, sees before him the blossoming earth, its mountains and waters, and the numerous animals which inhabit this beautiful epic landscape. In the midst of a broad grove grows a tall oak tree or a wide-branching birch. At its foot is a deep lake, and, all around, herds of horses and uncountable flocks of cattle wander freely, scattering without trace in various directions. A multitude of winged creatures lay colored eggs in rows. The fourfooted beasts who here "have found a safe haven and multiplied," raise a bustle and commotion everywhere. But this is no prosaic drawing, nor even a romantically colored hyperbolized picture of some actual beautiful corner of the earth. Before the 267

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poet's mind's eye there slowly rises, as it were, a majestic image of the universe, represented in the mirror of popular fantasy, and an imagined picture of all its worlds is drawn. The action begins "on our blessed earth, bordered with reclining mountains, so that it should not move; fortified with standing mountains, so that it should not move; fortified with standing mountains, so that it should not come loose; strewn with rocky mountains, so that it will not sway; where the top is earth, and the middle water, and which is clothed with turf. "A frozen sea around, on the east a warm sea, below the Arat-sea; if you press it, it does not sway; if you advance, it does not yield; if you trample it, it is not shaken"—with such firm lines, the poet limits the expanse of the middle world, the earth-mother. With bright colors he depicts its lively idealized aspects. The expanse across is unknowable—a broad and radiant country. The distance is unknowable—a limitless prospect of earth. At the foot of the eastern slopes, the fair earth is wound with confused threads; at the western slopes it is stamped out in beautiful meadows; at the northern slopes it is forged in grass-fringed fields; at the southern slopes it is lined with the green silk of valleys; its groves are like sheets of hammered tin; no shadows are visible—bright lakes; the milky lakes are covered with foam; the soil there is curds; the salt-flats stores of milk; the black boulders; oil with sour milk; the forest lakes of butter; the mountains of intestinal fat; the cliffs of lard. The grass there grows as high as a young horse's head, and the green sedge as the fluttering forelock of a good horse; the mountain sedge comes to the smooth flanks of an excellent horse; and the plumed grass to the knee-caps of a beautiful horse. The white willow is as if plaited with silver, and the rose willow like spun silver; the dwarf willow grows around, and the roads are overgrown with black crowberry. There is no winter, but summer reigns forever, in that country. There are no nights, but bright day stands always, in that country. The sun never sets there, nor is the moon extinguished; the big-chested cocks do not fly away; the loud-voiced cuckoo never ceases cuckooing; the turtledove does not fall silent; the white-flanked ducks do not fly away, nor do the curlews depart (Yastremskiy 1929: 56). In the center of the universe, at the very midpoint of the middle world, rises the mighty tree of life, created for the happiness of all things living on earth (Fig. 61). With special love, the poet depicts its clear silhouette: At the very top of the cape, High, facing the waters And consorting With black whirlwinds— The souls of sacrificed beasts, Lonely grew the many-branched Holy tree of happiness— With raised roots,

The Yakut Epos

Fig. 61. The world-tree fial luuk mas from the drawing of i. V. Popov, Tattinsk rayon). With slightly rubbed bark, With bare branches And top bent askew. Bottoms upward, Kumiss cups with crest Like silvered cones Hanging. To the eastern hill From the end of a cone With a willow ptarmigan Flew to earth A foamy moisture. Like wisps of hair From the tail and mane Of horses, 269

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Gathered in a bunch, Trailed far-flung Silken Green needles, The foam by drops (as large as) a ptarmigan-cock Flowed forever. From the westward points Of its branches In an endless stream Foam oozed On the holy earth. This stream, Three hand-spans deep, Dug deep in earth-mother. And of pure milk Formed a lake. Nourished with the juices of this tree, Bathing in its enlivening flow, The weak grow strong, They grow, the small filled out, The sickly were made whole. Such was the purpose Of that, for the happiness of the living, Created blessed Regal tree.* This miraculous tree unites the three worlds of the universe. Its roots reach down to the nether world, whence, taking fright from the cold and filth of the ice world, it turns back in a bow in order to become a post for the hanging of cream vessels for the lord and lady of the genii, the rulers of cattle. The top of the mighty tree reaches the heavens. Bypassing that part of heaven where the ruler of hesitating people and of restive cattle lives, it attains the bright country of Urul)-Ayyy-toyon and becomes his hitching post. Near the hitching post, the gods feast; they drink for seven days seated in a circle; they give each other cups and exchange beakers. Like an island of birchwood, the gods erect a fence at the top of the holy tree. And one can see, they say, the sign of this Olympian feasting: the drops, the size of the eggs of the golden-eye duck, falling on the earth, murmur and mutter as they become the milk lake which is not covered with froth .... The singers of the olonkho, similar to Homer's epics, presently are little interested in what happens in heaven and in the lower world. Their attention is completely occupied with the affairs of the middle world and its inhabitants. The middle world is described in the olonkho as a heavenly sacred land of the golden age, when: On the eastern hill The mother-goddess, • (Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala .... Lenskiye pesni, pp. 28-29.) 270

The Yakut Epos On the western—the grantress of good, On the southern, the spirit Orlan; But on the northern, happiness itself, Living, they carried out their deeds. On the edges of the steppe Young mares Neigh long. In the southern valleys The young stallions With the sound of neighing, pined. In the eastern valleys Mother-mares With spotted nostrils and With tousled mane With low neighs form a herd. On the western plains, Selected bulls With arshin-long horns Sent down by Ayyyhyt, the Empress, With booming bellows wander. And in the southern dales— Young cows With elegant tails, Spotted across the forehead, With nine Choy-Bagarakh's Grace engendering, With inviting mooing, There they multiplied. It seemed, With this abundance, Uncounted riches The valleys were sated, The glades overflowed. There was no empty land, No unused steppe.* In this wondrous country, sings the Yakut olonkhosut, eternal summer ruled; without ceasing, the cuckoo-bird of love and happiness cuckooed; the gray doves cooed incessantly; the cocks and the buzzards never flew away; and the eagles did not stop their loud screaming. In this land there was neither sin nor illness nor death itself: In this sacred land, When the first men Knew not the heaviness of sins, They knew no evil crimes ... The radiant sun-god's Wrathful thunder fires Constantly played, Rolling thunder passed by, • (Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala .... Lenskiye pesni, pp. 28-29.) 27I

THE ORIGIN OF THE YAKUT PEOPLE

Flashing lightning flared. Then divine fire cleansed, Since in those times Disease, frailty, and illness Hindered people not. Of death they knew nothing at all. Cough, contagion did not touch them, In the cattle yard at the stake The calves did not drop from hunger, And in the horse shed, sores Did not ruin the young stallion then.* The authors of the Yakut epics depicted in their prologues the very childhood of the universe, a miraculous golden age when the world had just risen from darkness and mist. Almost the same introductory picture, with all the majestic images characteristic for it, is not hard to find in the epics of other tribes of Siberia. In Altayan epics we encounter the same image of a happy land, the silk-blue Altay with yellow dawns, where the cuckoos, not falling silent, sing, the forest is forever green, and at the foothills of sixty mountains, seventy lakes are seen; a honey-yellow tree rises, on the branches of which clouds curl like birds' nests. This image is well known also in the Buryat uligers (epic tales). As in the Yakut epos, here a blessed summer always continues, plenty and happiness prevail, even lambs do not die, and kids and other animals nowhere perish. Over a valley, strewn with downy flowers, rises the worldtree, a mighty larch; the frozen sea is visible far off. This cosmic image of the universe is developed still more vividly and colorfully in the openings of the Oyrot-Mongol epics. They begin with the same kind of majestic panorama of a beautiful country, where "rises the five-headed mysterious Khangay, which grew up at once, without slopes or foothills, and the heaped Altay Mountains lift themselves, and form without saddles or passes.... Thirty-three great wide mountains stretch out [so far] that even a born champion could not walk around them" (Vladimirtsov 1926: 56). In this "joyful, beautiful fatherland," this country of eternal summer, ten great, healing lakes and spring-fed seas ripple smoothly, and a hundred large rivers flow, twisting; in that country, the feathered creatures eternally rejoice in the sun, "hoopoes and cuckoos coo and call, flying in flocks"; the grass is always green, "the groves of juniper and sandalwood crowd together, fruit trees and sandalwood trees sway and rock." In this fabulous country, life flows as from a spring; "the wild beasts of fearful strength roar, antelopes of seventy colors graze, following one after the other." Tigers and bears run about, playing. Nor are domestic animals lacking here. A herd of bronze-bay horses grew up and multiplied on the banks of the eight healing seas, covering the yellow valleys. With the same emotional force of a passionate pastoralist as the Yakut olonkhosut, the Mongol rhapsode depicts this unheard-of • (Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala .... Lenskiye pesni, pp. 28-29.) 272

The Yakut Epos multitude of horses: "The horses grew, waving their manes; they grazed, covering the surface of the golden earth; they fed, tearing the grass with their sharp teeth. The stallions and the mares walk together, touching flanks; the colts, yearlings and two-year-olds wander, neighing, among their comrades. The whinnying of the horses sounds, loud and joyful, their voices are as the voices of swans, they answer each other, they talk to each other in the voices of wild horses" (Vladimirtsov 1926: 103). On the shady slopes of the white Khangay mountains, uncounted herds of camels grew; around them, the black bulls bellowed in the ravines, so that a din was heard. With them "sheep white as shells grew, filling the foothills of the thirteen passes of the Altay ... uncounted years have passed since their number was last known, infinite years since their number was forgotten." The fabulous Khangay of the Mongol epics, with all its numerous population, corresponds entirely to the universe of the Yakut epos. There is here a correspondence of the lake of milk with the life-giving moisture of the Yakut olonkho, and of all these "white overflowing seas," babbling brooks, and rivers of transparent water, curative of all diseases (Vladimirtsov 1926: 232). Only the holy focal point of the universe, a majestic world-tree, is lacking; the groves of sandalwood trees and the luxurious temples of Buddhism have replaced.it. The description of a wonderful country, in the heroic poems of the Yakuts, as in the epics of the peoples related to them, however, is only a unique decorative base on which subsequent narration unfolds, dedicated to the activity of the main personage—the hero of the poem. He is the best among men, the first among the Yakut-Uryankhay. Yet, at the same time, he is a lonely man who knows not his parents, or wherefrom he came. "He knew neither an honored lord-father nor an honored ladymother," the poem relates. He reasons, "If I fell from heaven, I would be otherwise dressed, and if I came out of the underground world, I would be covered with earth. Genius of the earth, provider, creatress. You, nine beautiful youths adorning the grass. You, eight hymn-singing girls decking the earth with finery,"—thus he addresses his plea to the favoring spirits of his grove—"Of whose blood am I, and from whose womb? By what deity was I created? Is there not a commandment of fate on me? He who lives on the milky lake by the foothills of milk-white stone, the White CreatorLord, did I not spring from him?" But even the spirits of the grove cannot answer his questions. The secret is revealed only when the thunder unexpectedly rolls, large pelting raindrops come down, and ragged white clouds, "as if with heads and feet," are blown in from the four corners of the heavens. The sky opens wide in wind and thunder, and three youths, with white wands in their hands, on three milk-white horses, arrived—"the grooms of god." We have come, they declare, "as trusted heralds," "swift messengers." The White Creator-Lord, your grandfather, and his wife—"the sun is her eye and the kumiss-sack her breast—the bright, honored mistress, your grandmother, have sent us to make known their will" (Yastremskiy 1929: r4-15)• 273

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The hero must receive, from the progenitor of nine smiths, armor of seven layers of strong iron, from [the trees] of the winding valley a long bow, feathered burning arrows, and a heavy mace of nine hundred puds. In exchange for this armament, he must offer the blacksmith the daughter of the terrible lord of the underworld, Arsan-Duolay, and thereby begin his heroic feats. But this is only the beginning, or, rather, a collateral episode of his activity. The hero's chief obligation is revealed to him by the gods who created him—the White Creator-Lord (Ururj-Ayyy-toyon) and his wife (Kubeykhotun). These same three white youths tell him, in the name of the gods, that at the very edge of the earth, where "the wide rumbling heaven hangs down like wavy crane feathers and the underworld bends into a bow like the skis of the Tungus," lives the Copper Lord-God, who has nine young sons and eight daughters, the best of whom is White Ukeydeen. "Eight deities gave this woman a destiny. The ruler of Fate, the Lord, your grandfather, ordered, and the protectress who nourished you, said: "This, they [the eight deities] say, is your fate—go and bear the children who appear late on the earth; feed the tardy beasts; in summer, place four lucky stakes with springs at the ends; in winter, cut eight thick treetrunks; kindle the sacred fire; build a neat house" (Yastremskiy 1929: 2I-22).

Thus the highest meaning of life and the fate of the hero are determined. The hero was created by the gods themselves, and is their child—the chosen one, called to execute divine will: to become the progenitor of the human clan and the founder of an abundant pastoral economy. Properly speaking, he is, in the eyes of the olonkhosut, the first man on earth—just like Adam, but with this difference, that the image of the biblical hero corresponds to a later epoch, when there has already arisen the concept of humanity as a whole, embracing all peoples; but ErSogotokh, the Elley of the Yakut epos, belongs still to that stage when the concept "man," or, more exactly, "real man," is limited to the boundaries of the clan and tribe proper. A similar image of the lonely hero-ancestor is characteristic also of the epics of other steppe tribes of Asia. Among the Altayans, this is the "orphan Yuskuzek," or Kulakchin, who sings of himself: "I know not the father who provided for me, I had no nourishing mother's breast. I grew as an orphan, I wandered along among the camps, my horse is chestnut, my name Kulakchin" (Anon. 1937: 165; Vikhliantsev 194o: 165). Among the Buryats, Alamzhi-Mergen appeared on the earth "not settled by people, where the horse did not step." The epic hero knows neither his father nor his mother, and evidently they did not exist at all: "Near the great black mountain, at the edge of the black sea, he was born," they relate. "Man-like I was born, like a human son I was born, like a man I was born, by the will of Esege-Malan," he, being born, said (Sanzheyev 1936). It should be emphasized that here we have no khan, no prince, no feudal lord. It is also characteristic that the principal hero of the epos is 274

The Yakut Epos depicted as a fighter against evil and coercion, for the triumph of good. His activities are directed against misfortunes and calamities threatening himself and his people. He does not strive toward the seizure of alien property and toward power over people, but, on the contrary, wishes for them happiness and a joyful life. The heroes of the olonkho do not busy themselves with seizing other countries, or with the enslavement of people and the plunder of their property. Even the diabolic bogatyrs, hostile to men, and the rulers of the countries of dark powers, have no other wishes beyond the desire to seize a woman in a tribe of the middle world, or in general to do them evil, destroy their happiness, destroy the entire tribe. For example, in the olonkho Nyurgun-bootur (Orosin and Ergis, 1947: 67-69) it is related: This gray-spotted world in the very middle With falling waters steaming, With thinning trees falling, And the happy inhabitants and its beasts, Its enormous countless riches, Its wide free plenty, Its high triumphing happiness, Destroy just this, says the ruler Of the lower world of twenty-seven tribes— Old man Ard'ang Duolan With his old woman Ala Buuray, who Has wooden shoes on her feet— They, living at the very bottom Of the three underworld countries Nryukeng Yueden, Expressly exporting thence Sorcerers of the deep land, Villains of that place, Tricksters of the lower world, A tribe of eight-legged dwarf-demons, Bloodthirsty, one-eyed monsters, Spilled the happiness of the middle world. They're the ones who overturn the cradles of the newborn, Destroy the fences of bred beasts. Here's this country we see, Will it really be now the possession of evil ogres? Or how will it be otherwise? Who now will save our tribe of Ayyy? The unfortunate people of the villages of the sun. As concerns the hero of the bright sunny land, in the parting words to him as he sets out for the middle world, they say: Alway remember That (you) should never Make weep and sigh, Groan and suffer The people of the tribe of Ayyy, People of the village of the sun. 275

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If you do, you offend All people and deities of the Ayyy. This you remember forever. For, if the day comes when The chosen atamans* of the evil ogres, Greedy gluttons of the southern tribes, Chosen from the woodgoblin monsters, Begin to offend and press The people of the tribe of Ayyy, People of the village of the sun, You should protect and guard them. Be to them a shield, like a dense forest.t When the struggle with the evil forces of the lower world is finished, the heavenly mentors say to the hero and his wife: Payment and atonement you exacted, Bloody battles to the death are finished, And the black wicked fate is departed. Live peacefully— In order to make the fences for multiplying beasts, To build the cradles for newborn children, To increase your offspring You were sent to the middle world, In order to become the progenitors of men.** In the image of the bright hero of the middle world in the Yakut epos, as in analogous images from the epos of other peoples, features of a prefeudal epoch are thus reflected, and, along with this, the dreams and aspirations of the working people for the final triumph of social justice and truth on earth. The coincidences in the naming of the heroes of the epic poems also deserve attention. The Yakut Er-Sogotokh corresponds to the Kyrgyz Er-Manas, to the Altayan Er-Samyr, etc. Still more widely distributed are the generic terms by which the heroes of the epics are called: bergen or mergen, "archer," botro, kan or khan, botur or bator, known among all Turkic and Mongol peoples of Siberia and Middle Asia. It is not only the central personage of the Yakut epos that confirms the traits of its heroes, held in common with the main heroes of the Mongol and Turkic epics. The same similarities are not hard to find among the many other [lesser] epic heroes, both those who number among the friends of the bogatyr and [those who are] among his enemies. Besides the supreme god-protectors of the hero, a very important role in the events of the olonkho belongs to the "white" female shamans, either the sisters of the bogatyr or of his wife. Dressed in white clothes hung with silver bells and rings, these female shamans sing: • [Leaders. Editor, A.t.N.A.] t (Orosin and Ergis 1947: 357) •• (Ibid.) 276

The Yakut Epos We are cleansed with eight fiery rays of light, We grew with saddle blankets of pure white hair, When we in the image of mature mares With spotted nostrils, With bunch-tangled manes, Stood, bending our forelegs, Presenting eight sacred cups Brimming with kumiss and butter. Holding these cups, they went round us From the sun's side And consecrated us shamans, giving us The blessed force of words On the eight paths of light. '0 mother-queen,' they address the goddess Ayyyhyt: 'Turn not from us, taking for shamans the darkness With blood-clotted hands. We stand before you, Blessed she-shamans of the light With pure thoughts, with cleansed bones.'* The white she-shaman protectresses, or sisters of the hero, rescue him at the moment of his most desperate danger; they intercede for him before the gods; they give him their blessing for a peaceful, happy life and for new achievements. In the Buryat uliger, the corresponding figure is the sister of the hero, together with whom he was miraculously born on the earth. In the Oyrot-Mongol epics, it is the heavenly fairy-dagina (Zhamtsarano 1918: XXIX, XXVIII; Vladimirtsov 1926: 48 and passim). Along with the sister-shaman, there is an earthly friend, a close-comradein-arms of the hero. In the epic Surj-D'aahyn, just such a friend appears, for example, as the unexpectedly returned older brother, Ayyya-bogatyr (Yastremskiy 1929). In other cases, he proves to be the conquered bogatyr, who willingly unites with the hero, as happened in the case of Oksekyleekh Bykystey, in the epic Khaan-D'argystay (Khudyakov 1890: 215). In the Oyrot-Mongol epos, this collateral hero is made the friend of the main bogatyr after a stiff, fierce duel in which he is wounded, as for example, Zambulin in the epic Dayni-Yurgyul or Khadzhir-Khara in the epic Bum-Erdeni (Vladimirtsov 1926: 46). In the Altayan epos, such a one is Anchi-Mergen, who voluntarily becomes the friend and companion of the bogatyr Kokin-Erkey, and a participant in his heroic feats. Of the hostile heroes of the epic cast of characters, besides the usual diabolic bogatyrs, inhabitants of the underworld, sometimes the "mongus" occupies a special place in the Yakut olonkho—some kind of unknowable but threatening monster. One of the chief enemies of Geser is also the twenty-headed mongus, the destruction of which even this divine hero accomplished only with guile and the help of his wise wife Aralgo-Goa. Repulsive monguses are the chief enemies of heroes in the Oyrot-Mongol epics too. The monguses • (Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala ... ; Olonkho Saaryn-baay-toyon, pp. 51-52.)

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of the Oyrot-Mongol epos correspond, in the Buryat epics, to the same kind of many-headed monster, hostile to the human race, the mangatakhai, whose task is to devour people, "to defile" heaven (Zhamtsarano 1918: XIX). But still more terrible than the monguses themselves is their mother, the sinister she-shaman Kerinkey-Zandan, living at the source of many rivers, at the foot of the hill Ongon, beating a crooked drum, possessing a hat, which brings on melancholy, and sorcerer's spells. In the Yakut epic, Er-Sogotokh, the hero, having annihilated the eightlegged demon of the bogatyr N'urgun, also clashes, at the northern edge of the world sea-ocean, with a terrible old woman with three humps; she leads a white dog with a skinless muzzle, and under one arm holds an iron cradle. "Woe," sings the old woman, "thick fog are my melodies, snow and rain my cries, black smoke my song." Like Geser, Er-Sogotokh cannot equal her in a fair fight; he conquers her with hypnotic guile and trickery, but not with force (Yastremskiy 1929). The ruler of the dark country, the underworld, whence the diabolical bogatyrs of the olonkho come to the middle world, is the Lord ArsanDuolay, depicted in the form of a scarecrow, with his mouth on the crown of his head and his eyes on his temples, whose only wish is that death and devastation should rule in the middle world (Khudyakov 189o: 134, 166, 218; Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 15o, 751). Among the Altayans, the corresponding figure to this dread deity of the underworld is Erlik, and among the Mongols Erlen-khan, whose name is not known to the Yakuts. It is the more interesting that one of the Khalkha-Mongol epics mentions the terrible fifteen-headed mongus Aan-Duolay, whose name corresponds to the Yakut lord of the underworld Arsan-Duolay. If the population of the upper world is represented in the olonkho by the gods and the members of their household, and that of the lower world by Arsan-Duolay and his tribe (to which the diabolical bogatyrs, the eight-legged monsters belong), the inhabitants of the middle world are personified primarily in the figure of the dweller in the happy country, the possessor of numerous herds and a large household, with the people dependent on him. His daughter becomes the wife of the hero of the poem. This ruler of the middle world is depicted in the form of an honored elder of uncounted wealth, "like an eagle, with a great face overgrown with beard." At his side is a portly old woman, with head white as snow, in a coat of selected sable skins and a fox fur hat, with a colorful divining spoon in her hand. His people "live on nine creeks in large villages, and on seven creeks, thickly settled, his good neighbors live" (Yastremskiy 1929: 100-102). In some olonkhos, this old man is called the Copper Lord-God, in others, Sabyya-baay-toyon, and so forth, but most frequently he is called Baay-Kharakhaan-toyon. In the epos of the Türks of Minusinsk kray, frequent mention is made of Karakan, the Black Khan, represented in the form of a wealthy lord dwelling beside the warm black sea. In one such epic, the Bronze Archer, Kuruldey-bergen, comes riding to the Black Khan to sue for the hand of his daughter, and, after a number of adven278

The Yakut Epos tures, receives her, just as the hero of the Yakut olonkho receives to wife the daughter of Sabyya-baay-toyon or Baay-Kharakhaan-toyon (Katanov 1885; Anon. 1858: 122). Among the Altayans, this rich man, the son-inlaw of the hero of the poem, is known under the name of Kara-khan or Karaty-khan, and among the Kazakhs, he bears the name Kara-bay. In the description of the Altayan storyteller, Kara-khan or Karaty-khan is also rich, but even more powerful than the Yakut Baay-Kharakhaantoyon. He lives by the blue sea near the hundred bays, near a majestic mountain, with a hundred waterfalls; his herds cannot fit into the Altay; his people are crowded on the earth; his good fortune flows like a river, as with the Yakut Baay-Kharakhaan-toyon. The next character of the heroic epics occupies a somewhat separate place among the heroes of the olonkho, with a special respect tinged with fear, and his mighty figure does not yield in majesty even to the most prominent epic heroes. The olonkho relates: "At a distance of nine hundred days' journey, there is heard the noise of the anvil of his smithy; his dwelling is a brownish hill of potter's clay, with openings in nine places. Inside the hill, blazing with fire and smoke, there are huge noisy bellows as large as white mares, an anvil of solid stone from the underworld, a hammer [sounding] like a wave of the sea. His servants are nine hundred young stokers, black as coal, and seventy young metal workers; he himself is called `the forefather of nine smiths,' ` Duodarba the Destroyer, the Black Smith' " (Yastremskiy 1929: 15). The same incisive lines are used in the Dzhan gar to depict the Terrible Blue Smith, Koko-darkhan, who lives in a yurt of untrimmed natural boulders, inside which is a bright red bellows. Twenty-five people blow up the bellows, and a hundred smiths help Koko-darkhan. No one may enter the dwelling of the dread smith without permission: "The hundred people on duty at the terrible black bellows cry and roar more strongly than the strongest men: `He who enters without permission will be most strictly punished' ' " (Lipkin 194o: 323). In the Buryat epos, the mighty darkhan-smiths are occupied with the making of weapons for the tenger-gods themselves, and only at the hero's persistent requests make for him the articles he needs. The hero's horse is among the most active participants in the epic tales; its role and place in the olonkho are the same as in all epic poems of other peoples; it is the hero's helper and friend, if not the most reliable of all his associates and comrades-in-arms. The life of the principal hero of the Yakut olonkho takes place surrounded by these characters, so well known from the epos of other pastoral peoples of Siberia. The similarity in plot between the Yakut olonkho and the epos of other Siberian and Middle Asian pastoral peoples is equally great. Two examples should suffice to convince us of this. Setting forth on his exploits, the Yakut bogatyr hastens to the patroness spirit of his native land and to her older sister, who lives within an "eightbranched sacred oak tree." The oak tree opens, and, in its midst, there appears a majestic woman in a silver sable coat, with a hat of spotted 279

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lynx pelts. The goddess blesses the hero and permits him to suckle her own breast (Yastremskiy 1929: 22). In the epos of other Turkic and Mongol tribes, it is true, such a clear and complete picture is no longer to be found, but the idea that the sacred world-tree helps the hero is widespread in them. And in one of the Altayan epics, it is told how Kara-maas-bogatyr, the "Orpheus" of the Altayan epos, plays on a wooden pipe with eighty-two openings before a hundred-year-old cedar of sixty times a man's reach around. On hearing Kara-maas's song, "the moon-winged birds ceased to feed their young, and even the beasts forgot to tend their cubs," green silk leaves sprouted on the dry branches, innumerable flowers bloomed on the barren earth, the mountains inclined their peaks to the singer, the sea became calm, and the very sun paused in the sky. Under the influence of the magical song, the tree "opened wide its breast, and a beautiful girl appeared out of the mighty tree." This was the daughter of Altyn-1146gen, the beautiful Kumush-tana, who was predestined for the hero (Vikhliantsev 1940: 240). Subsequently, the most severe trial in the fate of the hero proves to be the instance in which, as a result of treachery, he falls into a "bottomless" pit, and remains there doomed to extinction, or perishes altogether. In the Yakut olonkho "The White Youth" (Urul]-Uolan), the rescue of the hero from the trap of the abyss is accomplished with the aid of a golden hair of the heavenly deity Urura-Ayyy-toyon. The sister of the bogatyr, the White Ukeydeen-Kuo, learning of his dismal fate, requests, from her father Ayyy-toyon, through her two sisters, one of the three golden hairs growing on the crown of his head. Ayyy-toyon is not inclined to part with his golden hairs, but UkeydeenKuo's sisters, by guile and persistence, obtain permission to tear out the shortest and thinnest hair; however, instead of this, they tear out the longest and thickest one, thereby offending and fiercely angering their divine father, the lord of the heavens. Having made from this hair a rope which shines in the darkness, the White Ukeydeen lets it down into the dark depths of the chasm and saves the White Youth from destruction (Khudyakov 1890: 150-51). Exactly thus in the Altayan epic, the heroine Kan-Tyulku transforms herself into a "thin hair" and saves the hero; in other cases, he is rescued by the hero's horse, to whom his sister, the beautiful Torko Chachak appeals for help. The horse lets down, into a hole of seventy sazhens' depth, one hair from its tail, and lifts the master out of the pit (Vikhliantsev 1940: 24, 273). Analogous examples are found in Buryat and KhalkhaMongol epic poetry (Potanin 1903: 173-74). Among the examples of direct correspondences in plot, we should also mention the trials of the bogatyr at the black or boiling sea, the battle of the hero with the children or grandchildren of the subterranean ruler, the proposal of the diabolical bogatyr to divide in half the beautiful lady, on account of whom the battle is being fought, in such a way that he would obtain the lower half, and the hero of the good principles, the upper part of her body. 280

The Yakut Epos To the same category belong such characteristic details as the magical transformations of the hero, who changes himself into the balding old man Uödey (in the Yakut olonkho) or Tas-Tarakay (in the Altayan epics), the infant avenger as the most terrible enemy, the murder of the bird, which is a living talisman and contains the soul of the enemy. Among the smaller but specific details, the bridge from which the enemies are thrown into the sea, "the water of death"; the oath before the moon and the sun (among the Altayans) and the ancient ysyakh [ritual] in honor of the moon and the sun (among the Yakuts) ; the appearance in the skies of messengers of the will of the gods; the threat to break the enemy's hitching post; the custom of the Yakut and Altayan bogatyrs of raising the heart and innards of a killed opponent to the skies on a spear; the sharpshooting, in which the arrow passes through the saddlebow (in the Yakut legends about Tygyn and in the Altayan traditions about Kochkorbay) ; and the description of the hero's fighting bow or horse—all these are deserving of attention. Finally, as the Yakut olonkho usually closes with a picture of a national festival—a ritual feast, ysyakh—in honor of the bright heavenly patron deities and creators of the human race, so the steppe epics close with the same kind of end-piece, depicting a merry toy-festival against the background of a paradisal country (Vikhliantsev 1940: 182-83; Ulagashev 1941: 149, 323; Orlov 1945: 71) As in the other Mongol or Turkic epics, we see in the Yakut olonkho a further structural feature—the development of the action, not in one section but in two: the first describes the doings of the hero himself, and the second those of his son (Sanzheyev 1936: xxv-xxvii). Like the other epics of the Turkic and Mongol peoples, the Yakut olonkho is characterized by a regular alternation of rhythmic speeches of the heroes, verse couplets, and prose discourse in the descriptive passages. As in the Buryat uliger, each character of the olonkho has his own personal musical motif, typical of this or that group of characters (Sanzheyev 1936: xx; Orlov 1945: 20; Zhamtsarano 1918: xvi). For the speeches of the diabolical bogatyrs and their retinues, a sharp dynamic outline and melody, with passionate and even fierce tempos, is characteristic. The positive characters sing at a more even and monotonous pace. A soft lyrical intonation is usual for feminine roles. The singing of good spirits and of the white shaman protectresses of the hero breathes the tranquility of the solemn algys, the chanting in honor of the bright heavenly deities of the Yakut pantheon. As for the character of epic discourse, the alliterative structure of the Yakut epos is characteristic to the same degree as that of the Buryat, Oyrots, Khalkha-Mongols, and Altayans. Like the epics of these tribes, and particularly those of the Oyrot-Mongols, the Yakut models constitute unwritten literature of a high style; these are also "actual literary works, only not written down— preserved not on paper or parchment, but in the memories of professional performers (Vladimirtsov 1926: 35). As with the Oyrot-Mongols, among the Yakuts "there exists side by side with their ordinary speech a special language, distinguished in 281

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grammar and vocabulary, used for solemn occasions, at the climatic moment, when a person wishes to speak beautifully, in an exalted or touching way, or merely wishes to make an impression by his speech. This special language finds its particular application in works of folklore: songs, tales, proverbs, sayings. In heroic epics, it is used predominantly" (Vladimirtsov 1926: 35-36). The language of the olonkho is characterized by poetic metaphors and hyperboles, which are usual in the same forms in the epos of the steppes. The Yakut storytellers do not spare colors in describing their hero, his house, his herds, his weapons or utensils; all of these are striking in their abundance, their rare and expensive materials, and particularly in their dimensions. The greatness of the hero is expressed with particular force in the hyperbolic descriptions of his swift riding. From the swiftness of Er-Sogotokh's ride, the olonkho tells us, the sea churned and began to rage, a storm and blizzard were raised, hailstones of the size of a three-year-old cow began to fall, great trees bent and broke, the khakhay began to roar, even the underworld let its tongue fall on its breast, and heaven looked down with the broad whites of both its eyes. When the bogatyr Surd-D'asshyn rode, the sound of his horses' hoofs spread like peals of spring thunder, trees flew apart in splinters, the dry dust rose upwards in clouds, the breath was taken away, and everything around was wrapped in pitch darkness. In another case, concerning the son of Er-Sogotokh, it is told of the hero Basymn'y that "from the swiftness of his riding the sea churned and raged, the unshakable underworld, like an island of floating moss, bobbed up and down; the wide sounding heaven was covered with thick smoke" (Yastremskiy 1 929: 15, 37, 45, 97). The riding of the heroes is described in the same fashion in the Altayan tales. When the hero Kogutay races on his bull, heaven and earth shudder at the sound of his war cry; the mountains tremble, and the blue sea of one hundred bays is disturbed; the black mountain, from which a hundred waterfalls descend, shudders from foot to peak. From the running of his bull, trees break, dust rises from earth to heaven and falls down from heaven to earth, and day becomes night (Yutkanov 1 935: 79, 186, 187). The olonkhosuts are especially inventive in their hyperboles and comparisons when describing the struggle of their heroes with hostile forces. Their arrows pierce mountains; they throw their opponents on the ground with such force that their bodies penetrate the earth for seven sazhens. The battle of the great bogatyrs is of the proportions of a world catastrophy; it brings consternation not only to the inhabitants of the middle world but also to the dwellers in the other two worlds of the universe. At the time of the decisive encounter of the hero Basymn'y with the eight-legged son of the demon, they collide with each other like two thunderclaps in a storm. "Under the weight of their feet, the sea tilted and spilled over. The dragon-fish of destruction, with the scales on its back and with its fins inside out, swam about so quickly that its belly was torn apart. Those who lived above flew into the air, and the underground ones fell downward. In the heavens, three generations of the 282

The Yakut Epos clan, bending down, looked: `There are warriors for you!' The eight underground generations moving forward exclaimed: `What people!' ' " (Yastremskiy 1929: 53.) The battle of the heroes is described in exactly the same way in the Altayan epics: the Altay Mountains tremble and shake from the bouts of the bogatyrs, the sea spills over, the thunder rises to the blue sea, and an impenetrable night comes on. The inhabitants of the lower and upper worlds are seized with horror. "Erlik-biy in the underworld was deafened, and the three Kurbustans in the heavens were terrified" (Ulagashev 1941: 302, 322.) Similar hyperbolic descriptions of the battles of the bogatyrs are characteristic of the epos of the Mongol tribes, from the Buryat uligers to the Oyrot-Mongol epics. Comparisons and metaphors of the Yakut epos are quite distinctive. Yet, here too, we find many startling coincidences with the epos of the steppe dwellers. In describing the heroes, the olonkhosuts sometimes naively emphasize their heroic appetites by telling how they swallow meat with lightning speed, spitting the large bones from the mouth and emitting the little ones through the nose. Still clearer is the comparison of the eyes with lakes and with an ice-hole on the lake, or the traditional description of a beauty who is so beautiful that through her dress the skin is visible, through the skin, the bones, and through the bones, the marrow (Yastremskiy 1929: 37, 54, 66; Khudyakov 1890: 145, 190; Ulagashev 1941: 213, 215, 294, 382; Potanin 1915: 39; Arkhiv Yakutskoy ...No. 6: 133).

Such hyperboles are characteristic for the epos of steppe peoples. In the Kazakh epic about Er-Sayna, the beauty of the heroine is described with similar expressions: "If she begins to swallow food, the food is visible through her throat. If she looks at the sun, her face reflects the sun's color" (Orlov 1945: 55.) In Buryat epics, the bogatyr Erkhe-Tokholo-Mergen, looking at the daughter of the ruler Narin-Sharag, also "looked through the clothes at the body, through the body at the bones, through the bones at the marrow"—such a wondrous beauty was she (Potanin 1903: 105). In the light of these comparisons, the question of the place of the Yakut epos among that of other peoples of Siberia and Middle Asia has special interest. The heroic epics, as is known, are divided into a number of groups, corresponding to definite stages of the historical development of the epos, connected with the society, historical growth, and ideology. At first there arises the basic plot of the unjustly persecuted beast-like ancestor of the clan, the "totem," the suffering beast-divinity. In its most primitive form, this plot is represented among the Paleo-Asiatic tribes of northeast Siberia, but traces of it are easily found in the folklore of the Altayans or the western Buryats (the persecution, by wicked people, of the miraculously-born beavers, the ancestors of the Buryat people, the children of the divine bull, Ikhirit and Bulagat). This basic plot is sometimes complicated and accompanied by other, 283

THE ORIGIN OF THE YAKUT PEOPLE

auxiliary, motifs included in the circle of primitive cosmogonic conceptions, among which are the world-tree and the three worlds of the universe, the dualistic myth of the struggle of the two principles, upper and lower, good and evil—personified in the animal images and connected with the most ancient dual-clan organization, and with the female divine rulers. This intellectual heritage of profound primitiveness carried over into the epoch of a new social structure, no longer the matrilineal clan, as before, but the patrilineal. [The change] is reflected in the fact that the place of the female deities and progenitrices is taken by male gods, animal images are replaced by human ones, and the dualistic plot of the struggle of two basic principles acquires new content. Myths arise about the struggle of the representative of the good principle, the bogatyr-man, with the representative of the evil principle, personified as a horrible female monster. The stories of the struggle of the bogatyrs with monstrous old women are their remnants. The latter are represented by the female shaman Kerinkey-Zandan, of the Oyrot-Mongol epos, and by the mother of N'urgun the Mighty, in the olonkho $r-Sogotokh of the Yakuts. In the new stage, when the patriarchal clan system is already being formed, and within it are born the first elements of more progressive, class relationships, the true heroic epos begins to mature, on the variegated foundation of mythological conceptions inherited from the past. Its basic content is, at first, mythological genealogy; that is, the history of legendary ancestors, progenitors, having the task of praising their exploits. This praise is molded into a heroic epic, the content of which is, primarily, war with the forces of evil, and the struggle with other tribes. The Yakut epics have such a character, as do the epic works of other peoples related to them. In glorifying his hero, the mythical clan founder, the Yakut olonkhosut freely uses the traditional means of folklore, the entire store of mythological conceptions. He usually begins his story by showing the hero against the background of the mother-universe, formed in that distant time when the world had just been created. This is quite natural, since, for the olonkhosut, the hero of his tale actually is the first man on earth, a kind of Adam in the first-created paradise, Edeme. Along with him are also shown, however, many other people, among them ones like Sabyya-baaytoyon or Baay-Kharakhaan-toyon. From this it by no means follows that the hero of the poem is not the first man. As has been mentioned earlier, the bard does not look at the rest of humanity as writers of our time do. In the eyes of the singer, only he and his fellow clansmen are "real" people, people in the proper sense of this word. In his clannish isolation, he was not yet in a condition to elevate himself to a broader view of seeing neighboring clans or tribes as "a people" or "humanity as a whole." Setting forth the events of the life and activity of his hero, the poet, as before, widely uses ready-made images and plot schemes. As before, the hero fights with beast-like monsters, the chief and most dangerous of which is their mother—a shamaness or sinister old woman in whom it is not difficult to recognize the overthrown and dishonored divinity of the epoch of the matriclan, Sedna of the Eskimos or Khosyadam of 284

The Yakut Epos the Kets. The hero himself has some archaic features, too. If, for example, he was not born in the form of an animal, at any rate he experiences at first the fate of the unjustly persecuted seal of the Chukchi tale, persecuted by wicked enemies, as are Geser and Alamzhi-Mergen. No less characteristic is that strange link which unites him with his own sister or sisters, in distinction to his proper wife, who is often treacherous. There is nothing surprising in this if it is recalled that, under conditions of the clan system, the wife was always from an alien clan, but, earlier yet, the sister was wife to the brother. Here also belongs the purely Paleolithic motif of the changeling wife, who leaves her husband as soon as she receives her former animal or bird attire. Yet, in general, we have before us something completely new in structure and character: not a short story, but a long poem with countless inserted episodes, with various everyday descriptions and details; a complex narrative; a real epic drama, the prosaic text of which was generously illumined with poetic song inserts. This is a real artistic work, the elevated and colorful language of which is set apart and distinguished from the everyday speech. We can confidently assert that such a work could arise only in conditions of an already fully developed patriarchal clan system, when definite shoots of new social relationships spring up, having nothing of the old primitive-communal order. From here it is only one step to the following stage, when, instead of numerous independent heroes of separate poems, there emerges a single main figure around which all remaining plots and traditional casts of characters gradually unite. A definite epic cycle forms, surprising in its size and in the strict balance of all component parts, as in Manas, Dzhangar, or Geseriad. At the same time, the political and geographical viewpoint of the authors of the poem widens considerably; they go far beyond the narrow bounds of their clan or tribe. Also, the epos now has definite, if very peculiar, traits of historicism; its action already unfolds not in abstract surroundings but on the real expanses of this or that country and the neighboring regions; in it are mentioned real peoples, tribes and, in particular, concrete historical events. The Yakut epos, however, does not yet reach this level. In it there are no signs whatever of a cycle of semi-historical tales, although it long ago passed the first mythological stage. Thus, we may draw the general conclusion that the Yakut olonkho was originally formed in the south, far from the middle Lena, at a time when its creators lacked the social soil for forming later epic cycles of the Manas and Dzhangar type, but that the ancestors of the Yakuts and the tribes related to them already left far behind the ancient system of the matriclan and entered into the epoch of the developed patriclan. The formulation of the olonkho took place in conditions of close cultural-historical ties and constant interaction of the ancestors of the Yakuts both with their nearest fellow clansmen, the ancestors of the present-day Sayan-Altay tribes, and with the ancient Mongols. At the following historical stage, when the ancestors of the Yakuts 285

THE ORIGIN OF THE YAKUT PEOPLE

had arrived on the middle Lena and had been cut off for a long time from the other steppe tribes and also from the direct influence of higher cultures—Indian and Tibetan on the east, and to the west the rich and colorful cultures of the agricultural peoples of Central Asia—the Yakuts retained their ancient folklore almost in its entirety. On the other hand, among the peoples related to the Yakuts, the epos was strongly metamorphosed under the influence of Buddhism, and retreated into the background relative to written literature, or went into decline altogether, as happened to the Khalkha-Mongol epics, which were gradually transformed into schematic sketches of the most popular plots. This conclusion is confirmed by the relationship of the olonkho to the other forms of folklore closest to them—the historical traditions and legends. The legends and traditions about the progenitors of the entire Yakut people, E11ey and Omogoy, or about the forefathers of individual clans, exist in complete independence of the olonkho, not blending or crossing paths with them. These historical legends indubitably grew and changed form in the course of time. The olonkho, on the other hand, as though set apart in a special imaginary world, was subject to comparatively little change in plots, motifs, or figures. It was not fossilized or frozen completely, but neither did it show large progressive changes or shifts of substance. It must be for this reason that the Yakut olonkho occupies an altogether special place in the epic poetry of the Turkic and Mongol peoples: as a relic in which the features of that archaic period have come down to us. This explains the similarity of the olonkho to the most ancient features of the epos of the steppe tribes of southern Siberia and Central and Middle Asia, and at the same time determines its particular value as testimony to the southern origin of the Yakuts.

286

Linguistic Evidence of Yakut Origins

Chapter 5

An especially important place in the formulation of questions connected with the study of the origin of this or that people belongs, as we know, to language. As has already been partly shown above, the Yakut language has borne in its lexicon, until the present time, valuable traces of the past of the Yakut people, testimony to its ancient culture and life. But what can the Yakut language itself concretely present for the resolution of the question of the origin of the Yakut people; that is, in the first instance, its relationship to other peoples? This question long ago attracted the attention of linguistic specialists, and we must first turn our attention to the results of their work (Ubryatova 1945, Kharitonov 1947). According to the views of one of the greatest Turkologists of the 19th century, Academician V. V. Radlov, the Yakut language originally was not a Turkic language, and only later on adopted that Turkic character which it has at present. Radlov proposed that the Turkicization of the original Yakut language began in the south, before the settling of the ancestors of the Yakuts on the northern Lena, and was completed in a number of consecutive stages (Radlov 1908). With the views of Radlov there was connected in particular the hypothesis, set forth in recent times by S. A. Tokarev, that the Yakut language arose from a non-Turkic linguistic substrate, not in the south but in the north, as a result of the Turkicization of the languages of local tribes, in the first instance the Tungusic and in part also the Paleo-Asiatic ones (Tokarev 1941, 1945). Before Radlov's time, a second distinguished student of the Yakut language, Academician 0. Böhtlingk* held a view diametrically opposite. In Böhtlingk's opinion, the Yakut language was the most ancient of the presently existing Turkic languages, and the Yakuts were the first to separate from the general family of Turkic peoples. Therefore, Böhtlingk proposed, instead of the term in use at the time to designate related Turkic languages, "Turko-Tatar languages," a new term, "Yakut-Tatar languages" (Böhtlingk 1851, 1853). • [Russian rendition of Böhtlingk's name is "Betling." Editor, n.t.N.A.]

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Without going deeper into an analysis of special linguistic argumentation of proponents of one or another point of view, we should only note that, in recent times, further study of the Yakut language leads Turkologists to the conclusion that the Yakut language originally belonged among the ranks of Turkic languages, in which context the study of the peculiarities of the Yakut language gives a basis for certifying the presence in it of extremely ancient elements in the development of Turkic languages. Especially striking is the presence in the Yakut language of a number of features which bring it close to the one expressed in the Orkhon-Yenisey runic inscriptions of the 7th-8th centuries A.D. S. Ye. Malov (1941, 1952) adopts such a view in a number of his works on Turkic languages. Ye. I. Ubryatova comes to the same conclusion; she emphasizes that the Yakut language received an inheritance from the ancient Turkic languages. As Ubryatova states: "Not just one Turkic language took part in the formation of the Yakut language, but several. One of them was a language close to the language of the Orkhon inscriptions" (Ubryatova 195o: 128). As time went on, the bearers of this ancient Turkic linguistic property found themselves in contact with Mongolspeaking peoples. This is attested to by the presence in the Yakut lexicon of upwards of one-third of Mongol or Buryat words, as determined by Academician Radlov on the basis of the 1,748 stem words available to him (Ubryatova 195o: 24o-41). Also striking are the reflections of connections with Tungus-Manchu tribes, basically the Evenkis and Evens. As Ubryatova emphasized, with this, in linguistic structure, its syntax and morphology, only that which corresponded to the inner line of its proper development was borrowed (Ubryatova 195o: 275). In this connection, even Radlov, who considered the language of the Yakuts originally not Turkic, admitted the enormous significance of Turkic grammatical structure on it. Indeed, Turkic linguistic rules and laws were so strong, he wrote, they subjugated all these heterogeneous acquisitions, reworked them, and, as Radlov picturesquely expressed it,- completely furnished them with a proper Turkic linguistic dress. In the lexicon of the Yakut language, those elements must have been most often borrowed which corresponded to conditions which were new for its bearers—primarily natural conditions. We have already seen examples of this above. The basic vocabulary, on the other hand, remained the same as that which had existed in the original Turkic languages and in the Mongolic languages, the contact of whose speakers with the Turkic ancestors of the Yakuts had obviously been longest and closest, by virtue of specific historically determined causes. In order to see this more clearly, it is sufficient to take as examples several terms of the type it is most difficult to borrow, along with this or that object or culture element. Such, primarily, are the terms relating to man himself and to his own body. In this category we must also place the terminology embracing conceptions about the universe, the earth on which man exists, or about the heavens, under whose arch his life runs its course. "Man" among the Yakuts is in general denoted by clearly Turkic and, in part, Mongolic terms :46 288

Linguistic Evidence of Yakut Origins man [person]—kihi (Turkic: kili, kishi, 1909) man [male]—erkihi (Turkic: er and giren [plural], 274 father—aya; child—oyo (Turkic: oglana, 1889) old woman—emeekhsin, imeekhsin (Turkic: emeyan)

The names for body, soul, and the parts of the body are also Turkic: waist, thorax—köyys (cp. Turkic: köyus, early Turkic: köküz) head—bas (Turkic: yyus, 2414) face—syray (Turkic: syray, chyray, shyray; Buryat: shyray); Mongolic: charay; Manchu: chira, 2476, 2239) thorax—dagdaka (Mongolic: dagda, 662, 663) stomach—kharba (Mongolic: kharbing, "hanging belly," 3349) heart—syrekh (Turkic: yyurek; Buryat: deurkha; Mongolic: dzhiuruke, 2404) blood—khaan (Turkic: kan, khan, 3295) arm of a man—i/ii (early Turkic: ilig, älig) leg—atakh (Kyrgyz: ayak, "foot," "lower part of leg"; early Turkic: adaq, "leg") arm, hand—khol (Turkic: kol, 3445)

The terms for the earth, the universe, and the sky are also Turkic and,

in part, Mongol: universe, earth, fatherland—doydu, daydy (Buryat: daydy, "broad," "extensive," 666) the entire earth—sir-doydu earth, country—sir (Turkic: yyer, yir, dzher, dzhir, 2236) earth, country, chasm, bottomless pit, underworld, lower world, underground countries—ytygen (Turkic: ötükän, "place inhabited by the eastern Turkic peoples in northern Mongolia"; Buryat: utugen, "goddess of the earth," 3 1 95) sea, great water, the deepest water, a mass of water in one place, bottomless pit—dalai (Turkic: taluy; Mongolic: daluy, 666) water—uu (Turkic: sub, sup, stt; Buryat: :than; Mongolic: usu, "water," 2965) visible heaven, heaven as deity, general designation of good spirits, godtayara (Turkic: tayry, tayara; Buryat: teyere; Mongolic: teyri, 2551) sun—kyn (Turkic: kun, 1297) month, moon—yy (Turkic: ay, "moon," "month," 3760) star—sulus (Turkic: yulduz, yyldyz, zula, "light," "luminosity," 2334) morning and evening star (morning star, false dawn, Venus, sometimes Jupiter)—cholbon; (Turkic: cholbon, cholban, cholpan; Buryat: solbon; Mongolic: cholbon, 3635) Pleiades, Little or Great Bear, the constellation of the Pleiades*—yrgel (Turkic: ürgä, ürkar, ülgar, Pleiades, 3170) Here should also be mentioned the kinship of the Yakut and Turkic terms denoting cloud, rain, snow, ice, heat, day, night, and other words relating to phenomena in the heavens and atmosphere. Reviewing these terms, we may come to a general conclusion that the • [Utinoye gnezdo, "the Duck's Nest," in the original. Utinoyc gnezdo is the traditional Russian designation of the Pleiades. Translator.]

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ancestors of the Yakuts, dwelling to the south of the middle Lena, called themselves "man," "male," "child," using the same terms as did the ancestors of the Turkic steppe tribes. By identical or basically related Turkic words, they also designated the parts of their bodies and the entire external world, the heavens, the water, the earth, and the creatures inhabiting it. In their speech, the words relating to the most important branches of their economy, to their material and, as will be shown below, their intellectual culture, to the ancient social order all had the same sound. Thus, everything which was vitally important to the people, everything essential and primary, is called here by Turkic and, in part, by Mongolic names. The last place, as we might expect, is occupied by TungusicManchu elements. Consequently, the language of the Yakut people, as the most important cultural and ethnographic index, and one of the most important historical sources, like its whole culture, testifies expressively to the southern roots of the ancient culture and to the southern origin of the ancestors of the modern Yakuts—if not of all of them, in any case of a significant part of them. At the same time, the Yakut language, in its vocabulary and structure, confirms the conclusion that the ancestors of the Yakuts and of other Turkic- and, in part, Mongolic-speaking tribes were connected by an indubitably historic community. This common heritage may have been, in the first place, the result of long contact and connection of the Turkicspeaking ancestors of the Yakuts with their neighbors. It may also have been still deeper, in which case it would testify to a former linguistic and ethnic unity of the ancestors of the Turkic peoples and the Mongols in distant antiquity, before the division and separation of the Turkic and Mongol tribes—that is, to the existence among them of a common "proto-language." It may be that certain coincidences with other languages of the so-called Ural-Altayic group, principally the Tungusic-Manchu languages, should be included here. The last conclusion that follows from everything that has been said above is that the Yakut language was formed not on the middle Lena but in some other place, where dwelled Turkic and Mongolic tribes and peoples, but not northeastern Paleo-Asiatics, and not northern Tungus tribes, although the Yakut language later found itself in interaction with the languages of the latter. Because of the condition of the sources, linguists cannot yet furnish us with additional solidly based historical facts on the ancestors of the Yakuts. It is very possible, however, that, on linguistic grounds, we should include among the Turkic peoples or tribes most closely related to the Yakuts those tribes which spoke a language close to or identical with the language of the Orkhon-Yenisey inscriptions. This, in combination with other data, will allow us to place the history of the ancestors of the Yakuts in definite connection with the history of the Turkic tribes and peoples of medieval times, who used the Orkhon-Yenisey script, of which we will also make use below, primarily in considering the Kurykans and their possible ties with the ancestors of the Yakuts. 290

Northern Elements in the Culture of the Yakuts

Chapter 6

It would, of course, be incorrect to suppose that all of Yakut culture, including its language, was retained on the middle Lena in the same form in which it existed among the remote southern ancestors of the Yakuts before their migration to the north. It is self-evident that these latter must have somehow or other changed their way of life and culture because of the new conditions, and that their contacts with the local native population must have been reflected in their culture and language. Reviewing the ancient culture and language of the Yakuts from this point of view, we find in them many interesting facts, no less expressive than those adduced above, which tell of the life of the ancestors of the Yakuts in the south. The Tungus contribution to Yakut culture is best traced in that part of the Yakut vocabulary which relates to reindeer-breeding operations. Such are the following terms: labykta, reindeer moss (Iceland moss); albara, reindeer blanket; khayalda, reindeer bell; maabyk, lasso; meger, saddle bags; ondoodo, decoy reindeer. These terms show that the reindeerbreeding of the Yakuts was connected with Tungus reindeer-breeding, that the Yakuts (the northern ones, who keep reindeer) borrowed reindeer-breeding from the aboriginal tribes of Yakutia. Some reindeer-breeding terms which have been included in the Yakut language have proved to be borrowed from the tribes of the northeast: khoroy, "young reindeer"; khaargyn, "reindeer" (from Chukchi kargen). The changes in the economic life of the migrants from the south who entered into the northern environment were also reflected in the borrowing of hunting methods from the northern peoples. Aside from the general features of the Yakut hunting technology—deadfall traps, crushing traps, falling-board traps, spring traps, bows, and animal-triggered crossbows, the single-bladed spear (palms or batiya*), it is entirely possible that the Yakuts took over from the northern reindeer-herding tribes also the method of hunting with a [tamed] bull, behind which the hunter hides while creeping up on his prey, just as the tundra hunter uses a tame decoy reindeer to catch wild male reindeer (Popov 1937: 164). Among the terms • [A knife-like blade fastened onto a wooden shaft. Editor, A.I.N.A.]

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borrowed from the Tungus are included certain words and elements of life having to do only with the hunt: the word anaby, "elk"; the nymaat, a custom of obligatory distribution of the catch (of meat animals); sinkeny, "hunting fetishes"; yyteen, the hunter's dwelling in the form of a temporary tent made of slats; kholomo or golomo, the dwelling in the form of a pyramidal shed covered with turf (Maak 1887: III, 344; Pekarskiy and Tsvetkov 1911). Certain terms relating to life in the forest, but having no direct connection with reindeer-breeding or hunting, were likewise borrowed. Tungus influence on the Yakuts in ancient times reveals itself in the mention by Gmelin of two Yakuts—a young man and a girl—encountered by him at Kazan in November 1733; they were being brought to the tsar's court because their faces bore tattooed patterns. From the drawing appended to Gmelin's note, it is clear that the pattern of tattooing was analogous to Tungus patterns of this type (Fig. 62). The similarity is so

Fig. 62. Tattooed Yakuts, a girl and a young man (after Gmelin). great that one wonders whether Gmelin was not taking Tungus for Yakut. Yet, the accuracy of Gmelin's description, which has been checked repeatedly, indicates that the young man and girl, "with sewn faces" (as it was expressed in the i8th century), were not Tungus but Yakuts, probably northern ones, living along the Lena downstream from Yakutsk. Certain coincidences between the traditional national costume of the Yakuts and that of the Tungus are of great interest. Basically, it is a jacket with a short front (son), worn in combination with knee-guards (suturuo), trousers, and soft boots, (eterbes). In the same category is the headdress in the form of a hood, close-fitting behind and opening wide in front. The distinctive nature of this costume was already noted by writers of the 17th and i8th centuries (Fig. 63). Issbrandt Ides, in his brief account of the Yakuts, dealt primarily with the costume, which was striking in 292

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Fig. 63. Traditional Yakut costumes of the 18th century. (From excavations of Ye. D. Strelov and I. D. Novgorodov.)

its general aspect and cut: "The peoples living in the vicinity of the city (Yakutsk—Author) and on the banks of the river Amga are called Yakuts. They wear clothing made of pieces of fur of various colors forming a strange mixture. At the seams and around the entire costume there is an edging of white reindeer fur of a hand's breadth; the costume is closed on both sides and is made somewhat in the German fashion" (Alekseyev 1941: 2nd ed., Vol. 1, No. 2, 148). The dress of the Yakuts of that period is described in still greater detail in Georgi's well-known work: "The entire dress consists of an outer coat, which is fitted close, with narrow sleeves, and ties in front with laces; it reaches to the knee. The collar and edges of the suede summer garment are embroidered for two or three fingers' width, by means of the sinews of animals, with beautiful patterns or figures, and are edged with white horsehair or some other hair for a palm's width, in place of a fringe. In 293

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the same way they edge the collar and the shoulders. Between the seams, they sew on several spangles, or make stripes with blue or red dye in place of this. The winter (coat–Author) is embroidered beautifully in exactly the same way and edged with horsehair in place of a fringe" (Georgi 1799: VI, 185). This clothing, in its cut and general form, is so different from the clothing of the pastoral tribes of Siberia—to say nothing of that of the northeastern Paleo-Asiatics—that the difference was even noted by Strahlenberg: "These Yakuts, against the custom of all the peoples thereabouts, wear their hair long and their clothes cut short, while all the others, on the contrary, shave their heads smooth, or, at the most, wear one long braid in back" (Strahlenberg 1730: 128). However, later 18th-century authors, writing when such clothing had already gone out of use, also noted that it was extremely close to the clothing of the Tungus and also to that of the Yukagirs, who had garments of identical cut. "All Yakut clothing in general, like the Tungus clothing which is similar to it, is more handsome, lighter, and more becoming than all the other clothing [of those] living in these countries," wrote Shchekatov in his dictionary (Shchekatov 18o8-o9: VII, 362). Thanks to the permafrost, such outer garments have been completely preserved to our day in 18th-century pre-Christian graves excavated in the Megino-Kangalas, Churapchinsk, Yakutsk, and Ordzhonikidze rayons, all neighboring the city of Yakutsk. "Considerably shorter than in the r9th century, always with vents down to the waist in back and on both sides, fitted close to the torso in the upper part and widening below the belt, it had in a number of cases no collar at all, this being replaced by a fur scarf, wound two or three times around the neck. The sleeves were sometimes shortened to the elbows. Thong laces often took the place of buttons. Wide bands of fur edging were the most characteristic feature of this garment, emphasizing its peculiar cut. They bordered the skirt and shoulders of the costume and also the vertical lines of the vents. Wide perpendicular bands of fur also encircled the forearms. In addition to this, the garment was richly ornamented with beads and fur applique (Nosov, MS, n.d.). Subsequently, when even the memory of this clothing had been lost, and when the clothing was first taken from graves, examples and drawings of it in the Yakutsk Museum were so unlike the garments usually considered to be the ancient Yakut costume that many people doubted that the excavated graves actually belonged to Yakuts and not to some other Yakutian nationality, for example, the Lamuts (Strelov 1937; Bogoraz 1936: 73). Long before this, Seroshevskiy had, in his turn, written concerning the drawings of Yakut costumes published in the works of Georgi and Sarychev: "The male costume in these drawings is strange. Its decoration, form and workmanship is strongly reminiscent of the Tungus or, more accurately, of the Yukagirs" (Seroshevskiy 1896: I, 334) The similarity between the ancient Yakut costume and the TungusYukagir one is, in fact, indubitable, particularly when compared with 294

Northern Elements in Yakut Culture the dress of the steppe pastoralists or the Koryaks, Eskimos, and Chukchis. This similarity is expressed both in the general cut of the clothing, made, as Issbrandt Ides aptly expressed it, "as though in the German style," and in the profuseness of bead embroidery and fur applique, in the combination of variously-colored suede and leather, and particularly in the fringe of reindeer-fur (according to Ides) or horsehair (according to other sources). To this we should add one unusual detail. In one of the ancient Yakut burials, found within the confines of what is now Olekminsk, lay the skeleton of an old man, on whom was found a peculiar, low girdle on the trousers, similar to a pair of trunks sewn with beads. On the front of the girdle, above the pubic bone, there was a bunch of leather strips— a fringe. The same sort of fringe, in the same place, is also known on the Yukagir short trousers and among the Eskimos. This is obviously a very ancient northern element in the decoration of clothing (Fig. 64). This, like the coincidence between the ancient Yakut and Yukagir costumes, throws light on the relationship of the Yakut culture not only to the Tungus cultures, but also to the cultures of northeastern Asia, primarily that of the Yukagirs. In this connection, great interest is created by the Yakut bow, similar to the Evenki bow, which also seems to constitute one of the influences of northern cultures on Yakut material culture. A detailed examination of its structure shows that it does not belong to the steppe type, but to another group of bows which, on the basis of territorial distribution, should be called hyperborean or northern. The bow is made of two layers of wood, larch and birch, and covered on top with a layer of sinew and birchbark. For fastening the string to the ends of the bow, that is, to its "horns," two grooved bone plates are attached. These plates are cemented into the "horn" and wrapped around with a thong. The grooves are located not on the side but directly within the cut off outer end (Strelov 1927b: 66-67). Analogous bone endplates have been found in the ancient Eskimo settlements on the Chukchi Peninsula and in ancient Koryak semi-subterranean dwellings near Magadan. The construction of the Yakut bow which we have described differs sharply from the Bronze and Early Iron Age bows of the more southerly regions of Siberia and from the Mongol bows of the 12th-14th centuries A.U., which were the predecessors of the later composite bows of the Türk-Mongol type." The Yakut bow was obviously preserved in Yakut culture as a direct inheritance from the local indigenous culture. There is one curious custom in the area of belief and religion which is of considerable interest. The Yakuts in antiquity had a custom of malaahyn or choroy, "the sharing among relatives of the remains of an honored dead person, usually the head of the clan." This was the procedure with the body of the head of the Malzhakhsa clan of Meginsk ulus, Toronoy-bootur by name, who lived in the 17th century. Having divided his body at the joints, and apparently the flesh, for use as talismans, the clansmen "gathered all the bones into a skin." The latter were converted into a fetish and were thereafter called Bakh-Tar)ara 98 295

Northern Elements in Yakut Culture This incident took place not in some remote region, not on the borderland, but in the very center of the Yakut territory of the 17th century, among typical representatives of the southern border of the Yakut tribes —the Megin pastoralists. In order to evaluate fully the historico-cultural importance, and to understand the origin of this custom, we must recall the similar ritual of dissection and mummification of the honored dead which existed among the Yukagirs. The first information in the European literature about this Yukagir custom was furnished by Issbrandt Ides, who reported that "beside the Yakuts, we find on the banks of the river Lena also some idolators who are called Yukagirs. All that is particularly known to me about these peoples is that they cut the flesh from the bones of their dead, dry out their skeletons, and, having decorated them with several rows of glass beads, hang them up near their houses and do them divine honors" (Alekseyev 1941: Vol. I, Part 2). "Their faith is that they worship the sun and the moon and sew up the bones of the dead in reindeer skin, embroidering it with beads,"— thus wrote later the members of the Yakutian service gentry, the authors of an 18th-century description of the peoples of those parts (Yakutskiy Respublikanskiy Arkhiv, 1758). In this connection, we must include another small but very important detail from the world of art—the ornament made from the white neckhair [bell-hair] of the reindeer (Shternberg 1931). According to the method of making it, this ornament may be divided in two groups having special regions of distribution. In the first group is the linear corded ornament, common "decisively to all hyperborean peoples," and thereby, according to Shternberg, being "a new, striking indication of the most ancient cultural-genetic ties among all hyperboreans." The ornament of reindeer hair, indissoluably linked with the way of life and beliefs of hunters and reindeer-breeders of the north, with their hunting cults and magic, in Shternberg's words, "is completely alien to the pastoral peoples who use the hair of other animals; for example, to the Yakuts. Apparently, this ornament is a purely individual peculiarity of that group of peoples who use it now" (Shternberg 1931: III). But it is the more interesting that, contrary to Shternberg's words, it existed also among the Yakuts, as the legacy of a more ancient ethnic layer. Reviewing the ancient Yakut ornamentation, full of embroidery, on quivers, saddle-bows, and clothes, we become convinced of the surprising general similarity of these embroideries with those sewn with reindeer hair, in the band ornamentations of the Paleo-Asiatics and Tungus. Although these bands are also done with threads, including silk, they are, nonetheless, completely identical in width and color to embroideries of reindeer hair; the silk and cotton threads borrowed from the Russians, apparently, supplanted the proper Yakut materials used for this purpose in antiquity. What the latter were, besides horse hair and sinews, is shown by data presented by Pekarskiy, who indicates that for embroidery the Fig. 64. Old Yakut burial in Olekminsk. Belt decorated with tasselled fringe.

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Yakuts previously used the afore mentioned neck hair of the reindeer, sinne or sinn'e (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 2230), "long fur under the neck of the reindeer, used for embroidery," "embroidery with reindeer wool," "a decoratively-sewn thread of wool (on clothes) of long white reindeer wool as a thread" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 2169). This similarity of the Yakut embroideries not with the generally northern linear corded ones, but with the band embroidery characteristic only of the "Americanoid" group of tribes of northeast Asia, is of extraordinary import. Various northeastern Paleo-Asiatics belong to the "Americanoid" group, including the Yukagirs, from whom ornamentation from reindeer hair, in its second specific form, reached the Tungus and Yakuts, who acquired it in the locality where it had already formed during the Neolithic on the Lena, and not in the south, or not from a more ancient hyperborean ethno-cultural layer. The paths and conditions by which there came to be possible connections of Paleo-Asiatic, primarily Yukagir, ethnic surroundings with the Yakut nationality at a relatively early time in its middle Lena history, can be explained if we turn to the facts of the recent distribution of the Yukagirs in northern Asia beyond the bounds of their contemporary settlement. The Yukagirs, once one of the most numerous and interesting nationalities of the Far North, from an ethno-historical point of view, suffered in the past a truly sad fate. This people formerly was numerous, fearsome to their neighbors, and ruler of vast lands; but when, from the spread of various illnesses, smallpox and another called the khilikin sickness, many died, then their neighbors, the Koryaks and Tungus, took the upper hand, and, because of their former hatred toward them, began to press into Yukagir hunting territories; wars followed which exterminated almost their whole clan (Sarychev 1802: 65). Legends expressively tell of the former large numbers of the Yukagirs (or Oduls, as they called themselves). They relate that Yukagir campfires were as many as the stars in the sky on a clear frosty night in winter, and white birds flying over Yukagir lands became yellow from the smoke of these fires (Ogorodnikov 1924: 54, 61; 1922: 273). There still lives a recollection of the former numbers of the Yukagir people in the Yakut folklore and language. The Yakuts to this day call the northern lights "Yukagir fires," saying d'yykeebil uota umayar, which means "the fire burns among the Yukagirs." The Yukagirs lived, in ancient times, not only on the Yana and the Indigirka but also on the lower reaches of the Lena, and still earlier they apparently settled places located further to the south along the Lena, preceding here not only the Yakuts but the Evens (Lamuts). The latter to this day call the Yukagirs bulen, which at the same time means "enemy." Hence the contemporary expression, bulen klassan, "hostile class." Like the Yakuts, the Lamuts call the northern lights "Yukagir fires," bulen togan (tog, "camp-fire"). (Levin 1936: 23, 96; Vasilevich 1940: 25.) 298

Northern Elements in Yakut Culture Thus, in antiquity, the territory in the valley of the Lena, to the east and, in part, to the west of it, was Yukagir land. The Lamuts encroached on it, wedging among the Yukagirs in warfare, wherefore the word "enemy" was a synonym for the word "Yukagir." Only later were peaceful relations between the tribes established, which led to the assimilation of the weakened Yukagirs by the Lamuts. It is to the Yukagir that we should therefore ascribe those noted ethnographic elements of the ancient autochthonous culture of the tribes of the north which were impossible to bring from the south (from the Baykal area or the SayanAltay taiga regions). Some remarkable relics in the contemporary culture of the Yakuts are evidently an ancient Yukagir contribution which finds its nearest analogies, not in the living ethnographic reality of other tribes, but in the archaeological facts gathered on the middle and lower reaches of the Lena. One of the most characteristic elements of the ornamentation of clay vessels among the Yakuts was the application of fillets, either smooth or crosscut [to resemble a twisted] cord, horizontally placed below the rim. The olonkho says of clay vessels: "a strong pot of nine rims" (Yastremskiy 1929: 1o9). The same type of fillets, smooth or crosscut, comprise the basic ornamentation of the local pre-Yakut pottery of the Early Iron Age, the most ancient examples of which are observed even earlier, at the end of the Neolithic. No less indicative in this regard are the contemporary kumiss vessels. Carved of wood, and known in different variants of their basic form, which is a tall bulky cup on a narrow conical stem, these vessels, completely covered with a slightly raised ornamental pattern, are the exclusive property of the material culture of the Yakuts. At the present, there are now no other vessels like these among any other people in the world. It is therefore the more interesting that the form and ornamentation of the chorons once again find striking similarity in examples of the most ancient local pottery on the middle Lena. The ornamentation of the chorons is basically the same as that on the clay vessels already known to us from the settlements of the Early Iron Age of Yakutia. The olonkho also testifies to the antiquity of the pattern on the chorons, as on the clay vessels, when, concerning the choron, it describes it "with nine bulging rims, wound around like a mane, to the top-filled goblets, spiced with butter." As concerns the shape of the chorons, their reservoirs faithfully simulate the round-bottomed, elongated, egg-like clay vessels of the Early Iron and Bronze Ages, with a characteristically broadened lower part and narrowed rim. It is similar to the ancient round-bottomed vessel, which preserves the old composition of the pattern, only adding a conical base, as in the Scythian kettle. It is quite possible that the Yakut choron developed as a peculiar crossing of the local round-bottomed vessel, covered with a zonal ornamentation of convex fillets, and the borrowed form of the Scythian kettle with its elongated conical base. This, most probably, happened at the end of the Bronze or at the beginning of 299

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the local Iron Age; that is, long before the formation of the Yakut people and its culture in their contemporary aspects. Such an origin of the Yakut chorons is the more probable because they were connected with the ritual of the kumiss festival, ysyakh, sanctified by centuries, and with the cult of the bright heavenly gods ayyy—the givers of milk foods. As sanctified ritual vessels, inheriting all that cult reverence with which their direct predecessors, the clay vessels of the ancient population of the middle Lena and the copper Scythian kettles of the steppes, were surrounded, the Yakut chorons preserved, along with their archaic shape, the ornamentation of the latter. Just as distinctive a legacy of the distant past is the ornamentation of the carved wooden cups, kytyya. Decorated with the same care and thoughtfulness as the chorons, with a slightly raised carved pattern, these cups have, below their rims, a wide ornamental band of two fillets, sometimes imitating a tightly twisted thin cord and downward pointing triangles. A similar ornamental band of two parallel fillets and triangles pointing downward like spikes is characteristic both for the taiga celts and for the bronze spearpoints from the Markha and Aldan rivers. Thus, the Yakut kytyya preserved to our times the specific ornamental motifs of the middle Lena Bronze Age artifacts, which were not preserved even on the chorons. In the light of the aforementioned data, another item, belonging not to the field of material culture but to the epos, takes on significance. The Yakut olonkho carries to our day, in its archaic language, sparse but clear references to bronze tools of the distant past. Such are: bolot—"a bronze sword," "a double-bladed, copper-red weapon of huge dimensions," noted in Pekarskiy's dictionary (1907-3o: art. 494); the "eight-sided copper lances" in the epic of Er-Sogotokh, recorded by Yastremskiy (1929: 28); and "the copper knife in wooden knife-handles" in Potanin's notes (1883: 634) ; that is, almost the whole collection of fighting equipment of the Bronze Age, known from archaeological data (excluding only celts, of which there is no information in folklore). Here, too, enter copper arrowheads. The champion Nurgaabyl in the khosun epos, conquered by his mighty opponent, gives him an arrow with a patterned copper tip, and the other, in his turn, gives him his own arrow, in order that they may later know each other by it. Copper arrowheads are mentioned even in Chukchi folklore: the archer Rulteniy-Orion courts a group of women, but, being refused, shoots at them, and his copper-pointed arrow sticks in the soil of a moss pile trampled by reindeer, where it can be found to this day (Mindalevich 1934: 119; Bogoraz 1939: 24). Thus, it is significant that, along with the probable influence of the late reindeer-breeding Tungusic ethnographic complex in Yakut culture, one may observe traces of another, incomparably more archaic, ethnographic complex—the culture of the "unmounted" lake fishermen and hunters of the forested tundra, whose only domestic animal was the dog. Comparison of these traces with ethnographic data of the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, shows expressively that the most important thing in 300

Northern Elements in Yakut Culture this ethnic complex—its economy and corresponding material culture— was most completely preserved by a definite group of the Yakut people who, in the 17th and the beginning of the 18th centuries, lived in the valleys of the Vilyuy and Aldan, in the lower reaches of the Lena, and also in the southern regions of Yakutia. These were the Yakut balyksyts (that is, fishermen), who lacked cattle and fed on lake fish and pine bark. They lived here, then, in quite the same way as did their distant predecessors, people not only of the Early Iron or Bronze Ages but also of Neolithic times; they ate fish and taiga game; they lived in turf huts of the kholotno type, or in tents, and of domestic animals they had only a few dogs. The data of physical anthropology are no less interesting. In studying the physical aspect of the Yakuts, anthropologists found among them representatives of a distinct "Baykal" or "Paleo-Siberian" type. The region of distribution of the given type at the present time covers vast stretches of northern Asia from the Okhotsk Sea and the Aleutian Islands to the Cis-Baykal, and also the northeastern Cis-Ural region.* Its representatives now are the Tungus-Lamuts, the Aleuts, the Cis-Baykal Tungus, and the Voguls. The oldest traces of the Paleo-Siberian physical type were recognized by G. F. Debets in skeletons relating to the Baykal Neolithic culture on the Angara, the lower Selenga, and the upper Lena, and also from Gunni [Hun] burials of the Trans-Baykal (Debets 1941: 15).t Like the elements of material culture noted above, the Paleo-Siberian anthropological type is incomparably more ancient, and was distributed far more widely, than the later Tungus people proper. It was the original, oldest physical type in eastern Siberia, and its representatives entered into the composition of the ancestors of the Yakuts. From the latter the southern newcomers took that part of cultural property which expresses northern character and local, aboriginal roots. The general unity of the ancient cultures of Yakutia, beginning with the Neolithic, but particularly during the Bronze and Early Iron Ages, leaves no doubt that there lived here, for ages, native tribes of the north related to each other, part of one and the same great ethnic massif. Within the boundaries of that ethnic group, distributed from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Vitim, and even as far south as Kirensk, there took place over the course of centuries the unbroken transmission of the archaic elements we have noted. In reviewing the question of northern elements in the culture of the Yakuts, the investigator cannot bypass some additional facts, which show that not everything in it was borrowed by the ancestors of the Yakuts on the middle Lena from the local tribes, but that, on the contrary, there are elements which could have been brought from mountainous taiga regions, situated far to the south, between southern Siberia and Mongolia. Even in the field of reindeer-breeding, where such borrowings • [That is, the northeastern corner of European Russia. Editor, A.I.N.A.] t [For a detailed development of this thesis in English, see M. G. Levin, Ethnic origins of the peoples of northeastern Asia, Anthropology of the North: Translations from Russian Sources, No. 3. (University of Toronto Press, 1963). Editor, A.1.N.A.]

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are most natural and appropriate, among the Yakuts there is a vast circle of distinct terms, not Tungus in origin. The latter embrace all facets of reindeer-breeding, beginning with the designation of the reindeer, which the Yakuts call not oron but taba (compare Tuvin tiba, tibe, "bull," and Uygur-Dzhagatay tebe, "camel"). (Pekarskiy 1907-3o: arts. 188, 1124, 2470, 2793; Potanin 1883: 158.) It is significant that, according to the dictionary appended to S. Ye. Malov's work Pamyatniki drevnetyurkskoy Prismenosti ["Relics of Ancient Turkic Literature"], the ancient Türks of Siberia and Middle Asia already knew this designation for reindeer in the form 1äbä. This allows one to date this designation for the reindeer as being not less than fifteen hundred years old (Malov 1951: 428).49 The Yakuts call the fawn of a reindeer tugut, which is similar to the usage of the Khasuts on Lake Kosogola (tu gal) and of the BuryatMongols, but the mature reindeer bull is called buur, the same as the term for "camel" among the Tuvins. There is a similar transposition of the name for the camel, tebe, to the reindeer and the musk deer. The Yakuts call an important part of the reindeer harness, the cheekpiece, synaakh which literally means "jaw." Hence, it is deducible that a portion of the ancestors of the Yakuts was in contact with the tribes of the Sayan-Altay Upland, who were occupied with breeding reindeer and who rode them, or even that they numbered directly among them. It may well be that there existed among them, in deep antiquity, reindeerbreeding with an origin independent of the Tungus. This connection, not with the most recent Tungus, in the proper sense, but with the more ancient culture of the forest tribes of the Sayan Upland, can also be traced in hunting and fishing, in shapes of dwellings, and in beliefs of the Yakuts. It may be regarded as a northern taiga layer underlying Yakut culture at its very base—before assimilation of the Sayan aboriginal tribes by the Turkic-speaking peoples. On this foundation there was deposited, apparently, a later, purely Tungus and Yukagir borrowing, appearing as the result of subsequent lengthy contacts of the Yakuts and Tungus. All the facts collected and generalized above are witness that the Yakut people was formed as the result of a long and complicated historical process. Heterogeneous ethnic groups, living on different territories and at various times, took part in this process. We have seen a decisive role in the formation of the Yakut people belonged to tribes of the Turkicspeaking group, who lived earlier far to the south of the middle Lena, the Aldan, the Vilyuy, and the Kolyma. Part of these tribes could have had ties with hunters and reindeer-breeders of [mountainous] southern Siberia. Appearing in the north, the southern newcomers, who spoke a Turkic language, entered into a new stage of their history; in many ways the history of the local aboriginal tribes also changed, their fate being from now on intertwined with that of the newcomers. Being on a higher level of cultural development, the Turkic-speaking ancestors of the Yakuts not only pushed out the aborigines but also subjected them to their influence by peaceful means; they assimilated and absorbed them into 302

Northern Elements in Yakut Culture their mass, which was expressed first of all by the transfer of these aboriginal tribes to a language of the Turkic system new to them, the Yakut language. With this, the local tribes lost the former ethnic name and a proper ethnic consciousness, no longer separating themselves from the mass of Yakuts and not opposed to them as independents. The southern ancestors of the Yakuts, confronted with tribes and clans of another origin, took them into their ethnic midst, transferring to them a progressive influence, and yet not lowering their own cultural level. On the contrary, firmly preserving their ethnic and linguistic identity, they enriched themselves at the expense of the cultures and languages of all these homogeneous tribes and clans of the north. Consequently, as a result of the mixing with northern aborigines, the southern ancestors of the Yakuts supplemented their culture and language with new features distinguishing them from other steppe tribes. In order to put a solid base to the general structure of the early history of the Yakut people, one must attempt to determine first where the southern homeland of the Yakuts was, and from just what component parts they were formed as the people whom the Russians encountered in the r7th century on the Lena. As we will see, this picture will be very complex, unclear, and even contradictory in many respects. Further studies by Soviet archaeologists, linguists, ethnographers, and physical anthropologists will undoubtedly introduce much that is new into the study of the given problem. Nevertheless, even the relatively little that we know now allows us to make a number of conclusions which will bring us closer to an understanding of the general course of those complex events as a result of which there was discovered in the r7th century, by the Russian people, a Yakut nationality in almost the same form, with basically the same culture, and with the same language, as prevailed two to three hundred years later.

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SECTION TWO THE EARLY HISTORY OF THE YAKUT NATIONALITY

The Culture of the Kurykansthe Southern Ancestors of the Yakuts in the Cis-Baykal Chapter 1 The large place which is occupied by southern elements in the formation of the Yakut people and their culture forces one to look to the south for definite traces of that ancient culture which was the main base of the historical development of Yakut culture. Such attempts were made early. Some authors even attempted, for example, to derive the ancestors of the Yakuts directly from the "state" of the Orkhon Türks in Mongolia or even from the shores of the Aral Sea. Science does not know where and how the most ancient stages of the past of the Turkic-speaking ancestors of the Yakuts occurred, and at the present we cannot penetrate into these complex problems. But we can say with certainty that this sought-for "south" (whence the southern ancestors of the Yakuts immediately appeared), lay nearer to the presentday northern homeland of the Yakut people than Mongolia and the Aral region. According to the legends, the ancestor of the Yakut people, Elley, appears on the middle Lena in the region of present-day Yakutsk and the settlement of Pokrovskoye, having arrived there from the upper reaches of the Lena. In the same way, moving from the south to the north along the course of the Lena, another ancestor of the Yakuts, Omogoy-baay, arrived before Elley. These legends, of course, are replete with mythological details, but as far as the movement of the Yakuts' ancestors along the Lena is concerned, they fully transmit the real happenings of the past, although invested with the trappings of traditional mythological images and legends. Besides, as we will see further on, there is at our disposal the direct testimony of the earliest transcriptions, relating to the first half of the 18th century, about the movement of the Yakuts' ancestors, this time not mythological, divine heroes, but real earthly people. This movement proceeded down the Lena, from Kachug to present-day Yakutsk. There is, consequently, every basis for trying to find on the upper reaches of the Lena and neighboring regions of the Cis-Baykal area such archaeological remains as could be related to the southern ancestors 305

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of the Yakuts, and also that distinct, relatively high culture, of which traces are found in the language and in the material and intellectual culture of the present-day Yakuts. The credit for discovering these relics belongs to participants in the Great Northern Expedition of the Academy of Sciences. During a journey to Lake Baykal, on the 26th of September, 1745, J. Lindenau, a participant in the expedition, came across an ancient fortress which, in his opinion, was an abode of the Yakuts before their settlement on the middle Lena. Lindenau pointed out a second such place at present-day Kachug, on the right bank of the Lena [Lindenau n.d., b]. Then the first cliff drawings on the Lena, which also have a direct connection with the ancient sites noted by Lindenau and with the question of the origin of the Yakut people, were noted by the investigators. One hundred and fifty years later, through the initiative of M. P. Ovchinnikov, sites of this type again drew the attention of investigators in connection with the same problem of the origin of the Yakut people and its pastoral culture. As a result of these researches, a new Kurumchinsk culture of the Iron Age, until then not distinguished from the general mass of ancient sites of the Baykal area, became widely known, and was ascribed to the ancestors of the Yakuts. It received its name from the Kurumchinsk khoshun [administrative sub-division] of the former Ekhirit-Bulagat aymak [administrative division] of the Buryat-Mongol A.S.S.R. The most extensive excavations were conducted in 1912-14, in the valley of a small river, Murin, a left tributary of the Kuda. The general distribution of the sites of the Kurumchinsk culture at the present include the lower reaches of the Selenga, the valley of the Barguzin, the Tunka district, the valley of the Angara downstream past Balagansk, and the upper reaches of the Lena to Zhigalovo. Thus, it had Baykal as its geographical center, with its (at that time) thickly populated shores, the central part of the region being the upper, that is, southern, part of the Angara and the headwaters area of the Lena, with the area between these rivers included, and encompassing the Baykal shores and neighboring Olkhon Island. Reviewing the materials of the Kurumchinsk sites, we may with fair clarity determine the general culture and way of life of this region's ancient population, the probable ancestors of the Yakuts. The most characteristic feature of this culture is the high level of its iron technology. The sites of the Kurumchinsk period present a characteristic picture of the camps of smelters and smiths. Everywhere are strewn cinders, smith's deposits, fragments of hearths, fragments of clay pipenozzles used with the blacksmith's bellows, and whole and broken crucibles. In one of the earth huts in a settlement at Utu-Yelga Falls, the remains of a small furnace turned up, constructed in the wall at the location where a stove-warmed sleeping bench was commonly put in the dwelling. The furnace had the appearance of a large thick-walled vessel with a round bottom. In the pot there were two openings for nozzles, and it also contained ore and charcoal in layers. During smelting, air was forced into the vessel through the nozzle with bellows attached, and from above 306

Culture of the Kurykans coal and softened [preheated] ore were gradually added. In the process of smelting, the iron settled, and a large ingot was formed, its lower part rounded and the upper surface flat. The raw iron of Kurumchinsk possessed high qualities; the percentage of metal was exceptionally high (99.43 per cent); therefore it was especially malleable and durable. It was worked into various articles at the sites at which it was smelted. The Kurumchinsk smiths made knives, arrowheads and spearheads, and also a number of domestic utensils, with the exception of kettles, which were cast iron Chinese kettles. Yet, they were able to mend broken kettles, putting a patch on the outside. Some investigators opine that the Kurumchinsk people themselves could cast pig iron kettles. For several centuries, separating the height of this culture (about 6th-8th centuries A.D.) from the earlier stages of the Iron Age, the inhabitants of the Cis-Baykal were able to forge ahead in the field of technology, and, insofar as metal-working is concerned, they yielded nothing to other tribes of Siberia of the first millennium A.D. Features of progressive development were clearly present in the economy of the Kurumchinsk people. They were able to develop animal husbandry at a relatively high level, even on the limited pastures of the Cis-Baykal. The broken and split bones of animals at the sites, primarily of horses and cows, testify to the numerous head of stock they must have possessed. Above all, they lavished care on increasing the herds of horses, which must have been their true pride. At least, it is horses and saddles which are the main subjects of the cliff drawings of this time, which have been preserved near the village of Shishkino and at other places along the Lena, and also on Khashkhay Mountain at the river Unga, and on Mankhay Mountain in the valley of the Kuda River, which are contemporaneous with other remains of the Kurumchinsk type, and belong to one tribe. The Kurumchinsk people were a horse people, a tribe of shepherds and riders. Judging from the cliff drawings, an important place in their economy was occupied by the two-humped camel—the most typical representative of the animal world of the steppes and desert of inner Asia, and, along with this, the inalienable property of the pastoral culture of steppe nomads, with whom the inhabitants of the Cis-Baykal apparently had rather close communication. As among all pastoral tribes, along with animal husbandry, hunting for wild animals must have been of no small significance. The bones of the roe deer and elk are fairly frequently encountered in the campsites and stockades, although less frequently than the bones of domestic animals. In the cliff drawings, one may observe scenes depicting the battue type of hunting. One such drawing consists of three figures of semi-fantastic beasts, depicting probably wild boars rushing in one direction. Behind them follows a mounted driver, and in front, coming toward the boars, a second hunter leaps. The battue is shown here thus, conventionally, from the side, with the figures distributed in a line. There is a rare hunting scene depicting a rider who is rushing after an elk, with lasso in hand. In these places, such a method of hunting is unknown. But in antiquity the lasso was widely used among steppe 307

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peoples, not only in hunting but also in war. The use of the lasso in these cases was closely connected with the way of life and pastoral economy of steppe tribes, among whom the lasso was a necessary means of catching horses. Apparently, one must think in the same terms of the Kurumchinsk people. In one drawing, instead of the usual loop of the lasso, something like a net is depicted; it is a hatched area with slanting lines in a checkerboard pattern. Perhaps the artist wanted to depict not a lasso, but a net. According to European writers, such were the arms of the Gunni [Huns]: "In one hand they held a sabre, and in the other a net, in order to entangle the enemy in it" (Radlov 1893: 105). Besides hunting and pastoralism, the Kurumchinsk people, although this may seem strange in relation to the zealous pastoralist, also occupied themselves with agriculture, being the earliest agriculturalists in the Cis-Baykal. Near their stockades one encounters, in places, traces of ancient plowland, in the form of long parallel garden beds. Similar beds are found near the Kurumchinsk fortified site, near the village of Kulakovaya on the Angara; the beds closely adjoin the stockade and are clearly discernible from the neighboring elevation above the site. Many are eroded and are almost level with the surrounding surface. Others clearly stand out as parallel wavy elevations. Agapitov saw analogous garden beds on the Kuda, at the fortified site on Khandagay Mountain: "The beds were placed there on the eastern side of the mountain and had the form of elevations of a width of four sazhens and a length of ten sazhens and were oriented east and west" (Agapitov 1881b). The Kurumchinsk pastoralist-agriculturalists must have widely used artificial irrigation of fields or hayfields. In the Kudinsk steppe, for example, near Barturka ulus, 3 km from the rayon center of Ust-Orda village, there is a network of irrigation ditches, originating at Idyga Falls near the mountain Ulan-Zola Tologoy, on which the Kurumchinsk fortified village is located. The latter apparently defended the main approach to the irrigation works and to the fields. The irrigation ditches were dug along the sides of a small terrace approaching the right bank of the Kuda River. From one side of the terrace, two ditches, 100-15o m apart, were dug. Their depth is 0.5 m—I m; their width reaches 2 M. Some laterals, which fed water to separate fields, emanated from the main ditches. Altogether, the construction embraces an area 5 km long and up to 300 m wide. Similar irrigation works are found also at the Kurkhir Falls, opposite Bokholdoy ulus, and beyond Kharazargay ulus in the valley of the Kuda (Khoroshikh 1930: 85). Additionally, the "cup" stones may be counted among the remains of ancient agriculture in the Cis-Baykal. The local Buryat population ascribed them to the Chinese, and called them "Chinese mortars," assuming that the Chinese pounded millet in them (Agapitov 1881b: 12-15). It is not surprising that the Kurumchinsk settlements had the appearance of a constant, settled, or, in any case, semi-settled character. Their culturebearing layer was often thick and densely packed with the remains of everyday life: fragments of clay vessels, the wastes and bones of animals. 308

Culture of the Kurykans Such a cultural layer could be formed only in places of the long-time residence of many people. In a number of places settlements are known, consisting of the remains of once solidly built dwellings of the semi-subterranean type or built up with wattle-and-daub. Remains of structures of this type are found at the very headwaters of the Lena, in a Kurumchinsk camp near the village of Yushino, in the locality "Rogatka." In the culture-bearing layer, along with the bones of horses and horned cattle and the characteristic fragments of clay vessels, there were numerous masses of burned clay, mostly laminated, with impressions of plants, mostly stems and husks of barley or wheat, and also of grains. On the Angara, between Irkutsk and Balagansk, along the Kuda, in the Kudinsk steppes, on the Unga, Osa, Ide, or Ilga, there are also remains of fortified settlements or refuge stockades, which may be related to Kurumchinsk period. One such fortified site on the upper Lena is near Ocheul ttlus, a second on the Ilga River, near the village of Novaya Sloboda (between the villages of Znamenskoye and Zhigalovo), a third also on the Ilga, near the village of Kamen. They are usually placed in groups, sort of "nests," at points where, apparently, a large population was gathered; that is, in places with rich meadows and pastures, on picturesque heights dominating the valleys. Very typical and characteristic, from this point of view, is the group on the Kuda, in the locality of Kapsal, or one near the village of Kulakovaya, on the Angara. The latter forms a single defensive system of three points: two are located opposite each other [across the valley], and the third is at the crest of the falls. In general, these fortified places have a four-cornered or round configuration. The former are surrounded on three sides by embankments and ditches and from the fourth bounded by precipitous slopes. Sometimes the ditches of the stockade are bow-shaped, and cut through the promontory-like ledges on the banks. Roughly formed dry stone walls, of limestone slabs or gneiss, are a special attribute of fortifications in places where there are many stones. One such wall is near the mountain of Mankhay on the Kuda; several stone walls were built on the cliff elevations of the Olkhon region. Burials found on Olkhon Island fully correspond to those of the Kurumchinsk settlements and fortified places, with their cultural remains indicating a semi-settled form of life. In outward appearance, the graves are like miniature, conical, tent-like yurts similar to the Evenki dzhu or the Buryat bukhekoe [ttkhehed] of the distant past. The grave superstructures are constructed of gneiss slabs, placed in such a way that, within, one gets a hollow five- or six-sided pyramid. There are large pyramids up to a meter high. Their similarity to tents is magnified by the presence of side openings, facing south and corresponding to the entrance into the yurt. In the graves were interred skeletons of adults and children, or the remains of burned skeletons. In one grave, at a depth of i13 cm from the base of the pyramid, between two small slabs, there was found a small clay vessel turned bottom up, with burned bones, among which was one 309

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human phalanx. Besides human bones in the graves, one encounters the bones of sheep, apparently remains of food. In shape and ornamentation, the pottery from these graves is analogous to that from the Kurumchinsk camps and from fortified places. The vessels are jar-shaped; they have a flat base and they are ornamented with applied fillets and carved lines of festoons and arcs. Metal objects are very rare: only iron bits, an iron knife, and three arrowheads have been found, as well as a stirrup with a wide oval base. Of ornaments, one black glass bead has been excavated. Graves with stone superstructures in the form of small conical yurts are found also at other points in the Olkhon region, near the uluses of Kura, Kular, Sarma, Zama, Talovskiy, and Onguren. The number of graves here reaches one hundred to one hundred and fifty, and the area occupied by them is measured in kilometers (Agapitov 1881b; Stanilovskiy 1912). The graves which are most characteristic of the Kurumchinsk culture, and which have been most fully studied, are valuable not only for the idea of a belief in afterlife as a continuation of earthly existence (the graves in the form of yurts are the dwellings of the dead), but also for their abundance, their clumped arrangement, which is unusual for the Cis-Baykal region, and which confirms the opinion that the Kurumchinsk people led a settled life. Such cemeteries could not have belonged to wandering hunters or nomads. They could have been left only by a relatively numerous population, which had dwelt here for a long time. In accordance with the general development of their economy and way of life, the Kurumchinsk people had progressed significantly in other areas of culture as well. We may judge of this primarily by the relics left by them—the cliff drawings already mentioned in part earlier. They are distributed along the Lena, within definite and sharply limited areas: from the town of Bolshiye Goly (upstream from Kachug) to Karinga village (downstream from Verkholensk), and not farther north. They are found also on the Unga, near the ulus of Nukut on Khashkhay Mountain "0 The Kurumchinsk drawings are most numerously represented on the upper Lena around the village of Shishkino. In the center of the Shishkino cliff drawings, we find depictions of riders and horses, very true to life and rich in everyday details, and after these come scenes of military actions and of hunting elks and goats. Among them, a group of pictures of riders with luxurious horse trappings is outstanding. The riders are usually represented without headgear, with round or oval heads, and in costumes reminiscent of a narrow, tightly belted outer coat. A banner or standard is sometimes placed in the hands of the rider. The legs are usually not depicted (Fig. 65). Occasionally the figures of the riders are covered with criss-cross Fig. 65. Figures of horsemen with banners. 1—Shishkino cliff; 2, 3—Sulek; 4, 5—tombstone with picture of banner, Yenisey Valley. 310

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diagonal strokes, reminiscent of a rhombic network. It is probable that these represent chain mail or armor in general. In one of the best executed drawings, wide trousers are depicted, also by criss-crossed diagonal lines. This drawing, strongly reminiscent of some ancient Kyrgyz cliff drawings on the Yenisey, may relate to earlier cliff drawings, together with the figures of horses entirely covered with fine strokes within their outlines. With the representations of horsemen, we also find drawings of people on foot, which, by general stylistic criteria and technique, are part of the same group of cliff drawings (Fig. 66). These are warriors in close-fitting

Fig. 66. Kurykan cliff drawing at Kurtukhay. outer garments and high boots or unty.* In other cases, groups of people are depicted standing in a row, facing the viewer. They are all dressed in garments of identical cut, resembling long-skirted gowns reaching to the heels, or sheepskin coats overlapping at the waist and with long sleeves narrowing toward the cuffs. On their heads, we see tall hats with rounded crowns. On their feet, footwear in the form of low boots is sometimes indicated. The cut of the clothing on the figures in the cliff drawings of the Shishkino style coincides with that of the Turkic-speaking tribes of southern and Central Asia. "The cut of their clothing," wrote S. I. Rudenko in 1925, "is very simple and characteristic of them: the Turkic horse-nomads have worn from ancient times a long loose garment hanging from the shoulders, with a vent in front, wide trousers, short soft boots, and wide hats with side flaps, or else tall ones. Long double-skirted overcoats with long but narrow sleeves and long wide fur coats are the typical outer garment of Turkic peoples. They are as characteristic for the women as for the men" (Rudenko 1926a: 62). The general character of the garments in the drawings of Shishkino type is the same. Of domestic animals, we find the camel and oxen depicted on the cliffs. In the hunting scenes, the most frequent wild animal is the elk, and more rarely the Siberian stag, which was represented with two branching antlers, • [Soft leather boots used by the northern people for travelling in the forest. Editor,

A.t.N.A.] 312

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Fig. 67. Kurykan cliff dwellings at Mankhay. sometimes treated in an extremely schematic and simplified manner, as a herringbone pattern, but sometimes also with striking verisimilitude and realistic precision. In the technically best executed drawings, these animals are depicted in a very lively manner, in swift movement or at the gallop, although they lack the peculiar monumental strength and force which distinguish the images of elks during the developed Neolithic (Fig. 67). In one drawing depicting battue hunting, we see represented what are apparently wild boars. Also common are strongly stylized representations of some large water fowl, most closely resembling swans or geese, always with several figures in one group, arranged side by side or even in two or three rows. The presence of writing among the Kurumchinsk people is especially important for a description of their cultural attainment. For a long time, the attention of Turkologists has been drawn by examples of ancient Turkic runic script, found on the Angara-Lena watershed, in the valley of the Murin, in the Olkhon region. They were two small discs, cut from local Cis-Baykal material, bokheda (a variety of coal), lightly worked with a simple knife, and lightly polished. In the center of the discs there is an opening, in which a wooden shaft was placed. They served as spinning whorls such as those used to this day, among various pastoral tribes of Asia, for spinning thread from sheep's wool. Ancient Turkic inscriptions were scratched on them. In 1941, on one of the cliffs, not far from Verkholensk, near the village of Kurtukhay, in the locality of Nikolskiy Ruchey, a third runic inscription was found in form of an epitaph. Later, near Kachug and on the Shishkino cliffs, two runic inscriptions were found. On the road from the Angara to the Lena, in the valley of the Kuda River, a runic inscription was found on a cliff in the vicinity of Mankhay. A similar inscription is preserved on a stone near the locality of Sagan-Zaba (on the shore of Lake Baykal, to the northwest of Olkhon Island). 313

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There is information that, on the well-known mountain Khashkhay, near the Nukuta ulus of the former Alarsk aymak, besides cliff drawings depicting horsemen and various animals, there are traces of ancient inscriptions similar to the runic ones. Thus, in the western Cis-Baykal, there were found in all about eight ancient inscriptions in the Turkic language executed in the OrkhonYenisey runic script, which are indisputable signs of the sojourn, in the western Baykal area in the first millennium A.D., of some ancient Turkic tribe acquainted with the Orkhon-Yenisey runic script. At the same time, they explain the ethnic affiliation of the mysterious Kurumchinsk people who settled the Baykal region at this time, leaving behind them many camps, burial grounds, cliff drawings, and fortified sites. These show their culture in its highest aspect. Because of these occurrences, we must now ascribe to these inhabitants of the Baykal area what we noted for their neighbors on The Selenga and on the Yenisey : the presence of phonetic writing with runic script, definitely affecting the life of the local population. Like any other developed writing, the Orkhon-Yenisey one arose, developed, and existed in a society which knew class stratification. It must have served mainly the ruling class of the ancient Turkic tribes, and the state apparatus created by them. We must suppose, therefore, that the Baykal forest Türks of the 6th-9th centuries A.D., the Kurumchinsk people, acquired the Turkic runic script of that time, and in their social structure were close to their steppe neighbors; but from this it does not follow, of course, that among them there already existed a real, if embryonic form of the state. This [the stage of development of social structure] is supported by the evidence of the cliff drawings of the Shishkino group. In them, horsemen are pictured, riding richly decorated stallions. These drawings throw light on the social structure. A definite spirit of class differentiation emanates from them; they are replete with a special aristocratic, heroic feeling. On the heads of the horses there is a luxurious headpiece, embroidered at the top to imitate plumes of feathers or hair. From the bridle hangs an equally luxurious embroidered tassel, or bit piece. Similar tassels, hanging from the saddle or the saddle blanket, are sometimes seen under the belly of the horse (Fig. 68). Luxurious horse trappings of this type are well known from contemporary archaeological remains of another type; for example, from the flat metal figurines from Minusinsk kray (Levashova 1939: 68, Plate XVI, Fig. 14) and the Trans-Baykal. On the figurine found in the valley of the river Chikoy [in the Trans-Baykal], "the horse is adorned with a beautiful saddle; it wears a bridle furnished with neck tassel and forehead plume. The neck tassel is a characteristic decoration for festive Middle Asian finery" (Levental 1929: Vol. IV, 225). Such tassels had a magical character, being guard-talismans, but they also signified the leading social position of their owners (Rostovtsev 1913: 31o). This supposition is confirmed for a later period by data on the use of neck tassels among the Seljuks as the distinguishing mark of especially prominent warriors. The bakhadurs [bahadursi and alps, distinguishing themselves in warfare by annihilating 314

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Fig. 68. A Kurykan cliff drawing at Shishkino. The figures are emphasized with chalk. enemy detachments, were rewarded with the plume; to the necks of their horses they fastened the kutas, the tail of the yak entwined in a golden ornament. Thus the ales were distinguished among ordinary warriors (Gordlevskiy 1941: 158). The thoroughness and care with which figures of horses were drawn on the Lena cliffs, the transmission of their shape and movement, the pictured details of their luxurious trappings—all this recalls the military horses whose names are preserved to this day on the grave monuments of the Turkic princes and khans of the 7th and 8th centuries A.D. in the steppes of Mongolia, or the seven favorite horses of their contemporary, the renowned Chinese emperor T'ai-tsung of the Tang dynasty, pictured on the superstructure of his grave. As we will see later, the connection between the horses of the Lena cliffs and those of T'ai-tsunk involves more than a simple comparison of a similar relationship of military masters to their animals. The special significance of the military horses depicted in the cliff drawings is also reflected in their figures. The artist always strives to transmit the features of a special, aristocratic breed of horse, of a knight's horse destined not for the everyday work of the steppe pastoralist but for military matters, or for knightly pleasures and delights. These were the tall, well-built horses, with arched small heads set on gracefully bent "swans' necks," horses with the powerful chests and thin legs of tireless jumpers. These horses, furnished with luxurious trappings with tassels and plumes, did not, of course, belong to ordinary members of the society, to ordinary mortals. They were the property of a small aristocratic component 315

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of the local population, that "well born" upper stratum of ancient society whose basic occupations were feasts, hunting, and war, whose life often ended on the fields of battle or in a struggle with a wild animal during the hunt. It is not surprising, therefore, that on the Lena cliffs one encounters not only separate figures of horse-warriors, but also carefully executed compositions, depicting entire scenes of military activity and hunting. In one picture there is shown a group of foot soldiers, their hands raised, and warriors shooting at them with the bow. In another picture, we see how the horseman, with banner in hand, drives before him two humped camels, depicting, perhaps, a herd driven away from the enemy. In a third drawing, the horsemen chase after elks, attempting to throw lassos over their wide-spreading antlers. For an understanding of the social-political relations among the Kurumchinsk people, a detail of some Shishkino cliff drawings takes on importance. Reference is to the banner carried by some of the horsemen. The banners are depicted as rectangles, almost squares, perpendicularly attached at the end of a long straight pole. On one side of the banner there are three horizontal lines, probably depicting the fluttering of the three [horsehair] tails attached to it. The dimensions of the banner, judging by the proportions of the various parts of the drawing, were relatively small—not more than a meter. Chinese sources indicate, of the Yenisey Kyrgyz, that "in war they use bows and arrows and banners" (Bichurin 195o-53 edition: I, 445)• Authentic drawings of Kyrgyz banners of that period have also been preserved. Engraved on a rock on Solyanaya Gora [Mountain] in Sulek (to the west of Bateni on the Yenisey, upstream from Krasnoyarsk), there has been preserved a figure of a mounted warrior, in coat of mail and helmet, with a long spear, on the end of which there is a rectangular banner with two appended tails (Savenkov 191o: Plate 8). In another cliff drawing from the "inscription" mountain in Sulek, there is a horseman jumping at full speed. In one hand he holds the rein, in the other a spear with two small flags, which perhaps represent, in schematic form, the tail-like appendages. The flags of individual warriors are probably depicted in these drawings. Additionally, real banners, in the form of wide rectangular panels, are represented three-dimensionally on the remarkable stone statue, kizhi-task, located near the mouth of the Askyz River in Minusinsk kray (Pestov 1883; Spasskiy 1857: 124, Plate 1, Fig. 4; Gryaznov and Shneyder 1929: 85, Fig. 68, Plate 2; Pallas 1773: 5o1; N. Popov 1871: 6o). From these examples, it is clear that the Lena banners belong among the usual medieval military banners of Middle and Central Asia; at the same time they show a close similarity to the banners of the neighboring Yenisey Kyrgyz. Their significance also must have been identical among all Asian peoples; the banner was surrounded by a religious aura and enjoyed profound religious veneration (Bichurin 1950-53: I, 445,449)• The banner was a sacred object, within which dwelt the spirit-protector of the tribe. It contained a mighty force on which depended not only military success but also the very existence of the tribe. 316

Culture of the Kurykans The banner as a sacred relic, as a tangible symbol of the blood kinship of the entire tribe, and the dignity of the leader and his title, were indissolubly connected with each other. Without a banner there could be no leader or khan. The banner accompanied the military leaders into battles. Marco Polo, describing the rebellion of Nayan against Khubilay [Kublai1, specifically notes that before a fight "they raised high his, Nayan's, banner" (Polo 1940 edition: 78). The banner always accompanied the leader to the grave ([Ibn Fadlan] 1939 edition: 77; Dmitriyev 1914; Okladnikov 1951a: 153). The significance of the banner in the burial ritual deserves special attention in connection with the Lena cliff drawings and inscriptions. In 1945, S. Ye. Malov wrote a letter to me about the Kurtukhay inscription, claiming that it was a burial epitaph. A. N. Bernshtam, having examined the Lena inscription, proposes that the Kurtukhay inscription contains the words byug metim, that is, "I took no pleasure." This is a conventional formula of the Yenisey inscriptions in honor of the dead, concisely expressing the thought of untimely death, and of the fact that the deceased was unable to enjoy the good things of life belonging to him. The inscription at Shishkino can be read, in his opinion, as ach olym, "I die" (Bernshtam 1951: 77, 8o). Considering that both epitaphs are on the cliffs with figures of horsemen, we may suppose that their connection is not accidental, and that the figures of mounted warriors most probably depicted dead leaders corresponding to the traditional cult figures, dolls or dummies, depicting the deceased as the repository of his soul. In the light of the adduced data, it also becomes clear that the banner carried by the horseman in the Shishkino drawings serves as a direct indication of his social position and leading political role. These proud horsemen and standard-bearers were either living, or dead and already deified, military aristocratic leaders of the clans of the Kurumchinsk tribe, leaders of their fighting corps, and rulers. We may, therefore, propose with some certainty that, in the Kurumchinsk stage on the Lena, there existed a society divided in at least two basic strata: simple people and aristocrats. The existence of such an aristocratic stratum is quite natural if we consider not only the general level of economic development, but also the whole aspect of this culture, and the connection of its bearers with the external world, which determined their position among the remaining tribes. The Kurumchinsk people of the Cis-Baykal cannot be considered as isolated from the societies and state formations surrounding them at that time. It would be strange if the existence of this people with a relatively high culture for their time and place did not find at least accidental and incomplete reflection in the written sources of that time, in the ancient Turkic runic inscriptions, and especially in the Chinese chronicles, where the historians of the Middle Kingdom constantly mentioned the barbarian tribes of Mongolia and Siberia with whom the Chinese from ancient times had many constant ties. In spite of the remoteness of the Cis-Baykal from China, in the chronicles of the Tang Dynasty there is actually preserved a short but completely 317

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Fig. 69. Chinese drawing depicting a Kurykan (after Pozdneyev). vivid description of a tribe known to the Chinese as Kuli-kang (Fig. 69). These Kuli-kangs of the Chinese chronicles and, in part, other tribes close to them, may be approximated to the Kurumchinsk people of the CisBaykal on the basis of the data given. They must be the very same people who left the monuments in the Cis-Baykal, including the runic inscriptions on the Lena and Kuda mentioned above. In the chronicles of the T'ang Dynasty it is related that the Kuli-kangs were among the number of ancient Turkic tribes Kao-kuei or Hui-ho, that is, Uygurs. All the Chinese sources unanimously note that in T'ang times the Kuli-kangs lived far to the north of the Uygur tribes and the Turkic tribes in general. In I. Bichurin's translation from the T'ang-shu, the following is entered concerning the dwelling place of the Kuli-kangs: "The Kuli-kangs nomadize to the north of Baykal. The lands of the Kuli-kangs stretch northward to the sea and are extremely distant from the capital (of China). When one crosses the sea `Baykal' to the north, the days are long and the nights are short. When the sun has set, there is just time to broil a ram's spleen before dawn shows itself in the east. This country is near to the place of the sun's rising" (Bichurin 1950-53: 1, 440)This information seemed so unusual to the Chinese that, a millennium later, in the 18th century, emperor Ch'ien-Lung, in his notes on the 318

Culture of the Karykans compilation of data from the chronicles of all dynasties, T'ung-chiang, expressed serious disbelief concerning the reports of the T'ang chronicle about the land of the Kuli-kangs. He wrote: "What truth is there in the story that from twilight until dawn there is only time to broil a ram's spleen.... Using only the bragging words of travellers, they have written them down in the historical records. The matter does not correspond to the truth, and is not worthy of belief" (Kyuner [1946] MS: r6). However, the brief and unsophisticated story of the T'ang chronicler about long days and short nights depicts well the short northern summer with its white nights. From it there breathes in fact the chill breath of the Arctic. Furthermore, the northern region of which the Chinese of the T'ang period had heard may be localized rather exactly between presentday Yakutsk on the south and Zhigansk on the north. But further to the north, beyond the Arctic Circle, in the country where the sun in the summer revolves around the horizon without setting for days on end, the informants of the T'ang chronicler had clearly not penetrated. They did not even suspect the existence of the country of the never-setting polar sun. Some scholars, including Pozdneyev and Chavannes, suppose that the term "Han-Hai" (to the north of which lies the country of the Kulikangs) of the T'ang texts, signifies not the Sea of Baykal but the sandy steppes. Baykal, on the other hand, according to the interpretation of the learned Chinese who in 1744 compiled the general description of the Ta-ch'ing empire (Ta-ch'ing-i-t'ung-chih) is the sea which lies to the north of the Kuli-kangs (Kyuner [1946] MS: is). If this be the case, the Kuli-kangs must have lived not to the north but to the south of Baykal, a small distance to the north of the Hui-ho (that is, Uygurs), as it is written in the T'ai-p'ing-huan-yü-chi ("Geography of China and Foreign Countries"), compiled during the Sung period (Kyuner [ 1946] MS: 7). But even if the question of the location of the Kuli-kang country is resolved in this way, this locates it directly on the shores of Baykal, that is, in those parts of the Trans-Baykal where there are found archaeological sites identical with the Cis-Baykal ones of Kurumchinsk type (campsites and burial grounds in the valley of the Selenga near Kabansk, in Tunka, and, in part, in the valley of the Barguzin). Additionally, in another Chinese source of the T'ang period, the geographical survey T'ang-shu-ti-li-chih, it is clearly stated that people similar in their customs to the Kuli-kangs live to the north of Baykal: "To the north of the two tribes Kuli-kang and Dubo,* there is a small sea. When the ice is strong, horses, travelling for eight days, can cross it. To the north of the sea are many high mountains. Their inhabitants are very strong in their aspect (figure). In customs, they are similar to the Kulikangs. The day is long, the evening short. These waters are the so-called 'small sea' " (Kyuner [1946] MS: 7). The "small sea" here certainly refers to Lake Baykal. The mountains are undoubtedly the Baykalskiy Range or the Onotskaya Heights. The crossing with horses over the ice of the "small sea" also corresponds to reality. The inhabitants of these parts were known by similar names to the . [Dubo, probable ancestors of the later Tubalars and Tofalars. Editor, A.I.N.A.]

319

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ancient Turkic peoples of Mongolia. They called them Kurykans. The Kurykans are mentioned in the famous epitaphs of the Turkic khans, discovered in the valley of the Orkhon River. There is no doubt that the term Kurykan is in this case original, and Kuli-kang derivative from it, formed by the rules of Chinese pronunciation of foreign words. The descendants of the Kuli-kang-Kurykans were those forest peoples who lived in the 8th-11th centuries A.D., to the east of the Yenisey Kyrgyz on the lower Selenga, on the banks of Lake Baykal, on the Angara, and probably on the upper Lena, and who are mentioned in the Moslem sources under the name "Furl" or "Kuri" and in Chinese works of the Yuan period under the name Kuri. Comparing all the written information at our disposal concerning the eastern neighbors of the Kyrgyz, we come to the conclusion that the territory occupied in the first millennium A.D. by the Kuli-kang-Kurykans, and afterward by their descendants and tribes related to them, living to the east of the Kyrgyz, coincides fully with the regions where the Kurumchinsk settlements, fortified sites, cemeteries, and cliff drawings, all of the same period, are distributed. These are the regions immediately adjoining Lake Baykal on the east and on the west: the valley of the Barguzin, the lower Selenga at Kabansk, Tunka, Angarskiy kray approximately to Ust-Uda, and tire upper Lena to Verkholensk, that is, the entire region of the Baykal forested steppe, distributed along the valleys of the main rivers and their tributaries. The affiliation of these ancient Kuli-kang-Kurykan-Kuri with the Turkic peoples of Siberia, and not with some others, is confirmed by documents in their own Baykal script of runic type, and also by the fact that in the T'ang period the Kuli-kaans were part of the Uygur ethnic grouping. This fact, noted in the Chinese chronicle, is supported by the entirely natural similarity of the relics of the Kurumchinsk culture to those of the Barguzin and Selenga valleys, since, at this time, the basic mass of Uygurs lived beyond [to the east of] Lake Baykal, and on the lower Selenga, and, later, further up this river. The material culture of tribes close to each other, living under similar conditions, must naturally have reflected to some degree their kinship. The same thing is indicated by the presence, in the runic descriptions on the Lena, of old Kyrgyz, Orkhon, and (what is particularly important) old Uygur linguistic forms, which was noted by Bernshtam. In his words, the runic script of northern Asia and Mongolia was created by those Turkic-speaking peoples who lived on our territory and were related to the Uygur Turks, who, as is known, achieved the highest level of cultural development of the Turkic tribes of the time. Among these tribes, consequently, were the Kurykans (Bernshtam 1951: 86). Continuing the comparison of the Kurumchinsk material relics with the literary sources concerning the Kurykans, we must consider further the features of the economic life of the population of the Baykal region according to the Chinese chronicles of T'ang times. These sources mention one specific but highly characteristic detail of the Kurykan economy, which leads us to understand better the level and nature of their agriculture. In 320

Culture of the Kurykans the T'ai-p'ing-huan-yü-chi ("Geography of China and Foreign Countries" during the period of rule of the T'ai-p'ing-sung Dynasty, 976-889) we read: "In the country there are many lilies; the inhabitants consider them an article of food" (Kyuner [1946] MS: 7). These liles are certainly the day-lily, the bulbs of which constituted a most significant part of the diet of the Sayan-Altay forest tribes, up to very recent times. The important role among the Kurykans of the gathering of wild food thus indicates the primitive nature of their agriculture and the limited scale on which it was conducted. This conclusion is also confirmed by the remains of the Kurykan plowed fields. The long wide ridges characteristic of them are nothing other than garden beds; these are not plowed fields in our sense of the word, but are rather gardens. The absence of plowshares in the archaeological finds may also be considered as an indirect proof of hoe cultivation. Pastoralism, which is also indicated by the archaeological relics of Kurykan culture, appears next in order as a chief occupation, reflected with special vividness in the Chinese chronicles. The Kuli-kangs especially loved to raise horses the reputation of which reached the very capital of the Middle Kingdom. The country of the Kulikangs, wrote the Chinese, produced "excellent horses, which in their heads resemble camels—strong and well grown; they can go several hundred li in a day" (Bichurin 195°-53: 1, 44°). The Kurykan horses brought to the court of the emperor T'ai-tsung aroused his enthusiam. T'ai-tsung, the chronicle says, received them and named them all together "ten jumpers," giving a separate honorary name to each jumper, and afterwards dedicated a special poem to them (from the Ta-Ch'ing-i-t'ung-chih; see Kyuner [1946] MS: 5; also Fig. 70). The representations of Kurykan horses on the cliffs of the Lena may, in fact, serve as illustrations to the words of the Chinese chronicle—visible documentary proof of the passion with which the Kurykans, as zealous pastoralists, carried on their horse breeding. The cliff drawings in the Lena Valley, and the Chinese reports concerning the excellent horses of the Kuli-kang tribe, show that, in the first millennium A.D., the best representatives of the Central Asian tribes were found farther to the north than would ever have been suspected, at the very edge of the civilized world of medieval times—on the Angara and at the sources of the Lena. Also an indication of the high level of the horse-breeding economy of the Kurykans are the horse trappings which we have mentioned more than once, even richer than those pictured on the Yenisey cliffs. The Kurykans carefully brushed and combed their horses, hung on them luxurious tassels, bits, and tasseled bridles and plumed headpieces; they cherished and tended them well. According to the Chinese sources, the Kurykans were a small but independent people who could put up a five-thousand-horse army. The independent existence of the Kurykans is expressed in the fact that they sent ambassadors and themselves received embassies. The ancient Turkic runic sources mention the same thing: 321

3

Culture of the Kurykans "In the tale of the burial of Bumyn-Istemi-kagan, the Kurykans are called Uch-Kurykans, that is, three-Kurykans. Similar names always point to an el consisting of several tribes who had previously kept aloof" (Melioranskiy 1898: 282). Thus, the Kurykans had their own clan organization, their union of tribes, their el. The leaders and important people of this el, who guided the socio-political life of the Kurykans, were, evidently, not only horsemen but also unmounted people in long kaftans or coats and in tall hats, representations of whom remain on the Lena cliffs. A kind of wide band, placed vertically and spreading upwards like a mace, is sometimes noted in their hands. Apparently, these were, in fact, staffs or maces, serving as regalia, signs of power and dignity. We may project that the horsemen standard-bearers of the Lena cliff drawings were military leaders of the local clans, and the unmounted people with the maces were the civilian leaders (the elders in the original sense of this word), and also the consecrated princes, such as represented by the Khazar khakan. This projection is supported by the presence, on the Yenisey cliffs, of unmounted people in a distinct and luxurious costume which ends below in a wide train. They carry staffs and maces. The pose and whole aspect of these figures have a suggestion of solemnity and majesty. On the cliff drawings near Verkholensk, these unmounted people with maces are usually depicted not singly, but as several in a row. Hence it follows that they could be not tribal but clan elders. In the Chinese sources, there are indications of tribal organization among the Kurykans. In the Wen-hsien-t'ung-k'ao, the well-known work by Ma Tuan-lin, it is written, concerning the Kurykans, that famous horses were brought to T'ai-tsung by "the great elder, Ssü-ch'in" (Kyuner [1946] MS: 12). In the T'ang-shu the latter is called "the main elder, Ssü-kin" (Bichurin 195o-53: I, 44o)." This elder probably enjoyed the basic rights of the head of their clan union, the el. Therefore, of great interest is the mention, contained in the T'ai-p'inghuan-yü-chi, that in the country of the Kuli-kangs, "two hsi-chin live together" (Kyuner [1946] MS: 13). These two sykins (hsi-chin) could be military and civilian leaders of the Kurykan tribe or heads of its component parts. However, the latter is less probable, for the name of the tribe itself, Uch-Kurykan, indicates that there had to be at least three such leaders. Among the Kurykans, consequently, there were a number of military leader-elders, and there existed some hierarchical ties among them corresponding to the ties which united various clan groups in one state-tribal whole. The focal point of the socio-political life of all Kurykans, or at least of Fig. 70. Figures of horses with manes in the shape of teeth. 1—Sulek; 2—wall paintings in a catacomb, Kerch; 3—relief on the grave of the emperor T'aitsung, China; 4—figure of a horse of the Sassanid emperor on a silver dish; 5—figure of a horse on an etched boulder in the Altay, the burial ground of Kudyrge; 6—statue of a horse at the grave ot Emperor Kao-tsung. 323

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the Lena group of them, and along with this the most magnificent cultural center of the Kurykan lands, was, apparently, the sacred cliffs on the Lena, at the foot of which the Russian village of Shishkino ultimately arose. A comparison of the Chinese written sources with the Turkic runic ones illuminates the mutual relations of the Kurykan el not only to its nearest neighbors but also to more distant countries, including the Orkhon Türks and the Chinese empire of the T'ang dynasty. From the inscriptions on the grave sites of the Türk rulers in the valley of the Orkhon, it is known that emissaries of the Kurykans were, among the representatives of other peoples, at the funeral solemnities in honor of the progenitor of the Orkhon khans, Bumyn-kagan, in order to express the condolences of their people on the occasion of his death. This event relates to 552 or 553 A.D., and is the first confirmed historical date relating to the history of the Kurykans. Later the Kurykans took an active part in the struggle of the Uygur tribes and the Oguz with the Orkhon Türks. As is known from the Chinese sources, the Uygurs were the staunchest enemies of the Orkhon Turks after Ilteres-Kagan, or Kutlug, having set up a Turkic state on the Orkhon at the end of the 7th century, went after them, "robbed nine clans," and, "having gotten rich with horses, declared himself khan" (Bichurin 1950-53: I, 322). Among the enemies of Kutlug, together with the Kyrgyz and the Otuz-Tatars, the Kurykans are mentioned: "On the south the Chinese people were his enemy; on the north, the Toguz-Oguz people of Bazkagan were his enemy. The Kyrgyz, the Kurykans, the Otuz-Tatars, the Chinese, and the Tatabi—all were enemy to him" (Melioranskiy 1890: 67). With the remaining participants of the northern coalition hostile to the Orkhon Turks, the Kurykans also maintained close ties with the Chinese empire, the most powerful enemy of their common opponent. In spite of the distance from China, they sent their embassies to the capital of China several times. They were supposed to have arrived in China the first time in 629 A.D., among the representatives of eleven clans subordinating themselves to China and requesting "that ranking officials of the house of T'ang be placed among them." Kurykans were in China also at the time of the second embassy, in 63o. These embassies were connected with important events in the land of the Turkic peoples. At the beginning of the year 63o, Tszeli [Chieh-li], the khan of the Orkhon Turks, was routed by the Chinese under the command of the energetic emperor T'ai-tsung and khan Tszeli himself was taken prisoner by the emperor. The elders of the eleven Teles (Uygur) tribes then decided to enter into closer ties with mighty China. They declared to emperor T'ai-tsung: "Now each person has a piece of land allotted to him; all desire to subject themselves to the Son of Heaven, and request that he establish among them for this purpose ranks [officials] of the house of T'ang" (Bichurin 1950-53: I, 375 ). In accordance with the request by the elders of these tribes, thirteen districts, headed by the elders who now held Chinese military titles, were formally established in the country of the Teles [T'ieh-lieh]. The domain of the Kurykans was on this occasion renamed Hsüan-küeh-cheu (Bichurin 1950-53: I, 376). 324

Culture of the Kurykans A reception was held in the palace for the ambassadors. It was of an especially extravagant character, since the emperor wished to impress the steppe barbarians with his greatness, and to instill in them fear of mighty China. When receiving the foreigners, writes the chronicler, the emperor ordered that musicians be placed about, and he himself sat on a throne concealed by a high buffet; a vessel covered with cinnabar-colored lacquer was placed atop the buffet. From a side room adjoining the buffet to the east, a trough in which wine flowed to the vessel was hidden. From the vessel, it was decanted into a huge vase suspended on chains. "Several thousand Oykhors drank from this, and could not drink half of it.... Then the Chinese, civil and military officials of the fifth rank upward, also were ordered to drink" (Bichurin 1950-53: t, 378). Thus, with naive simplicity, the chronicle tells us of this feast in honor of the "northern barbarians." The latter were, besides this, given cloth robes in dark scarlet and yellow colors, expensive swords, and rare articles. Later embassies of the Kurykans to China are registered for the year 647, in the twenty-first year of the reign of Cheng-Kuan, of T'ang Dynasty —in the summer, in the fifth moon, when their representatives arrived together with ambassadors of the Dubo (Tuba [Tuva, Tubalar]) tribe, who lived in the Sayans. It was at this time that the merits of the Kurykan horses were remarked on in T'ai-tsung's poem. The Kurykans who had arrived in China offered the emperor horses sent by their "chief elder, Sygyn." The emperor, so it is written in the chronicle, "chose ten excellent ones of the sort called `thousand li,' and they were given high-sounding titles." In the "new T'ang history," all of these "beautiful names" of the Kurykan horses are listed: "I) steaming white, like frost; 2) piebald, glistening like snow; 3) piebald, like frozen dew; 4) piebald, like hanging light; 5) beautiful, like a horse cutting through a wave; 6) a yellow horse, like the flying dawn, 7) red, like the swift lightning; 8) a yellow horse with a black muzzle, like flowing gold; 9) dark red, like the shining ch'i-lin (phoenix); io) red, like the fleeing rainbow" (Kyuner [1946] MS: 13; from an excerpt in the Yüan-chien-lei-han). It was especially noted in the chronicles of the T'ang Dynasty that the envoy of the Kurykans was received in the Chinese capital "with honor." The visit of the Kurykans to the imperial court later called forth a reciprocal embassy from China. "As soon as the Kuli-kangs had come to the palace, it was ordered to send out the high military official Khan-Sumi, with a grateful answer" (Bichurin 1950-53: I, 356-72, 439-40; GrumGrzhimaylo 1926: 244-99; Tolstov and Bernshtam 1939: 95-100; Bernshtam 1939: 480-86). Fifteen years after the arrival of the embassy of 647 in China, a significant change took place in the country of the Kurykans. As the T'ang chronicle relates, "in the reign of Lung-Shuo, in the year 662, the district of Hsiian-küeh was renamed Yü-wu and made subject to the Baykal (Han-Hai) viceregal administration" (Kyuner [1946] MS: 12; Bichurin 1950-53 : I, 380) .

This change certainly signified a limitation of the autonomy of the Kurykans, who were now no longer subject directly to the Chinese 325

EARLY HISTORY OF YAKUT NATIONALITY

[central] government, but to its Han-Hai regent. The chronicle informs us on this occasion: "Almost all the northern foreigners were subjugated." This, of course, did not prevent them from appearing in China with embassies (Kyuner [1946] MS: 13). This embassy must have taken place before the incursion of the Turkic [khan] Kapagan-kagan or Mo-chou into China. The traditional policy of friendship with China, carried out over the length of the 7th century by the Uygur-Oguz or Teles tribes of the eastern Turks, including the Kurykans, and also their centuries-long struggle with the state of kindred Orkhon Turks, had deep roots in their basic political interests. The northern tribes upheld their independence against the Orkhon Turks. The Oguz and Uygurs preferred nominal subjection to the Chinese emperor, under whom everything among them was left in its place and a pompous Chinese title was merely added to the designations of the clan chieftains, to the entirely real and savage regime of the neighboring Orkhon khans, who were related to the Oguz and Uygurs by language and blood. When subjected to the Orkhon kagan, on the other hand, the northern tribes were compelled to bear burdensome requisitions, and, in a number of cases, to submit humbly to simple robberies and despotic interference in their internal affairs by the khans and princes of the ruling tribe. Besides this, the Uygur tribes, like the Orkhon Turks themselves, were attracted to China by the passion for "red gold," for precious silks and jewellery, for luxurious gold and silver dishes, and for all that which their own herds of beasts and pastures could not give them. Their elders not only received generous gifts from the Chinese court in exchange for the horses which they offered the emperor, but were able to market with profit the products of their pastoral economy, and also probably the furs which they received from their forest neighbors in the form of tribute. The Kurykans maintained consistent friendly relations with the western neighbors of the Kyrgyz, the Dubo, who lived in the Sayans (Fig. 71). In the Wen-hsien-t'ung-k'ao, we read about the latter's journey to China with the Kuli-kangs. Under previous dynasties, they had had no relations with China, but "having heard that the Kuli-kangs had appeared, in the twenty-first year of the reign of Cheng-Kuan (647 A.D.), to establish relations with China, they sent an ambassador to offer tribute." In the Yüan-chien-lei-han, in an excerpt from the new T'ang history (Hsin-T'ang-hsu), it is written in this connection: "In the twenty-first year in the reign of Cheng-Kuan they offered tribute through the Kulikangs. Through an envoy, they also established relations with China" (Kyuner [1946] MS: 13). These latter reports should obviously be understood in the sense that, having heard of the Kuli-kangs' intention to send their ambassadors to China, the Dubo [Tupo] joined their own envoy to these ambassadors, Fig. 71. Native of the Dubo tribe. A Chinese drawing (after Pozdneyev). 326

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EARLY HISTORY OF YAKUT NATIONALITY

and gave the Kuli-kangs gifts to transmit to the emperor by way of tribute (Bichurin 1950-53: I, 439). Archaeological remains also testify indirectly to the friendship and close ties between the Kurykans and the forest tribes of the Sayan-Altay Upland and Krasnoyarsk kray. Finds in caves, the materials from the fortified sites of the Ladeyka type, and the usual open settlements and camps of the same Ladeyka culture in the valley of the Yenisey near Krasnoyarsk show very close similarity to the Kurumchinsk artifacts in a number of important details. The pottery, for example, is basically the same. The cultural and historical ties of the Kurykans with their more cultured but also more distant western neighbors, the Yenisey Kyrgyz and Altay Türks, are also reflected in relics of art—the cliff drawings, and, as we will see later, the characteristics of the runic script. The art of the Kurykans is, by its content and style, an inseparable part of the distinctive art which blossomed at that time among the Kyrgyz on the Yenisey, in the Altay, and among other Turkic tribes west of the Yenisey—an art which grew up on a common social and cultural foundation, and which was characterized by one and the same style and content. The early Turkic representations on the cliffs of Minusinsk kray are very close to the Lena cliff drawings of the Kurykan group, both in their common content and in characteristic stylistic features. In both places, we see rendered the same types of figure and the same scenes: warlike horsemen with banners or standards, with bows and bow-cases, camels and horses. On the surfaces of overhanging cliffs on the Lena and Yenisey, there are visible fragments of hunting scenes, episodes of warlike encounters and military operations of entirely identical content. These are fragments of, or illustrations for, the heroic epos, engraved in stone, created by warlike tribes of horse pastoralists. The cliff drawings of the upper Lena and Minusinsk kray sometimes seem to be merely transferred onto stone directly from the golden and silver vessels from which the ancient Turkic warriors drank their milkwine, or from their saddle blankets and saddles, covered with analogous pictures. At the same time, the art of the Altay and Minusinsk Türks also reveals considerable correspondence to that of Central Asia, whereas, in the examples of Yenisey Kyrgyz art, there is much that is specifically Chinese. Its horsemen and animals have a definite Chinese cast, both in their outlines and in the rendering of movement; they are surrounded by a Chinese landscape. Their entirely western, basically Central Asian, Turkic compositional scheme is, as it were, enveloped in a luxurious Far Eastern garment. Thus, in the Altay Upland and the Yenisey Valley, the influences of the advanced cultures of the Iranian and Central Asian West mixed with the Far East over the basis of the distinct culture of the nomads. The same thing apparently happened also on the upper Lena, since the art of the Kurykans grew out of the same root as that of the Turkic peoples of the Altay and Minusinsk kray, and developed in the same kind of soil. The direct and profound ties of the Kurykan culture with that of the 328

Culture of the Kurykans Yenisey Kyrgyz are no less clearly reflected in the Lena inscriptions—in peculiarities of the runic lettering of the local epigraphy. Despite the small number of inscriptions that have been preserved by script, they are clearly connected, not with the Orkhon, but with the Yenisey ones. In the Kurtukhay funerary inscription, at least two of the eight symbols, "d" and "t," are distinct to the Yenisey inscriptions (Savenkov 191o: 341).52 It is probably not accidental that Tumanskiy's manuscript indicates that "the Furi people are also of the Kyrgyz." Nor is it an accident that— according to the data of the Chinese chronicle describing the history of the Yüan (that is, Mongol) dynasty—the country and people of the Kuli were subject to the Yenisey Kyrgyz. The district of Angkola [Ang-kuo-la], the chronicle relates, "takes its name from a river. It was united to the Kyrgyz land by annexation, and is 25,000 li distant from T'a-T'i. The language of the natives differs markedly from that of the Kyrgyz. This is the country of the Kuli, who are mentioned in the T'ang history" (Schott 1864: 436). Similar comparisons of Kurykan culture with that of their western neighbors may be carried out also in the fields of material culture and social structure. Study of Kurykan culture poses the initial question of the relationship of its bearers to the later Yakuts. In the first place, it should be noted that the part of the Cis-Baykal occupied by the Kurykans is located considerably closer to what is now Yakutia—presently the country of the most northerly Turkic-speaking people in the world. This territory includes the upper Lena, the fatherland of the Yakuts according to their epic traditions. Here began the direct road from the legendary south to the present homeland of the Yakuts, one mentioned in their legends as "the road of $lley." The Kurykans show all the basic elements of that higher ancient culture which the southern ancestors of the Yakuts possessed before their migration to the middle Lena: highly developed blacksmithing, a wellestablished pastoral economy, richer than their later one, acquaintance with grain and agricultural tools, a script of the phonetic type, with the corresponding socio-political system—a society already divided into classes, with a powerful aristocracy. We may therefore propose with some confidence that it was indeed the culture of the Turkic inhabitants of the Baykal region, the Kurykans, which constituted that ancient source, to the south of contemporary Yakutia, from which Yakut culture derives. Besides the basic arguments just cited, this general conclusion is emphasized by certain others which indicate the ties of the Yakuts and Kurykans. In comparing the relics of Kurykan and Yakut cultures, we may cite as an example of their mutual similarity a special method of hunting—the chasing of animals on horseback, a method unknown to the other tribes of the North. Game is chased in autumn when the water freezes and the snow becomes deep enough so that the horses cannot slip, and yet not so deep that it would hinder the rider. In the Kurykan cliff drawings near 329

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Shishkino, there is depicted a chase on horseback of an elk, in which the rider following the animal carries a lasso. In the field of material culture, the coincidence of such a detail of horse trappings as the neck tassel portrayed in Kurykan art with the neck tassel which decorated the old-fashioned Yakut horse (moonn'okh simeI ' ; see Fig. 72) is worthy of note. The people bearing wands in the cliff drawings of the Kurykan style recall the heavenly horsemen with silver wands, messengers of the will of the gods, and heralds, of whom it is said: "The heavens opened and three young men with silver wands, messengers of god, arrived on milkwhite horses" (Yastremskiy 1929: 15) . The final echo of remembrance of the former acquaintance with the banner, whose image appears on the cliff drawing, may be the Yakut term duogalaakh, which is comparable to the Turkic tuglik, "having a banner," "with a banner," although at present this word is used by the Yakuts only to designate a brindled bull's tail. There is nothing surprising in this if we recall the standards of the steppe tribes, made from the tails of yaks and bulls. From these, the term duogalaakh may easily have been transferred to a bull's tail, distinguished for its motley coloring. Passing from the cliff drawings to other archaeological relics of the Cis-Baykal, we note the general similarity of the old-fashioned Yakut clay vessels to the Kurykan pots, which have already been noted more than once by investigators. The Yakut pots are also flat-bottomed, and have a form identical to them, and are decorated with a similar pattern, in the form of a notched ridge and incised lines in the shape of festoons. Also of interest is the pattern rather frequently found on metal artifacts from the Cis-Baykal, in the form of openwork heart-shaped figures, reminiscent of the "ace of hearts." Such aces are common in Yakut ornamentation, and it has been hypothesized that the lyre motif, which is specific to Yakut art, has been derived from them. The numerous Kurykan graves in the form of conical huts made from stone slabs recall the small urasa-huts made of wood splinters, which, by Yakut custom, are erected over the afterbirth once it has been buried. The similarity of the Yakut custom of burial of the afterbirth with the Kurykan burial goes even further than this. It is known that the Yakut parturient placed the afterbirth in a clay pot or a birchbark box, since if the afterbirth were injured or eaten by animals, this might rouse the anger of the spirits, and particularly of Ayyyhyt, the patroness of motherhood. A woman who had brought upon herself the anger of the goddess might be deprived of the ability to conceive. Inside the Kurykan graves on the Olkhon, there have also been found clay urns for preserving the remains of people. Fig. 72. Old-fashioned Yakut hats and horse tassel compared with pictures of hats and tassels on the cliff drawings. I—representation of a horseman in a horned hat, Shishkino; 2—old-fashioned Yakut hat with horns (after I.V. Popov); 3—Yakut bridle tassel; 4—horseman, Shishkino; 5—horse in Yakut wedding trappings. 330

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Even with the scarcity of data concerning Kurykan religion, the similarity of the Yakut cult of horses with the cult revealed by the cliff drawings, in which figures of horses take first place, may be especially emphasized. Undoubtedly, the representation of horses on the sacred cliffs, the places of worship of the masters of the river Lena, had religious significance, especially in cases where the horses are depicted by themselves, without riders or altogether without human figures. It is no less important that they coincide in their location with the religious center of worship of the masters of the river Lena, who are personified by the latter. It is proposed that the ties between the Kurykans and the later Yakuts are also revealed in the language of the runic inscriptions. It is in the historical environment which developed in the Cis-Baykal area of the Kurykans of the 5th—loth centuries A.D. that we must seek the explanation for the presence of certain non-Turkic elements in the Yakut language. The ethnographic map of the Cis-Baykal and territories adjacent to it at that time contained the following approximate distributions: the Kurykan Türks lived on the upper Lena and Angara, and also probably on the lower reaches of the Selenga, and on the shores of Lake Baykal. To the west of them lived forest tribes bearing the general name Dubo, from whom are descended the now Turkic-speaking Tofalars and some Altayan tribes. Still further to the west lived the Yenisey Kyrgyz, at that time a true Turkic people by language. Tribes of Turkic origin, the Uygurs, also lived on the Selenga and the Orkhon. Alongside the Kurykans in the Angara-Lena taiga and further to the north apparently lived the Tszyuy [Chiu-i?] and U-van [Wu-wan?]* tribes; these were probably the ancestors of the reindeer Tungus, who have no livestock other than reindeer. Beyond Baykal, on the other hand, beginning at the northeastern shores, and further eastward towards the headwaters of the Amur, lived the Otuz-Tatars, who are considered the ancestors of the Mongol tribes. Thus, whereas the ancient tribes of the Baykal region, the most northerly Turkic people of that time, on one side adjoined the western and eastern Turkic tribes of Siberia and Middle Asia, on the other they were surrounded by Tungus and Mongols. It is, therefore, entirely natural that in the language and culture of their descendants, the Yakuts, against a basic and very ancient Turkic background (in the opinion of eminent linguists, such as S. Ye. Malov), there should be discovered, along with later borrowings from the Tungus language, a no less important and equally archaic stratum of Mongol and Tungusic-Manchu origins. It is also natural that the Yakut language should preserve direct indications of close kinship with some of the tribes mentioned, beginning with the ancient Uygurs. The shamanistic incantations mentioned "nine Uygur maidens" or "maidens of nine Uygurs," who bring insanity upon people. The Yakut elders, the most expert in the legends and traditions of their people, also know the name of the Kyrgyz, from whose tribe, according to some data, Omogoy and Elley took refuge. • [On the basis of spellings in the original Russian, the names of these tribes appear to be derived from Chinese sources, although the Author does not cite the source. Editor, A.I.N.A.}

332

Culture of the Kurykans As regards the relationship of the southern ancestors of the Yakuts with the Buryats and Mongols, it is important to note, first of all, that the Kurykan Türks replaced some tribe of ancient Mongols on the upper Lena. These most ancient Mongol inhabitants of the Cis-Baykal, who appeared here from the Trans-Baykal, were the bearers of the Iron Age culture on the upper Lena, represented by burial grounds of the loth and firth centuries at the mouth of the Manzurka River, near the Tsigenovskiy (Segenut) ulus and the former yasak* village of Baykara, in the vicinity of Khabasay. In the general features of the burial ritual [indicated by grave furniture], the Segenut burial ground of the Iron Age is close to the Mongol burials near the village of Okinino, on the right bank of the Irkut River (14 km to the south of Irkutsk), and to a number of analogous but later (13th and 14th century) burials known in Tunka, and also to some burials in the valley of the Selenga. They are all marked on the surface by horizontally placed stones in the shape of a circle or an oval. The skeletons usually lie in log troughs or boxes. The burials, besides various articles of weaponry and domestic utensils, are accompanied by the remains of food, usually the bones of a ram. These early Mongol burials are thus sharply distinguished from the ancient Turkic ones. They have different external markings; there are no traces of cremation in them; the pottery is flat-bottomed and sharply distinguished from the Kurumchinsk type. The Segenut burial ground of the Iron Age, consequently, constitutes direct proof of the replacement of the Kurumchinsk Türks by new tribes of Mongol origin, whose homeland, it is supposed, lay to the east of the Selenga, in the valleys of the Onon and Kerulen, near [the lake] BuirNor; this replacement occurred in the loth and nth centuries A.D. Even at this time, the Turkic tribes who brought with them to the mouth of the Siine (Siney) River a runic script of the Orkhon-Yenisey type, had apparently been driven far to the north, into the depths of what is now Yakutia, by the new arrivals. These large-scale changes in the interrelations of the tribes inhabiting the territories adjacent to Lake Baykal, which took place approximately a century before the rise of Genghis, had as their cause movements still vaster in their scale and their consequences among the tribes of Middle Asia, of which we learn from the writers of the Moslem Middle Ages. Tahir Marwazi (a writer of the early 12th century) and following him, Aufi (13th century), tell us how the Kun tribe, living next to the Kidans [Khitans; that is, Tatars], and to the east of the Kyrgyz, in fear of the Kidan overlords of the Liao Dynasty, and being crowded in their pastures, left their former territories. Later, they were subjected to persecution by the stronger Kai tribe, and moved still farther west, into the territory of the Shari tribe, which, in turn, left for Turkmen territory. The Turkmens turned to the eastern part of the country of the Guzz Türks, and these moved into the territory of the Bedzhenek (Pechenegs), near the shores of the Armenian Sea, that is, the Caspian or Black Sea. • [Fur-tax collecting point. Editor,

A.I.N.A.]

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The wave of migration of tribes mentioned in Marwazi's report took place, in V. Minorskiy's opinion, in the 1040's A.D. (Minorsky 1942: 3o, 95-104). At approximately the same time, if we may judge by archaeological data, there took place the first incursion of Mongol tribes into the Baykal region—the lower Selenga, Tunka, and the upper Lena. They may have occupied the most northerly regions vacated by the Turkic-speaking natives, and a part of the neighboring territories, where the first recorded Mongol history finds these Mongol forest tribes at the beginning of the 13th century. Their original homeland, in the opinion of most historians, was the region located along the Onon and Kerulen. Consequently, the first Mongol migrants must have penetrated to the shores of Baykal, originally settled by Turkic tribes, at the beginning of the IIth century. However, it would be erroneous to suppose that the Mongol tribes completely expelled their Turkic predecessors and destroyed all traces of their long stay in the Cis-Baykal. Türk-Mongol interrelations at this period were of a more complex nature, as can be deduced both from archaeological data and from ethnographic and even somatological evidence. Archaeological facts are represented by cliff drawings of a new style, showing the decay and disintegration of the Kurykan art, but at the same time bearing witness to a certain uninterrupted tradition of it, which can be felt even in the latest and crudest pictures on the cliffs. As an example, we may cite several figures of horsemen on the "Fifth Rock" near the village of Bolshiye Goly, very carefully executed, with overall polishing inside the figures, and outlined with deep grooves. In the general outline of the horses and their riders, and also in certain of their most characteristic details, they definitely repeat, and even blindly copy, the cliff drawings of the Kurykan style. The horses are decorated as before, with neck tassels and even with plumes. Their bodies still retain some natural rounding of form and liveliness in the rendering of movement. Individual parts of the body are shown rather realistically: the tail is depicted with bunched lines, the head actually resembles that of a horse. But, nevertheless, this is no longer the same art as we described earlier, even in the worst examples of the Kurykan art. The decay of the art is especially noticeable in its main subject—the horse. We may speak of some approximate rendering of the natural pose and outline of the horse's body only by comparing these drawings with later and even more primitive ones. The rider's headdress, which, according to intention, was supposed to resemble the plume, has become something on the order of a shaggy mane made up of widely separated hairs. The standard in his hands now takes the form of a stick with two crosspieces. The stiffness of movement, the schematic nature of the outline, and the departure from reality toward a conventional treatment of the subject are seen with full and unhindered force in the other neighboring figures of the "Fifth Rock." One figure of a deer is especially typical of this style. All traces of movement, even vague hints at it, are absent. The deer stands as if planted, resting all four feet on the ground. Its legs do not bend; they 334

Culture of the Kurykans are as rigid as sticks. The body of the animal is strikingly narrow, in the form of a long band; the neck and legs are equally long. The outline of the animal's body is rendered with extraordinary simplicity and poverty of drawing. The entire figure is outlined essentially with two parallel lines, beginning at the head. The riders are usually drawn over the body of the animal. They are frequently shown standing at full height on the back of the horse— obviously because the artist did not know how to draw a horseman sitting astride. The pictures of groups of people on foot are somewhat more realistic. They have forked legs, and their arms are diagonal or straight, like a crosspiece. They carry bows. It is not merely separate figures that are depicted here, but an entire military scene, since we can see between the two figures at the extreme right short lines which must be conventional representations of arrows in flight during a battle. The same type of drawings, with even more pronounced stylistic peculiarities, are found on the shore of Lake Baykal, 4-5 km from the ulus of Kutul. Here, nine figures of animals are depicted, cut into white limestone—roe deer, Siberian stag, goats, and a mountain sheep (Khoroshikh 1924: 36-37, Plate 2). Similar findings were also made on the sacred mountain of the Lena and Kuda River Buryats, Baytok (Khoroshikh 1930: 98).53 If the most ancient of these cliff drawings still retain traces of the realistic Kurykan style, the later ones change, on the same cliffs, into the schematic representations left by the ancestors of the present-day LenaKuda Buryat Mongols. But even these later, purely Buryat cliff drawings also continue, in many respects, the subject-pattern characteristic of Kurykan art. The drawings of animals are often direct imitations of Kurykan ones. The representations of human figures (ongons) on these cliff drawings also appear to be connected to some extent with the Kurykan pictures of people in long robes standing in a row. In both cases, however, we must recognize not only a sequential transmission of forms and subjects, but also significant changes in the style and content of the cliff drawings (Khoroshikh 1930: 87). The cliff drawings of the Kurykans are full of elements from real, daily life. There is much in them that is earthly, even if these drawings served religious purposes—in particular those of the cult of the dead accompanying the funerary ritual. In them we see the features of great and true art, and we hear echoes not only of the steppe epos but also of true literature. But in the later upper Lena drawings we find only purely religious figures, monotonous and spare in content; the hunting magic of half-savage hunters is predominant. It may thus be supposed that some descendants of the ancient Kurykans continued for a long time to dwell on the Lena, retaining remnants of the culture of their ancestors and living by traditions inherited from them, but, with the course of time, becoming more and more dispersed in the mass of immigrant Mongols, and losing the content of their ancient culture. On the other hand, it is entirely natural to assume that the Mongol newcomers did not remain free of the influence of their Turkic neighbors, 335

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[that they] mixed with them and, in one way or another, acquired their culture. This supposition is supported by the data of physical anthropology, linguistics, and ethnography, which show that, as a result of mutual influence, a new culture and a new nationality grew up in the Cis-Baykal. To judge by the Buryat oral traditions, and, in part, by the few archaeological finds, the ancestors of the Buryat-Mongols were originally not sedentary or semi-sedentary inhabitants of the forest steppes like the Kurykans, but were wandering hunters and pastoralists. They combined a nomadic hunting way of life with the raising of livestock and the gathering of vegetable foods. The steppe-nomadic way of life of the first Mongol arrivals on the Lena is reflected in the remarkable drawings on the cliffs at Shishkino as One of these shows the migration of ancient nomads with their livestock, property, and dependents. In front is a man on horseback, driving before him an animal which probably represents, in conventional fashion, a herd of horses. After him comes yet another horseman. Behind, five portable tents move in a long chain, each one pulled by a long-horned ox, driven by a person sitting on its back. As eternal wanderers, the ancient Buryat nomads did not know pottery, and had no brittle clay vessels: "The traditions nowhere mention the potter's art among the Buryats" (Khangalov 1891: 165; Potanina 1891). They prepared their food in wooden vessels by dropping hot stones into them or by filling the skin of an animal with its own meat and hot stones, as Gmelin and Miller both observed in their day. Agriculture apparently had not been acquired by them [at the time of their arrival]. It is therefore probable that the Buryats borrowed from their predecessors, the descendants of the Kurykan group of tribes, the main elements of the sedentary agricultural-pastoral economy which were foreign to them. These include the cultivation of buckwheat and millet, the watering and manuring of cropland and hayfields, the storing of hay for the winter, the erection of solid winter dwellings of octagonal ground plan, similar to the analogous octagonal and hexagonal house-yurts of the Altayans and Yakuts. This is shown by the following terms: Buryat, utug, Yakut, yetekh; Buryat, kyure, sele, khosha, Yakut, khahaa, stile, kyryö, "fenced place for cutting hay and pasturing livestock." Terminological cross-borrowing and connection took place here as well as in the fields of social relations (Yakut d'on and Buryat dzhon, "people," "tribe"; Yakut and Buryat-Mongol, charardar, "servants" [collectively]), of religious belief (the funerary horse of the dead—Buryat, khoylgo; Yakut, khayylga, ritual feast—malaahyn), and of epic poetry (the connection between the Oka-Unga and Yakut epos). Perhaps the most vivid and, at the same time, unexpected example of the connections of Yakut with Buryat folklore is the coincidence between the Buryat legend concerning the masters of the Lena River, Khara Azhiray and Kharamtsay Mergen, and the Yakut stories about Elley and Omogoy. In both cases there are two heroes; both are pursued by enemies and flee, escaping from them down the Lena. Like $lley, one of them sails down the river on a log which he finds. The only difference is that, in the Buryat 336

Culture of the Kurykans legend, both heroes perish and do not become the progenitors of people. But even in the Yakut sagas, Elley's father dies on the way down the Lena, and, according to Lindenau, both heroes of the Yakut saga died in the Cis-Baykal. This motif, consequently, is the common property of both Yakuts and Buryats, who must have received it in inheritance from the Kurykans. The linguistic kinship of the western Buryats and the Yakuts is so great that linguists studying the western Buryat vocabulary have come to the definite conclusion that any conception according to which the dialect of this branch of the Buryats is considered corrupt is incorrect. On the contrary, they see in it "a historically-developed root language whose specific character, in contradistinction to eastern Buryat, consists in its immediate connection with a Turkic linguistic element," and, as was long ago established, primarily with the Yakut language (Bertagayev 1933: 153, 159, 169). This conclusion is confirmed by the observations of anthropologists. The northern Buryats "are closer to the Yakuts than to the Trans-Baykal Buryats. They have high, moderately brachycephalic skulls, with huge diameters of the face." Anthropologists see in them "not a Middle Asian, but an Angara-Lena variant of the Siberian Mongoloids," that is, the Iron Age Kurykans of the Baykal region. The latter, in their turn, have as their ancestors a definite group of the Neolithic population on the middle Angara, whence, at the beginning of the Iron Age, they travelled up to Lake Baykal and did not come from Mongolia (letter from G. F. Debets to the author, November 3o, 1946). From Mongolia came, consequently, only a small group of pure Mongols, who later assimilated the local native population. Such are the most probable hypotheses and information concerning the ethnic environment in which we may seek the southern ancestors of the Yakut people. It remains to trace how far and how early these southern ancestors of the Yakuts, who lived in the Baykal region around the 6th— loth centuries A.D., penetrated to the north.

337

The Lena Forest Ancestors of the Yakuts

Chapter 2

To the north of Verkholensk, beyond the boundary which, according to the legends, the pastoral Buryats never crossed, on the right bank of the Lena, opposite the small village of Davydovo, very unusual cliff drawings have been preserved, cut into the overhanging cliffs of red sandstone. By content, these are not genre pictures, not scenes of everyday life, but religio-magical productions directly connected with hunting. In one drawing are pictured, in the form of a continuous narrow band, six figures of wild deer, most probably Siberian stags, following one another. In another drawing, a human figure is depicted, apparently female, in a wide dress, with hands horizontally extended at the sides and with fingers spread wide. Alongside her is pictured a zigzag band of three parallel, deeply incised lines. It joins with a large net of vertical and horizontal lines transecting at right angles. Lines go out from the net uniting it with a complex labyrinthine figure in the form of a "heart" filled within by entangled crooked lines with some sort of wiggling shoots outside. Further in the same direction follows the figure of a deer. Under it and over it, and also near its neck, is seen a figure in the form of a net. After the first deer follows a second; under it is again placed a large net, into which the front legs of a deer enter. Ahead of it a third deer stands, under whose belly is seen an analogous net and one yet unfinished. Somewhat higher is placed a line of runic inscriptions (Fig. 73). These drawings may be interpreted as follows: the woman who heads the scene is the main acting person. She guides the deer along the road, signified in the second drawing in the form of a zigzag band. This is the mistress of the deer and the chief figure of hunting game. The deer sent by her fall into the game stockade and net placed in their path, and also into some kind of supplementing labyrinthine structure. Felled trees shown on the drawings apparently served the same purpose. Probably the simplest obstacles [or fences] and deadfalls were built in them. Such means of catching hooved animals, by fences with snaring pits and self-activating crossbows, existed on the Lena until the most recent times, even among the Russian population, and traces of snaring pits are visible to this day in the taiga along the banks of the Lena and on the 339

EARLY HISTORY OF YAKUT NATIONALITY

,A

‘4,'

, Attk 2

IP\44

.7

Fig. 73. Runic inscriptions of the upper Lena. i, 2—cliff drawings near Davydovo village; 3—runic inscriptions near the village of Petrovskoye. mountain ranges. But snaring reindeer in nets is completely unknown to the Russians. There are now no wild reindeer here; only elks remain. In the Far North, capturing wild reindeer with snares or nets was usual from ancient times until the recent past. As early as the i7th century, De Bruin knew that the Nenents caught reindeer in the tundra with snares, into which they fell "like fish" (Bruyn 1872: 16; Zolotarev and Levin 1940: 179). Toward spring, the Tavgi even now capture wild reindeer with special nets made from thin leather thongs. In this connection, the line of runic symbols accompanying the second such scene of magical hunting on the cliff opposite the village of Davydovo takes on particular interest. It begins at the left with a brand-like symbol in the form of a fork, with a long shaft, ending in a ring. Three additional, equally clear signs follow. Traces of similar symbols are preserved in other places; for example, opposite Pisanyy Island (below the village of Tyumentsevo) on the right bank of the Lena. Pisanyy [Inscription] Island received its name from the cliffs on its left bank, which are almost entirely covered with various inscriptions, including Russian ones of the i7th, 18th and 19th centuries. The inscriptions are very plentiful, but most of them have been so weathered that, with few exceptions, they are almost impossible to discern. In one place, however, a line of five runic symbols in ancient Turkic script is clearly visible. A. N. Bernshtam has deciphered the inscription on the cliff at Davydovo village as the word alkatim: "I have blessed." The second inscription on Pisanyy Island signifies the same. We know that the Yakut language preserves to this day the word algys, signifying a solemn address to the gods, a prayer. Hence it follows that both inscriptions constitute an invocatory prayer formula which was supposed to insure the success of the hunt. 34°

The Lena Forest Ancestors Thus, the drawings of the upper Lena reveal two closely intertwined aspects of the life of the ancient inhabitants of these parts—their hunting practice and actual means of taking game, and the cult activities and religious concepts connected with the hunt. The cliff burials near the Vorobyevo cliff drawings must be dated to the same period as these upper Lena cliff drawings and runic symbols. Narrow crevasses and natural cavities in the cliffs were used for the burials. In one such crevasse, formed by a huge block of sandstone which had broken off from the mass of the cliff and settled beside it, a collective burial was found. The width of the crevasse is not more than 0.5 m, and its depth exceeds 1.5 m. Toward the top, it was densely filled with numerous human bones. The bones belonged to at least three adults, two adolescents, and one infant. Only fragments of the skulls were found, with the exception of one intact one, belonging to an adolescent or a young woman. It was located in the very corner of the crevasse, and was carefully wrapped in several layers of birchbark, on which was preserved a complex stamped pattern in the form of bands of crescents touching each other. Pieces of such ornamented birchbark were also found in other parts of the crevasse, and, furthermore, they sometimes retained traces of sewing—round or triangular holes through which thread, probably made from sinews, had at one time been drawn through. The bones were put in the crevasse haphazardly and not in anatomical arrangement. The presence of earth and rubble among the bones indicates, however, that the filling was not done with one load, but gradually and in sequence, and, furthermore, with parts of skeletons dismembered beforehand. Apparently, this was a sort of common bone-yard of a clan group. Originally, the people may have buried their dead in aboveground structures of the arangas type, and afterwards they gathered the remaining portions of the already disintegrated skeletons and laid them in a common burial vault, at a point marked by religio-magical images of elks and scenes of the magical hunt, on the territory of a cliff sanctuary which was the religious and cult center for the whole clan or tribe. Besides human bones and birchbark coverings, there was found here a scant assortment of grave goods: awls made from the leg bones of elks, which had almost entirely retained their natural form. With them was found a single ornament—half of a large double shell of marine origin, perforated at opposite ends, obviously for attachment to clothing (Fig. 74). Among various forest tribes of Siberia, similar discs have been used from ancient times, except that they were made not from shells but from silver. Among the Yukagirs, they adorn women's aprons and bear the characteristic name of "chest sun." Among the Yakuts, such silver plaques on hats, called tuhakhta, were primarily a necessary and extremely important part of the costume, from the point of view of their religion. They were worn also with women's chest ornaments and on men's belts. As among the Yukagirs, they were called kun, "sun." The finding of such a shell ornament in the Vorobyevo bone-yard recalls the mention by Tahir Marwazi (12th century) of the predilection of the 341

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3

2 Fig. 74. Finds in the cliff burial at Vorobyevo village. I —piece of ornamented birchbark; 2—seashell disc; 3—awls. women of the Furi tribe and all their neighbors for white shells, the cowrie, which served them as decoration and took the place of beads. Also on the upper Lena, on the road to Yakutia, there are found not only the burial grounds, cliff drawings, and runic inscriptions of the ancient Turkic population of the Lena taiga which have already been mentioned, but also traces of their settlement. One of these was discovered, for example, near the village of Petrovskoye, above Ust-Kut. An ancient storage pit similar to the Yakut earth cellars of the 18th and 19th centuries was found here. On the bottom of the pit lay the bones of domestic animals, the skulls of sables, large fish bones, potsherds, antlers of the roe deer, and a bone awl similar to one of the awls found with the human bones at the cliff drawings near the village of Vorobyevo. The pottery from this settlement is similar in general form, in the thickness of its walls, and in the makeup of the clay to the Kurumchinsk pottery, but is considerably cruder. Besides this, we find here types 342

The Lena Forest Ancestors of vessels on the whole foreign to the pottery of the Kurumchinsk people; for example, vessels with straight, narrow, and high necks. The herringbone ornament, consisting of long stamped impressions arranged like narrow willow leaves, is also unusual for the Kurumchinsk culture. The fortified site near the village of Boyarskaya, above Ust-Kut, in the locality of Poltso, is perhaps the most interesting of these sites. Here, among the cultural remains, were found bones of animals and fragments of a thick-walled vessel with a rim girdled by a thick fillet with vertical transections. This vessel is close to the Kurumchinsk pottery in all its aspects, but at the same time has a certain special character. Not far from it there turned up a potsherd with a herringbone pattern analogous to that just described for the site near Petrovskoye village. Bones and teeth of a domestic horse were found with the sherds in this fortified site. At the present, the site is entirely covered with young pine trees. All around stretches the dense taiga—the kingdom of bears and elk, a place where in the summer the taiga insects, blackflies, horseflies and mosquitoes, rage fiercely. At first sight it seems quite unbelievable that any kind of pastoralists could have lived in such a place before the coming of the Russians—the more so since even the economy of the latter, up to the present time, is based on hunting and forest occupations and not on agriculture and animal husbandry. Yet, we find that some sort of semi-sedentary mounted pastoralists lived here long before the Russians came, and that they had built the same kind of fortified settlements as the Kurumchinsk people had in the Lena-Kuda or Angara steppes, and also that they raised horses. It should not surprise us, then, that still further to the north, near the mouth of the Kuta River, on an Iron Age site, together with crude pottery and furnace slag, there were found the bones of the domestic horse, bearing witness to the sojourn here of mounted pastoralists, long before the appearance of Ivan Galkin's Cossack troop. Thus it seems that, contemporaneous with the Kurumchinsk pastoral culture, there existed to the north of it, in the dense taiga along the Lena, a horse-breeding culture related to it by a number of elements, constituting a northern offshoot of the former. It follows from this that, in these northern regions along the river Lena, rather inhospitable by comparison to the Baykal district, there existed some ancient Turkic population (to judge by its inscriptions) which, like the Kurumchinsk Kurykans, successfully carried on the raising of horses and cattle. It had permanent settlements along the Lena. Fearing its enemies, this population, like the Kurumchinsk people, even built in the dense taiga fortresses with earth walls and moats. Their pottery, similar to the Kurumchinsk ware, also corresponds to the stable way of life of settled and forest pastoralists. Yet, together with undoubted closeness to the Kurykans, these northern sites reveal, as a whole, a definite stamp, though almost intangible at first glance, some shading of profound inner peculiarity. The fundamental difference between this and the Kurykan culture was determined by the geographical characteristics of the area. Here there are no open expanses 343

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of forest steppe; the people lived in the dense taiga along the narrow valley of the Lena, squeezed between high banks. This was already a purely forest culture, and it is not surprising that hunting occupied first place in the lives of its bearers. The cliff drawings at Davydovo and at other places along the Lena clearly show what great importance the people attributed to the hunt for forest ungulates, and, furthermore, to hunting of an essentially primitive character, the collective mass hunt by driving with the aid of fencing and nets. The especially important role of the battue for forest wildfowl is apparent, even if only from the fact that magical acts, images of spirits, and, apparently, the no less sacred runic inscriptions on the cliffs were devoted to it. Besides this, it appears from the pictures on the cliffs that this form of hunting was accompanied by specific religious activities, that it was connected with a conception of some anthropomorphic deity, the creator of game. In this connection, we must therefore recall the extremely significant role, almost without parallel among other Turkic tribes, of hunting cults among the taiga dwellers, the Yakuts. One of the most popular deities, or, more accurately, spirits of the Yakut pantheon, was Baay-Bayanay. In the invocation addressed to him, the algys, he is called the spirit master of the dark forest and the ruler of the animals who dwell in its depths. Bayanay is the deity of the hunt, who directs to the hunter the herds of animals subject to him. But what is important is not this, but rather the means by which the hunter gets the game. He secures the animal not by chasing after it on skis with a bow or a hunting spear. "With game hunted by means of the bow, Bayanay has nothing to do" (Ionov 1916: 4-5). Thus, in the invocation addressed to Bayanay, we find described with special vividness not so much traps and snares but the means of hunting the large ungulates of the taiga, in which fences and deadfalls are of decisive importance. Before the hunt, Bayanay is addressed with the request: "Uniting them from the distant peaks, driving them from the headwaters of the rivers, bring the longshanked ones (elks) to my deadfall, drive some of the dappled ones to my deadfall. Turn a male elk with branching antlers toward me, lords, my grandfathers! Lords my grandfathers, drive [it toward me] as if toward the very crossbow; drive [it toward me] as if toward my snare. Bring it into the space between the snare and the stick to which it is tied; do not let it see my track" (Novgorodov 1916: 37-39; see also Kulakovskiy 1923: 38-39). Through the mouth of the shaman, Baay-Bayanay answers this request with a laugh: "For a hunter of my party, why should I not bring some of my long-shanked ones to thy deadfall! "How should I not turn some of my red-haired ones to thy deadfall! "How should I not grant some of my wild dark-haired ones to thy snare! "Why should I not show honor with my grown ones [that is, mature animals]! "Why should I not give a reward from among my thick-haired ones! "What should I not drive down some of my blue-furred ones! "Let me now give to the hunter of my youth my words, spoken for a short time. 344

The Lena Forest Ancestors "Of my long-shanked ones!" After the last words, the shaman stretches out his hands with (for example) four fingers extended, which signify the promise of four elks (Kulakovskiy 1925: 38-39). The hunting fences mentioned in the invocations to Bayanay are the same as the enclosures and nets on the cliff drawing. The Yakuts in the taiga did not use nets only to catch animals. This is perhaps to be explained by the strength of the stag, which can hardly be held by any net other than one of wire. On the other hand, the red deer and the roe deer, which are common on the upper Lena and which could be caught by nets, are not found in central and northern Yakutia, and even in the past may not have had the importance in hunting in the forest regions of the north that the elk had. No less interesting is the question of the deity which corresponds to that on the cliff drawings, by its position and role, to the Yakut Bayanay, appearing in the capacity of giver of game, driving it into the hunter's enclosure. The only difference is that the Yakut Bayanay is called "grandfather," and, judging by this, must have a male aspect, while on the cliff drawings we find a female deity, as the dress and the braids show. Yet, the Yakut Bayanay is also thought of not as a simple being, but as a complex one, "divided" into a number of figures not only masculine but also feminine. In one of the variants of the most popular olonkho, "The MuchSuffering, Much-Sinning Lonely Hero" (Er-sogotokh), the Tungus champion, invoking a deity, sings: "Spirit of the primeval Mother Earth, Mistress Aan-darkhan, spirit of the dark forest, Mistress Baay-Byryylaakh, lord my grandfather Baay-Bayanay!" (Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR, n.d.).* The spirit-master of the forest is obviously represented here divided into two beings, masculine and feminine. In Pekarskiy's dictionary, Bayanay is defined as "the goddess of waters and of fishing" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 341). This figure of Bayanay as a goddess-woman is also known in the mythology of the Turkic tribes of the Altay. According to the Altay conceptions, Bayana, or Payana, is the giver of children. As the deity of childbirth, she was undoubtedly thought of, like all other such deities, in the form of a woman and mother (Potanin 1883 : 69, 77, 691) . Potanin was the first to establish that "a deity by the same name exists among the Yakuts. They call her Bay-Bayana and hold that the securement of animals depends upon her (Potanin 1882: 293; see also Yastremskiy 1929: 196). Popov also reports that, according to the ideas of the Vilyuy Yakuts, there are among the spirit-masters promoting the multiplication of birds and animals bayanai or ehekeen, spirits of the female sex, including the daughters of Bay-Barylakh, who are the "mistresses" of the wolverine, and also of small animals like mice and chipmunks (A. Popov, 1949a: 268-69). • [The incomplete reference does not allow further identification of the source. Editor, A.I.N.A.]

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Such a goddess, the giver of game and of luck in hunting, already humanized in her outward form, is consequently the female deity of the Lena cliff drawings, accompanied by the ancient Turkic inscriptions at the village of Davydovo. In themselves, the runic inscriptions at Davydovo and at Pisanyy Island are very ancient algys—wishes for good fortune—placed here in the mouth of the goddess-provider of game, luck, and success, who says to the hunters: "I have blessed you with success." We may even assert with confidence that this goddess was the immediate predecessor of the most recent Yakut deity, Bayanay, through whose image there gleam even now the half-obliterated features of the ancient mother-goddess of the animals of the epoch of the matriarchal clan. But if Bernshtam's reading is correct, the hunting deity of the forest Turkic tribes of the Cis-Baykal has a male aspect, and ethnography has brought down to our time, along with him, even more ancient conceptions, in various versions. The material data of archaeology, indicating such an early dissemination down the Lena, from south to north of the Turkic tribe which laid the foundation of the modern Yakuts, is supported by other sources, primarily place-names. Thus the name of the Khariyelokskiy alas of the former Ukirskoye vedomstvo [administrative center] of Balagansk okrag, on the Ide River, represents a slight distortion of the Yakut word kharyyalaakh, which is common in Yakutian place-names and means "place with firs," "fir island," or the like. It shows that the ancestors of the Yakuts already possessing a purely Yakut speech settled at first not only the upper Lena but also the western Buryat steppes, in the area of what is now Balagansk (Patkanov 1912: 484). In the headwaters of the Lena, the landmark of Tumyrbash (that is, Timir-bas, "Iron Head") on the Anga River near the village of Kuret, draws attention by its Turkic name. A compact "nest" of Turkic placenames is found not far from Tutura, in the valley of the left tributary of the Lena, the Ilga. The name of this river itself is derived, according to Strelov, from the Yakut words ylgyn, "the little finger," or elge (more accurately elgeen), "small deep river with high steep banks" (Strelov 1925: 46; Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 246; Khudyakov 1890: 195).55 Especially notable are the names of small rivers: Kikirek (Kyökh-yrekh, "Green River") and Iretka (Yrekhteekh); that is, "river with brooks," since it actually originates in the mountains, with ten springs (Strelov 1925: 57). Analogous terms formed from Yakut words may doubtless be found even further down the Lena, with careful study of the local place-names. Such are the names of the river Chochuy (from Yakut chochu, "whetstone"), the Chochuy nasleg on the Vilyuy, the river Ilim (Yakut ilim, "net," or UM, "front," "eastern"), the river Turuka (from Yakut turktaas, "ledge," "cliff standing like a rib"). Even in the "Siberian Atlas" of Semen Remezov (end of the 17th century), we find registered in the area of what is now Ust-Kut, which was then inhabited by Tungus and, in part, by Russians, a strange geographical name neither Tungus nor Rus346

The Lena Forest Ancestors sian—Kulyakuk, which must be a lake, since the Turkic name for lake is kul and the Yakut kyöl. "Lake Yakuk," puzzling at first glance, is not unique in this respect, as we can see, on the Lena below Verkholensk. There are other geographical place-names here with a Yakut sound (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 2849, 2850, 3659). Thus, the place-names of the upper Lena confirm the supposition that the ancestors of the Yakuts moved gradually from the Baykal district into the valley of the Lena, from south to north, toward the region where the Yakut people are now settled. There is a still more convincing proof of the connection of the population of the middle Lena with some original ancient Turkic forest culture which was discovered above Ust-Kut. This comes in the form of an ancient site found on the middle Lena proper, in the very depths of Yakutia. Among the cliff drawings found near the village of Petrovskoye, above the mouth of the Balagannakh-Yuryuyete, there appears a group of quite unusual drawings. Executed in dark red ochre, almost brownish, they are located in a single horizontal row. In the center is the figure of a man, larger in dimensions than any of the others. In general appearance, it recalls in many ways the anthropomorphic drawings on the cliffs along the Lena and its tributaries. To the left of the human figure, and in its immediate vicinity, there is a symbol in the form of the Russian letter "Y" turned upside down, and a little farther on another symbol, reminiscent of an oval, with a straight line drawn downward from it. To the right of the human figure, four symbols are placed in sequence: near the figure itself there is a symbol in the form of an oblique [St. Andrew's] cross,* and after that a zigzag sign reminiscent of a drawing of a short composite bow, or the Russian letter "3," then a symbol recalling the Russian letter "P." The extreme right-hand symbol resembles the Russian letter "N" or an oblique cross, but differs from it by its asymmetrical and irregular form. Below this line there are other drawings, executed with ochre of the same tone, and apparently contemporary with it. It includes circles transected by two vertical lines (drums), and the head of a person with a peculiar headdress in the form of a low hat, with long earflaps at the sides. It may even be that these are not the earflaps of a hat, but a woman's braids. Basically, these pictures do not differ greatly from other local cliff drawings of ideographic type on the middle Lena. Nevertheless, our attention is drawn by the circumstance that most of the conventional symbols found near the village of Petrovskoye are not encountered elsewhere, that their general makeup is very distinctive and new, and that their outlining reveals considerably greater similarity to the alphabetical lettering which existed among the ancient Turkic tribes than is found on other cliff drawings. In comparing them with the Orkhon-Yenisey letters, we may observe that they all—of course, not counting the human figure—may be compared with the signs of the runic script, particularly if we allow for the influence • [In form of an "X".]

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of the technique of application of our drawings by painting and not by carving, with its inevitable consequence: the loss of the graphic precision and rectilinearity characteristic of incised letters. The supposition that this inscription is connected with the phonetic script of the ancient Turkic tribes is favored both by the similarity of the signs to runic letters and by the fact that it is impossible to derive them from the actual objects which were the basis of most of the more ancient ideographic symbols on the middle Lena. Most probably they were borrowed directly, in finished form, from the fully developed alphabetic script of runic type, which existed in the first millennium A.D. among the Turkic tribes of Siberia and Middle Asia, and which had already traversed a long path at this point. From a paleographic point of view, by the character of the outline of individual symbols, the inscription in question resembles the earliest ancient Turkic inscriptions on the Orkhon and, particularly, on the Yenisey. As far as its similarity to the Orkhon inscriptions is concerned, the outlining of some symbols resembles most closely the signs on an old monument of the Turkic language, of the year 692, inscribed on the tomb of Bilge-khan, of which Radlov wrote: "All these letters clearly belong to a more ancient period than the letters on the monument of Kosho-Tsaidma and form an intermediate link between the latter and the letters of the Yenisey relics" (Radlov 1895: 245) . Both by the technique of application of the dye [to the incision] and by its other features, this inscription has analogues among other examples of ancient Turkic epigraphy. Bernshtam writes of this [middle Lena] inscription that it is an actual runic one—northermost in the world. Of its eight symbols, he reads five. He conditionally sees in it a brief text concerning the treasures or property of a specific person (clan, tribe)—perhaps a sign marking the place where it is buried. In Bernshtam's opinion, the inscription may hypothetically be deciphered thus: "The Az[?] beads* are the goods (in the sense of property) of the house." The figure drawings represent brand-marks (Bernshtam 1951: 78) . The presence in our inscription, besides conventional symbols, of a carefully executed small human figure does not contradict this conclusion. On the contrary, the latter permits us to understand more fully the conditions in which this inscription appeared. It shows that, at approximately the end of the first millennium A.D., the local ideographic script, which already had behind it at least two or three thousand years of independent evolution, collided with the phonetic script of the ancient steppe tribes, incomparably higher in its level of development. The alphabetic symbols borrowed from the south were combined in this instance with the traditional local drawings—ideograms devoted to the customs and ancient cults of the natives and derived from the Stone Age. Furthermore, the human figure executed in red dye—a depiction of a head, with a hat or with braids—deserves special attention. The treatment of the face, with three dots representing the eyes and the mouth, is extremely unusual for the archaic Lena cliff drawings, where, in general, the face is never detailed. The single exception other than the drawing at * [Azskiye busy in the original, Editor, A.t.N.A.]

348

The Lena Forest Ancestors Petrovskoye is one drawing on the cliff near the village of Vorobyevo, where there is depicted the figure of a person with a round head, containing three circles which also represent mouth and eyes. Further, this outlining of the face is very similar in character to the rendering of the details of the face, in one of the symbols of the Orkhon-Yenisey alphabet, which has the form of a semicircle with three dots inside: two in place of the eyes above and one beneath, in place of the mouth. Also, the treatment of the face and braids on the anthropomorphic figure from Petrovskoye approximates it directly to the female figures—bayanay—from the village of Davydovo. The comparison of this drawing at Petrovskoye with the runic graphic signs is instructive because it confirms the connections between the relics of the type found at Davydovo on the upper Lena and at Petrovskoye in the very depths of Yakutia. They basically belong to one and the same culture, to one and the same ancient Turkic forest tribe. The Yakuts have preserved to this day, in language and folklore, traces of former acquaintance with some sort of indigenous script. As early as the first quarter of the i9th century, the eighty-two-year-old Yakut man whom Vrangel [Wrangel] met on the Kolyma, in conversation with him, "complained of the ignorance of his fellow countrymen and suggested that their ancestors had been considerably more educated. In his opinion, the Yakuts had lost the art of writing and, along with it, the means of educating themselves further" as a result of their migration to the north. (Vrangel 1948 edition: 212.) This opinion was reiterated in later times, to various investigators, by a few Yakuts interested in their own past, for which reason the investigators were also inclined to suppose that the Yakuts had at one time possessed their own script. "At one time, so a very few people affirm, the Yakuts had writing, but as a consequence of some great catastrophe which overtook the whole tribe, they threw all the documents and hooks into the rivers. But under what circumstances this occurred, or when, they do not know"—so writes, for example, M. V. Ovchinnikov, who studied the life of the Yakuts of Olekminsk rayon at the end of the 19th century (Ovchinnikov 1897: 150-51; Shklovskiy 1908: 48-49) Ge The source from which the Yakuts took their information was apparently the well-known genealogical saga of the Yakuts about Elley and Omogoy-bay. "In his former homeland, Ellcy (whom the storyteller whom Ovchinnikov encountered, and who was apparently one of the Olekma Yakuts by birth, introduces under the name Tyla-Suokh—Author) was literate and had books, but he threw his books into the river when he ran from his house" (Ovchinnikov 1897: 149). In the later recordings of this saga, there are actually direct indications concerning the documents of Elley, which he lost at the time of his flight down the Lena. According to one variant, E11ey merely lost or sank "the learned documents which he had at that time," (Pekarskiy 1909)57 and, according to another, these documents belonged to Elley's father, Darkhan, or Khayarang, and were placed with him in the coffin. One tradition says 349

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that, before reaching the place where the city of Kirensk now stands, old Darkhan died, and before his death he ordered that he should be buried in an arangas, and that the documents should be laid with him (Pekarskiy 1925b: 140). The olonkho also mentions some ancient writing. In the poem "The Terrible Striker" (Sui-D'aahhyn), the hero Agyya meets, by the eightchanneled sea of Araat, a man wearing a hat on which nine arshins of snow had fallen. In the words of the storyteller, this man "stands and writes letters on a stone column." His name is "the Administrator and Scrivener of Heavenly Commandments," or, in other words, "the Scribe of Fate" (Yastremskiy 1929: 82). In another epic, this scribe of the commandments of fate proves to be D'ylga-toyon himself, the god of fate. He says: "Concerning N'urgunbaatyr I have written on a pure stone column, having four sides and eight angles and red with blood at the top, that he shall become a chieftain in mighty battles, that he shall condemn the evildoers of various countries, that he shall subdue the tricksters in those parts" (Pekarskiy 1911, quoted from Barashkov 1942 [edition]:' Pekarskiy 1911: 37-38; see also Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 248; Khudyakov 1890: 174). All of this information, of course, is of a clearly fabulous nature. Some details, such as for example the figure of the scribe, armed with an eagle feather "which writes black and white letters," may have been borrowed by the Yakut olonkhosuts after the coming of the Russians. The tradition of the loss of writing by the Yakuts' ancestors is in general clearly reminiscent of analogous legends among other peoples (Pekarskiy 1907-30: column 2176). But here also we find some important realistic features which echo the archaeological facts. Such are the hanging coffin (arangas) of Irlley's father, the stone column, and the crimson blood; that is, the red dye with which the writing is carried out. The hanging coffin and the crimson dye of the cliff drawings are indubitably elements of local character. The inscribed stone column, on the other hand, has recalled to the minds of investigators the stone slabs with Turkic funerary inscriptions in Mongolia and on the upper Yenisey. It is still more important that the Yakuts possess both the words which, among the Turkic and Mongol tribes, express the concept "script," "writing," "letter," "to write": suruk and bichik. The first of these, which in the Yakut language properly signifies writing, was registered as early as 1741-46 by Ya. Lindenau, who wrote: "Syuryuk, 'writing' or 'letters,' 'script.' " Traces of such an ancient indigenous script among the Yakuts of preRussian times must have been retained near the village of Petrovskoye. The archaeological data cited give us the right to draw the final general conclusion that the Turkic tribes—the bearers of that ancient culture on which contemporary Yakut culture is founded—first settled the upper Lena and then slowly moved north, colonizing the region downstream from present-day Verkholensk, approximately as far as Ust-Kut, and left • [Apparently in MS form in 19tt. Editor, A.I.N.A.I

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The Lena Forest Ancestors here indubitable traces of their long sojourn, in the form of runic inscriptions, fortified sites, and other archaeological relics. It is interesting, in this connection, that echoes of some tales concerning a people close to and related to the Kurykans, and living to the north of them, reached the Chinese of the T'ang period. In a Chinese source of the T'ang period, the geographical survey T'ang-shu-ti-li-chih, which we have already mentioned, we read that to the north of Baykal lived "people of huge stature, similar in customs to the Kuli-kangs" (Kyuner [1946] MS: 16). The mention in the Chinese geography of the great stature of the inhabitants of the North undoubtedly has an ethnographic basis, although it should hardly be regarded as a report concerning some actually existing tall tribe. In the North, from the Yukagir country to Norway, a folklore motif concerning fabulous giants, inhabitants of the Arctic Ocean, enjoyed wide popularity. This apparently reached the Chinese chronicle from the northern folklore through the Kurykans, together with other details of stories concerning the northern countries, which extended to the land of the Kurykans. It must be then, from this source, from the northern neighbors of the Kurykans, that the stories about unusually short northern nights and long days during the summer reached the Chinese. These were probably not the Kurykans themselves, but some offshoot of them— one of the northerly tribes entering into the Kurykan tribal confederation (el), perhaps as its third member. The Chinese of Wei times must have heard about them from those Kurykans who lived near Lake Baykal, as about "giant" people of the North. These may not have been the Ta-mo of the Wei annals, or the Ku-shih, with whom the Ta-mo were interconnected. Very interesting also is the story in the Wei annals about the Yü-kai, who lived fifteen days' journey to the east of the Isyuy [Chü] (Uran) [Wu-wan], whose country was spacious, and its population large, similar in manners and customs to the Bayegus [Wa-yeh-ku-ssü?]. In contrast to the pure pastoralists, they had "few cows and horses, many sable and squirrels."58 The latter feature of the way of life may apparently relate in an equal degree also to the Turkic forest people in the valley of the Lena, who, at that time, lived to the north of present-day Verkholensk. This branch of the Kurykans, as is shown by the northernmost ancient Turkic inscriptions in the world, found at the village of Petrovskoye, only zoo km from Yakutsk, was already widespread in central Yakutia during the time when runic writing existed among them; that is, about the 9th or loth centuries A.D. It is entirely natural to conclude that the penetration to the north of at least the most ancient portion of that complex of Turkic elements which is found so definitely at the base of modern Yakut culture is to be connected with the dissemination of this people. However, this is the last direct archaeological indication relating to such an early phase of Yakut ethnogenesis.

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Chapter 3

For lack of other, more trustworthy sources for the history of the movement of the southern tribes to the north, and of their mutual relations with the indigenous tribes of Yakutia, we must turn to the legends of the Yakut people which relate to the legendary ancestors of the Yakuts, Omogoy-bay and Elley-bootur. These legends transmit popular conceptions not only of the arrival of these folklore heroes of the Yakuts on the middle Lena, but also of the native population of the region living there before them and entering into the makeup of the elements from which the Yakut nationality was formed. Among the native inhabitants of central Yakutia, who lived there before Omogoy and Elley, besides the Tungus, the legends mention the Kharasagyl (literally, "black foxes"). They had no cattle; hunting and fishing were the basic sources of their existence. Concerning the legendary representative of the Khara-sagyl, an old shamaness who sojourned with nine sons in the [present-day] first Oltek nasleg near Lake Balyktaakh-$be, the legends relate that she occupied herself with fishing. Once, casting the net, the old woman let her needle case, innelik, fall into the icehole, whence the lake received the name "Innelik Typsyt kelyyete," that is, "lake of the fallen needle case." The Khara-sagyl, who were few in number, could not offer resistance to the stronger and more densely settled newcomers, and quickly disappeared. Apparently, that is why the Yakuts gave them the picturesque nickname Tyal-buolbuttar, "those who have become the wind"; that is, who have scattered like a puff of wind. The last remains of the Khara-sagyl were supposed to have been preserved in Megin and Borogon districts up to the middle of the 19th century. They were considered to be endowed with a special magical strength; they were feared and disliked. "He is of special origin, the descendant of the Khara-sagyl, from the clan Tyal-buolbuttar. His tongue is heavy and harmful; he destroys people; his eyes are fiery. Each time he shamanizes, you see the fire of his eyes"— so they spoke of the last descendant of the Khara-sagyl, the old man Montiye Bokhsuluy ([Bolo 1936]). 353

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Besides the Khara-sagyl there is even mentioned in the legends a "special" tribe of "Sakhalar," living in the basin of the Lena, according to the storytellers, "before the arrival of our ancestors Omogoy-bay and Elleybootur." They were supposed to be distinguished by their elongated heads, and had no hips ([Bolo 1934c]). The Sakhalar, like the Khara-sagyl, hunted and fished. Unfortunately, nothing more is known of them. Even their name is clearly the result of some confusion in the legends, since "Sakhalar" is the name by which the Yakuts call themselves. Yet, some tribe of hunters and fishermen who preceded the Yakuts, and were distinguished from them physically, in all probability existed on the middle Lena. In general, the aboriginal tribes of central Yakutia are depicted briefly and schematically in the Yakut legends; their physical aspect is wrapped in the misty smoke of legend and fantasy. The stories of the native inhabitants of the Vilyuy regions, the lower Lena, and Verkhoyansk kray are significantly clearer and more fullblooded. According to legends, on the Vilyuy, before the arrival of the Yakuts, lived the D'irikinei people, "with sewn faces," dressed in fawnskin coats and hats, decorated with red ochre. They lived by hunting and reindeer-breeding, and led a nomadic way of life. "It seems as if," say the storytellers, "in those years there were also Tungus, for example, Sologons, who kept reindeer and wandered with them along the rivers Vilyuy, Eeyik, Tyuyusken, and Markha." [Bolo 1938c.] In the region of Nyurba, when there was still no big lake, and reindeer moss grew, there lived a people N'uurbagat, or N'yrbagat, among whom there was a clan Ygyleet. Once, after a forest fire, water gushed out and flooded their places, wherefore they were forced to nomadize in part on the river Tolba, in part on the river Zhuya. The Tolba and Zhuya Tungus are their descendants. According to other legends, the N'yrbagat left the Vilyuy and went to the Chona, Olekma, and Keybele because of the attacks of a people with "sewn faces," bearing the name Tumat. According to the legends, the Tumats lived by fishing, tattooed their faces and hands with a thread of sinew smeared with black dye, and wore clothes decorated with ochre. They were supposed to be cannibals. They say that one Tumat girl, learning of the intention of her parents to eat her, hid in a snowbank. Having lost the tracks, which were covered by a storm, the girl's father said: "It's a pity we lost her breasts, we could have eaten them." [Savvin 1945•] With the Tumats on the Vilyuy there is also connected a topic, widespread in the north, of feasting guests on a daughter of the host, specially fattened for this occasion. Stone artifacts found in the Vilyuy taiga are also ascribed to them. Of the Sortols, to whom are ascribed all long-abandoned dwellings, scattered near lakes in the depths of the taiga, overgrown with moss and trees, the legends recall that this was a numerous forest people, whose dwellings were in the valley of the Vilyuy and along both banks of the lower course of the Lena. Sortols lived in the taiga near lakes, and hunted and fished. Their houses looked like the Yakut balagans; in them was neither chimney nor windows. The entire clan lived together, and for sleep used a single sack-mattress, one in common for the entire family, mixing old and young, ten to twenty people at once. 354

Legends Relating to the Appearance of Yakut Ancestors The Sortols were led by military leader-bogatyrs and khosuns, the latter called kylys-khosun. They wore white clothes of ermine skins and braids reaching to the knees. The khosuns of the Sortols had up to nine wives, obtaining them through wars with neighboring tribes. After a victory over their enemies, the Sortols piled up their corpses in heaps and burned them. Only warrior-khosuns of other tribes who had fought them especially bravely and stubbornly did the Sortols inter in hanging coffins, urangas. Their own dead they interred on the surface of the earth, near tall old larches, near houses. In popular tradition, the Sortols are usually depicted as inscrutable, dark people, like the Gothamites* of Russian tales. In the legends it is said that, supposedly not having windows, the wisest of the Sortols proposed to illuminate the interior of their dark dwellings in the following manner: to collect the sunlight in leather bags and carry them into the house, and collect the darkness in the same way in the bag, tie it up and throw it out of the houses. In another instance, the legends say, the Sortols began to build a house, but the tie-beam was too short, and did not reach from wall to wall. Then the wise Sortols proposed to smear the tie-beam with oil in order that the wood would soften and could stretch in length; and then they ordered two groups of the strongest people to grasp its ends. When one of the two opposing parties did not hold on, and the other party drew the log to its side, the weak ones were reproached that just a little more and the matter would have been crowned with success, and now they were to blame for everything. Because of their weakness the tie-beam did not stretch. The Yakuts consider the Sortols the ancestors of the Tungus and other northern tribes. But the Tungus do not recognize the Sortols as their progenitors. Both sides are at one only in being convinced of the profound antiquity of the Sortols and the etekh (s) which they left behind. Of some of the Sortol etekh (for example, on the Great and Little Kustekhteekh) the local inhabitants say that those who dwelt in these houses were slaughtered by their enemies, possibly the reindeer-breeding Tungus tribes who after them occupied the region of the Verkhoyansk Mountains [Bolo 1942] 59 All of the tribes listed, except perhaps the mysterious Sakhalar of the distant past, are hunters, lake fishermen, or, as on the Vilyuy, reindeerbreeders. It is, however, very interesting that, according to the Yakut traditions, they were preceded on the Lena by some pastoral people, who lived there long before the Yakuts, and seem to have borne the name of "Kyrgys." According to these legends, the Kyrgyz migrated to the middle Lena before Omogoy and Elley, bringing horses with them. It is said that they, like the Yakuts, held ysyakhs. At burials, they smeared the face of the dead with subcutaneous abdominal fat, then placed the corpse in the hollow trunk of a tree and took it into the forest; there they held an ysyakh, and, after the feast, the body was burnt. The Kyrgyz are also mentioned in other legends about the forefathers of the Yakuts. "The Yakuts have a tradition that they came from a country located 3,000 versts to the south of the place where the city of Irkutsk now • [Poshekhoncts in the original. "Wise man of Gotham." Editor, A.I.N.A.]

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stands. The Kyrgyz Sarabay-toyon and his wife Saysar, who was Tatar by birth, set out with their children northward from their homeland. Sarabay-toyon died at the place where Irkutsk now stands, and his wife, with the children, travelled further, and arrived at the place where Yakutsk now stands, near the Saysara branch of the Lena" (Troshchanskiy 1902: 14). The brief and obscure stories concerning the existence on the middle Lena, before the arrival there of the Yakuts, of some other pastoral people, are also supported by some supplementary information from folklore. According to some variants of the saga of Omogoy, while he was living near Lake Saysara, he multiplied at that place the livestock he had brought with him. According to other versions, Omogoy's people found animals on the spot: first they brought with them from northern Ytyk-khay, a three-year-old cow with a calf, brindled like a bumble-bee, and then they brought from southern Ytyk-khay a four-year-old brood mare. Of the origin of Omogoy-bay's livestock, another legend relates that Elley asked him where his stock had come from, whether he had brought it with him or had gotten it on the spot. Omogoy answered: "No, (I) found my livestock here in this country. Having arrived here without animals, I wept and grieved sorely. I begged my deities to send me down cows and horses. One day, behind the Southern Sacred Mountain, I found two foals—a male and a female. My herds are descended from these.' The brief information which has been cited exhausts the data contained in Yakut historical folklore concerning the mysterious alien pastoralists who were the predecessors of the Yakuts on the Lena. Everything else in this folklore relates entirely to those heroes and tribes who are considered the direct ancestors of the true Yakuts of our own time, and not aliens. According to most traditions, the first of the ancestors of the true Yakuts to encounter the native tribes of Yakutia was Omogoy-bay, or Onogoy—a Buryat by birth, or a native of the Buryat country, who was later joined by the "Tatar" or "Kyrgys" fugitive, Elley. In one of the most complete versions of the saga of Omogoy, it is told that "under the Ural mountains" there lived a Tatar by the name of Khoyos-Khayyppar, who had four sons. One day he killed, with a bow and arrow, a bird with beautiful multicolored plumage which he plucked, and he also cut off the bird's wings and tail. The wings he gave to two of his sons, the third son got the tail, and the fourth son was left without anything. The one who had not received his share began to cry, and was much offended at his parents, thinking that they loved their other sons more than him. A friend of Khoyos-Khayyppar, the Buryat Khongor-Sara, somehow told him that "in the northeast there is a good country. The various feathered creatures, having spent the summer in that country, return thence much recovered in good condition: probably this is a wonderful land." Having heard this story, the youngest son of Khoyos-Khayyppar, Omogoy, being already a seventy-year-old man, disappeared, taking his wife with him. When Khongor-Sara returned to Khoyos-Khayyppar, the latter, remembering his son and regretting his absence, began to cry: "When you told of the country to the east and to the north, my lad listened with great interest. 356

Legends Relating to the Appearance of Yakut Ancestors Probably he went there and was lost without trace, because he went to an uninhabited country." (Omogoy, having left his father, got onto a raft in the upper Lena, and went down the river.) When Khongor-Sara told at home about Omogoy's flight, his unloved son $lley listened and also decided to flee to the north. On the way, he encountered the charred stumps of larches which someone had felled, and thereby found Omogoy in the place where Yakutsk is now located (Anon. 1908). According to other and more widespread versions of the legend, Omogoy-bay was living in the Buryat country at the time "when the flame of war, started by the Tatars," who, in the time of Mamay, overcame the Russians living in the south and in the west, "spread to all the small peoples, and then bloody battles took place in the southern countries. "In that fearful time, a person named Omogoy-bay, living in the Buryat country, who was rich in horses and cattle, after the seizure of his properties by Tatar troops, rushed about, not knowing where to go" ([Bobo 1934b])• Wishing to find a safe refuge, he compelled his shaman to foretell the future. The latter, according to one of the variants of the legend, flew away to the north in the image of a white swan, and following the threechanneled Lena River, came to its confluence with the Vilyuy, and, even further—to the nine snow-white mounds of ice on the shore of the Arctic Ocean, which gave rise to the nine shamanistic roots. Climbing up onto one of the mounds, the legend continues, the shaman looked into the distance along the Lena, "with its three greedy channels, its rich waters, its tall trees," and suddenly felt himself struck by warm air from the upper part of the river. Following the river upward, the shaman reached a broad plain, extending between two mountain peaks, where he saw the spirit of the country, the mistress Aan-Chelbey, in a fox fur hat and a sable coat, leaning out of an eight-branched birch tree. The mistress of the valley predicted to the shaman that people and animals would multiply in this place, and ordered him to send into it some lucky person, who would multiply people and spread luck and success. This valley was Tuymaada, where the city of Irkutsk now stands. Omogoy's path into the happy valley of Tuymaada near Lake Saysara, according to some versions of the legend, went down the Lena. Moving along the Lena, Omogoy stopped in its headwaters, and wintered near what is now Kachug. In the spring, he made a raft and sailed on it down the river, until, in the autumn, he stopped, because of low water, near the mouth of the N'unne (Nyuya) River. Having found in its headwaters a grass-surrounded stream, Omogoy wintered there, occupying himself with hunting. Some of his people, on the other hand, having come to like the place, stayed permanently. In the spring, Omogoy again sailed down the river, until his raft stopped at the island of Kyyllaakh (Kyllakh). That autumn, having found the rivers of 011okhun (Olekma) and Chara, Omogoy once more wintered, and left some of his people as settlers. In the spring, Omogoy sailed to the territory of the Nemyugin nasleg of the western Kangalasy ulus, and spent the fourth winter there. Having 357

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seen the southern cape, the peak of Ytyk-khay, Omogoy's people then reached the very green valley with excellent fields and warm air, which the shaman had foretold. Here Omogoy settled, putting up his birchbark tent between the two sacred mountains, near the mound above Lake Saysara [Bolo 1934b]. According to other versions of the legend, Omogoy, having become lost on the way, got into the headwaters of the Vilyuy instead of the Lena, and then sailed along it, on rafts, to its confluence with the Lena, and pulled his raft up the Lena to what is now Namy rayon, or to Kildemskoye Hollow, and then to Saysara, where he settled. The tradition of the arrival of some other settlers, besides Omogoy-bay, on the Lena along the Vilyuy, is of great interest. One of the traditions recorded from the Vilyuy storytellers mentions one Khara-Tyumen and his travelling companion, Bolodoy-Orkhon. "In olden times, very long ago, when the Yakuts had not yet come to the Vilyuy, Khara-Tyumen arrived from the south, from the headwaters of the Vilyuy. With him was the visionary shaman Bolodoy-Orkhon, who had the gift of foretelling the future by means of second sight and the reading of omens. After they had come to the mouth of the Vilyuy and had stopped to spend the night, Bolodoy-Orkhon said in the morning: `From this river there blows a very warm air, which signifies a flourishing, rich, and prosperous life in the future. Here people and beasts will multiply, and will live happily. This country, as we can see, is narrow, and for this reason should be called Sya Bylyy, Bytey Bylyy: "Fat Vilyuy," "Narrow Vilyuy"'" ([Bolo 1938b]). Having thus named this river and reconnoitered the place, they went farther, but it is not known where. In another version, this saga has a different content. While Rich Man Omogoy was coming to "Happy Saysara," Khara-Tyumen arrived from the south, from the Buryat country, with two travelling companions, seeking a convenient place to settle. Khara-Tyumen arrived on the Vilyuy after he had crossed its headwaters, and from the sweet smells coming from its forests and lowlands, he named this river "the priceless fragrant Vilyuy, the Fat, Narrow Vilyuy." Having come down through the mouth of the three-channeled Vilyuy into the Lena, he took a deep breath of the air and said: "In such a marvellous place there is probably someone living." Then he headed up the Lena and found Omogoy in the happy valley of Saysara. Having visited him, Khara-Tyumen travelled further, but his two companions, who had committed some serious crime at home and feared punishment, killed their master along the road. Returning home, they told there how some great misfortune was supposed to have happened to them, from which they barely saved themselves but lost their master. "The great chief of the Buryat people," the legend tells us, did not believe their story, and called upon the shaman to practice clairvoyance. The shaman told of the murder of Khara-Tyumen by his companions, as though he had been an eyewitness. The great Buryat chief punished the companions of Khara-Tyumen for the malicious and premeditated murder. Afterwards, the Yakuts began to call the place where Khara-Tyumen was killed "Khara-Tyumen." It is the second village upstream from the city of Olekminsk" ([Bobo 1938a]). 358

Legends Relating to the Appearance of Yakut Ancestors Thus, if we can believe these traditions, separate groups of newcomers tried independently to come down the Lena and the Vilyuy, probably passing into the headwaters of the Vilyuy from the Lena, in the area of the Nyuya and Suntar. It is especially interesting that the Yakut traditions about the settlement of the Vilyuy and the Lena district contain not only a story about the migration of an entire nomadic group, with preliminary reconnaissance, but also about one purely reconnoitering expedition by Khara-Tyumen, ending in the death of the scout. This story is told no longer in the tones of shamanistic fantasy but on a precise, realistic level. As far as the legendary hero Omogoy-bay is concerned, the authors of a number of versions of the Yakut genealogical saga derive from him the ancestors of the Namy and Bayagantay uluses. The accounts of these descendants of Omogoy are very valuable for the description of the internal interrelationships of the Yakut uluses [districts], which were once tribal territories. It is said, for example, that Omogoy-bay had a son, Baay-Baaragay. From him was born Aan-Taybyr, and from the latter, Bayagantay-darkhan. This progenitor of the Bayagantay u/us, the storyteller says in concluding his tale, "was driven out as a bad and worthless person, and was settled on the eastern Aldan. For this reason, the Bayagantay u/us was in the past considered lower than the other five uluses, and it was looked on as a land of foreigners" [Bobo 1934C]. In other variants of the same legends of the origin of the Bayagantay ulus, it is said that Omogoy-bay had an only son, Keltegey-Tobuk; he "suffered poverty and lived on the game which was brought to him by a black dog" (Priklonskiy 1890-91: 3o). Recorded by S. I. Bolo from the storyteller P. F. Sleptsov, in one version of the legend, of the Bakhsyt nasleg of Churapchinsk rayon, the son of Omogoy-bay is called Daybakhkhy-khara, and it is said of him that he "prayed incessantly to the deity Khomporoy-Ayyy to increase his wealth, at which the deity, heeding his prayer, sent him a dog with white feet, white muzzle, white neck band, and a tuft of white fur in the middle of his tail." He himself and his descendants were nomads and hunters; from them came the Yakut population of what is now Verkhoyansk rayon. Other traditions mention, as a son of Omogoy-bay, Aan-Erese-oyuun, whose son was Nam, the progenitor of the Namy ulus, or a daughter by the same name. The legends tell also of people left by old Omogoy after his death. Some of them lived in the locality of Tulagy-Killem, to the north of what is now Yakutsk; others fished and hunted on the territory of the modern Borogon ulus. According to one legend, they were later joined by one of the sons of Elley Khatan-Khangyll (Nosov 1926: 31). Thus, the inhabitants of the large uluses—Bayagantay, Namy (including Tulagino-Kildemets), and Borogon—are traced not from Elley, but from his predecessor Omogoy-bay and from other ancestors. They are distinguished from the descendants of Elley by the characteristic features of their way of life: they are primarily hunters and lake fishermen of the taiga, and not typical pastoralists. It is not accidental that the ancestor of one of these uluses, Bayagantay, is shown in such close connection with a 359

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dog who is his protector and nourisher. This dog was undoubtedly the ancient totem of the forest hunters and fishermen, while the totem animals of the pastoralists, the descendants of the steppe-dweller Elley, were the white-lipped stallion and the eagle. Equally characteristic was the attitude of the ancient pastoral Yakuts to their brethren. The latter were considered foreigners, aliens, and not fellow tribesmen; they were looked upon condescendingly, and even with a shading of contempt. This view was, in the course of time, disseminated even among the inhabitants of Namy ulus, who frequently recognized the superiority of the descendants of Elley, the Kangalasy people. Such, for example, is the attitude of the legendary old woman Muogan, the wife of Kedegey, in a conversation with Tygyn. As late as 1945, an old woman from Namy rayon (formerly Namy ulus) declared to B. O. Dolgikh that the inhabitants of their ulus were "the worst people," and that the ulus was "worse than any" of the other uluses of Yakutia [Dolgikh, personal communication] . Such views in regard to aliens and members of other tribes were expressed in the offensive sayings which were exchanged by the opponents at various encounters: "Bloody Kangalasy," "Nakhara blood," "Khorin witch-doctors (sorcerers)," "shifty Amga people," "Tatta people who get butter from locusts," "inhabitants of the western side of the Lena who eat hamsters," "inhabitants of the eastern side of the Lena who make presents of watermole meat," "the clayey (earth-dwelling) Borogontsy," "the blind Magasy, who go on adventures at night, have woolly feet, and white birchbark brands on their forehead," "the Kurunbayday, who know how to get blood out of dead wood," "the Yuryugey, who rinse out a basket of worms and eat it," "the Batagay, who get lost at the sources of a turbid lake, find rotten fish and eat it" ([Bobo n.d., f.]; cf. Altayan sayings in Potanin 1883: 937-41 ). In these nicknames, the conflict between the warlike Kangalasy pastoralists and the fishermen of the eastern districts, who live in dwellings of earth or smeared with clay (buor balayan), stands out. But the most vivid reflection of tribal separatism and enmity toward aliens were the interclan and intertribal encounters. Besides the frequent encounters between Borogons and Bayagantay, the Meginets and Tatta peoples, Yakut folklore clearly reveals a traditional struggle between the Kangalasy, the descendants of Elley, and the inhabitants of the eastern uluses, the descendants of Omogoy. The traditions concerning Tygyn Munn'an explain that he was a descendant of Elley, and carried on a struggle with the descendants of Omogoy-bay, the Vilyuy, Namy, Khorin and Bayagantay tribes, striving to conquer these distant uluses, "which came from another blood" ([Bob, o n.d., i]). The descendants of Omogoy apparently also realized that they had no blood kinship with the descendants of Elley. At least in the legend of the Verkhoyansk Yakuts relating to Daybakhkhy-khara, the son of Omogoy, there is transmitted an entirely separate and independent account of their origin, having nothing in common with any other version of the tradi360

Legends Relating to the Appearance of Yakut Ancestors tional story of Elley, other than the opening motif of the flight of their ancestors from south to north to escape oppression and crowding. The tribal separatism of the "descendants of Omogoy" is indicated also by the predominance of dialects which transform o into a, that is, in the eastern and northern uluses of Yakutia. Yet, even here, the Yakuts, who were considered by their neighbors as descendants of Omogoy, apparently did not always trace their descent from him. Among them, completely different local ancestors usually appear in place of the common ancestor Omogoy. Such, among the Namy Yakuts, are the old man Kedegey and his wife, the old woman Muogan. Their wealth consisted of horses and cattle, which are supposed to have been so numerous that, during their migration from place to place, they extended from the plateau of Khaturgan to a mountain in the vicinity of Challa-Tiit, in the valley of the Lena, over a distance of three-and-a-half kosy ([Bolo n.d., g]). (A kos [kös] is equal to approximately 7—to km.) In some traditions, apparently of more ancient origin, the old man Kedogoy [Kedegey] is depicted, however, as a hunter and fisherman, and not a pastoralist: "When he wandered on Lake Muogan, following a duck, the water came only to his waist." In another variant of the legend concerning the progenitors of the Namy Yakuts, the old ancestress of the Namy people says to Tygyn: "We are bad neighbors. We have nothing. (I) am a very poor old woman. Three of my sons went to the northern river to hunt; we are very bad neighbors" ([Bolo n.d., g]) . Concerning another Namy hero, Kyysteekh Saalaakh Kyheneke, it is said that on his lake he killed white cranes, which he ate, and he also lived by fishing. The same figure of a poor fisherman and hunter is found in the tales concerning the ancestors of other eastern naslegs and clans, which are not part of the Kangalasy group. Of the progenitor of the Yakuts of Sylany nasleg, Uraanay-bootur, it is told that he lived with his wife "under the ground, having dug himself a pit in the middle mound of Lake Sylany. His brother also lived hiding in a pit-house in the vicinity of Bie-Beyik Tumul, seven kilometers from Lake Sylany. They were both heroes; despite the distance which separated their houses, the brothers conversed with each other as though they were standing side by side. Uraanay-bootur himself wore a white horse hide, and, from a distance, people took him for a white swan sitting down" ([Bolo n.d., k; n.d., j.]). The Borogons have an epic hero, a hunter and fisherman, corresponding to Uraanay-bootur. He is Bert-khara, the son of the widowed old woman Khalyng Son-Dadyr. Up to the age of twenty, Bert-khara, who was then called Bayyttyman, was a cripple; he could not walk, and lay in bed all the time. His mother dragged him on a hand sled, fished, hunted hares, and thus nourished herself and her son. One day, climbing a mountain in the neighborhood of Kysyl-Syyr, the old woman slipped and fell, lamenting that she suffered these torments on account of her crippled son. Then, Bayyttyman threw a sword at the old woman, and wounded her in the knee. Smearing his joints with his mother's blood, Bayyttyman stood up on his legs and was transformed into a mighty hero, the best fisherman 361

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and hunter, yielding nothing to the falcon in swiftness. Bayyttyman's descendants, who received from Tygyn the name Bert-khara, later formed the two Bert-Usov naslegs in the Borogon [country]. Their old men related that, until recent times, they had seen on the ground the huge circular rim of the fish-landing net which had belonged to Bayyttyman, and that, on the western border, in the neighborhood of Khanga, there stood for a long time a tree with its top cut off which was not touched and was honored as a memorial to Bert-khara, because he had topped it as a measure of his own height ([Bolo n.d., c]) . Of the other Borogon clan, the Bes-borogon ("Pine-borogon"), the traditions say that the Kangalasy Tygyn, frightened by the horrible appearance of Bayyttyman, secretly fled from him, but on his way came upon thirty houses of the Bes-borogon clan, and in his annoyance ordered that all of the people be put to the sword. "They relate that, out of all that multitude of people, there remained alive only one poor four-year-old little boy, who, in the confusion, went under a big pine bowl, and hid there from his enemies. Afterwards, the Bes-borogons who formed the Sygat nasleg were born again from that four-year-old who had remained alive inside the big bowl" ([Bolo n.d., c]). The same legend of the ancestor of a clan, who took refuge under an overturned bowl, is known in other folklore sources, among various peoples. Other variants of Yakut legends about clan ancestors are equally ancient, including the one concerning the lonely ancestress from whom the legendary heroic forefather of the given clan is born. Although in the majority of cases all these heroes are dated in one way or another to the time of Tygyn, and are connected with his adventures, their figures are certainly considerably older than the 17th century. Their connection with Tygyn is to be explained only by the fact that, as often happens, all the remaining motifs of local traditions and legends about local heroes, the ancestors of clans, were united in the course of time around this most popular character in Yakut historical folklore. In connection with all this, the storytellers as a rule emphasize, in their tales about their own ancestral heroes, the legendary strength and courage of the latter; they show, for example, that not even Tygyn himself could overcome the champion Bert-khara, and was turned to flight by the very sight of this giant. Even in the case where another hero, Uraanay-bootur, is surrounded by his enemies sent by Tygyn, who break his shinbone or hip with an arrow, he pierces the front saddle-bow of one of the enemies with an accurate shot, and with it the middle part of his belly. The frightened Kangalasy turn back in terror, and Uraanay-bootur, holding up the broken leg with one hand and hopping on the other leg, wades across the lake and pulls up by the roots a larch tree from which could be built a whole riverboat [for lighterage]. In another version, he cuts it off at his own height, and, only after this exploit, falls dead on the steep bank of the river. The local origin of these heroes and the parts of the Yakut population connected with them is revealed primarily in the economy and the manner of daily life—lake fishing and hunting as the main source of subsistence, 362

Legends Relating to the Appearance of Yakut Ancestors and the types of semi-subterranean dwellings dug into mounds near lakes. Such details take the investigator into the depths of the most ancient history of Yakutia, to the Neolithic and Early Bronze Ages. In this connection, certain archaeological finds on the lower Vilyuy, and on sections of the northern Lena Valley adjacent to it, are deserving of special attention. Sites have been discovered here which show that, in ancient times, this was the home of some particular group of the Yakut population, very close to the southern Yakuts, but, at the same time, sharply distinguished from them in economy and manner of daily life. The remnants of such settlements, which precede the appearance of the Russians on the Lena, are preserved 85 km from the mouth of the Vilyuy; that is, in the same district where the Russian written sources of the early i7th century note the presence of "unmounted" Yakuts, near the Daalgan River around the lakes of Great and Little Kyustyakhtakh. Both lakes are rich in fish. In the same place dwell many ducks and scoters, and, in the surrounding forests, elks, bears, and other animals. The shores of the lakes are in large part convenient for dwelling, especially where there are dry sandy ridges with pine trees. Analogous settlements were found under the same conditions at other places on the lower Lena— for example, near Sangar-khaya. The dwellings of these settlements are divided into two groups: small rectangular houses, with hearths made of stone slabs, and large round structures, of the type of the earthen yurt, kholomo, only not pyramidal, but conical in form. They are surrounded by earthen ridges and pits at the side, from which the earth was taken. In the cultural remains inside the dwellings, there are no traces of pastoralism in the form of bones of domestic animals; we find only bones of wild animals and fish, including some very large ones (Figs. 75, 76 ) . The inhabitants of these settlements were not pastoral Yakuts as we know them from the historical documents, folklore, and material relics. They were forest fishermen and hunters, who lived on fish from the lakes and on wild fowl, and, in part, from reindeer herding. Another feature of these settlements, one that reflects the social structure of their inhabitants, is also remarkable. While the pastoral Yakuts lived in relative isolation in separate yurts, here there were many houses in the same place, making up a rather large settlement. The social relations of their inhabitants probably rested on the collectivism of the primitive clan system, which was still very strong. At the same time, our attention is drawn by the small dimensions of the dwellings and by the poverty of the finds in them, which must have reflected the actual destitution of the fishermen, among whom, the traditions tell us, there was usually only one cooking pot for the whole family. The almost complete absence of pottery in the archaeological sites is therefore not surprising. No more than the remains of one clay vessel has ever been found near the "small dwellings" or inside them. But however scarce the remains of pottery may be here, they have a special value in determining the cultural-historical place of these sites and of the population that once lived here. 363

0 1 2

3

0 IN

Fig. 75. Ground plan of an old kholomo, locality of Zelenoye, below Sangarkhaya; a—earthen wall; b—hearths; c—pits, d—artifacts.

C=) 1

o 0 I

I 3

sm t

Fig. 76. Ground plan of one of the small houses in the vicinity of Zelenoye, below Sangar-khaya.

Legends Relating to the Appearance of Yakut Ancestors Like most local vessels of the Neolithic, Bronze, and Early Iron Ages, the clay pots from the "small houses" had very thin walls and were distinguished by a distinct ornamentation of bands of fine molded ridges, sometimes interrupted on the half-circle. The lip of the rim is often marked with diagonal notches, as were the rims of the older periods in Yakutia. One fragment of the rim of a vessel, which simulates in shape the small birchbark pails (chabychakh), is of special interest. The form of the clay vessel remained unchanged, the same as it had been in the birchbark prototype, that is, that of a truncated cone. The "rim-stick" wrapped in birchbark was reproduced in the form of a convex band of clay along the rim, and the horsehair thread with which the bark was secured was conventionally rendered by incised lines. The only difference is that, on the birchbark chabychakh, this winding usually takes the form of an "X" pattern, while on the clay vessel it is rendered more simply as a zigzag. (The latter is also occasionally found on birchbark vessels.) However, with these archaic traits there are also new and completely different ones in the pottery of the "small houses." These vessels had not a round but a flat bottom; a stamped pattern, unknown previously, in the form of separate figured impressions of a short stick with a carved pattern on its end, appears for the first time. Although these impressions are very close in technique and form to the ancient comb-stamped ornamentation of the Early Iron Age, on the whole, such ornamentation is already part of the complex of characteristics typical of 18th and t9th century Yakut pottery. Such stamped patterns, in the form of an "X," or of a small cross made up of four circles and four small rectangles, symmetrically placed within a large square, are widely distributed in this pottery (Fig. 77). The discovery of the northern Yakutian sites which we have described is especially important in that, up to now, Yakut culture, in the proper sense, known from archaeological data, has seemed to be basically different from everything which preceded it on this territory. The thought of some deep chasm separating the Yakuts from their aboriginal predecessors, of a true ethnic catastrophe which accompanied the appearance of southern migrants on the Lena, arose involuntarily. On the one hand, there was the primitive culture of wandering hunters and fishermen, who did not have permanent settlements and durable dwellings (intended for long occupancy), and who had at their disposal only primitive, round-bottomed, thin-walled ware, and afterwards no pottery at all—an ancient culture apparently tied directly to the local Bronze Age and Neolithic cultures. On the other hand, there was the culture of southern immigrant pastoralists, living in permanent winter dwellings at definite places, and having achieved a relatively high cultural level. But, at the same time, the presence of northern elements in the culture of the Yakuts—the existence of a number of ethnic groups which had been assimilated by and merged with them, particularly between the Aldan and the Lena and on the Vilyuy—indicated that there must have been other material relics reflecting the processes of interaction between the southerners and the native population and the assimilation of the latter. 365

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Legends Relating to the Appearance of Yakut Ancestors The relics of the "unmounted" Yakuts which have been discovered recently are valuable precisely in that the results of studies of such settlements significantly change and supplement the general picture of the life of the ancient Yakuts and of their interaction with the aboriginal population. As we have seen, all the essential characteristics of the culture of "small houses" bear the impress of a gradual transition from the old culture of the north to the new northern Yakutian culture of the 17th to 19th centuries. This transition occurred as a result of long-lasting contiguity and interaction of the tribes of the north with an in-migrant population, from which they took over a number of elements of material culture, and also, apparently, the Yakut language, but retained the economic basis of their way of life—lake fishing and hunting. On the lower Vilyuy, these aboriginal tribes, according to the Russian sources of the 17th century, were the ancestors of the Dolgans, who later migrated northwestward, into the basins of the Popigay and the Khatanga. The Yakut traditions also, apparently, have these tribes in mind when they mention the Sortols, the inhabitants of the ancient dwellings on the Daalgan creek, which preserves the very name of the Dolgan tribe, and also on Lake Kyustyakhtakh. The legendary Sortols, connected both with the later Dolgans and in general with the northern Yakuts of the 19th century, were apparently one of the first northern tribes which entered into communication with the ancestors of the Yakuts, acquired elements of their culture, and, for the first time, widely disseminated the Yakut language as a sort of "international" language among the polyglot tribes of the Far North, thereby breaking down the narrow barriers of tribal isolation of previous times. A number of Yakut naslegs on the Vilyuy bear to this day the name of the legendary Sortols. Neighboring them on the Aldan and its left tributaries dwelt other hunting and fishing tribes, which gave rise to the later Borogontsy and other groups of Yakuts, who traced their origin from such legendary heroes of the past as Bert-khara and Uraanay-bootur. Their manner of life, dwellings, and social structure were certainly basically the same as those of their northern neighbors, the Sortols and the ancestors of the Dolgans. It is therefore the more interesting that no less vivid local features appear in the epos of this section of the Yakut nation. The traditions concerning Uraanay, Bayyttyman, and other ancient heroes of this cycle, form part, by a number of characteristics, of the khosun epos of the North. In them we may note a specific Arctic undercurrent, sharply differentiated from the Middle Asian steppe folklore of the pastoral Yakuts. As in the khosun epos, the main character here is a hunting and fishing hero. Like the northern khosun, he is dressed in white clothing, and even in death resembles a white swan; he is also naïve, straightforward, and honest—by no means the cunning warrior of the pastoralists. But, at the same time, he is almost as fierce and wild as the heroes of the khosun epos, Fig. 77. Objects from the "small houses." r–iron scraper; 2 to 5–pottery. 367

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with their "sewn" (tattooed) faces. True, he no longer constantly eats the bone marrow, blood, and liver of his conquered opponents, nor, going into battle, does he put to death his old mother and anoint his weapon with her blood in order to arouse the spirit of bloodshed and then bury the mother's bones with honor in an aran gas. When the life course of the hero is finished, and he, as a true champion, dies on the field of battle or perishes from the perfidy of enemies, all the circumstances of his death again repeat the traditional plots of the khosun epos. Uraanay-bootur dies from a well-aimed shot which fractures his hip. Chempere also dies thus in the khosun legend; an enemy arrow overtakes Chempere while he crosses a river. Mortally wounded, Uraanay, before death, also fords across his native lake, and Bert-khara dies "beyond the river." A special place among the ethnic elements entering into the makeup of the Yakut nationality belongs, further, to the mysterious Khorins (Khoro, Khorolors), who are sharply distinguished from all the other components of the Yakut nationality. Old man Uluu-khoro is considered the ancestor of these Khoro. In one tradition, he is called the elder brother of Omogoy's wife (Priklonskiy 1890-91: 331; Troshchanskiy 1903; 14-15). In other legends, nothing is said of his kinship with Omogoy, and he appears completely independently. In the majority of cases, it is simply said about him that a man by the name of Uluu-khoro arrived from the east on a swift-legged bull, and with him many people and cattle. Attempting to cross the river Aldan on the bull, he did not succeed because of the depth of the river, and therefore called it "Aldan with the filthy smell." According to other traditions, Uluu-khoro foretold that the Aldan would never become shallow. He gave the first names to the Amga and Tatta; about the Tatta, he said solemnly: "A sluggish course in future betokens a multitude of people and cattle; it will be a happy country" ([Bolo n.d., m]). Stopping in the locality of Myuryu, of the Borogon nasleg, Uluu-khoro decided to hold there an ysyakh. But the long-time resident of his place, Bert-khara, lit birchbark and, attaching it to an arrow, shot it into Uluu-khoro's compound. The frightened Uluu-khoro fled to the right bank of the Lena, to present-day Yakutsk, where his descendants, the Khorins, multiplied, and later became dependent on the Kangalasy leader Tygyn. People of the Khoro tribe, from ancient times, also lived in other regions of Yakutia. Besides the Khoro nasleg in West-Kangalasy ulus, there are also naslegs and clans in the Magan nasleg of the same ulus, in the Namy, Bayagantay, Megin, Baturus, Upper Vilyuy, and Suntar uluses, and also in Olekminsk okrug (Pekarskiy 1907-3o: art. 3505). According to the traditions, the Khoro lived also in the Far North, in the basin of the Yana and in the Egin nasleg, below the mouth of the river Bytantay. There was a Khoro aymak also in Kolyma okrug, on the river Alazeya 81 In spite of the fact that the Khoro were sometimes considered people of purely Yakut blood, Yakut folklore testifies to their former ethnic independence, mentioning a special language incomprehensible to other 368

Legends Relating to the Appearance of Yakut Ancestors Yakuts. The saying "Don't speak in Khoro, speak Yakut" is well known, as are tales of some shamans and old men who spoke, supposedly, in a special "Khoro language" (Troshchanskiy 1903; Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 44-45, 3504; Khudyakov 189o: 24). Like the legendary Khara-sagyls, the Khorins were surrounded with an atmosphere of magical power and spells. Their ancestor Uluu-khoro was considered the protector of fire-makers and flints; for striking fire as a means against typhus among the newborn, they called "a man of the Khorin clan, that is, descended from a witch or sorcerer" (Sleptsov 1886; Yastremskiy 1929: 210). Addressing the fire, they said: "Spark, spark, shine, shine, Khorin clan, Khorin clan" (Yastremskiy 1929: 210). The god-totem of the Khorins was the eagle, khotoy, "the root (ancestor) of the eagles" (khotoy tördö), "the deity of the birds" (kötör ayyyta). Often, instead of the eagle-totem, they would say: "the khoro deity;" for example: khoro tarjarallakh kihi khotoyu ölörböt, tyyppat—"a man having the khoro deity as a protector," that is, "bowing to the eagle and honoring him, he does not kill and does not threaten the eagle" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3505). A shaman, having an eagle as his protector, whose spirit the eagle of the upper heaven nourished until the time when he became a shaman, was also called by the Khoro tnarallakh oyuun (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3505; Ionov 1913a: 3, 10) 62 The last and most significant of the component elements of the Yakut nationality about which Yakut folklore testifies is connected with the name Elley or Eldey-bator. Traditions about him are known in many variants. The most complete begins with the tale of how, in "Great Mongolia," the chief Chyrj-khaan had a military leader Tatar-Tayma, in old age blind in both eyes. At that time, a prolonged drought occurred, and all waters and lakes dried up; therefore the local "Urankhays, Mongols, Tatars, and Buryats" had to migrate to other places, rich in water and suitable for settlement. The chief ordered that all young children, and the old who could not stand on their legs and walk without help, be put to death. Horrified at the thought of the murder of his old father, the son Elley hid him in a sack and fled through the waterless countryside. The good old man saved his son with the advice to drag the sack in the morning along the damp grass and, pressing out the moisture, to drink it. They then came to a lake with transparent water, at the bottom of which they saw a young woman of rare beauty. They decided to draw her from the water, and began to send the best men into the lake with ropes, but they died in vain. When it came Elley's turn, old man Tatar-Tayma told him that the woman was not on the bottom of the lake but on a mountain above the lake; only her reflection was seen in the water. The lord of the people wished to possess this woman and ordered Elley to climb the inaccessible mountain to obtain her. At his father's advice, Elley by cunning set the lord himself climbing the mountain, and when he disappeared, all the people dependent on him "straggled wherever they wished, however they like, one after the other." Further along the journey, the father told Elley that ahead lay the rivers 369

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Vilyuy and Lena, where there were many beautiful places at which people and cattle could live and multiply. Finding the upper reaches of the Lena, Elley should have to make a raft, but not yet reaching Kyyllaakh Island, he would have to bury Tatar-Tayma. On Kyyllaakh, and on the way to it, Elley was destined to meet people who "fled from the homeland ages ago and settled there." However, he should not remain with them, but float further, to the locality of Happy Saysara, where there lived a very rich man by the name of Ytyk-Onogoy ("honored and holy" Onogoy). Here he should marry the unloved and unbeautiful daughter of the old man and scorn his beautiful daughter. Then old Tayma ordered Elley to hold the first ysyakh, to invite Onogoy to it, and he prophesied that the latter's cattle would jump to Elley, would go to a remote unknown place and turn into forest spirits. All happened as the old man foretold. Elley became the grandfather of the people, and from him descended the Yakuts of Yakutsk okrug ([Bolo, n.d. l]). According to one of the authors of the most complete and archaic versions of this genealogical saga of the Yakuts, A. A. Pestryakov ([Bolo 1934a]), born in the Second Kurbusakh nasleg, of Ust-Aldan rayon, Elley had six sons: Namylga-Silik, the conjurer, had no children, and flew away to the other world; Khatan-Khatamallay, from whom Khyyr-Khangalas was born, who was the founder of Kangalasy anus; Kharakh-Nal, who sired Taata, the progenitor of the Baturus ulus; Menge-Bekichel, who sired Menge, the progenitor of the Megin ulus; D'uon-D'aangy, the father of Borogoy-Okhkhon, the progenitor of the Borogon and Dyupsin uluses; Langkha-Silik, the ancestor of Namy dim." Thus, according to the legends recorded in the i9th and 20th centuries, the entire process of formation of the Yakut nationality took place on the present territory of their settlement, in the bounds of contemporary Yakutia, on the middle Lena, since the mythical grandfather of the Yakuts, Elley, appears here alone, and only in the happy valley of the Saysara, where Omogoy-bay's people lived, did he have children, who became the ancestors of the six Yakut anuses. There are at the disposal of the historian additional, significantly earlier, and therefore especially interesting folklore materials collected in the 1740s and t75os by a participant in the Academy's Kamchatka Expedition, Lindenau [n.d., a], which considerably expand the circle of our folklore sources and facts on the early history of the Yakuts. The value of these materials is enhanced by the fact that, besides the short notes published by Strahlenberg, they are the first transcriptions and the oldest examples of Yakut historical folklore to come down to us. They were transcribed with a thoroughness and care rare for that time, undoubtedly gathered from the best contemporary experts in the past of the Yakut people, and, judging by their content and characteristics, from Yakut rather than Russian interpreters. In these stories there are almost no "great places," or fantastic details and exaggeration, which saturate the later legends of the rgth and aoth centuries. They are an example of a dry transcription of protocol, a kind 370

Legends Relating to the Appearance of Yakut Ancestors of oral chronicle, belonging in a number of cases to contemporaries and eyewitnesses of the events described. Lindenau's data paint a new picture, from the point of view of the prevailing conceptions of the past of the Yakuts before the arrival of the Russians on the Lena. "As concerns the (former) settlements of the Yakuts," Lindenau writes, "I encountered (their) ancient fortress on the 26th of September 1745, at the time of my journey on Dalay or Baykal-lake. They also had a place on the high and even right bank of the Lena below the village of Kachegi (Kachega). This place was called by the Russians Yakutskoy Zvoz, and by the Buryats and Yakuts `Kobuoluur' "Kobuoluur," Lindenau explains further, "means in Yakut `he quarrels,' or `he shouts at me'; in Buryat, on the other hand, this word has no meaning. The word kobuoluur actually exists to this day among the Yakuts in this sense. "The first clan and its leader," Lindenau continued, "which had its place in the aforementioned locality, was called Omogoy—a man from the Batulu clan; he had no heirs whatever, but took a girl from his own clan, whom he met and chose as his heir. When she grew up, there came to him one runaway, by name Er-Sogotokh, or, as he was also called, Elley, or Elley-bator. Omogoy gave him his adopted daughter, by whom Elley had eight sons and four daughters." The names of the sons of Elley-bator were: Antantyuik,e5 Barkutay, the twins Kordoy and Kogosuk,88 Bolotoy, Katamalay, Cheriktey, and Artbuday. "From them, in the course of time, descended various clans—a multitude of people distributed on Lake Dalay, which they called Baykal" (Lindenau, MS, n.d., a: 1-to). Omogoy himself, according to Lindenau, was descended from the Batulu clan; but his clan bore the name of a certain woman, Eng-Elsa-Elai; the son of the latter, from whom the Namy clan descended, was called Bulgudyalgu;6T his son Dekhsi-darkhan, in the course of time, became the leader. The Kangalasy clan descended from Antantyuik, the Borogon clan from Barkutay and Cheriktey, the Bayagantay from the twins Kordoy and Kogosuk, the Menge from Bolotoy, and the Khataly (Khatyly) or Buturus clan from Katamalday. In the fur-tax registers, these main clans (haupt stämme), Lindenau says, were set up as Namy, Kangalasy, Borogon, Megin, Bayagantay, and Baturus volosts. In Tygyn's time, to them were added still other volosts: to the Namy—Meik, Lechni, Edugei, and Tagus; to the Kangalasy—the Khorins or Koro (Khoro), who honored the crow in distinction to the others, the Kharins, the Bertyukh, Nirukhtay (Neryuktey), Nakhara, Dzharkhanskaya, and Bordonskaya; to the Borogon—Cherikte, Bertyukh; to the Baturus—the Dzhoksogon, Balagur (Bologur), Betun, and Orgety, who are now called Skraulnaya (Skoroulskaya), and the Mangarasskaya (cf. Tokarev 1945: 389-92) "The eight Yakut clans," Lindenau continues, "living around Baykal and the surrounding steppes, had uninterrupted clashes with the Kyrgyz, or as some sources say, with the Mungals. "Their leader was then Antantyuik, and after him, his son toyon 371

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Badzhey °8 Since as a result of these clashes the Yakuts were seriously weakened and could no longer oppose their enemies, toyon Badzhey, with his fellow tribesmen (tribuus), went away from the hill Kyubyulyur down along the Lena, which departure is confirmed also by the Buryats. Going away from the upper Lena, toyon Badzhey came to the locality where Yakutsk now stands, settled there, and resettled, in various places, others of his clansmen. "Badzhey had four wives, to one of whom, by name Kangalass, was born a son, named Mundzhan-darkhan who, on his father's death, inherited his position. Mundzhanß° had three wives—Diergan (Dzharkhan), Bologoy, and a third from the Menge clan. From Dzharkhan, he had two sons, Kadzhaga and Dedudor; from Bologoy, the sons were Kudzhe, Tyumerey, Ite-Kan, and Oko, and, finally, Tygyn (Tugin)" (Lindenau, MS., n.d., a: I-ro). Thus, from Lindenau's materials, it follows that the saga of Elley and Omogoy-bay was known to him, but the latter supposedly lived not in contemporary Yakutia, but on the upper Lena, near present-day Kachug, Omogoy being from the Batulu clan.i0 It follows further that the descendants of Omogoy and Elley, as eight main Yakut clans, were distributed over the territory of the Cis-Baykal, along the shores of Lake Baykal and in the neighboring steppes, until, under pressure from enemies, the Buryats or Kyrgyz, they were compelled to leave the native places, and they fled down the Lena to the north. The legend of Elley and Omogoy-bay undoubtedly has, as its base, a number of ancient mythological plots skillfully woven together, which later united around the personality of the legendary forebearer, the clan ancestor of the Yakuts. Such tales of the hero-forebearer, of the son of heaven persecuted by enemies, of his killing the impious enemy deity (sometimes the father), of how the ancient custom of killing off old men was abolished, and others are not only Middle Asian but also, in part, plots universal in their distribution. Apparently, with this complicated mythological complex were united other legends, which have not come down to us, of the sons of Elley, the grandfathers of separate uluses. It is quite possible that, earlier, they had an independent character similar to that of the legends about Uluu-khoro, about the grandfathers of the Sylans, about Keltegey-Tobuk or Bayagantaydarkhan, but in the course of the merging of separate clan groups, they united around the personality of the mythical god-hero Elley Ayyy, and then completely disappeared from the memory of the people. That the process of such a convergence of myths was not fully completed even in the rgth and loth centuries may be judged from the numerous variants of the saga of Elley and Omogoy, and from the discrepancies in the genealogies, where, for example, even the father of Elley is variously named (Tatar-Tayma in some cases, Khayarang in others). Nevertheless, a similar and already far-advanced consolidation of tribal legends, and the beginning of a single summary variant of the genealogical saga of the Yakuts, is an indisputable fact, testifying to the existence, at the beginning 372

Legends Relating to the Appearance of Yakut Ancestors of the 19th century and even earlier than this, of an idea of kinship and tribal unity of all the principal tiluses. The special popularity and wide distribution of this summary saga among the Kangalasy, as well as the fact that, among them, the saga is connected first of all with the personality of the semi-legendary leader of the 17th century, Tygyn, as a direct descendant of Elley, lead us to suppose that the dominating role belonged to the Kangalasy in the creation of a summary genealogical saga, and in the origination of this ethnic whole, the Yakut nationality, which found its expression in the mythological form. But when, where, and in what circumstances did this supposed process proceed? Before attempting an answer, we must review the facts which may in some measure illumine the past of each of the basic parts which subsequently formed the contemporary Yakut nationality. One of these, as we have already noted, was indisputably connected with the territory of Yakutia and with its native population, as testified to by the northern elements in the culture of the Yakut people. Some clan groups of forest hunters and fishermen, of the eastern and northern regions of Yakutia, such as the Sylans, the Borogons, perhaps the Namy and other Yakut clans and naslegs, which the other Yakuts consider the descendants of the legendary Omogoy, must be the possessors of these northern elements. They could have been like the Tungus (Tumats) or the Yukagirs, or even representatives of some other subsequently vanished northern tribe like the mysterious Sortols and Khara-Sagyls. Yet, even in the 18th century, there did not remain among them traces of the original tribal languages, and the Yakut language prevailed everywhere. From the second ethnic group, nothing remained beyond the names and fragmentary traditions. Reference is to the pastoral "Kyrgyz" who, according to the traditions, preceded the Yakuts on the middle Lena. In them, the Yakuts must have encountered the last representatives of some very ancient, probably Turkic-speaking, pastoral population, who melted into the Yakut mass without trace. The accounts probably reflect the actual existence of an ancient pastoral tribe. Material proof is furnished, as was mentioned earlier, by the runic inscription at the village of Petrovskoye, near Sinskoye. In its turn, the designation of these ancient Yakutian pastoralists as "Kyrgyz" is nothing unusual or extreme in Yakut historical folklore. The latter often mentions the country and tribe of the Kyrgyz in connection with the names of Elley and Omogoy-bay, who are sometimes said to derive from it. Moreover, the folklore evidence in this case is supported by indications from written sources and by archaeological data, from which it appears that the Kurykans and their neighbors were for many centuries in contact with the Yenisey region—the Kyrgyz country. Concerning the origin of the third component of the modern Yakut nation, which was preserved in it as separate enclaves, the Khorolors [Khoro, Khorins], the folklore evidence yields more definite indications. Khoro-sire, the homeland of the Khoro, was, according to Yakut views, located in the south, in the warm country from which the birds come 373

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flying to Yakutia. This is reflected in Yakut riddles: "The Khoronoy daughter says, `I would like to go to the south (smoke).'" Or, another: "The Khoro maiden has gone to China (smoke is coming out of the chimney)" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3504; Khudyakov 189o: 44). In this southern country dwell camels, khoro tebien; hence came the ornaments of sequins and pearls, khoro chopchu simekh (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3504). Judging by the riddle cited above, the Khoro country was close to China. It may have adjoined the country of the ancient Kidaneans, since occasionally, in the legends of the Ust-Yansk and Verkhoyansk uluses, the country of "Kytat" corresponds to it. Various investigators have repeatedly identified the Khorolors of Yakutia with the Khori-Buryats of the TransBaykal (Shchukin 1844: 273; Aristov 1896: 335; Troshchanskiy 1903: 15-17), who, in their turn, blend with the ancient tribe of the Khori, of whom Rashid-ad-din wrote that it lived with the tribes of the Bargut, Tulas, Tumet [Tumat], and Uryankhit "on the other side of the Selenga, at the edge of the places and land occupied by the Mongols," in the region of Bargudzhin-tukum (Rashid ad-din 1858 edition: 87, 92, 141).• Further, it is entirely possible that these Trans-Baykal Khori, as inhabitants of Bargudzhin-tukum, are to some degree descendants of the Turkicspeaking Kuri or Furi, that is, the Kurykans, who remained at their previous place, not far from the Kidanean country, from the 12th to 16th centuries, but fell under the strong influence of the Mongol tribes and were, as a consequence, completely Mongolized. The next component of the Yakut nation may be designated, as we have seen, as "descendants of Omogoy-bay." At the same time, we may see, in it, the primary bearers of the second component element, known from the archaic epic designation of the Yakuts, Uraaij-khay-sakha. According to the Buryat traditions, the predecessors of the Buryats had ties with the Uryankhays, who lived in the Sayan Mountains. It is remarkable, therefore, that the Yakut legend about the progenitor of the Lena Uryankhays, Omogoy-bay, reveals a striking similarity with the traditions about the origin of the now-Mongolized Darkhat Türks. The Buryats call them Uryankhays, "Urankha." The latter, like the Uryankhays (that is, Tuvins) employ the self-designation Uygur ("Uhar-Uyhar" among the Oka Buryats). These former "Uygur" Türks have a tradition that a certain rich steppe-dweller begot a quarrelsome son, whom the father afterwards banished. The son left, having stolen from him a black-dappled horse, after dyeing it to an apple color. For this the father put a curse on him preventing him to have issue (Sanzheyev 1930: 2-3). In exactly the same way, Omogoy-bay leaves his homeland, and afterwards feels the weight of the curse of the conjurer Namylg Silik, and retains no issue. His favorite daughter commits suicide; his sons run away to the * [Rashid-ad-din (5247-5358), eminent historian and political figure of the Ilkhan state (the Mongolian rulers of Persia and the Trans-Caucasus), was for twenty years the effective head of government under Gazan-khan. He was known particularly for his "collection of chronicles" which were, in effect, a description of all the nations known to him—from the "Franks" of western Europe to the Chinese. His writings are an invaluable source for the early history of the Mongols. Editor, A.t.N.A.]

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Legends Relating to the Appearance of Yakut Ancestors forest. In the saga about Omogoy-bay, we even find the stolen animals, which, however, are stolen not by Omogoy but by tile)/ from Omogoy; we also find the animal of brindled color, which Omogoy-bay gives to Elley. Thus, the legend about Omogoy-bay constitutes an exact copy of the basic elements of the Darkhat (Sayan Uryankhay or Uygur) genealogical saga. The coincidence of the Darkhat legends with the Yakut legends about Omogoy-bay must be regarded as an indication of a real connection of the latter with the other Turkic tribes of the Sayan Mountains and of the regions of Siberia and Mongolia adjacent to them; these tribes were known under the name of "forest Uryankhits" (Oyn-Uryankhit) as early as Rashid-ad-din's time, and as "Orengays" to Rubruck (Rashid-ad-din 1858: 86; Rubruck 1911 edition: 134). As far as the latter are concerned, the Sayan Uryankhays appear in Buryat and Mongol folklore as forest reindeer-breeders, and still more frequently as hunters and fishermen, sailing in birchbark boats and living on fish. According to the Buryat belief, the left rein of the water gods (Ukhankhats) is held by an Uryankhay—the shaman "who dives under the water" —from the Khulmenge tribe. Another text of the shamanistic invocation mentions "the Uryankhays who speak an incomprehensible language," who came sailing on thirteen birchbark boats and then were drowned (Agapitov and Khangalov 1883: 13, 1 4, 33) . In the legend of the origin of the ongon [deity] Anadabar, it is said that he went to the north, where the Uryankhays fed him with the heads of salmon trout (Potanin 1883: 114). In trying to explain the original meaning of the term "Uryankhit" or "Orengay," some investigators have derived it from the word oron, "reindeer," as the designation "reindeer-person." The connection of the Uryankhays of the Buryat legends (cf. also the Yakut urannykan, "little old man," "fisherman," "river dweller") with the element of water, and with fishing, indicates another and more probable alternative explanation of the word Uryankhay. It coincides entirely, according to Castren's data, with the Ket word uryankhit, "watery (river) person," and with the term for river among the Yakuts, yuryakh (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3163). It is therefore entirely possible that the term uryankhit was originally the self-designation of some ancient forest tribe related to the Kets, that is, of "Paleo-Asiatic" stock, living in the Sayan-Altay region, and carrying on hunting and fishing. Later, this tribe divided into parts which were assimilated, and which entered into the makeup of Turkic and Mongol tribes, including the Yakuts, the result being that the Uryankhays lost their original language and culture. With this loss, the Sayan-Uryankhays apparently forgot their ancient selfdesignation which, however, was retained by their steppe neighbors for them in the meaning of backward forest dwellers, adding to the name a negative, derogatory shading. To the contrary, their kinsmen, the Lena Uryankhays, kept the autonym with the nuance of "the bold one," "the dare-devil," "the hero." The idea of the kinship of the Yakuts with the "Uryankhays" of the Sayan Upland and their flight thence to the Lena was first expressed as 375

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early as the first half of the 19th century by a member of the East Siberian division of the Russian Geographical Society, Sychevskiy. He confirmed, as quoted by Selskiy, that "the Yakuts are fellow-tribesmen to the Uryankhays, and that they first went away from the mountain areas of the Tannu to the banks of the Lena as a consequence of internecine war" (Selskiy 1858). On the basis of Rashid-ad-din's mention of the forest Uryankhays of the 12th-14th centuries, they were seen by V. Radlov as the ancestors of the Yakuts-Uryankhays (Radlov 1908). In the language of the Yakuts, as noted above, there are definite evidences of a familiarity of at least part of the southern ancestors of the Yakuts with reindeer-breeding. It is also possible that the Uryankhays of antiquity, being neighbors of the nomadic tribes of Mongolia, early experienced the influence of the Mongols, and appeared on the middle Lena already in significant degree Mongolized, which explains that great quantity of Mongol elements in the Yakut lexicon and also the profound ties of the Yakuts with the Mongols in all the remaining fields of culture. The last and most important component part of the Yakut people, from the point of view of ethnogenesis, as we have noted more than once above, is perhaps in conjunction with the historical traditions naming "the people of Elley," and, in later times, "the people of Tygyn." These are the Kangalasy clans. They must have been the main bearers of those southern cultural elements, including Turkic speech, which firmly determined the basic character of the later Yakut culture. The question remains of the time to which one should attribute the appearance on the middle Lena of the last southern ancestors of the Yakuts—"the people of Elley." Lindenau's data seems to indicate it quite exactly. The Yakuts, he says, fled from the Kyubyulyur Mountain below Kachug only two generations before Tygyn. Only Tygyn himself, and his father Mundzhan (the Munn'an-darkhan of Yakut traditions), were born in Yakutia; Tygyn's grandfather was born and grew up somewhere near the shores of Lake Baykal, on the upper Lena, and, as a result, being the leader of his tribe, left the Cis-Baykal. At the time of the arrival of the Russians in the 163os, Tygyn, according to the Yakut traditions, had reached a great age. Judging from this, a large part of his life was spent in the 16th century. The activity of Tygyn's father, consequently, falls completely within the Ibth century. Tygyn's grandfather, Badzhey, must have lived, most probably, at the beginning of the i6th century or at the end of the 15th century. Hence it follows that the advance of the Yakuts from the upper reaches of the Lena to the north, with toyon Badzhey at the head, took place approximately at the beginning of the i6th century. The traditions Lindenau collected are supported by other folklore sources, including both later and earlier ones, the earlier ones being especially valuable. Such is the information provided by N. Witsen in his Nord en Oost Tartaryen ("Description of the North and East of Tataria"), written at the end of the 17th century. Of Yakutsk and the Yakuts, Witsen wrote: "In former times, in the forests around Yakutsk, lived aliens, 376

Legends Relating to the Appearance of Yakut Ancestors who arrived from Kazimot (Kasimot), and who were called Kazimotets [sg.] (kasimotiensis), along with a rather large quantity of Yakuts. They remained with the Korats (korati), and after some time attacked the Buryats, took away their cattle and all equipment, killed many, and took the rest into slavery. After this, the Yakuts fled, leaving their dwellings, and stopped at the sources of the Lena, and then, travelling along the river, reached the territory of the Tungus. There they settled in the fields [open country] in a permanent settlement, while the Tungus remained living in the forests" (Witsen 1705). All this took place, in Witsen's words, "more than two hundred years ago"; that is, also approximately at the end of the 15th and the beginning of the 16th century. Witsen transmits here, apparently, the content of some Yakut legends of the resettlement of Yakut ancestors. The legends existed in the 17th century and, consequently, represent the earliest folklore information of this time that has survived to our day. Like much other information received by Witsen from Russian sources, these data are to some degree distorted in his rendering. It is quite apparent that, in the beginning, the tradition relates not to forests which are "around Yakutsk," but to some other country, whence the ancestors of the Yakuts went away to the upper Lena, in order then to travel down that river. But the fact of a clash of the ancestors of the Yakuts with the Buryats, noted here, is quite definite. The conflict of the ancestors of the Yakuts with the Buryats is confirmed, as Lindenau himself noted in his time, by parallel Buryat folklore data, in which there was, to the end of the 19th century, fresh recollection of comparatively recent clashes with the Yakuts, and even of the latter's flight to the north along the Lena. In the traditions of the western Buryats, as the Buryat ethnographer-folklorists confirm, "to this day we may encounter reminiscences of the Yakuts, who lived on the Buryat territory until the arrival of the Buryats" (Baldunnikov 1928: 33) • M. P. Ovchinnikov, in summarizing all the legends heard by him, wrote that, under "Olot-khan, the third in line after Chingis [Genghis] Khan, there took place internecine wars, since Olot-khan collected taxes twice in a year and took a quantity of warriors, old men, and adolescents. Under this khan, many tribes taking advantage of the disorders separated, and migrated from the old places." The Buryats and Yakuts belonged among the number of those who departed: "The Yakuts went to the north across the Sayans, along the rivers Oka, Belaya, Kitoy, Yenisey (?), and Irkut. Coming to the Angara and Baykal, they went along the Kuda River into the Verkholensk steppe. In this steppe, the Yakuts forged iron objects. The Buryats encountered the Yakuts here in places where there are now Buryat uluses, and pressed them to the north." The resettlement of the Buryats and the ousting of the Yakuts by them, as a lama of the Kyrensk datsan* told Ovchinnikov in 1906, was supposed to have happened 683 years ago. In the lama's words, the clashes came about because of the use of pastures, since both peoples were pastoralists (Ovchinnikov 1916: 15-16). Leaving aside the chronology and details of these tales, the basic fact—the clash of the Buryats with the Yakuts—must apparently be considered real. " [A

Lamaist place of worship. Editor, A.I.N.A.]

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The Olkhon Buryats also relate that, in the mountains of KharaKhoshun and Dain-Khoshun, where there are stone defensive works in the form of walls, "the Yakuts fought with the Mongols" (Khoroshikh 1924: 3o). The inhabitants of Kurtun settlement in the Olkhon region ascribe to the Yakuts the ancient cliff drawing on the wall of a small cave, executed in red dye, and apparently depicting a shaman's drum (Khoroshikh 1924: 38). Analogous traditions exist among the Buryats also on the other side of Baykal, in the region of the Barguzin [River]. In one of the local Buryat traditions of the struggle of the Buryats with the Yakuts, transcribed in the 18th century on the Lena, there seems to be direct confirmation of Lindenau's story of the departure of the Yakuts from Kachug, from the mountain of Kyubyulyur. An associate of the Academy of Sciences, I. Islenyev, who was travelling in the 176os along the Lena to Yakutsk to carry out astronomical observations, wrote in his diary that "six versts from Kachug, on the right side of the Lena River, on the mountain, is a height, called Kurt, about which the inhabitants say that the Yakuts took refuge on it from the Buryats" (Islenyev 1788). The local inhabitants could receive such information, of course, only from their neighbors, the Buryats. The author of a description of Irkutsk guberniya, remarkable for its carefulness and thoroughness, Anton Losev, also wrote of the Yakuts, in 1805, this time in their own words: "The first known chief over them, Omogoy-bay, who with his family was chased from his places by force of arms, resettled first on the upper Lena, where, being pressed by Buryats, floated down the Lena and stopped where Yakutsk is. This Omogoy, however, was attacked by the Buryats while floating down the Lena, with the intention of exterminating his whole clan; but, fortunately for him, the Buryats were awaiting the waning of the new moon. In the meantime, he, using the slowness of his enemies, crossed over the mountain in the dark of night, transported his cattle, and floated on a raft on the Lena" (Losev, MS., n.d.; leaves 158, 159)?' The elevation on the right side of the Lena near Kachug, of which Islenyev writes, is undoubtedly that very "mountain" across which Omogoy-bay escaped at night in Losev's story. This is the same "Yakutskoy Vvoz [Ascent]" or, in Yakut, "Kyubyulyur Mountain" which was mentioned in Lindenau's report. Moreover, this locality, in a remarkable way, still preserved in Islenyev's time its non-Russian name "Kurt," that is, "Surt" (in Yakut, "the place of the camp," "pasture," "summer pasture," `old homestead"), remaining as graphic evidence of the Yakuts who previously lived there.72 In the 18th century, the village of Vzvoznaya (now the village of Makarovo) was located there. Lindenau's information about the time of resettlement of the Yakuts in the north is also in agreement with other sources, in this case with the Yakut genealogies of the 19th century. In one of the most complete variants of the genealogy of the Kangalasy ulus, transcribed at the end of the 19th century by a Yakut from the Sottinsk nasleg of the WestKangalasy ulus, Sawa Sleptsov, it is said of the origin of the Yakuts: "The Kangalasy alas originated from the Tatar in the following way. At 378

Legends Relating to the Appearance of Yakut Ancestors the time of the vanquishing of the Tatars by the most famous of fighters, Yermak Timofeyev, and the subjugation to the all-Russian throne of the captured Tatars under Shuri-khan, the son of the ruler, called Eldey, went away from his fatherland and floated down the river Lena on rafts, reached a pastoralist named Omogoy, from the Buryats who had, with his family, arrived hence before him, no one knows how many years before. Further, it is said that Elley [sic] was accepted by Omogoy as his born son and married his daughter, and from them descended: EkinAbagan, Dekhsi, Khogosun, Doydusa-darkhan, Munnyan, and Tygynthe ruler of the Yakuts, under whom there was a battle with the Russians" (Bobo 1937). In another variant of the genealogy of the Kangalasy ulus, written on a stone grave-marker in memory of an inhabitant of Khakhsyt [Khakhsyk] nasleg, Shadrin, the following genealogical scheme is represented. "In the year 1574, under tsar Ioann Vasilyevich Grozin, Elyay begat: (1) Kyuaban. (2) Khordokogosun. (3) Doydusa darkhan. (4) Munyan. (5) Tygyn, 1660, in the time of tsar Aleksey Mikhailovich. (6) Chemchon.78 (7) Tyuryuney. (8) Uta. (9) Tyasa. (to) Motun. (ii) In 1770 in holy baptism given the name of Pavala Shchadr. (12) Aleksey Shchadr. (13) Galaktion Shadr. (14) Ionn Shchadr. (15) Branch descended from Elyay." This monument, as is evident from the continuation of the inscription, was set up in 1887, on the grave of Ivan Galaktionovich Shadrin, born in 1808, died in October 1886.7' The placing, in both variants of the Kangalasy genealogies—Sleptsov's and Shadrin's—of the legendary progenitor Elley or Eldey in the time of Ivan the Terrible, that is, in the 16th century, is undoubtedly a result of later acquaintance of the Yakuts with Russian folklore, but there may be some substance to it. Other legends tie the departure of the ancestors of the Yakuts from the Cis-Baykal with the battles of Chingis [Genghis] Khan. Thus, the tradition heard by M. P. Ovchinnikov from the Olekminsk Yakuts relates that their ancestors arrived from the Barabinsk steppes in the upper reaches of the Yenisey, thence went beyond Lake Baykal. The Yakuts moved away from [the Trans-]Baykal as a consequence of their oppression by Chingis-khan. They were supposed to comprise one of Chingis-khan's leading detachments, and Chingis-khan "always used them, without pity, in time of battle, in the front ranks, whence the Yakuts were decimated in number; having a premonition that, if their extermination went on as fast as that, they would all be killed, they went away to the north, leaving Chingis-khan and the present-day Trans-Baykal oblast" (Ovchinnikov 1897: 15o) 75 This last version of Chingis-khan gave some investigators the basis for relating the resettlement of the Yakuts' ancestors on the middle Lena to the x3th century. The legendary information and genealogies transcribed by Lindenau, as we have seen, give another more exact and more probable chronological outline. Comparing the clans of the Yakut heroes according to folklore materials of the 19th century and to Lindenau's data, one is convinced 379

EARLY HISTORY OF YAKUT NATIONALITY

that, in spite of the different names (besides Elley himself, Munn'an and Tygyn), they differ little from each other. Thus, if we adopt for a base the general chronology and sequence of the events of the pre-Russian history of the Yakuts, as recorded in Lindenau's work, and as confirmed by the analysis of later folklore data, we see that, in any case, the basic part of those considering themselves descendams of Elley came from the upper Lena in comparatively recent times, two, or at the very most four, generations before Tygyn, that is, some time in the first half of the 16th century or at the end of the tsth century. These were mainly the Kangalasy and other clans closely related to them, like the Nakhara of Yakut legends. The Namy and Bayagantay—the closest descendants of Omogoy—moved along with them at the same time, or somewhat earlier, as an independent group under the leadership of Dekhsi-darkhan or Depsi-darkhan-tegin. It is quite possible that reconnoitering sojourns, like that of KharaTyumen of the Vilyuy legends, preceded their [the Yakuts'] movement to the north, and the very process of resettlement was not accomplished in one step, but proceeded in successive stages, from one locality to another. Judging by the legends, in the process of moving to the north part of the migrants settled near the Olekma River, and part went into the basin of the Vilyuy River, and from it to the Lena, along which they moved northward. Gradually mastering the valley of the Lena and its tributaries, the newcomers crowded out and, in part, assimilated the polyglot inhabitants of the country, among whom were pastoral groups who had penetrated here very long ago. Judging from Yakut traditions and archaeological data, these could have been Turkic tribes who sprang from kinsmen and neighbors of the Kurykans, who left written relics of their language and beliefs on the Lena cliffs at Pisanyy [Inscription] Island, near the village of Davydovo, and at Petrovskoye. All this cannot, for the present, be based fully on, and supported by, details with any other more exact and firm documentary evidence than folklore data. But the general course of the long process of resettlement of the southern ancestors of the Yakuts in the north, which basically falls into two decisive stages—the first finishing around the Loth—ttth centuries A.D., and the second a hundred to a hundred and fifty years before the arrival of the Russians on the Lena, as well as the shaping, as a result of these events, of the complex composition of the later Yakut nationality— is drawn clearly and sharply enough from the data adduced above.

380

SECTION THREE THE YAKUTS ON THE MIDDLE LENA BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

The Economy and Way of Life of the Ancient Yakuts

Chapter 1

Until the arrival of the southern newcomers, there lived, over the course of thousands of years on the territory of present-day Yakutia, various tribes and peoples. These tribes, the ancestors of the later Yukagirs-Oduls, Chukchis-Luoravetlans, Koryaks-Nymylans, Eskimos-Yuits, LamutsEvens, and Tungus-Evenkis, and also, apparently, those tribes, languages, and designations which have not come down to us, in the eyes of the ancient Yakuts were the indisputable first settlers of their new homeland, and they called them, therefore, olokhtookh, kyrd'agas, teryt yallar, "locals," `old ones," "native inhabitant".[...] Some of the tribes of the Far North still remained on the level of the Stone Age in the i8th century. As before, they continued to use stone axes, daggers, scrapers, spearheads, and arrowheads. Among them, iron was, even in the beginning of the i8th century, exceptionally rare. The Eskimos, Aleuts, Koryaks, and Chukchis also were on this level. Others passed early through the Bronze Age and entered the Iron Age. However, even these latter continued for a very long time to use stone and hone tools and weapons, along with metallic ones. While in southern Siberia, beyond Lake Baykal and in the fertile valleys of the Cis-Baykal, many tribes, having passed over to agriculture and pastoralism, entered into a stage of class differentiation, in the northern taiga and tundra, hunters of the reindeer and the elk roamed as before.[...] The single exception was the reindeer-herding tribes, but how early and how widely reindeer herding was disseminated in antiquity remains unknown. It is, therefore, difficult to evaluate the importance of the new events which were connected with the appearance of pastoralists from the Cis-Baykal in the second millennium A.D. The forced migration to the distant cold north, under the pressure of cruel necessity, under the attacks and blows of hostile tribes or of the troops of the terrible emperor, yraakhtaayy, of which the epics tell, was a great misfortune for the refugees. This is how it is evaluated by the Yakut people themselves, who contrast the mythical southern land, their former homeland, where "the sun never set, the moon never waned, the cuckoos never ceased cuckooing, the grass did not yellow, the trees were never 381

YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

felled, and the white storks never flew away," with the present country of the Yakuts, "with its falling, impermanent forests, with its short-lived people, with its late-bearing cattle, with burning frost blazing, with crackling frost burning, with eternal snowstorms and repulsive slush, with a whip of sharp wind, a country under the spell of sharp frosts and fogs" (Yastremskiy 1929: 56). Finding themselves in the north, the southern newcomers quickly dropped their agricultural practices and lost their herds. The ties with the progressive countries formerly to the east and west of them were cut. While still on the journey to the plains of Tuymaada, a legend relates, Elley lost his "letters." And, in fact, they must have existed among the new settlers only a short time; otherwise, there would have been found more than the single insciption mentioned earlier. But, even in these difficult conditions, the ancestors of the Yakuts were able to preserve a quantity of their previous cultural property, in particular cattle and horses. Having done so, the ancient Yakuts, incomparably more fully and with more variety than their predecessors and neighbors, mastered the vast expanses of the north, widely diffused in them a new economic system, and were the bearers of a higher culture, progressive for the time and conditions. They were able to preserve and even to develop further their most valuable possessions—their eloquent, versatile language, an amazing epos, and a peculiar art, including elements of a typical steppe ornamentation (spirals, plant decoration, decorations in the form of a "ram's horn"; Fig. 78) . Subjecting various neighboring tribes to their influence, mixing with them, soaking up, swallowing up, and dissolving them in their mass, the southern ancestors of the Yakuts at the same time adopted much of the northern culture which had developed over a course of millennia [...]. As to how the Yakuts lived before the arrival of the Russians, we may judge not only by folklore but also by archaeological data, which depict the way of life of the two main branches of the Yakut people: the "descendants of Elley," the southern pastoral Yakuts, and "the descendants of Omogoy-bay," the northern hunting and fishing Yakuts. We are already acquainted with the life of the latter. It remains to indicate how their southern neighbors lived some hundred or two hundred years before the arrival of the Russians. The relics of the life of this group are primarily the kyrgys-ötökh, that is, the remains of dwellings from the time of the internecine wars, before the arrival of the Russians, which have been studied in the valleys of the Markha and Markhachan rivers, and in some other places. All of them are situated in the forest, near brooks and lakes rich in fish, and in places provided with meadows convenient for the pasturing of stock and the gathering of hay. Remains of such dwellings constitute rectangular areas of up to forty square meters, surrounded on three sides by ramparts. On the outside of the ramparts were the pits from which the earth for the roof and walls was taken. Their excavation has shown that these structures are the remains of ancient dwellings, which were put up on a carefully chosen dry and elevated place near the mouth of a river, or near a lake. The 382

Economy and Way of Life

Fig. 78. Sample of steppe decoration ("ram's horn"). Carrying bag from an i 8th-century burial. floor of the dwelling was flat, on a level with the surface, and rectangular in outline. The wooden frame of the house consisted of posts and beams serving as support for slanting stakes or boards from which the inwardsloping walls of the house were built. The roof was probably gabled. From the outside, the dwelling had the shape of a truncated four-sided pyramid. Inside it was placed a hearth smeared with clay. The kyrgys-ötökh is similar in all its essential features to the well-known sakha-balagan, the characteristic Yakut dwelling. This ancient structure was probably not so different from the old-fashioned Yakut balagan-yurt, which was so vividly described at the end of the rgth century by V. Troshchanskiy: "Thus I see before myself a truncated four-sided pyramid of a brown color, four arshins high, with rounded corners and a spreading foundation, with a slightly convex earthen roof, plastered at the edges with a low border of manure, with a slanting, twisting chimney made of stakes tied together with rose-willow switches and smeared on the inside with clay" (Troshchanskiy 1908: 339) The only unusual thing in the kyrgys-ötökh is the earthen wall: such walls are not found in the later Yakut dwellings in the South. The square and rectangular pits adjoining the walls on the outside are also absent. The presence of earthen walls surrounding the older structure may be 383

YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

explained by the construction of [hollow] earthen pediments for heating the building during the winter (Troshchanskiy 1908: 339). According to Troshchanskiy, the custom, prevailing in the 19th century, of plastering Yakut balagans with manure was relatively recent. In former times, they were always faced or covered with turf or dirt. Troshchanskiy's opinion is confirmed by the testimony of 18th century travellers. G. F. Miller wrote: "The said Yakuts nourish themselves with cattle and horses, in which they take great pleasure, and live in the winter in yurts piled with earth, and in the summer in birchbark yurts" (Miller 1761: 400). Islenyev saw in Yakutsk, among the local Yakuts, the same sort of wood-and-earth structures: "Their buildings are everywhere the same: the walls are made of boards standing in two rows, and between them earth is packed. The outer row of boards is smeared with clay by some, and above this, for warmth, they lay sod. In each wall they make one small window, and in place of window frames they put gut or, in winter, ice. In the middle of the yurt, in place of a stove, they make a hearth, which in Siberia is called chuval" (Islenyev 1788). Or, in the folk tales, it is mentioned, as if by the Tungus: "they know a people, the Yakuts, who pile their yurts with earth—buor sakhalary kihi biler" (Khudyakov 1890: 68). In the story about the "forefathers of the Yakuts," the Khoro, we find mentioned the pits beside the houses, from which material for the covering of the balagan was taken; when the Khorolor hero Bata-batyr was surrounded by three rows of $gins, "he jumped through all of them, and fell into the pit from which they took earth to cover the yurt" (Khudyakov 189o: 57). Not only the walls but also the roof was covered with earth. In this case, the ancient Yakut balagan looked just like "a mound of brown potter's clay; that is, the earthen house in which dwelt, according to the olonkho, the forefather of nine smiths, Duodarbo the Destroyer, the Black Smith.i6 The old-fashioned Yakut balagan, of the type described, therefore approximates the wood-and-earth dwellings of the chum -kholomo type, in which the northern Yakuts live to this day; it represents the stage following the kholomo in the evolution of the Yakut dwelling, and precedes, in its turn, the contemporary balagan, which is plastered in winter with cow manure. The transition from the covering of the balagan walls with sod, as in the kholomo, to the plastering of them with cow manure thus led to the disappearance of dwellings of the kyrgys-ötökh type. For the same reason, the remains of houses evident because of earthworks ceased to be encountered. This was the case at least for the northern regions, and, in general, in places where the raising of cattle was hindered by natural conditions; for example, the taiga valley of the Chona. Old men relate that the Yakuts on the Chona built such balagans in remote antiquity, "when there were no cows," and it was therefore necessary to face them with sod, or to pile earth on them. In analyzing the archaeological materials, we may, in part, reconstruct some of the prominent features of daily life of the population which left them. Ancient dwellings of the kyrgys-ötökh type were located separately or in pairs, near lakes or at the mouths of small rivers, and were separated 384

Economy and Way of Life from one another by considerable distances. The settlement pattern of the Yakuts in later times was the same. That animal husbandry was the major occupation of the local population at that time is indicated by the bones of horses found in the culture-yielding stratum. The bones of reindeer appearing in a dwelling on the Bes-yuryakh [River] are of interest. It may be that domestic reindeer were kept here, but it cannot be excluded that these hones belonged to wild reindeer. Hunting in general had great importance in the economy of the local population, and even at the present the taiga abounds with elk, bear, and various fur-bearing animals. Many fish live in the taiga rivers, especially pike and burbot. The bones of large fish, which were found in the Bes-yuryakh, show that its inhabitants regularly occupied themselves with fishing. Not without interest are the facts that, close to the ancient dwelling on the Markha, near the village of Sayylyk, there is a pine grove, and the very name of the river where the second dwelling was found is Besyuryakh, that is, "Pine River." The economic significance of the pine in the life of the Yakut population of the recent past is well known. Maak told of this very graphically, by stating that the appearance of pines is a true herald of the nearness of Yakut settlements. "The Yakut can only settle within reach of the pine, the sap-wood of which serves him as a surrogate for flour; and he mixes it with the everyday food of milk and fish. That is why the encounter with pines gladdened us all, and the Tungus guide, whom I had asked for several days before this how great was the distance separating us from the dwelling places, pointing to the pine with a joyful face, naïvely remarked: 'We have reached the pines, it means the Yakuts are not far away' " (Maak 1887: II, zo). We must therefore suppose that, along with animal husbandry, fishing, and hunting, the gathering of vegetable foods, primarily pine sap-wood, played an important part in the economy of the dwellers in the kyrgysötökh. In the summer, the settled ancient Yakut population of the taiga streams probably built birchbark huts of the urasa type. The sedentary mode of life is reflected in a specific material culture and in an assortment of domestic furnishings, beginning with the characteristic pottery, which is purely Yakut in its general aspect. The importance of this detail of material culture of the inhabitants of the kyrgys-ötökh is determined by the fact that, from the i7th to i9th centuries, during the period of recorded history, only the Yakuts, of all the native tribes of the Lena Basin, knew how to make clay vessels, and the potter's art was specifically distinctive of Yakut culture. The making of clay vessels was completely foreign even to the semi-sedentary pastoralists of the CisBaykal, the Buryats; at least it was for several centuries, until the Russians arrival on the Lena. Even in later times, they did not make pots. The ceramics of the Yakuts, on the contrary, actually show signs of profound antiquity. Strahlenberg has already noted that "they made their own pots." In the literature, it was noted with justification that the origin of this craft among them is undoubtedly independent, as is shown by the purely Turkic terms for the various sizes of pots and the tools of the trade. The antiquity and distinctiveness of Yakut ceramics are confirmed by 385

YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

peculiarities of technique—the method of forming the vessel, the mixing of the fire-clay, the use of milk products, such as suorat,* in the making of pots, the character of the decoration, and the shapes of the vessels. The most ancient of the known examples of Yakut pottery are the finds in the kyrgys-ötökh on Lake Emis-kyuyel, near the settlement of Sayylyk on the Markha. Like the ethnographically contemporary Yakut pots for cooking, the ancient vessels from the kyrgys-ötökh had relatively thick, firm walls and flat bottoms. The fragments found at Emis-kyuyel came from a vessel of jar-like shape and relatively small size. Such vessels were used by the Yakuts for cooking food; the had purely Yakut names, bayachchakh or bayarchakh and bolchuk or bochchuk. There were also vessels of other shapes; in the materials from the old Yakut settlement 3-5 km below Tabaga on the left bank of the Lena, there was found a fine vessel, made with special care, with a narrow base and an amphora-like body, with a suddenly narrowing neck and shoulders in the upper third. Vessels of this type probably also go back to very early times. In general, the following type of vessel prevailed: the Yakuts always gave their pots, even large ones of 1.5-2 vedros* capacity, an egg-like, elongated form, with a small base and slightly convex sides. In the 192os, such vessels (ulakhan kyös) had gone out of use. A typical characteristic of Yakut pottery, to judge by the fragments found at Sayylyk, is the presence of a convex applique ring below the rim. The decoration is marked by pronounced paucity and primitiveness. It consists of three parallel rows girdling the upper part of the vessel horizontally, and formed from vertical impressions of a rectangular stamp. As among the contemporary Yakuts, the working of birchbark, from which vessels sewn with horsehair as well as other artifacts were made, occupied a prominent place among the people of the kyrgys-ötökh. The typically Yakut aspect of all household utensils is reflected in the wooden articles—for example, the decorated ladle for soup and milk, with a narrow oval bowl at a right angle to the handle, rather than slanted, as in European ones. The Yakut manner of life is reflected with special clarity in the toys carved from birch wood and depicting bulls, cows, and also—to judge by individual representations of antlers—reindeer. The shape of these toys is highly characteristic: the body of the animal is conventionally rendered in the form of an embellished figure, approximating an oval but ending at the rear in a point and furnished at the front with three projections, of which the two lateral ones represent the animal's antlers and the central one his muzzlei° (Fig. 79). • [Suorat, a type of yogurt. Editor, A.t.N.A.] • [ Vedro, a bucket with the capacity of 21 pints. Editor, A.t.N.A.]

Fig. 79. Finds from the kyrgys-ötökh type of dwelling. t—bone spoon; a—clay vessel; 3, 4—toys representing cows; 5—contemporary toy cow; 6—t7th-century toy cow from I. D. Novgorodov's excavations; 7—ornament of analogous form on old-fashioned Yakut woman's costume of the r7th century. 386

4

I.1

YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

The difference between the dwellings excavated on the B6-yuryakh and on the Markha is particularly instructive for the understanding of the daily life of the Yakuts. The first are of considerably smaller dimensions and have left much less noticeable traces than the second. Only bones of reindeer and fish were found in them; in the second type of dwelling, which was more spacious, the bones of a horse were found. The first dwelling belonged, apparently, to a hunter and fisherman without livestock, a balyksyt, who lived on what he could get by his labor in the surrounding taiga and the neighboring lake. In the second, there seems to have dwelt a wealthy person, the owner of herds of horses and surrounded by a large number of dependents and, perhaps, servants. Among the other archaeological remains which characterize the culture of the Yakuts of pre-Russian times, the traces of the ancient blacksmith's and ironfounder's art deserve special mention. The reputation of the Yakut smiths goes far into the depths of their "heroic age"—the time of the epic heroes. The olonkho mentions blacksmithing and smiths with reverence; the latter are personified in the epic figure of the mighty champion, the forefather of nine smiths, Duodarba the Destroyer, the Black Smith. The smith was surrounded with honor, and even with religious fear. Like the shaman, he was a healer and diviner. He was even considered stronger than the shaman; the smith could kill the shaman by his miraculous power, but the shaman with all his spirits was impotent against the smith (Yastremskiy 1929: 16-17; Kulakovskiy 1923: 67-68; Tokarev 1945: 9o) It is not surprising that all of the oldest sites of the Yakuts are accompanied by traces of blacksmithing and foundry work. Such traces, in the form of accumulations of iron scale and foundry slag, of pits where smelting and other processes were done, and also places where ore had been mined, are encountered at the most various points of Yakutia and are especially numerous in the Lena Valley, on the rivers Botomoyu and Lyutenge, and also on the Vilyuy. Very few samples of the ancient craft of the Yakut smiths have come down to us. At "Kyrgys Place" on the Markha, there was found a high narrow cauldron, with a flat base broadening upwards, made of several thin layers of sheet iron, held together with iron clamps. Such iron cauldrons, riveted together, according to the formulaic expression of the epics, "in nine places," are also mentioned in the olonkho as an appurtenance of the distinctive Yakut culture. Besides these crude iron objects of everyday use, which show the craftsmanship of the ancient Yakut smiths in a light by no means advantageous, there are also some other ancient artifacts of considerably more imposing appearance, although very close to the former in technique of production. We already know that the legends mention not only armor (kuyakh) but also helmets, including "golden" ones. Again, according to M. M. Nosov's data [Nosov n.d.] there existed armor not only for people but also for war horses. Besides this, there were placed on the breast of the war horses special points which, during battle, penetrated the horses of 388

Economy and Way of Life the enemy or the fallen warriors. Even the spurs of the mounted soldiery, according to tradition, ended in special dagger-like points at front and rear, by means of which they could strike the enemy or his horse by kicking. If we are to believe these traditions, which must reflect to some degree the actual state of things, the ancient Yakut warriors sometimes appeared armed almost like the heavy knightly cavalry of the Middle Ages, completely encased in iron. In the 192os, on the territory of the Borogon ulus (now Ust-Aldan rayon), in the Khora nasleg, in the dense taiga near Lake Myuryu, there were found two iron helmets and a great many plates from a kuyakh. This type of armor plate is the usual one for the Orient, where cuirasses, made of small plates laid end to end like scales, have been customary since remote antiquity. Such armor was regularly used by the Chinese and by other peoples living next to them. In the West, it did not exist in ancient times, and medieval examples there are very rare and usually derive from the Orient. As for the helmets, the first of them is remarkable in its technical mastery, elegance of form, and richness and perfection of finish. Its recherche decoration is usual in form and technique for the product of the Oriental craftsmen of the late Middle Ages; that is, between the loth and the i5th centuries. The zigzag ornament is very distinctive and recalls the local Yakut and Tungus decoration. The cord-style ornament is also traditional for Yakut artifacts. Taking everything into consideration, the Lake Myuryu finds represent part of the military equipment of one of the local Yakut toyons. He was probably buried according to ancient custom, on an aran gas (Fig. 8o) in the forest, which was -afterwards destroyed, and the things fell to the ground, where they lay until discovery's

Fig. 80. Aran gas (aboveground burial of reindeer herder). Bulun. 389

YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

Consequently, metallurgy among the ancient Yakuts stood on an incomparably higher level than among the people of the Early Iron Age in Yakutia, or even among the later northern tribes, with their wandering smiths.

390

The Art and Religion of the Ancient Yakuts on the Basis of Archaeological Data

Chapter 2

The ancestors of the Yakuts have also left other archaeological relics, the cliff drawings, which depict expressively, though in fragmentary form, the other aspects of their culture—art, religious beliefs, and forms of worship. The Yakuts also, it turns out, continued the tradition of painting on the Lena cliffs. These [paintings] are best preserved near the village of Pokrovskoye and somewhat upriver from it, in the region of settlement of the Kangalasy-Maldzhegars. One such drawing, located on a cliff near the mouth of the Malaya Keteme River, is widely known among the local population by the name $meget, whence the cliff where it is situated has received the name Emegetteekh-khaya; that is, the cliff with the picture of the spirit. [The picture] is located not far from ground level, and may be reached without difficulty by a small scaffold made of stones and wood. Because of this accessibility, the lower part of the drawing is severely scraped and scratched, but the upper part is not damaged. The drawing shows a person prayerfully raising both hands on high, with fingers outspread. The length of this figure is about 40 cm. Above it are placed three circles, all on the same level. The central one of these has three projections, probably representing rays. Above the circles, forming a solid horizontal band, are ten vertical strokes. The man-like being depicted below differs sharply from human figures in more ancient drawings. The latter are represented as though naked, with clearly drawn narrow torsos and extremities. Here the figure is covered to its knees with a clumsy garment, in the form of a wide robe. On the ancient drawings, the head is usually represented as a straight projection united to the neck, or, more rarely, in the form of an oval. Here the neck is clearly indicated, and the head is round and large. Of the same character is a drawing, found at a point north of the village of Yelanskaya, which clearly shows a shaman in wide costume hanging to the knees like a bell skirt. His head is the same as the one on the figure from the Malaya Keteme River. In one hand he holds a round drum, and in the other, turned upward, a drumstick (bylaayakh). The legs are thin and the feet are turned sideways. 391

YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

The latter drawing is combined with a series of others, found side by side, which depict shamans, hunters, and animals. Some are executed in red ochre, and the rest are done, in this case, in charcoal, which is well preserved because of the natural niche which protected it from rain and, in part, even from the wind. Of the charcoal drawings, one is especially interesting: it shows a shaman in characteristic robes hung with tassels and braids, with a luxurious fringe hanging to the knees. The shaman's hands are framed by the same kind of fringing. One of them holds a drumstick, the other a drum of oval form. The shaman's head is round, carefully outlined with a thin band of charcoal. He stands in the center, above all the other figures, and dominates them, occupying the position of chief actor. The next drawing of this type is situated in the locality of Mokhsogollokh-khaya kuturuga (Fig. 81). It consists of two parts, dating from differing periods and of differing characters. One of them is executed in yellow ochre, and by style belongs to the older drawings. It depicts an oval drum with a crosspiece, a stylized small figure of a man with hanging arms, and the usual oval spot-strokes. The second part constitutes a selfcontained composition, executed in red ochre and in an entirely different style. At the top are depicted three persons standing in a row; below is placed a round drum with a crosspiece, and beside it the figure of a shaman in a feathered headdress. The shaman's legs are depicted in a lifelike and realistic manner, the right foot stretched out and dropped down, the left turned outward. Slightly above this, there is the figure of a man, and, still further down, five human figures of the same type as above: short, massive, with round heads, arms hanging down at the sides, and slightly spread legs. In the lowest row, at the sides of the composition, above the •drum drawn in yellow dye, are located two figures of animals, one placed vertically and the other horizontally. A fourth drawing, executed in dark red, is on a cliff between the village of Yelanskaya and the settlement of Tiit-Aryy, 14-15 km downstream. Best preserved are two drawings, of a dog and of a horseman. The latter is especially valuable in that it seems to be the only one of its kind; there are no other unmistakable representations of riders on the middle Lena, and there is a horse represented in a separate, blurred drawing 5 km below Tiit-Aryy settlement. The three cliff drawings of this group, which are richest in content and united by common stylistic features and technique of execution (painting in red ochre), reflect a cycle of complex religious ideas. The first of them is a direct continuation of the old theme of the hunt, the chief actor of which, as before, is not the hunter, but the representative of supernatural forces, the shaman. It is clear that this theme is indissolubly connected with the cult of the gods who grant game—the bayanay. It is entirely Fig. 81. Ancient Yakut cliff drawings compared with Altayan drawings. 1—painting on Mokhsogollokh-khaya kuturuga, Lena River, near Pokrovskoye village; 2—Altayan shaman's drum; 3—detail of drawing on Altayan shaman's drum; 4—representation of spirits on Altayan shaman's costume. 392

Q

2

?Via .1n 7S 4

YAKUTS BEFOR$ THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

possible that the shaman himself, in this case, is none other than the shaman of the hunting deity, Bayanay, of which Lindenau wrote as early as the mid-18th century. The drawings on $megetteek h-khaya reveal another aspect of ancient Yakut religion: the person with hands raised in prayer has neither drum nor drumstick; above him we see three circles, which apparently symbolically represent three suns. We may assume that this drawing represents a prayerful address to the heavens. A remarkable parallel to it is found in an ancient pre-Christian legend of the Yakuts about the origin of the universe, gods, and people, which the storyteller puts into the mouth of a legendary shaman. According to Ovchinnikov's transcription, during an ysyakh, the shaman Doyudus sang at the house of the wealthy Yuryuken: "Once in old times, above the three heavens, with a warm breath like warm summer wind, with three souls, stretching forth his body like a three-year-old colt, thoughtfully stood Aar-toyon. He moved two white suns to the side, created a third, and hung it between heaven and earth, and said: `Yakut people, deriving from three white spumes, grow strong, bear fruit and multiply!' ' " (Ovchinnikov 1912a.) The absence of shaman's attributes on the human figure depicted in this drawing recalls the fact that the white shamans, who offered prayers at an ysyakh, according to some sources, had neither drums nor special ritual costumes. It must be such a white or "summer" shaman, as Gmelin calls him, who is depicted on the Mokhsogollokh-khaya kuturuga. The last theme represented in the Mokhsogollokh-khaya kuturuga drawings also relates to the field of religion and worship, but this time it apparently has a narrower topical application, limited only to concepts connected with the shamans themselves, with the shamanistic calling, and the origin of their "miraculous gift." This is indicated by the placement and makeup of the drawings—the drum, the shaman (probably a progenitor-shaman), and the shaman's anthropomorphic and zoomorphic protector spirits. The same thing is shown by the general composition of the drawings, which is strikingly similar to the pictures on certain shamans' drums of the Altay Turks (Fig. 81).

394

The Social Structure of the Ancient Yakuts

Chapter 3

If the material culture of the Yakuts in the pre-Russian epoch can be in significant degree established by archaeological data, with respect to their social structure, the matter is rather more complicated. The sources which we have on this question, the olonkho, the historical traditions, the linguistic data, and social survivals, suffer from a basic deficiency which, in significant degree, makes their use by the historian difficult. They do not yield to exact chronological fixation, since it is unknown when they were originally laid down and to what changes they were subject in the course of their development. This in particular concerns the olonkho, the basic kernel of which could have sprung up somewhere in the south, but then could have formed new layers on the middle Lena even in comparatively very late times. We must also consider exaggerations and embellishments of a former condition, characteristic of popular fantasy. Nevertheless, the olonkho, and the legends of the Yakuts, deserve the most careful attention, since these are the only (or almost the only) sources which reveal the social structure of the Yakuts before the arrival of the Russians on the Lena. The social structure of the Yakuts, based on the olonkho, is depicted in quite definite outlines. The olonkho mentions nothing about the existence of barter and craft. But, in this connection, the presence of such a colorful figure as the mythical smith is remarkable. He only occupied himself with the preparation of metal artifacts, and sometimes demanded as a compensation for his work that the hero get him a wife. In the published and translated texts of the olonkho, there are almost no traces of the matriarchal clan, but social relationships are indicated which could have appeared only after the formation of the patriarchal clan. Marriage is strictly patrilocal. On marrying, the wife leaves her kin and travels to the homeland of her alien husband. The hero of the epic says to her on this occasion: "You must go to your place, to my kin, to the honored lady mother, to your fate, to your vast wealth. There is no happiness in living as a girl with your parents." The fate of the girl bride is decided for her by the father. Even in a case in which the girl, by her father's will, has to go to an obviously unsuitable bridegroom, she meekly submits to his will. 395

YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

In one of the epics it is related how the daughter of the master KhaanKharakhaan was compelled to become the wife of the enfeebled son of Suokh-Kisi-ogoto, Tutuk-bogatyr, "who wet himself with urine." The young daughter wept that the fate of being the wife of an enfeebled man had fallen upon her, but she was compelled to execute "the will of the glorious god and of her parents." Even when a handsome horseman appears before her and in order to test her suggests that she leave her husband and marry him instead, the woman refuses the handsome man. "No, I cannot leave him whom my parents chose for me" (Khudyakov 189o: 232). It is, however, a curious feature of the marriage of good heroes in the olonkho that the parents grant their daughter a rich trousseau, and the groom gives nothing in return. The diabolical heroes, nevertheless, bring kalym [bride-price] to the parents of their brides (Khudyakov 189o: 116). Consequently, kalym was known from ancient times. Even in the middle of the 18th century, two forms of marriage existed among the Yakuts. In the one case, kalym was paid for the wife, but nothing was received in return from her parents, while in the other case, the parents gave, besides a small number of dresses for the bride, "almost all the animals which were received from the son-in-law as kalym, apart from those which were eaten at the wedding." The presence or absence of the trousseau had a direct bearing on what happened to the woman: "If a man receives a trousseau with his wife, she is considered among them as a free wife, and hence the husband has no right to sell her to another" (Arkhiv MVD 1785, items 7-9). In accordance with the general tendency to idealize the life and aspect of the positive protagonists of the epic poems, marriage with a trousseau is apparently presented as the model for the marriage of heroes, in which the wife retained a certain amount of personal freedom.i9 On the other hand, the marriage of the representatives of evil, the diabolical heroes, reflects the other form, that with kalym, in which the wife was considered to have been bought by her husband, and could even be sold off by him to another person, or, in other words, was converted into a slave. The family consists of the husband, the wife, their children, and dependents, including manservants and womanservants and male and female slaves. Such are the families of Baay-Kharakhaan-toyon, Sakha-saaryntoyon, Baay-sabyya-toyon, and other persons alluded to in the epic poems and personifying the population of the Middle World. The traditional figures of the hero's father-in-law and mother-in-law are especially expressive in the olonkho. These important and honored people, dressed in luxurious clothing of expensive furs, are corpulent, as befits such wealthy individuals. When Er-Sogotokh comes riding to the Handsome Rich Master for his daughter, the Master comes out to meet the hero, but cannot walk without the help of the others. "From both sides they supported him, ... and the old man came with uncertain steps. But he could not come out into the courtyard, for he was very fat. The fat around his heart smothered the old man," the olonkhosut relates with 396

The Social Structure naive simplicity. These people possess rich property, primarily great herds of horses and cattle. They have at their disposal large farmsteads, spacious meadows and pastures. They are surrounded by numerous dependents— slaves, servants, children, and relatives (Fig. 82). This is the typical monogamous family, characteristic of the period of the fully-developed paternal clan. It is precisely this family who, in the olonkho, as in the real conditions of the i7th century, is the sole owner of the basic means for and tools of production. In the olonkho, as in real 17th-century life, there are no traces of clan-communal property in livestock, which is the main source of subsistence and the chief wealth of the Yakuts. For that matter, the clan as such is nowhere visible in the olonkho; it mentions only clansmen living next to each other, and the ysyakh festivals, at which they gather on the occasion of the marriage of one of the heroes. The existence of the clan as a group of persons connected by unity of descent from common ancestors and by common religious worship is implied, but in economic life we see only the extended patriarchal family, with the dependent status of women which was characteristic of it. The signs of economic and social inequality within the community are very clearly depicted in the olonkho. Although the storytellers do not spare the colors in describing the happy life of their heroes in the conditions of the imaginary "golden age," this age did not exist for everyone. Together with rich men, it also contained poor slaves; there is no harmony of social interest among the inhabitants of the Middle World, and the bitter notes of the desperation of the oppressed erupt through the measured, even speech of the olonkho. Such a striking coincidence between the social relations of the ancient Yakuts as they are described in the olonkho on the one hand, and in the 17th-century Russian documents on the other, could be most easily and simply explained by assuming that the Yakut epic poems reached final form in the i7th and 18th centuries, or not long before the Russians' arrival on the Lena, and, consequently, that they reflect social relations characteristic only of this extremely late period. The firmly established fact of the coincidence between the Yakut epics and the heroic poems of the Middle Asian and south Siberian pastoral peoples, however, speaks against such a simple explanation. This coincidence extends both to the plots and to the formal characteristics of these poems, and, in a considerable degree, to the general picture of daily life and social structure which they contain. Both in the Yakut epics and in the Oyrat-Mongol, Oka-Ukga, and Altayan legends which are closest to them, there is drawn the identical picture of a society with patrilocal marriage, and with the patriarchal family, which is the sole owner of the means for and tools of production—a society divided into rich and poor, into slaves and lords. In these, as in the Yakut olonkhos, motifs of social struggle and class antagonism are also sounded. Finally, we again see in them, as in the Yakut epos, the same characteristic figure of the smith-craftsman; but, even here, there are no indications that these smiths are practicing barter. Hence it follows that, together with the epos and various other elements of their culture, the southern ancestors of the Yakuts brought to the 397

The Social Structure middle Lena these features of their social structure as well, in a finished and fully developed form. This general conclusion is confirmed by an analysis of different sources—by the elements of the Yakut vocabulary relating to social terminology, and also by ethnographic facts. These are primarily data shedding light on the class structure of the society in the conditions of which the Yakut olonkho and the entire distinctive culture of the southern ancestors of the Yakuts took shape. In the foreground, we must place the various terms denoting wealth and noble status. All of these are similar to Turkic and, in part, to Mongol terms. The opposite concepts—poverty, a destitute person, a poor man—are represented in the Yakut language not by Turkic terms but by words connected with the Mongol and, in part, with the Tungusic-Manchu languages (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 26-27, 366-67; Radlov 1893-1911: 1474) .80 The variety and abundance of these terms known in the contemporary Yakut language is increased still more by the presence of additional archaic expressions preserved by the author of the remarkable description of the Yakuts in 1741-45, Lindenau. He cites the following social terms defining property status: 1) Mung-aht bai (murk aat baay), a rich man who does not even know his wealth in cattle and horses; 2) orto bai (orto baay), a person with five or six herds; 3) bosak itaechdak, a person owning one or two herds (here the text is damaged and cannot be deciphered); 4) osin-tönötaerdak, a person with two or three cows; such a person, Lindenau adds, is also called a "balyksyt" (balliksit). On the last rung, according to Lindenau's data, stand the inhabitants of the northern regions, the tong-balliksit (tort-balyksyt), whose only domestic animals are dogs, and who not only live exclusively on fish, but also use fish skins to make their clothing [Lindenau n.d., al. Lindenau's information is confirmed by the later folkloristic data, which also mention three categories of rich men. One of the legends, recorded by S. I. Bolo on the Vilyuy in 1938, tells of the old-fashioned Yakut custom of "driving cattle far away": "The old-time Yakut rich men, fearing punishment and retribution for their wealth, ordered horses and cattle of unusual colors to be driven far away, into the headwaters of the river, and left there without surveillance, letting them go anywhere. By this custom, the richest man was supposed to carry out a drive three times in his lifetime in nine groups of nine cattle each; a middling rich man, three times in his life in seven groups of seven cattle each; and the least rich man only once in his lifetime in three groups of three cattle each."ß1 The names of rich men who drove the cattle three times in accordance with the custom, like the wealthy Moyechyu of the upper Vilyuy, the son of Byygynas, the progenitor of the Orosut nasleg, are frequently mentioned. The coincidence between the social terminology of the Yakuts in Fig. 82. Yakuts in old-fashioned clothing at an ysyakh. From a painting by M. M. Nosov. 399

YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

Lindenau's transcription and that of the Tien-Shan Kirgiz is especially interesting. Rich men among the latter were divided into three groups in the same way: the "hereditary," kordoluu-bay; those who had a large and firmly based economy, ordoluu-bay; and the impoverished, greedy skinflints, sasyk-bay ("stinking" bay). (Abramzon 1946: 47.) The first group of rich Kyrgyz corresponds to the Yakut mung-ahtbay; the second is exactly equivalent to the Yakut orto-bay; and the third designation is close to the Yakut bosak. The term orto-bay also recalls the division of the people in the "Kutadgu-biliga" into rich, poor, and middling. The difference between the Yakut bosak and the Kyrgyz sasyk may be explained by the fact that Lindenau did not hear this word clearly enough, and took it down incorrectly in the German transcription of his manuscript. This happened rather frequently with him. As for the balyksyt and too-balyksyt, these expressions in the 18th century denoted poor fishermen.82 In the light of the examples cited, there can hardly be any doubt that an extensive terminology connected with differences of property, upon which the status of their bearers in society depended, had long existed among the Yakuts and had traversed a long path of development. Furthermore, this terminology proves to be considerably more complex and highly developed among the Yakuts than might be expected of the northernmost Turkic tribe which, for a number of centuries, was surrounded on all sides by more backward neighbors who had not gone beyond primitive forms of economic life and culture. At the same time, both in the general tendencies and regularities of its development and in concrete linguistic data, it reveals a close connection with the analogous vocabulary of other Turkic and, in part, of Mongol tribes; this points once again to the profound and long-standing unity of the historical fate of the Yakut people with the past of these tribes. The traditional terminology which expressed dependent status among the Yakuts is no less interesting. The olonkho contains several terms defining various categories of personally dependent people. The most widespread and general is the term kulut ("slave," "slave-woman," "pageboy," "servitor," "woman-servant"), deriving from the word kul, which is known in this form as early as the language of the runic texts (Radlov 1893-1911: 966; Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. I2II).83 A variant of the term kulut in Yakut is the term enn'e-kulut, that is, the slave which a rich bride was obliged to have when she set out from her father's to her husband's house. In the epics, there is even mention of not merely one such "dowry-slave," but of a whole household of slaves who are given by parents to their daughter when she marries (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 1211; Khudyakov 1890: 157). In this regard, it is remarkable that both the Yakut term enn'e-kulut, and its meaning, coincide entirely with an analogous term among the ancient Mongols. Concerning it, B. Ya. Vladimirtsov wrote: "There is one other institution of ancient Mongol society, the inie. This designation was applied to people who were allotted, by the clans which owned them, to the daughters of these clans as dowry; they passed over to her husband's clan and became, in 400

The Social Structure consequence, subordinated to it. Thus, for example, the brother of Vankhan, the Kereit, gave, with his daughter, the cook Ashi-temur with two hundred people, whom her husband, Chingis, disposed of as he saw fit" (Vladimirtsov 1934: 68). Another such special variant of the term "slave" is the word nektel-kulut; that is, a male or female slave for any kind of dirty work, a girl who had the duty of undressing a noble maiden, and of going down on all fours when the latter mounted her horse (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 21 I). The olonkho contains definite data on how slaves were used in a household: "Here am I come," says the diabolical hero to his conqueror, "a long-suffering, much-suffering person, bowed down with torment and black misfortune," and asks to be relieved of torment, promising to pay for this by his work as a slave. "How will I pay? I will cook your pot, I will spin around before you, I will break myself in pieces preparing your food. I will dry your torbosy,• I will take off your shoes, I will split firewood, I will mow hay, I will look after the horses; I will look after the cows, I will do all your work, I will serve you" (Khudyakov 1890: 119). The hero, having encountered misfortune, asks the White Youth: "In summer I will cut hay excellently, for I am an excellent mower. In winter I will cut firewood nicely into small pieces; I am swift, obedient, with fastmoving shins; I am a clever and nimble man! I can drive both horses and cows excellently; I am adroit at this. I can also shoe a colt in the stall, and put halters on calves; I am good at this. To be a nimble fellow in the corral, even to be the last-ranked of the workers, at this I am a rather capable boy" (Khudyakov 1890: 151). Among the Yakuts, a slave's service to his lord did not end even after death. This was noted by Strahlenberg and also by Ides, both of whom wrote that a man had his servant or wife buried with him (Alekseyev 1941: 527). This custom was later remarked upon by Lindenau. In his words, rich Yakuts, even under Russian rule, had the habit of burying alive with the toyon his best and most trusted servant, dressed in festive clothing. If a rich woman died, her womanservant followed her to the grave. Detailed information on this custom has been preserved in the answers of an unknown Yakut informant, replying to Tatishchev's questionnaire: "In former years, it was the custom that, with a dead master, those of his servants who were faithful were buried ... and, with the dead master, horses were killed and specially buried near him, and a saddle and all the horse trappings, and his winter and summer garments, his bow with its accoutrements, and a kettle, and every kind of vessel they lay with him in one grave, with the thought that in the other world he would ride the horse, and the man would serve him, and he would wear the clothes laid by for him, and eat the food; and those who are very old and cannot walk, even if they are fathers—such are even now buried alive in the ground, and it is said that they have lived out their time on earth."84 Later, Gmelin also noted that, previously, among the noble Yakuts, one of the dead man's favorite servants was burned with him on a special pyre made for this purpose; "however, from the moment of subjection to the • [Torbosy, torbasy, soft shoes made of deerskin. Editor, A.I.N.A.] 401

YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

Russian sceptre, this pagan custom was entirely abandoned, and, during the whole period of Russian rule, there was only one case in which the imperial decree in this regard was violated" (Miller 1940 edition: 521). Traditions about this ancient custom, which, by the 17th century, had already become vestigial, were also noted repeatedly by other authors (Georgi 1799: Part IV, 188; Shchekatov 1801-o9: Part VII, 364; Middendorf 1838: 828; Pripuzov 1885: n. 65; Troshchanskiy 1902: 3; Levental 1929: 294) . The memory of it has been preserved in Yakut folklore to the present. It is related, for example, that on the Vilyuy, in the First Malzhegar nasleg of the Nyurba rayon, there is the grave of the wealthy Tosuukhan, who was buried with an ygyyrd'yt slave (a saddle-makergroom), and in the Bestyakh nasleg of the same rayon, in the alas* of Balyga Suokh, there is known a grave, chardaattaakh d'akhtar unuoha, in which a noble woman is buried with seven horses and the slave groom 8" As the source from which slaves were obtained, the olonkho mentions the enslavement of persons from enemy tribes. In the olonkho "KhaanD'argystay," the hero of the poem orders Uluskhannaakh Uluu-toyon, who lives beyond the revered heaven, to come down to him voluntarily, and to occupy the place of the most insignificant servant, to become, in the striking expression of the poem, "shoes (roads) for the fat stallions, to push the calves around in the calf pen, to become the least of the people in the hut." Besides slaves proper, there were also other categories of dependent people. A Yakut term signifying a person in a dependent position has been registered: töllönnyt, "paid slave."88 It is also known among other Turkic peoples, where it means "serfs to serve the sultan" (Radlov 18931911: 1262) . Slave women, of course, were also exploited by rich men. An ever-present character in the Yakut olonkho is the fabulous old woman Simekhsin, who is represented as ragged and dirty, "in a robe rotted through in ninety places, (sewn) of shabby calfskin, in rough trousers and bristling drawers, with skis on her shoes, and with a blackened iron spade." The description of her appearance is accompanied by ironic epithets: "the belle of the cow barn, a belle on a stick over the mangers, an intimate of the mangers, looking with eyes of red copper, like a waning winter moon" (Yastremskiy 1929: 49) . The name of this "comical old woman" signifies in other Turkic and Mongol languages a slave serving-woman; this completely corresponds to the position of the mythical old woman in the olonkho. The term kyrgyttar (that is, "girl") possessed a certain social nuance. In Pekarskiy's dictionary (1907-30: art. 2225), this term is derived from kyrhyn, "to cut, to shear." However, S. Ye. Malov has pointed out to me that in Kazakh, there is a term kyrgyn, "bondwoman, serving-woman," which is considerably closer in meaning to the Yakut kyrgyttar than is kyrhyn, "to shear." In P. M. Melioranskiy's Kratkaya grammatika kazak-kirgizskogo yazyka ("Short Grammar of the Kazak-Kyrgyz Language"), it is stated that kyz-kyrkyn, "girls," [is derived] from kyz, "girl" and kyrkyn, • [Alas, a grassy hollow or depression where trees cannot grow because of permafrosted ground near the surface. Editor, A.I.N.A.1 402

The Social Structure "bondwoman." Hence it follows that kyrgyttar is formed in the same way as uolattar, from uolan, "page-boy," and, in the past, signified servingmaiden, and not simply maiden, which all the other Turkic peoples designate in the plural—kyzlar (Melioranskiy 1894: Vol. I, 36). Also interesting from this aspect is the Yakut word noko, which designates, according to Böhtlingk, a mode of address to a young person by a person senior to him and of higher status. Pekarskiy also indicates that this term of address is slighting in character; it is used by adults to children, by parents to their children, by older members of the family to younger ones, and by higher-positioned people to those of lower condition. Vitashevskiy in turn specifies: "By a master to a workman" (Vitashevskiy 1929: 175). The similarity of the Yakut term noko to the Kyrgyz word nogor, "servitor" and to the Dzhagatay word meaning "comrade," "servant," "soldier," and the ancient Mongol nuker recalls the significance of this last word among the ancient Mongols (Vladimirtsov 5929). During war, the Mongol nuker was the faithful comrade-in-arms of his master; during the battue, his constant helper; he did not part from his master, and shared grief and gladness with him (Vladimirtsov 5934: 92-93). In peacetime, the nukers were the "household people" of the steppe aristocrats. They carried on all sorts of household duties, and were not very different from ordinary servants and dependents. "We know, for example, that Dzhelme slaughtered cows 'on the northern side of the yurt,' in the camp of Chingis. We know also that his father sent him to Temuchin `to saddle the horse and open the door'" (Vladimirtsov 1934: 92-93). In sum, the chiefs were always surrounded by a crowd of secondary persons dependent on them. In the epic "Sun-D'aasyn," it is said that, around Kharakhkhaan-toyon and his corpulent wife, there were seen on the right side ninety servitors like free cranes, on the left side eighty servant girls, and near the hearth was the inevitable cow-keeper, Simekhsin. Another epic tells of a special division of labor among the servants: "One man on horseback galloped into the field and drove a herd of mares into the corral. The youth Oguurdaakh-uol, who was a catcher with a lasso, caught a fat mare in his noose. Sulur-baatyr, the "putter-on of bits," put on the bit. The youth Uobegey, "slitter of the vein," slit the vein. The "skinner" Surdurahas-Samdargas removed the skin. The butcher Kybyrgas-Khabyrgas cut the meat in pieces. The young cook Buhukhaan cooked it, and so on (Seroshevskiy 1896: 450; see also Khudyakov 1890: 504). These designations were not proper names but common nouns: groom, driver, butcher, cook, etc. All of these categories of dependent people made up the master's chahar. "Chahar is an old word, and it meant the same as kergen does now. This is a hard word; it makes people cry. Good masters do not say it. I only heard once how the rich woman Lukina, in a fit of temper, called her household people chahardar," related a Yakut from Namy_ u/us in 1891. "Chahar-chahardar are the people who have to work for you, slaves, kuluttar. This word makes the heart contract," said another informant from the same u/us (Seroshevskiy 1896: 509). Such a coincidence in the meaning of the Yakut terms chahar and 403

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kargen (that is, in the sense of "retainers," including all dependent and inferior members) is well explained by examples from the social structure of the Mongol peoples. In the time of Chingis, the term chahar signified dependents in the household (camps) of the Mongol dignitaries and princes (Kozin 1941: 57) . The primary hero of the Kalmyk epos, Dzhangar, has in his camp a large group of subjects, hyperbolically counted by millions of souls—the chakhar; that is, "the population of the khan's retainers," his servants of all kinds, such as craftsmen, diviners, and other humble people of this sort, kharachzhu (Kozin 1940). The Kalmyk noyns [noyons] and zaysans, as late as the end of the 19th century, had Kalmyks living with them in the capacity of retainers, who collectively bore the name tsokhor. The Arabic sources speak of the personal guard of the Central Asian rulers in pre-Moslem times, of the shakirs or chakirs (properly "servants"). Of one of the Arab-conquering chieftains, Sabita, it is said in exactly the same way that he, "like the local rulers, surrounded himself with shakirs (bodyguards), apparently from among the natives, since the shakirs are contrasted to the Arabs" (Bartold 1900: 182; Tolstov 1938: 29, n. 3).87 Certainly we must not take seriously the hyperbolical tales of the olonkho about dozens of servants and serving-girls of the Yakut toyons. However, there is still undoubtedly some grain of historical reality in them, relating to the distant time when the southern ancestors of the Yakuts lived far from the middle Lena. There is no doubt that the more dependent people a toyon had, the more servants working in his household and compelled to do his will, the richer, the stronger, and the more influential he was. The olonkho contains no direct information on the means of exploitation by wealthy rayons of their fellow-tribesmen and fellow-clansmen related by blood. But without going beyond the chronological limits set for the present volume of the History of Yakutia, we may nevertheless, even though in a general form, refer to instances which were characteristic for the i7th and 18th centuries, and which have been cited repeatedly in the literature, primarily in the fundamental study by S. A. Tokarev on the social structure of the i7th and 18th century Yakuts. They undoubtedly had the same kind of exploitation of poor relation "living alongside"— the same methods of "allotment" of cattle to poor people for pasturage, the same khahaas, the same forms of working off obligations, which lasted until the 19th and loth centuries in Yakut life; that is, essentially, the usual forms, widespread from ancient times among all the steppe pastoralists of Asia. It is just these forms of exploitation of the immediate producer, who was formally a free member of the clan community, which are established by the written sources for the Turkic-speaking tribes of southern Siberia and Mongolia in the first millennium A.D. Consequently, there is nothing surprising in the fact that these forms of exploitation, comprising khahaas, various methods of working off obligations, existed among the Yakuts over the course of many centuries, in combination with patriarchal slavery. At the head of the elite of the pastoral Yakut clans and tribes stood the 404

The Social Structure noblest and wealthiest families, the toyon-uuha, as Lindenau calls them, from which the toyons, heads of clans and tribes, came; these families made up the masterful, cruel, and grasping Yakut aristocracy. Long before the arrival of the Russians, the Yakut tribes were headed by toyons representing the elite of Yakut society. The power of the toyons in the tribe was hereditary. Often, the toyons traced their descent from famous male and female shamans. In the opinion of S. A. Tokarev, even the sagas about Elley and Omogoy-bay, the forefathers of the Yakut people, constitute aristocratic genealogies of Yakut toyons, ornamented with heroic motifs. "Whenever the traditions about Omogoy and Elley may have been created, they existed during the period of conquest and served Tygyn and his clan as an ideological means of aristocratic self-exaltation" (Tokarev 1945: 164). The ideology of the tribal nobility also expressed itself in a special concept of "honor," of the "glorious name" of noble people. This motif runs like a red thread through the basic fabric of the Yakut heroic poems. It determines the behavior of the heroes, directs their acts, and impels them to feats of arms, making them despise danger and even death itself. Setting forth on a campaign, the champion Elbet-bergen says, addressing the old man Sabyya-baay-toyon: "It behooves me, being young, to ride out to make trial of death, to sojourn in battles, to hew down armed men with a sword, to collide with the glorious, to dispute with the brave! And you, tell me, who will be found to stop my boldness, who will be found to lower my arrogance, who will be found to cut down my valor" (Yastremskiy 1929: ii6). For both the champion and his enemies, for all the main characters of the epics, their high name and glory stand higher than anything in the world: "I have cut down your high name; I have trod your white face in the dust; I have cut down your glory!" Thus the victor addresses his defeated enemy (Yastremskiy 1929: 30). Even the diabolical bogatyr, even the demonic monstrous old woman herself, breathing her last, laments not wealth and treasure left behind, but the high name destroyed, the glory cut down. The devil is so sensitive to honor that, at the most critical moment of his final trial, he reconciles himself to positive ruin when the ayyy champion reminds him of his good name. "If you want, do not mount it (the magic horse) !" declares the champion. "For this I will ride expressly to the eight diabolical uluses and to all the Yakut people, to tell of your fraud, and of how you have violated your oath. "If you wish to have the name of a cheater, who does not keep his word, if you have no shame in your face, if your rib is broken (without shame), then perhaps you will not mount." At this point the devil, trembling with mortal fear, answers him: "No, brother, why should I get such a reputation: I will mount the horse of ruin, though this should cause the veins of my heart to be torn out!" And then he jumps on the horse and is killed (Khudyakov 1890: 230). If, in the Yakut epos, the honor and reputation of the aristocrats are given on the level of heroic feeling, another side of it, not elevated but purely everyday, and for this reason still more revealing, is shown by a 405

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sentence in Pekarskiy's dictionary about the old man Bood'oko. He was "something like a prince (elder), to whom, if one happened to upset him in the snow, one had to pay a mare and a two-year-old stallion 'for the shame'" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 518; cf. Pekarskiy 1925a: 684-85). Reviewing the words of the archaic Yakut language as they are represented in the olonkho and in traditions, we can see in them traces of those socio-political relations which go far beyond the bounds of Yakut society of the 17th-18th centuries. These are fragments of a socio-political structure which at one time existed in the steppe expanses of Middle Asia (in conditions of a barbaric or early-feudal state), into whose orbit the southern ancestors of the Yakuts must one way or another have entered. According to the olonkho, some of the representatives of the Yakut nobility had special titles which underlined their importance in the tribe. Among the names of the epic heroes and heroines, there are some which include the term tuy gun, for instance, Tuygun-Dokhsun, Uol-tuygunbukhatyyr, Ala-Tuygun-bukhatyyr, Kyys-tuygun, etc. In the contemporary Yakut language, tuy gun is used in the sense of "excellent," "supreme"; we may compare with it the ancient word from the runic texts: tuygun"some sort of dignity." The word tutuk, which forms part of the name of the hero of the epic, Tutuk-baatyr, corresponds in Pekarskiy's dictionary with the ancient Turkic word tutuk88 (Khudyakov 1890: 231; Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 2871; Radlov 1893-1911: 1779). To the same category must be assigned the name of the famous shaman Tyhymel, which is compared in Pekarskiy's dictionary (19o7-3o: art. 1985) with the Mongol tushimel, "official." Among the designations for Yakut gods, we also know the name of the deity Begi-Suorun-toyon, the eldest son of Uluu-tuyar or Uluu-toyon, the head of the heavenly abaahylars. In Pekarskiy's dictionary, this is compared with the ancient Turkic beg [elder or chieftain] (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 419; Radlov 1893-1911: 1580). These terms can be supplemented by the words böyö (boka), botur (batyr), alyp, bergen (mergen), which are customary in the compound names of epic heroes. Literally, these words signify in the Mongolic and Turkic languages "strong man," "bold one," "accurate archer," "heroic warrior." The same thing is noted for the Mongols. Describing the formation of the Mongol state, B. Ya. Vladimirtsov writes: "Special leaders or chieftains appear everywhere at the head of aristocratic houses or clans. Furthermore, these chieftains acquire power not as clan elders, not in the capacity of those senior by blood, but as strong, clever, intelligent, or rich individuals. Their power may be called a predatory power. Such leaders of aristocratic houses are called collectively noyan, "lord," but very often they bear characteristic nicknames, which, as it were, show what kind of people they are. They are often called ba'atur, "champion"; secen, "wise"; mergen, "accurate archer"; bilge, "wise," boka, "strong man" (Vladimirtsov 1934: 74) . It is apparent that the nicknames are the same as in the Yakut epos. 406

The Social Structure All of these, however, are dead terms, relics in the full sense of the word. In the Yakut language, there have been retained, nevertheless, some ancient terms which, in one way or another, have retained remnants of their previous social meaning. Such is primarily the Yakut term darkhan. In contemporary Yakut speech, it means "important," "majestic," "honored," "ceremonial," "haughty." The expressions darkhannyy, darkhannyy, "to be proud," "to be ceremonious," "to spread out," "to put on airs," "to strut," are derivative from it, and now carry a negative nuance, a hint of condemnation of proud and haughty people. In the language of the epos and the mythology of the Yakuts, the term darkhan is encountered as the basic part of compound, usually descriptive, designations of heroes and gods, including those best-liked and closest to the people. Thus, for example, the patron spirit of fire, "the greatest of all, ichchi, raised to the status of a deity and worshipped more than the gods," and, at the same time, the closest of them to man, is addressed in solemn speech: Aan-darkhan-toyon, Aan-darkhan-Ut (Priklonskiy 1391: 61; Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 678-79; Kulakovskiy 1923: 28-29). "The mistress of the earth, the very kind ichchi," who takes the place of the champions' own mother, and who takes "very close to her heart the fate and welfare of people" living on her earth, is called Aan-darkhan-khotun (Priklonskiy 1891: 5o; Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 678-79; Kulakovskiy 1923: 41-42; Pripuzov 1885: 62; Solovev 1877: 418). Sometimes the term darkhan is also encountered in the compound names of demonic beings, as, for example, the evil demon-deity Koyulgendarkhan, one of the spirits who afflict people with chronic ulcers (Priklonskiy 1891: 5t). Finally, the term darkhan forms part of the designations of actual historical personages who are mentioned in Yakut legends and traditions. It is found even in the earliest transcriptions of examples of Yakut historical folklore, according to which the ancestors of the Yakuts migrated from the south to the middle Lena under the leadership of their prince Dekhsi-darkhan-tegin. It may be that the father of the mythical hero $lley, the forefather of the Yakuts, "the old man Darkhan," who is mentioned in a tradition recorded in 1907, is the same character. In other traditions concerning the origin of the Yakuts, we also find mention of darkhans, this time descendants of Elley; for instance, Dekhsidarkhan, Doydusa-darkhan or Tyusyulge-darkhan. In other variants of the historical traditions concerning the ancestors of Tygyn, Kursen-darkhan, Mengi-darkhan, Degi-darkhan, Deli-darkhan, Deri-darkhan, Bagadysyndarkhan, Uolen-darkhan, Igidey-darkhan, Munn'an-darkhan and Khomuyan-darkhan are also mentioned. All of these darkhans of very ancient times are, according to the traditions, ancestors or relatives of the famous Kangalasy toyon Tygyn. Like Tygyn himself, they are depicted as independent rulers of their clans and tribes, leaders with full power over numerous warriors, slaves, and servants. There were darkhans not only in the Kangalasy volost (tribe), in 407

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S. A. Tokarev's opinion. Besides Kangalasy darkhans, they can be noted also among the Bayagantay, Megins, Altayans, and Namy. As the traditions collected by A. S. Poryadin among the Megins show, there were also darkhans after Tygyn, until the baptism of the Yakuts, and, in the words, of the collector: "Whoever considers himself great names one of his sons darkhan. For example, in the First Moyerut nasleg, among the seven richest toyons in Meginsk u/us, there was one Darkhan clan. A famous, rich, and powerful man of this clan, Aba-Uos-D'orkho, called his son Banchuk-darkhan. In turn, the latter had a son called Telgen-darkhan. This son was baptized with his father when the father reached the age of sixty. Afterwards, Banchuk-darkhan, who took the name of Ivan Skryabin, was elected prince, and was granted the first 'sword of office.' With him the name of Darkhan came to an end" (A. S. Poryadin, personal communication). This last of the Megin darkhans, Banchuk-darkhan, the son of D'orkho (Zhorko), is well known from Russian written documents of the 17th century. The term darkhan or tarkhan was widespread in the Middle Ages in Middle and Central Asia among Turkic and Mongol peoples. Without going into a detailed analysis of the meaning of this term, we merely note that, in certain cases, it designates the head of a patriarchal commune, or an elder, a tribal or clan chieftain, sometimes a war leader or military chief and sometimes a priest, the high priest of a particular clan or tribe. In other cases, we have before us a title corresponding to what is already a strictly feudal state. Thus, for example, among the Mongols, darkhans were divided into three groups. The first group comprised the darkhans, who were manumitted slaves and who were exempted from feudal dues, and who had attained various high ranks within the feudal society. The second was made up of the aristocratic noyans, who had received the appellation of darkhan in token of the privilege of being exempted from punishment for crimes. The third included the "great darkhans," dai darchad, who were free from personal dependence in relation to any feudal lord. Of them it was said that they were noyan iigei, that is, they had no lord over them, or alba iigei, that is, they were "not bound by the alba or feudal dues" (Tokarev 1945: Plate 5a, 320, 332-33, 351-52). The Yakut term darkhan, although it confirms the connection with the social structure of other Turkic and Mongol peoples, nevertheless does not reveal anything about higher and more complex forms of social organization extending beyond the narrow bounds of clan or tribe. However, other terms, corresponding to political units of broader scope, have survived among the Yakuts. Such is the term khan or khaan. It is not used in the usual everyday speech, but is very widespread in the epos as a part of the names of heroes of the sagas, and also in the mythology, where it belongs most frequently to gods of the upper echelon, placed immediately below the supreme couple—Yuryung-Ayyy-toyon and his wife, Kubcykhotun. Those gods who bear the name of khan are the mighty rulers of life and death; the arbiters of human fate are D'ylga-khaan, Chyngys-khaan, and Odun-khaan. Among the epic heroes with this name, Kharakhkhaan408

The Social Structure toyon, the champion's father-in-law, has the greatest popularity. Sometimes the champion himself is called a khan, as, for example, Khaan-D'argystay. And although in some cases the word khan or khaan stands in front of the hero's personal name, and in others behind it, this does not change the nature of the term. Pekarskiy translates it with the words: "large," "great," "important," "honored," "noble," and connects it with the TurkicMongolic term khan, kagan, kaan, meaning "prince," "emperor," or "khan [R.]" (Pekarskiy 1907-30: art. 3194; Radlov 1893-1911: 105). In Yakut usage, the term khan is certainly not now connected with any real institution, but there can hardly be doubt that it carries an echo of past relationships, from a time when the ancestors of the Yakuts knew khans; if not their own, then foreign ones. Another honorary title among the Yakuts was the word tegin. This term was first noticed in the brief communication by Strahlenberg on the migration of the ancestors of the Yakuts to the north, which was then repeatedly cited by scholars. The transcription in Strahlenberg's text, as has been pointed out in the technical literature, leaves no doubt that this word is identical with the ancient Turkic term tegin. At the time of the Orkhon-Yenisey runic texts, this term signified, among the Orkhon Türks "the highest rank," "a prince." In the Orkhon inscriptions, along with Kyul-tegin, the prominent figure in the ancient Turkic state and a great warrior, we find mentioned Yoilyg-tegin, Tonga-tegin, and other persons possessing the same title (Radlov 1893-1911: 1034, 1038; cf. GrumGrzhimaylo 5926: 227 and notes). There were also tegins among another Turkic peoples, the Uygurs, for instance, and among them this word was part of the composite names of some khans (for example, Enen-tegin). Various scholars have also compared the designation of the most popular hero of Yakut historical folklore, the early 17th-century Kangalasy princeling Tygyn (or, as his name is sometimes pronounced, Dygyn) with the ancient Turkic word tegin (Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 23-33). According to S. I. Bolo's materials, the Kolyma Lamuts, "for the sake of respect," call certain prominent Yakuts "Yakut Tegins," Yokhkho-tygyn. Here as well, the word tygyn is not a proper name, but a generic one. The idea of a previous tribal union is reflected, although weakly, in the Yakut vocabulary. From this point of view, the name of the progenitor of the Yakuts, $lley, is of great interest. $lley is a typical culture-hero. The Yakut legends attribute to him the invention of the smudge-pot for livestock tending and the preparation of vessels for milk from birchbark, wood, and leather. In the legends, he is the first craftsman and artist who laid the foundation for the entire material culture and art of the Yakuts, the first shaman and founder of religious worship in honor of the bright deities, and the first to hold an ysyakh and offer the bloodless sacrifice of kumiss. The first part of his name coincides with the steppe term el, which, among the Turkic peoples in ancient times, expressed the concept of a union of tribes. The loss of the el for the ancient Turkic peoples signified the loss of their tribal autonomy, of their political independence. The legends concerning the existence, in former times among the Yakuts, of "union council," which recalls the el, are of great interest in 409

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this connection. The traditions relate that the clans belonging to the union gathered when the council was held, each arranging itself in three circles, according to social status. In these folkloristic materials, the ancient Turkic designation of this tribal organization reveals itself in a remarkable way; such a union of tribes (d'on) was based no longer on kinship, but on a treaty, eyeleekh, that is, literally, "unions having an el," or "with an el." Such gatherings of the "best people" of various tribes took place, even in later times, when there was a question of some common undertaking (for example, an uprising against the voyevod ["military leader," Russian] although we certainly must not see in them a proof of the existence of any real all-tribal organization in the 17th century. One other fact from the past of the Yakuts, preserved by Lindenau in his Beschreibung der Jakuten, is no less important. Lindenau wrote that from ancient times to his own period, that is, the 1740s, there existed among the Yakuts a particular title, toyon-usa, (toyon-uuha), literally, "the toyon's clan," which signified the ruling and primary status of its bearers over all other Yakuts, this being applied only to persons who descended from Eldey-bator, that is, from Elley. The direct descendants of Elley, the Kangalasy toyons, according to Lindenau's data, even in the middle of the 18th century constituted a special group among the Yakuts, or, to be more accurate, a ruling clan, the head of which had the preeminent or exclusive right to this title. Thus, declaring that after toyon Badzhey his place was taken by Tygyn, "called toyon-usa, which means the lord's clan," Lindenau explains: "The other Yakut clans which have their own princelings call them not toyonusa but merely toyon; the title of toyon-usa is given only to the descendants of Eldey-baton ... Furthermore, as concerns the toyon-usa and his descendants to the present day, Tygyn had two sons—Okurey and Bedzheke. First, Okurey was the toyon-usa, and his brother Bedzheke became his heir. The latter was succeeded by his elder brother Masary, who made a journey to Moscow and appeared before Tsar Aleksey Mikhaylovich [1645-76]. He received the tsar's special favor, after which he returned to his own people. After Masary's death, his three sons, Kuinniyak, Karabytyk, and Bortok were left. Kuinniyak took his father's place. He left four sons: Ayagan or Bosogo, Syran, Kiliyan, and Ayagnit. Ayagan is at the present time toyon-usa among the Yakuts" (Lindenau, MS, n.d., a: leaves I-1o). From the subsequent account, it appears that the title of toyon-usa was handed down to a son by the father according to the latter's own desire, it being apparently presumed that the title belonged to the eldest son. Thus, for example, Lindenau writes that Mundzhan (Munn'yan) appointed Tygyn to take his place, bypassing his oldest son. Later, writing of Tygyn again, Lindenau mentions that, at the time of the Russians' arrival, "Tygyn was at that time the toyon-usa, or the head and commander of all, and Dekhsi-darkhan the chief of the Yengyasyali clan, which afterwards received the name of Namy." The materials gathered a half-century later, at the very beginning of the 19th century, by Dr. Merck, say essentially the same thing: "The descendants which had multiplied from 410

The Social Structure them (that is, from Elley and Omogoy—Author) always gave the primacy to the generation of Elley's older son, Khangalas, after whose name the Khangalasy ulus was called, and this primacy lasted until Tygyn's time, that is, until the Yakuts were subjugated to the Russian throne by means of a ruler who had emerged from among them" (Anon. 18o6). Something similar is noted among many of the steppe tribes. Among the Kazakhs, such clans were called "sultan clans." Among the Altayans, we find several "aristocratic clans." Of them, Radlov wrote: "The families of the zaysans and denzichi form old, princely, and noble clans, whose rank is hereditary down to the present day" (Radlov 1884: 251; Potapov 1933: 54, 75; Tokarev 1936: 63-64). Tokarev has connected the formation of the princely houses with the union of several clans under one zaysan. Such was also the case, to judge by Lindenau's data, among the Yakuts, where the surname, or, more accurately, the clan of Tygyn, acquired a similar position. In sum, leaving aside the echoes of the distant past, and taking account only of what relates to the life of the Yakuts, it may be stated that, at the time of the Russians' arrival, the old tribal structure established under the conditions of the steppe life still persisted to some extent among the Yakuts. Within it, there was sharp class differentiation. A nobility (the toyons), surrounded by slaves and dependent people, had long since emerged from among the mass of Yakut commune members. This mass also contained poor and deprived people. Despite the fact that members of the clan were bound by a patriarchal system and were dependent on a nobility, there existed, nevertheless, class antagonism, and a suppressed class struggle within Yakut society, even before the appearance of the Russians. Whereas the aristocratic ideology of the social elite, as we have seen, was vividly expressed in folklore, the moods and feelings of the oppressed strata of the people in their turn found expression in numerous sayings and proverbs which condemned the pride, haughtiness, and heartless cruelty of the rich: for example, one such saying about the toyons goes as follows: "From the `blind in one eye,' he took away the tears of his [remaining] eye, and from the lame, the juice of his joints." The hatred of the people for their toyon oppressors is also reflected in traditions, and even in the olonkho. Yastremskiy, for example, noted the motif of struggle against social injustice and the protest of the lower strata of society against the arbitrary acts of representatives of the ruling class in the olonkho about the two shaman sisters: "The retainer-champion Suodalba, sparing no pains, labors for the welfare of his masters, conquers their enemies, and provides them with domestic comforts, but when he hints at a request for help in setting up his own household, he meets with icy indifference. Then Suodalba explodes in wrath, and without asking takes part of the lord's furniture, and sets up a house for himself in the woods. Suodalba is undoubtedly the protesting element of the lower stratum of the people against the aristocrats who usurp the good things of life" (Yastremskiy 1929: 8). A legend about a proud and masterful wealthy toyon, who is called 411

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Dodor in some versions and Doyudus in some others, enjoys great popularity in Yakut historical folklore. As usual, Dodor or Doyudus is conceived in the stories as a real historical personage, the head of an ulus, who lived comparatively recently, during the first half of the 18th century. Even the remains of his homestead and of the house in which he lived are pointed out. Actually, there was a Dodor, who built a house of unusual size and height for that period. The door of his house, they say, was so high that a rider sitting astride a horse could scarcely reach the top of it with his whip. It may be presumed that the character and behavior of the actual Dodor in some measure provided the basis for a definite cycle of legendary motifs connected with his name. This will be brought out later. There now appears in the legend no longer a mere concrete personage of the toyon class, but a generalized figure of a cruel and haughty toyon, as it took form in the popular consciousness. He is depicted in the folklore as a cruel and merciless exploiter of his fellow clansmen, a petty tyrant and bully, without shame or conscience. The traditions relate that he had "excessively many cattle," and being "such a rich man as was found nowhere among the Yakuts of that time," he did not look after his own stock, but turned it over to the whole nasleg for feeding. All the labor of procuring hay and looking after the remaining livestock in winter was performed, without compensation, by his neighbors [relatives]. Thus, Dodor became the complete ruler of his nasleg and its inhabitants, and turned them into his workmen. Not confining himself to such uncontrolled power over other Yakuts, he became infamous for his hard ways and villainous tricks. Not satisfied with the usual Yakut dwelling, Dodor (Doyudus) ordered that a house of unusual type be built, with twelve base columns, made from trunks of aspens torn out by the roots. While the workmen were trimming the columns, Dodor (Doyudus) would ask them what they were doing. If he received the reply that they were preparing columns for their lord's house, he would beat the workmen into insensibility. If, on the other hand, a workman replied that he was making a framework for the grave of Doyudus, the latter would slap his thighs in glee and laugh and praise the workman. When he invited guests, the rich man, according to one of the versions, seated them at three tables placed respectively opposite the first or honored bench, the second or middle bench, and the third or rear bench. The first table was intended for the rich, the second for people of moderate means, and the third for the poor. On the table stood wooden dishes with boiled meat. Those who were to be fed at the first two tables, were called by Dodor with the words: "My ravens, my ravens! Come, sit down!" Sitting down, the guests cawed like ravens and ate without knives, tearing the meat apart with their teeth and nails. Inviting the poor people to the third table, Dodor said to them: "My dogs, my dogs! Come!" And they tore the meat with their teeth, growling at each other like dogs. Dodor arranged still more cruel sports with defenseless animals. Thus, for example, the traditions say that he caused a mare with a foal to be brought and chopped off the mare's legs at the knees. The foal was then 412

The Social Structure driven away from the mother and the mare followed, struggling over the ground with her chopped-off legs. In order to fully appreciate the significance of this detail, this attitude of the traditions towards the legendary Dodor, one must remember the position the horse occupied in the life and world-view of the ancient Yakuts. The horse was considered not only a pure but also a sacred animal, which was accorded an honored place in the religious worship of the bright, heavenly gods. Among the gods of the Yakut pantheon, one of the most prominent places belongs to the heavenly stallion Dzhesegey. The "creator-goddess," Ayyysyt, was herself represented in folklore and epic poetry in the aspect of a mare! Abuse of a mare was, therefore, in the eyes of the people, not only a sadistic act, but also a terrible blasphemy, a mockery of faith, and a challenge to the gods themselves. But even such "amusements" were not enough for Dodor. He brought together twelve shamans, ordering them to summon the daughter of a demon as a bride, and, since the shamans were unable to do this, he chased them away from his house barely alive. However, these "amusements" ended when a mighty shamaness, after shamanizing for nine days and nine nights, finally summoned to earth the daughter of an abaasa. Doyudus was so frightened by her appearance that he begged the shamaness to make her return below. The demon's daughter thereupon answered the shaman's request: "Dokhsun-Doyudus, having taken me to wife and brought me into his house, has hidden his shining face. This Doyudus, along with his people and his cattle, I will destroy before three years are out, and I will not permit him to see his progeny forever; I will cause your smoke-hole to be covered with frost, your windows to be frosted over, the eight main pillars of your house to go in different directions. By this I will make myself known! After this Doyudus died, and was transformed into a horrible yör. His people and beasts died, and his progeny died off" (Ovchinnikov 1897; Pekarskiy 1907; Vasilev, MS, 1945 [the tradition Dodor-Kuluba]). The same figure of a wealthy tyrant and bully is known in Buryat folklore, and even his name shows a partial similarity to Doyudus-Dodor. It is Done-bayan, or Dono, of the Buryat tales recorded by P. P. Batorov (Okladnikov 1937). The end of the legend, in which the haughty rich bully is punished by the heavens for all his crimes, is the same in both instances. A variant of this motif among the Buryats is the tale of a fierce cannibal, Boshko, who was known as khattu-khulitay-noyon, "the chief with a hard law" (Okladnikov 1937: 376-78). Analogous tales about a rich bully, punished by the gods for his acts, also exist in the folklore of other steppe peoples. The similarity between the tales of the legendary Yakut Dodor and the analogous tales of other Siberian peoples is remarkable in that it is a direct proof of the profound antiquity of those features of social relations of which such tales are an expression. The ideology of a still more cruelly oppressed, still more disenfranchised sector of pre-Russian Yakut society—the ideology of slaves—also found its reflection in Yakut folklore. A vivid example of this is provided by the 413

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"fairy tale" about the rich man Boilyt and the slave-champion Bert-Er, published by G. N. Potanin. It relates how the poor Yakut Bordo, on account of hunger, sold his sons into slavery to the cruel rich man Boilyt. Boilyt compels them to carry out an impossible task—they must cut ten cartloads of wood uninterruptedly, and, when they do not succeed, Boilyt subjects them to cruel execution. After two sons of Bordo have died as a result of torture, and the old man himself thereafter dies of grief, the youngest son, Bert-Er, who is still alive, wreaks vengeance upon the rich bully. Bert-Er is also sold into slavery to Boilyt, and finds out from the rich man's other slaves how his brothers had perished. Thereupon the new slave puts an end to his master's misdeeds: "Everyone began to do him honor; it seemed to everyone that he was a defender of the oppressed, and the slaves listened to his every word as though it were sacred. The slaves said to each other: it would be good if Bert-Er put this Boilyt before us. We would kill him like a dog!" The "fairy tale" of the wealthy Boilyt and the poor Bordo is, therefore, a true bylina [Russian epic], a remarkable example of the epos of slaves and the oppressed. In bold relief, it depicts what other folklore sources remain silent about—the hard lot of slaves and their relationship to the toyon lords, their secret mortal hatred and fierce thirst for vengeance upon their enslavers (Potanin 1883: 64I-47) 8° The class contradictions seething within Yakut society, which, by its external aspect, was still in the patriarchal-clan stage, were also expressed in distinctive architectural relics. Even to this day, there still rise, in some places, isolated material reminders of these contradictions—the storage towers built by the toyons, who kept their wealth in them, and who were concerned not only for the safety of their accumulated treasure but also for their own lives. Information about such fortifications reaches into the 17th century, but they continued to be built until the middle of the 19th century, especially during the period of Vasiliy Manchara. One of the best examples of such towers, erected by the well-known 18th century Megin toyon Ponomarev, stands in the locality of Turuyalakh Sayylyga, in the Second Melzhakhsin [Meldekhsin] nasleg on the river Sola, on the right bank of the Lena, below Yakutsk. In sum, what was the Yakut society depicted in the olonkho? This was, as we have seen, a society where clan ties were still strong. People lived in kin groups, observing the law of exogamous marriage as sacred. The clan was patrilineal. The power of the father in the family was indisputable. In inter-clan and inter-tribal conflicts, the barbaric custom of the vendetta revealed itself in all its savage power: the clan and the tribe stood as a unified whole in relation to alien offenders. But these clan ties did not preclude the existence of property and of social inequality, primarily in the form of patriarchal family slavery. Nor did they preclude the development of other forms of social inequality, these based on the exploitation of members of one's own clan and tribe, juridically free, but economically dependent on the wealthy, on the patriarchal-clan nobility. Without tying the hands of the exploiting elite of Yakut society, and without substantially limiting their activities, the 414

The Social Structure clan relationships gave the latter a character particularly repulsive in its barbarism and hypocrisy. The presence of patriarchal-clan ties permitted the Yakut toyons to cloak all these forms of exploitation of man by man in the idyllic covering of clan "mutual aid," and "care" for the economically weak members of the clan. The wealthy could at the same time use the force of primitive clan ties and traditions to uphold their rule, to suppress the protests of the oppressed, and to carry out their own selfish policy, directed toward the fomenting of inter-clan and inter-tribal struggle, and toward the seizure of slaves and property from conquered opponents. The level of development of the clan system which is under discussion here, corresponds in its general features to the words of Engels, who described an "ancient clan organization," as still "in full force," but already approaching the first stage of its disintegration. This system was characterized primarily by patria potestas and patrilineal descent,* with inheritance of the property by the children, which promoted the accumulation of wealth in the family and strengthened the family against the clan. At the same time, there appeared the influence of property differentiation on the social structure, in the form of a hereditary nobility, and, later, imperial power; slavery began, at first applied only to prisoners of war, but later including the enslavement of fellow-tribesmen, and even fellow-clansmen; the former inter-tribal clashes were corrupted into systematic brigandage for the seizure of livestock, slaves, and treasure. Engels thinks that a society which has reached this stage is characterized by "... the glorification and worship of wealth by force" (Engels 1951 [edition] : 111). Thus, within the primitive-communal structure itself, at its patriarchalclan stage, new relationships, which must lead to its downfall and to the origin of the state, come to birth naturally and inevitably. What were these relationships, and what kind of state developed? On the level of world history, the primitive-communal system is followed by a slave-holding system, and the slave-holding state which corresponds to it. In our case, however, we must bear in mind that Yakut clan society ran its course under special historical conditions. The first of these is that the ancestors of the Yakuts underwent the development of class relations many centuries later than did the population of the countries where slave-holding societies originated [and developed] in their classical form. Second, the long-continued existence among them of survivals of the primitive-communal system is to be explained, in the final analysis, by the low level of the productive forces, the primitive forms of pastoral economy, and the general backwardness of the Yakuts, who, because of their historical fate, were located in less suitable conditions than the other pastoral peoples of Siberia and Middle Asia. Further, their primitive pastoral economy was incapable of serving as the base for the mass use of slave labor, not to mention its transformation into [a more efficient] productive system. Under such conditions, the ancient patriarchal slavery could not develop [The Russian ottsovskoye pravo, like the German Vaterrecht, unites both these ideas into one conccpt. Translator.]

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into slavery of the Classical [Graeco-Roman] type. It could only be a constituent of the productive relationships—and not even one of primary importance in its proportion. With it, there existed elements of a second constituent, in the form of various types of exploitation by the toyons of their own fellow clansmen, who were independent producers of material goods, owners of their own livestock, and juridically equal owners of the communal lands. These forms of exploitation, which had grown up naturally in the course of the decay of the primitive-communal structure, were no longer slave-holding, but were feudal in their nature. The origin and development of these forms of exploitation of the immediate producer could not but be influenced by the historical circumstances which are illustrated by the aforementioned examples relating to the social structure of the Yakuts in the past, when they were living with other Turkic and Mongolic peoples, participating in their life in one way or another, and passing through a course of history which, if not identical in detail, was in many respects similar. Slave-holding did not achieve predominance anywhere among the steppe peoples of Asia; a slave-holding state did not arise. On the contrary, we know that all the states of the steppe tribes, beginning with the Mongol empires of the l2th—i4th centuries (during which they took their most precise shape), were based on feudal relationships which, in this instance, were primary, and determined the basic structure. It is no less obvious that even the Mongols of the l2th—i4th centuries did not have a true and pure feudalism analogous to that which existed at the same time among agricultural peoples, among whom the feudalism was based on the ownership of land, and where the feudal state structure arose in its classical form. Unlike the population of agricultural countries, the pastoral nomads did not have a true neighborhood commune founded on territorial ties. In place of the latter, the clan commune, reinforced by rooted kin relationships, continued to exist here. The long-continued existence of kin ties within the patriarchal clan, which not even the stormy period of conquests under Chingis Khan and his successors succeeded in eliminating among all the Mongol tribes and peoples, depended, in the last analysis, on the [economically] extensive character and primitive level of the basic production of the steppe tribes—nomadic pastoralism—and on the low level of their productive forces, and the corresponding primitiveness of their social structure when compared to the advanced agricultural peoples of Europe and Asia. Under these conditions, social relations which were half-patriarchal and half-feudal arose, and continued to exist over the course of millennia.

416

Historical Events of the 16th and 17th Centuries in Yakutia

Chapter 4

For a more detailed understanding of the socio-political structure of the Yakuts before the arrival of the Russians, the legends and traditions connected with the name of Tygyn are of great interest. These legends are interesting not only for the reason that they give an opportunity, rare for the North, to follow the activity of an historical person but also, first and foremost, because they are not a biography of Tygyn himself, as might be thought at first glance. Such a view would be not only superficial but also basically false, distorting the true meaning and content of historical folklore as a creation of the people, as a story of its own historical fate, thoughts, and aspirations. The traditions, although telling about Tygyn, in fact speak not of him but of the life of the Yakut people. The traditions tell, with epic simplicity and force, of the bloody internecine clashes weakening the Yakut clans and tribes. They depict in vivid colors the inter-clan relationships and the patriarchal-clan relations of the Yakuts. They illumine with astonishing fullness and force those complex events which took place here in the 16th and 17th centuries, before the arrival of the Russians on the middle Lena, and in which Tygyn actually played a leading but by no means basic role. As we will see later, such a role in these events belonged to the people. Actually, it is the people, and not Tygyn, who hold the role of the main hero in them. The last, decisive word belongs to them, and not to the power-hungry and despotic Tygyn. As concerns the personality of Tygyn, there exist in the literature two points of view on the historical content of the legends about Tygyn. Some saw in Tygyn a "Yakut tsar," the heir of the Uygur khans. They were even ready to adduce his genealogy from the last Uygur khan Enen-tegin, who fled to the west and was lost there without a trace. Such views are connected with the conception of ancient Yakut society as a purely feudal one. This view also cannot be accepted, since the facts contradict it. The first such fact is the leading influential position of Tygyn's descendants in relation to the other Yakut princes, both in the beginnings of the i7th century and considerably later, up to the end of the 18th century. "And these Kangalasy princes," the well-known Cossack ataman Ivan Galkin 417

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wrote of them to the tsar in 1634, "are numerous and possess the whole earth, and many princes fear them."" The second such fact is the special place which Tygyn occupies in Yakut folklore. As we know, no other personage of Yakut historical folklore was so widely known in all corners of Yakutia as Tygyn, or, as he is sometimes called, Dygyn. Properly speaking, Yakut folklore until the i9th century knows only two great epochs, and two names with which they are connected. The first of these names is the name of the legendary ancestor of the people, Elley; the second is Tygyn's. The remaining intervening events and personalities, as it were, completely dissolved, melted away in the rays of Tygyn's legendary "fame." Tygyn occupies a central position not only in the legends of the rgth and aoth centuries but also in Lindenau's unique transcriptions, which for the 16th and 17th centuries are important as a genuine oral chronicle. It was preserved by this remarkable student of Yakut folklore of the 18th century, who was far ahead of his time in the carefulness and breadth of ethnographic descriptions of Siberian tribes, with the exception of his contemporary, Stepan Krasheninnikov, the leading figure of Russian and world ethnography of that time. In order to see what role Tygyn really played, and why, and in order to get an idea of the actual historical events of that time, let us turn to the data of historical folklore, having as our starting point the evidence of the traditions transcribed by Lindenau. The traditions tell that the first leader of the Yakuts on the middle Lena was Badzhey, the grandfather of Tygyn. In the Yakut legends of the igth and loth centuries, he is called Doydusa-darkhan, which properly is not a personal name, but, as we have already noted earlier, a title. According to the data of Bolo, this Doydusa-darkhan is also called Tyusyulge-darkhan; that is, darkhan with a tyhylge, a festive sacred seat made of birchwood during an ysyakh. This last name also, apparently, was an honorary sobriquet, which was preserved until our day in folklore, when the direct personal name of its owner, Badzhey, disappeared from popular memory. The reason for this was most probably the ancient Yakut habit of avoiding pronouncing the names of the deceased, especially those of the most honored, the nobles, "guarding" the latter to avoid the heavy consequences of breaking a similar ban. Tyusyulge or Doydusa-darkhan, that is, Badzhey, is remembered as a mighty ruler, extremely rich with cattle, having many warriors, servants, and slaves, who lived on the central Kangalasy lands which, according to some data, were located in the present-day Nemyugin nasleg of the former West Kangalasy u/us, and, according to other data, on the hill at Lake Saysara. His domain stretched along the left bank of the Lena, from present-day Yakutsk to Pokrovskoye 01 Tyusyulge had two sons: Munn'an-darkhan and Mold'ogor, both famous rich men. Munn'an-darkhan had two sons: Tygyn and Usun-Oyuun (Bolo n.d., i). His relative Abyy-darkhan lived with him. When Elley and Omogoy-bay once lived here, the territory belonged to the Tungus, 4(8

Historical Events of the i6th and 17th Centuries and now, in Tyusyulge's time, the Tungus still lived in parts of the terriritory, among the Yakuts. Tyusyulge lived to a great age, but, as the legend affirms, in his old age, when Tyusyulge-darkhan finally became senile and his grey hair turned yellow, he died of shame brought on him by a Tungus among his enemies. "Descending from Omogoy-Elley, the grandfather of toyon Tygyn, Tyusyulge-darkhan," relates one of the best Kangalasy storytellers, ninetytwo-year-old D. E. Maksimov, "an extremely ancient venerable old man, like me, once sat with tousled hair warming himself before the fire, when suddenly from the courtyard came the Tungus." One of them, "conceiving a hatred for the old man and mocking him," so cruelly shamed him that he suddenly died (Bolo n.d., i). After this, another tradition relates, the Tungus, considering themselves victors, came out of the old man's dwelling and from that time on multiplied more than previously, and settled in Yakut country. Other legends tell of some temporary predominance of the "Tungus"; that is, the native inhabitants of the land. "Elley had four sons. They were all brave and manly people. In those days, many Tungus lived in our area. Elley's sons, becoming related to the Yakuts of Omogoy-bay, began to press the Tungus. The latter began to say among themselves: `Before, we lived peaceably and in good agreement with the Yakuts, but these vagrant newcomers are depraved and evil people.' Soon after this, the Tungus killed Elley and all his sons" (S. I. Bolo, personal communication) . Echoes of these events must have come down to us in the heavily disfigured tale about the origin of the Yakuts which was published by Witsen [Witsen 1705]. As Lindenau reports, after the death of Badzhey, his place was taken by a son, Mundzhan, borne by one of his four wives, Kanalas by name. Mundzhan's name survived in Yakut traditions to the present day in the form Munn'an. Aside from his name, we know nothing about him. In the later traditions, Munn'an, so to speak, completely merged with his son, and even his name was transferred to the latter, who, in a number of legends, is called Tygyn-Munn'an, although in some materials his real name is Tyyn, literally "breath" (G. U. Ergis, personal communication; cf. Pekarskiy 1907-3o: art. 2948). The "power" and "majesty" of the legendary Tygyn, as he is described in the traditions, are expressed in the descriptions of his external aspect. With this, Tygyn himself, and his children, are depicted in most of the traditions in a sort of dark and ominous, even demonic light. In the most widely distributed variants of the legends about Tygyn, he is depicted as a bogatyr-giant. The children of Tygyn—Tas-Ullungakh and Muos-Uol—are drawn with the same fabulous features. One of them, Muos-Uol, had a strong [and hard] body, like the horn of a cow, on which there was only one vulnerable place, in the form of a mole, known to no one besides his old mother. In other variants of the legends about him, it is said that he was a forest savage and that his skin, which had hardened in the forest, was covered with a thick shaggy fur, like that of a forest 419

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spirit. When he slept in a forest thicket and inhaled, the surrounding trees bent and united their tops; when he exhaled, they swung in various directions. His heart was covered with gristle and thick fur. Tygyn's second son, Tas-Ullungakh, that is, "the man with the stone heel," was so called because he had a foot or heel of stone or thick sinew. Like his elder brother, he slept not at home but on the top of the Northern Sacred Mountain, which was his nest. His old mother said of him to Tygyn that he would grow into a bogatyr of an unusually rough character, and that, when he was still in the maternal womb, in the seventh month of pregnancy, he felt through with his hand, pressing her liver and heart. Tygyn himself is depicted in these traditions with the features of a bully and a bloodthirsty despot. In the 18th-century entries about Tygyn, it is said: "This peaceful reign (of the first descendants of Elley—Author) continued until Tygyn, known among the Yakuts only by murders, thefts, and every kind of violence [came onto the scene]. Tygyn committed his outrages not openly, but with a great measure of cunning, pouncing suddenly, and not giving his enemies time to assemble. In order to carry on his plundering more easily, he never stayed in one place long, but spent the night in various places; where he happened to rest several days, he [falsely] left traces of another clan. Even though these have been obliterated, the Yakuts, according to the traditions, called them Tygyn's camps.' "92 According to the notes recorded in the 19th-2oth centuries, the legendary Tygyn also tirelessly persecutes other clans and tribes, kills their bogatyrwarriors, and also, in a number of cases, pitilessly murders their wives and children, seizes the property of the vanquished, and sets fire to their dwellings (Map 4). "If a strong bogatyr appeared somewhere, even in another ulus, Dygyn attempted to erase him from the world. For this, he sent a strong force of warriors with orders to bring back the bogatyr alive or dead. If the emissaries had no success, Dygyn himself went out with an army. Thus he killed many famous bogatyrs" (Nosov 1926: 42). Even the mightiest of his own sons fell victim to the bloodthirsty Tygyn: TasUllungakh and Muos-Uol were treacherously killed while sleeping. In those cases in which Tygyn encounters a stronger opponent—the brave Tungus champion, the simple-hearted fisherman Bert-khara, or another forest bogatyr —he simply saves himself from them by flight, punching through the back portion of his birchbark urasa [tent]. "This was a very strong, crafty, and evil person, a real despot. Tygyn was an extremely capricious man," wrote M. M. Nosov in his compendium of the legends. "Whimsical in his domestic life, rude in his treatment of strangers, he, Map 4. Schematic map of the settlement of the Yakuts and Tygyn's campaigns before the arrival of the Russians, according to historical traditions of the Yakuts of the former Yakutsk, Vilyuy, Verkhoyansk, and Kolyma okrugs of Yakutsk oblast. Collected by S. I. Bolo. Made by S. I. Bolo and I. D. Novgorodov in 1943-44. The triangle designates Tygyn's residence near Lake Saysara; the heavy black lines are Tygyn's campaigns against hostile Yakut tribes. 420

i

KHARALAR-BULDACHA (YUKAGIR-KHANAAY)

DOYDUKAATTAR (DOYDUKAT EVEN YAKUTS) VED-

K~ TEKHEETTERA,

YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

with his colossal size and incredible strength, produced fear in his simple-souled fellow clansmen. Not distinguished by special wisdom or good breeding, he nevertheless, thanks to the qualities noted above, enjoyed the slavish admiration of the entire Yakut country" (Nosov 1926: 42). But then, as a consequence, when Tygyn reached a great age, retribution caught up with him. From the south appeared threatening enemy newcomers, servants of a mighty tsar, but the former Yakut bogatyrs were no longer around Tygyn. Some had been destroyed by him; others had left the bloody son-killer despot, fearing his perfidy and rage. Crushed by the logs of a gigantic deadfall, Tygyn, in his death agony, with grief remembered his murdered sons, but it was already too late! Thus, Tygyn's fate is depicted in these traditions with these dark and tragic words. Under what conditions similar legends arose is explained by another cycle of historical traditions about Tygyn, the most ancient example of which was preserved by Lindenau. These legends tell of real events in the life of the Yakut people before the arrival of the Russians, of the time of sanguinary battles and internecine strife, which entered into folklore as an epoch of kyrgys-yyete, shrouded with the haze of fires and streaming with human blood. As Lindenau already mentioned, the heir to the title and position of toyon-usa after Munn'an, by the latter's own will, was his youngest son, Tygyn, who thereby occupied a superior position over the rest of his brothers. This happened, as Lindenau emphasizes, because Tygyn was more daring and more cunning than his brothers. Tygyn's elder brothers were highly annoyed, and quarrelled with Tygyn. The quarrel of Munn'an's sons caused disturbances among the people; almost all Yakut clans, Lindenau says, were disturbed. The internecine quarrel among Munn'an's heirs so deeply agitated the Yakut people in the second half of the 16th century that it is reflected even in later folklore, although already coded in the conventional, stereotyped language of the epics. According to the Tatta [Taatta] storyteller E. M. Yegorov, the young bogatyr Dygyn met in the northern taiga a beautiful woman by the name of N'yrbakaan, who had three sons. Having learned of this, Dygyn's father, Syraan-bay, asked his son to bring N'yrbakaan to him, so that she would become his concubine. N'yrbakaan, having become Syraan-bay's wife, lived in an urasa separated from the rest of his wives, and her sons, as before, went to hunt to the north, and always returned home with a rich bag°A Once they saw and killed the precious [benevolent] bird, Sar. The storyteller continues: "At that time, the Sar bird was considered a very precious bird among the Yakuts, signifying either happiness or something promised." Removing the skin of the bird, the hunters nailed it to the first (main) tie-beam of the house to dry. When Dygyn came to visit and saw the Sar bird, he began to ask the sons of N'yrbakaan to give him the cherished skin, but was refused. Then Dygyn quarrelled with them, and seized the skin by force, mounted a horse, and attempted to flee. N'yrbakaan's sons began to shoot at him with arrows. Jumping aside and dodging their swift arrows, Dygyn saw that the points of the arrows stuck into a larch to the very shaft. Frightened by this, Dygyn dropped 422

Historical Events of the 16th and i7th Centuries the skin of the Sar bird and fled homeward. Learning of what happened, old woman N'yrbakaan decided that she and her sons would no longer dwell here, and went to the Vilyuy, where she established the Nyurba [N'urba] ulus (Bolo n.d., e)." In other legends, the ancestress of the Vilyuy Yakuts was called Dzhardakh or Dzharkhan-emyakhsin. The initial part of the legends about her is the same as in those about N'yrbakaan. Dzhardakh came from a tribe of Tumats who lived on the lower Vilyuy. When the Tumats were being exterminated by the Tungus, Dzhardakh fled along the river, and then appeared in Tygyn's residence, where she became his favorite wife. After this, when Dzhardakh had borne and raised children, Tygyn's older wives, out of envy, began to incite their children to kill Dzhardakh's sons, and to Tygyn himself began to say that Dzhardakh and her sons were inciting the people against him." Learning of this, Dzhardakh and her sons decided to flee to the Vilyuy (Timofeyev-Tereshkin 1930). N'yrbakaan and Dzhardakh, in all these traditions, undoubtedly are one and the same person; they correspond to one of the three wives of Tygyn's father, Nunn'an, named Djergan (Dzharkhan), the mother of Kadzhagha and Dedider, whom Lindenau mentions. The tale is repeated here of the quarrel and resultant flight of Djergan-Dzharkhan and her sons to the Vilyuy. In the legend recorded on the Vilyuy by M. N. Timofeyev-Tereshkin, it is stated that, learning of the talk against her and her sons by the elder wives of Tygyn, the wise Dzhardakh ordered her sons to prepare secretly for flight as soon as the spring floods had passed and the earth dried up. Utilizing as an excuse the customary journey to the summer pastures (sayylyk). Dzhardakh's clan, with its cattle and property, fled then along the Lena. When, after a long time, Tygyn learned of their flight, he chased after them in the direction from which Dzhardakh had appeared, in the direction of the Far Western Land (Arga Kyyaar), but, having wandered many days, he found no trace of the fugitives. The course of subsequent events, which unfolded after Tygyn's quarrel with his brothers, is drawn in Lindenau's materials as follows: in spite of everything that had happened, Tygyn for a long time, from necessity, tried to preserve friendship and peace with them, but at the same time mercilessly pillaged and ravaged other tribes who decided to oppose him. He had clashes with the Borogons on Lake Myuryu, on the Aldan along the road to Verkhoyansk, with the Baturus on the Tatta River, and with the Betyuns on the Amga River, near the Khatuy. Indications of war by Tygyn with all the enumerated tribes are also contained in the later legends, which have special value because, in a number of cases, they clarify the course of events, not from the point of view of Tygyn's fellowclansmen, the Kangalasy, but from that of their enemies, since they were recorded among the descendants of the latter, in the eastern uluses. Tygyn's clashes with the Borogons are expressed, for example, in the legend about Bert-khara. In a variant of the legend, transcribed from the Ust-Aldan storyteller D. M. Govorov, about the first encounter of Tygyn's people with Bert-khara, it is related that, in seeking their horses, Tygyn's 423

YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

youth Bedeke-bege unexpectedly saw traces of a man which were as big as the bottom of a [large] birchbark vessel. Following along the gigantic tracks, he reached the Borogon lands and, in the locality of Khanga, caught up with the bogatyr, and then, emboldened, pushed him from behind with the breast of his horse. To this the bogatyr only waved his left hand, and Bedeke and his horse flew to the side with such force that he became stuck in a snow drift. The good-hearted Bert-khara turned, pulled them out from the snow, and, seeing a very considerable person in a dokha* of black sables, thought that a forest animal had fallen on him, and therefore placed him on his feet and turned his face to the west. Having listened to Bedeke's tale, Tygyn noticed an enormous bow which none of his warriors could draw. It turned out that this was the bow which Bert-khara had used in childhood. When Bert-khara returned, he seized a bull, laid it on his knee, and twisted its head off, and at the same time ripped its skin off with his hands. During the time that the bull was cooking, a hot billet fell on the bogatyr's knee, but Bert-khara did not even notice the burn. Tygyn was afraid to spend the night in the neighborhood of Bert-khara's dwelling, and went to Lake Myuryu, where he wintered. In the spring, Tygyn held an ysyakh and invited Bert-khara. He handed him a birchbark vessel with kumiss into which finely cut horse hair had been mixed. As the bogatyr sat and drank, Tygyn struck him with a sword aimed at the base of the neck. But Bert-khara turned aside from the blow, not even spilling the drink. When this treacherous blow was repeated, Bert-khara in anger wished to beat with his spear haft everyone who was in the urasa, and abandoned his intention only after long persuasion by Tygyn. During the festival, Bert-khara defeated all of Tygyn's best warriors in games and archery. After the end of the games and contests, at night, when Bert-khara slept soundly, Tygyn dismantled half of the urasa and fled through the opening. Chasing after him, Bert-khara and his fellow-clansmen Kylysa-syuryuk caught up with Tygyn's people at Lake Beydinge Tiyt, and drove off two-thirds of their cattle, and Tygyn himself, "not caring for the cattle," gave himself to flight (Bolo n.d., d). In other traditions, it is said that on the way back from Bert-khara, Tygyn nevertheless fell on one of the Borogon clans, the Bes-borogons, who lived in thirty tents, and exterminated them all, except for one boy who hid under an overturned vessel (Bolo n.d., c). In distinction to the Kangalasy legends, which insist that Bert-khara was reconciled, became the son-in-law and counsellor and member of Tygyn's guard, the Borogon legends stress the implacable nature of their enmity. According to the storyteller D. S. Krylov, among them, in the Borogon u/us "there was no such fairy-tale that Dygan-bay made Bertkhara his son-in-law; on the contrary, they say that Tygyn wanted to kill him, trample his name, take away his lands and places; he intended, tricking with the ysyakh festival, to catch, to kill, but that one was the best of the best, and Tygyn turned back, not reaching his goal" (Bolo n.d., c) . $ [Siberian fur coat. Editor, A.I.N.A.]

424

Historical Events of the 16th and i7th Centuries Of Tygyn's struggle with the Betyuns they say that on the Amga, in the locality of Somorsun Aryallyaa, there lived six or seven brothers who bore the name of "Betyun-wolves," or "Betyuns having the luck of a wolf." In the neighborhood, there lived another clan—the Nakhara. The Betyuns were related to the Borogons, and their neighbors, the Nakhara, were related to Tygyn. Once, in autumn, both clans organized a joint net-fishing expedition, the last of the year. The net-fishing expedition was accompanied by games, during which one of the young Nakhara, Bedeke by name, was vanquished in a fight with a Betyun youth. Knocking him down on the ice and not giving him a chance to stand up, the Betyun for a joke put snow in his pants, and the rest of the Betyuns laughed at him. According to another variant of the tradition, this thing happened because Bedeke, struck by the beauty of the wife of the Betyun Masarakh, his uncle on his mother's side, publicly glorified her and thereby shamed his uncle D° In the summer, the Nakhara held an ysyakh and invited the Betyuns to it, but they, riding up, saw the hosts in fighting gear which glittered in the sun. Seeing that it was a matter of war, the Betyuns returned home, shut themselves in a barn fortress built over a pit, and waited for their enemies. Nearing the Betyuns, the Nakhara began to shoot at the fortress with bows, and then, coming nearer, set fire to it. Not satisfied with the fact that the building was soon enveloped in flames, the Nakhara cut down a great tree and added it to the burning house. The tie-beam of the house fell in, and the flaming ceiling fell in. Seized with an evil joy, the Nakhara rejoiced, shouting: "Bere-Betyuns! Terrible people! What has become of you? Come here! Surely you, turning to ashes and smoke, flew into the air?"; gathering windfallen branches and twigs, they threw them on the fire, and the flames grew stronger, flared up brightly, and cracked loudly. The Betyuns, however, were hiding in the trench, covering their faces from the smoke with horse fat, which had been saved for food. At this time, a Nakhar began to walk on a tree which had fallen during the burning, and, shifting the ashes with a stick, mockingly shouted and sang: "How hard and terrible that our good neighbors the Bere-Betyuns, having been turned to smoke, have disappeared from the face of the earth!" Then one of the Betyuns sitting in the pit, the famous archer Yegedey, shot at him with an arrow through a peephole, and he fell dead. Deciding that the burned enemies had, in fact, turned into evil spirits (abaasy), the Nakhara fled home in fear. Seeing this, the Betyuns came out of the pit and set out after the Nakhara, who settled themselves for the night on the [river] Khotuya-Yurege. Before this, the Betyun shaman had called down the spirit of bloodshed, Ilbis, into the champion Teteibit-bootur. Maddened with a thirst for blood, the champion stole into the camp of the sleeping enemies and slaughtered them all, except one young shaman. The latter had sensed something bad, and had said that Ilbis's girl walked too frequently and importunately sang her songs. According to another variant of the legend, he prophesied: "Soon there will be a terrible calamity; the goddess of bloodshed, flying back and forth, sings of internecine war. The brook will fill up with blood to half a man's shank." Since his fellow-clansmen would not listen to him, he went away 425

YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

with his wife and children, thereby saving himself. Fleeing to the Lena, to his kinsman Dygyn, the shaman addressed him with the words: "The Bere-Betyuns living near us crowded and oppressed us, and finally exterminated us. Only I alone am left alive. Be our sun-savior, intercede, protect us" (Bolo n.d., b). In answer to the shaman's entreaty, Dygyn collected his warriors and sent them to the Amga to avenge the slaughter of his relatives. According to one variant of the tradition, Tygyn's army, having surrounded the Betyuns' yurt, and shooting with bows, demanded that they give up the nine-year-old son of Masarakh, Kis-sagin'yakh ("sable coat") by name, who had been born from a daughter of the Nakhara. Forced to accept this demand, the Betyuns pushed the sobbing boy from the yurt. Tygyn's army at once shot the boy so that the arrows stuck out of him on all sides like a fringe. The boy, covered with wounds, ran and ran around, sobbing and weeping from unbearable pain and suffering, until the army, surrounding him in a solid ring, slaughtered him with a spear. After the return of his warriors from the campaign, Tygyn decided to undertake a second campaign against the Betyuns, in order to exterminate them decisively. In the same spirit, and often in the same stereotyped formulas, the folklore clarifies Tygyn's struggle with the ancestors of the Namy and other tribes of the non-Kangalasy group—the Baturus, the Vilyuychans [Bylyycheen], and the Khorins. Tygyn's struggle with the Baturus, and his campaign against Tatta, are reflected in the tradition about the bogatyr Batas-Menduken, who supposedly was seized by him as a boy, during a campaign against the Megins. Batas-Menduken, when he grew up, married Tygyn's daughter, but, since they had no children, Tygyn decided to destroy him. Learning from his wife of Tygyn's intention, BatasMenduken fled with her to the east, to his native place, settling near the Tatta River, on the hill in the Maala glade. When next year Tygyn appeared with his warriors, Batas-Menduken defeated him with his dexterity, since he artfully avoided the enemy arrows, caught them, and stored them until the enemy ran out of arrows and had to save themselves by fleeing. The frightened Tygyn, riding back, shouted at him: "Let your name be Kechchekh-Tereley; be the progenitor of people!" From BatasMenduken, according to the traditions, descended the Yakuts of the Khatylinskiy [Khatyly] naslegs—the Achchagars, the Kytanakhs, the Ballins, the Boltogins [Boltono], and the Okans (Bolo n.d., a). Various versions of the traditions tell how Tygyn united the Khorins to himself. According to one of them, in the locality of Oyuu-Khatyn lived a man with four sons and a beautiful daughter, whom Tygyn futilely asked of her father for wife. The attempt to take her by force ended with Tygyn's defeat, as a consequence of which he said of his opponent: "He became for us a Khorin deity, for we could not conquer him!" Then Tygyn turned for help to Ann'yysar-bootur, the son of a blind old woman, who lived in the north among the Betyuns, requesting that he come to him and become his retainer (kergen-khara). Ann'yysar-bootur stole the girl, and then Tygyn said: "Now, when our power has grown so, we must 426

Historical Events of the 16th and 17th Centuries exterminate them all (the Khorins)." Having pounced on the Khorins, Tygyn's warriors at first killed the old man's three sons, and then fell on him. The old man said: "You kill us, who have not done a thing. It is you, Ann'yysar-bootur, who ruin us. After death I will bring a complaint against you to my creator father, Uluu-toyon. Know that if my complaint is honored, you will die from the arrow of my youngest son." The household of the slain dispersed, and the property was taken by the victors. With the beautiful girl, cattle, and people apportioned to him, Ann'yysarbootur returned to his homeland and rode to the right foothill of Kullaty Mountain; an arrow unexpectedly sang out, and the bogatyr fell from his horse. "The arrow of the son of the Khorins, it seems, kills strong and well," he only had time to exclaim before he died. The retainers who had accompanied him turned back (Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR 1921). Another tradition tells of the ruin of the rich Khorin, Tarbyakh-Tiis, who lived in the locality of Magyars near Lake Myuryu, at the time of the campaign of Tygyn's sons Bedeke and Challayy against the Bayagantays. In sending out his sons, Tygyn was reputed to have warned them: "On your way, in the locality of Toyon-Myuryu, you will find the rich man Tarbyakh-Tiis, who comes from the Khorin clan. Do not dare touch him: he is a very high-born person; it will be bad for us later on, (and besides that) he is a kind of friend of mine." But Tygyn's people, gripped by a lust for murder, did not obey his words. Attacking the people of Tarbyakh-Tiis, they first killed his son and his best warrior, and then broke into the urasa and speared the rich man Tarbyakh himself; the latter had suffered from dropsy, and therefore could not walk. Some woman, either the daughter-in-law of Tarbyakh-Tiis or his daughter, succeeded in escaping by taking off her embroidered coat and hanging it among the reeds. The pursuers began to shoot at it, but she had hidden herself elsewhere. Besides her, there remained alive a few more people who had been out hunting (from whom the later Khorins obviously descended). (Bolo 1929-36.) This legend undoubtedly arose among the Khorins themselves, the descendants of Tarbyakh-Tiis's people. Tygyn's struggle with the Namy is also 'reflected in various legends and traditions, which vividly depict the interrelations of the mutually hostile tribes. In the time when Tygyn lived (relates one tradition), there lived among the Namy, in what are now the Kusagan-Yal, Khatyn-Arin, and Khamagatta naslegs, in the locality of Neleger-ebe, an old woman with three sons. The sons' names were Chorbogor-baatyr, Obochcho-Tyumerey, and Kuonay-Kylysyt. They were hunters, good runners, and mighty men. The first son, Chorbogor-baatyr, equalled in strength the Borogon Bertkhara. Fearing him, the strong men from other uluses did not ride through Namy country. Once Tygyn, hearing about him, arrived among the Namy with his warriors, his milch mares, and his retainers, and established himself around the old woman in nine tents. The old woman said to Tygyn: "We are bad neighbors; we have nothing; I am a very poor old woman; my three sons have gone to the northern creek to hunt; we are 427

YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

very bad neighbors indeed." Tygyn's strong men, Telemiki-Syuyuryuk and Bedeke-bege, going into the tent, took a bow which was lying on the bed and tried to draw it, but could not. Dismayed, but not wishing to reveal their fear, they said: "A useless weapon." Having walked for a while and having found out about her sons, they came to their own camp. When the old woman's sons returned from hunting, she told them about the newcomers. Tygyn held an ysyakh, to which he invited all the local people and the old woman. During the games, there was a contest in target-shooting. Tygyn's foremost archers could not best the sons of the old woman. While he was drawing the bow, Chorbogor-baatyr's eyes leapt from their sockets; he, warming the palms of his hands in the fire, put his eyes back. His arrow had pierced the front of an iron stirrup. The frightened warriors of Tygyn broke off the games, and with this the ysyakh came to an end. Leaving the ysyakh, everyone went home. Tygyn, fearing the sons of the old woman, according to his custom, left at night half of each of his tents as a decoy, and himself went home. Thus he did not succeed in beating the sons of the old woman, in lowering their name, and in conquering their lands. Learning of Tygyn's flight, the sons of the old woman chased him over three foothills of the Holy Mountain. Chorbogor-baatyr, who was in the lead, saw on the slope of Yga-takhkhar-aattyk that Tygyn, with his warriors and cattle, having come down the mountain, had already arrived with great commotion at the Kangalasy border, the hill of Madd'ay. Chorbogor-baatyr, with one shot from his bow, killed three people, and cried: "I have taken blood for my arrows!" Thus terrified by the sons of the poor old woman of Namy zzlzzs, Tygyn returned home without a fight (Bolo 1929-36). In another tradition—that about the old Kedegey—it is told that, "hearing about such a well-known person, Tygyn with his warriors and his milch mares rode through the Borogon country into what is now the Muchchukinskiy [Mukuchu] nasleg, and established himself in nine tents around the dwelling of the old man Kedegey and old woman Muogan. There they cut down a huge larch worshipped by the local inhabitants and made from it a trough for feeding dogs. Seeing this sacrilege, the old man and the old woman were very excited and very sorry for the tree. After this, Tygyn ordered kumiss to be prepared from mare's milk, and held an ysyakh festival. To this ysyakh he invited all the people and gave them food. After this, according to custom, there were contests in archery and in running races. Tygyn's sons competed in running with the sons of Kedegey and Muogan. They ran from the slope of the western mountain called Ogon'or-aattyga to the river islands of Tobula-thrde and Khorbut-terde. In all the games, the sons of Kedegey bested Tygyn's people and his sons: they hit the target, came first in the races, and proved best of all in jumping on one leg. Tygyn was very much terrified by this. For this reason, without doing anything bad or saying any offensive or insulting words, he gathered his people that very night, stealthily took away the rear sides of his tents, and retreated southward toward his own country. Having gone through the range of the Holy Mountain, by the Kangalasy slope, he fled homeward. The Namy who 428

Historical Events of the 16th and i7th Centuries were chasing him, having learned about this, also turned back, saying: `They have dropped through, as if into hell' "' (Bolo 1929-36). These traditions, which belong to the Namy people, of course, render the events as a one-sided interpretation, from their own point of view. In reality, Tygyn came out the victor, at least in the majority of these clashes. In the rendering of the Kangalasy storyteller from Tygyn's clan, Mikhail Neustroyev, the issue of his struggle with the Namy is portrayed differently and, without doubt, is somewhat closer to the truth. Neustroyev's account of this struggle begins with a tale about a miraculous childchampion, born in Namy [ulus] in the locality of Betyun; this boy appeared in the world with an earring, made of a drop of molten gold the size of a teal's egg. Having heard about him, old Tygyn said to his retainers: "This child is growing up in order to rule over people. Go and erase the boy from the face of the earth, before his bones become strong." The boy was at that time six years old. When Tygyn's warriors came to the dwelling, the women had just gone out to milk the cows. In the yurt, there sounded the loud snoring of the sleeping child. As soon as the warriors came in, the child awoke, and, scenting trouble, jumped outside over their heads. They chased him for two days. They overtook him only at the northern Honorific Mountain in Odeytsy, where the path is blocked by a river. The child, running up the mountain, was pierced by the champion Begyuyel-Bege with an arrow, and he slid down, naked and head over heels. On returning from the Namy country, Begyuyel-Bege, taking his wife, rode homeward, since everyone against whom Tygyn had expressed animosity was destroyed. At this time, there lived in Namy, in the Betyun nasleg, a man by the name of Oborcho, who was a shaman. Having sacrificed a white-faced chestnut horse, Oborcho shamanized, invoking Uluu-toyon and imploring him to pacify Tygyn, since he was destroying all mankind, but Uluu-toyon answered by the mouth of the shaman himself: "He (Tygyn) is my own offspring, and therefore I cannot touch him." The shaman returned to earth in great grief and with weeping (Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR 1921). Some time later, Oborcho gathered forty people from among his adherents, and said to them: "Nov is just the right time to attack Tygyn and exterminate him with all his kin, for since his son-in-law Begyuyel-Bege and his son Challayy went away,87 he has become weak, and is no longer terrible." Oborcho, with his people, came to Tygyn and said: "Pay ransom for those you have killed, or prepare for battle.... You have given great offense to us; you have killed the great and the small; choose one of the two!" Tygyn replied: "Give me time to consider my final decision, and in the meantime, accept my hospitality." He gave them food and drink. Meanwhile he said to one of his champions, by the name of Konchoy, who was famed as a runner: "Go without delay to the headwaters of the Suntar and call Challayy. He will hardly continue to be angry at my joke. Let him return and bring his wife, and I will treat her all the time as a daughter-in-law. You must be here within two days!" The envoy returned within two days, having called Challayy. The necessary preparations had been made by this time. On Challayy's arrival, all the forty people of the 429

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shaman Oborcho were killed. He himself succeeded in fleeing, but was hunted down in the woods to the left of Kullaty Mountain. The shaman tried to escape from his pursuers to the depths of the earth, but became entangled in the root of a tree. Having caught him, the enemy could in no way kill him, and shot him only after they had torn out his lower jaw [trying to pull him from the root]. It turned out that he was wearing an inserted jaw taken from a two-year-old cow. Before dying, the shaman had time to say: "I have killed the spirit-maiden who inspires them (the family of Tygyn) to bloodshed; she was hidden in the forehead of Challayy's horse. Now they will have no more success in war" (Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR 1921). These last words, placed by the Kangalasy storyteller in the mouth of the Namy shaman dying at the hands of Tygyn's people, were certainly only an attempt to explain the ultimate downfall of Tygyn, and of the people subject to him, at the hands of newcomers, from the point of view of the Kangalasy themselves, who must not have doubted the divine descent of their chief from the fearful Uluu-toyon. At the same time, they fully show how hopeless, in the opinion of the Kangalasy, was the struggle of the Namy against Tygyn. Lindenau's materials testify just as definitely about the ultimate victory of Tygyn. According to him, the repeated military clashes finally brought Tygyn's opponents to a situation where they were compelled to agree to complete obedience, being conclusively weakened and no longer in a position to resist. Lindenau writes: "And thus, as a result of a long and stubborn struggle with the dissident groups, Tygyn attained great power, and began to rule autocratically over the other clans." [Lindenau n.d., a.] At this time, when Tygyn's power was attaining its zenith, he, according to the traditions, "owned farmsteads and estates around Lake Sakhsara [Saysara], at Ytyk-kel, Yuryun-kEl, and in the locality of Kytaanakhkyrdal. His horses and cattle, his people, warriors, workmen, and hired hands lived southward, to the very border of what are now the Maldzhegar [Maldzhagarskiy, Mallayar] naslegs, and northward to the border of Namy ulus. At that time, the valley, situated between the two Holy Mountains, was called Tuymaada. In Tuymaada, there were individual localities called Oyuu-Khatyn, Sakhsary, Ytyk-kel, Yus-Tiit, Uraakhy, Kyuyeregey, Aluu-Aryy, Mard'ay, and Killern. And the valley from the southern Holy Mountain to the border of the Maldzhegar naslegs was called Ierkeeni. In Ierkeeni, there were individual localities, such as Kytaanaakh-kyrdal, Oy-bes, and Tumul. In all these places lived people subject to Tygyn-Munn'an, and everywhere there were his cattle" (Bolo 1929-36). Lindenau also wrote that Tygyn had three residences: the first between the small rivers of Alagan and Kullaty (Kuldati) in the alas or valley of $rkani-Konuta, the second on Lake Tabaga, and the third where the city of Yakutsk has been built, on Lake Saysara (Lindenau, MS, n.d., a: 14). Tygyn's successes were achieved to a considerable degree with the aid of his fellow-clansmen who, although they were somewhat in opposition to him, nevertheless rendered him assistance in his struggle with other 430

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clans, and came running to him in case of danger, as, for example, the Nakhara people did during their clash with the Betyuns. According to the tradition, "Tygyn, not content with his wealth, estates, and dignities, and wishing to multiply them and to increase the number of his people and his land, demanded lands and dignities from the five Maldzhegar [uluses], Khara-Sirey-D'oguday, and the Nakhara, but met with constant refusal. These people lived independently, governing themselves. However, despite this, being relatives and feeling the connection of blood, they rendered Tygyn assistance with warriors and strong men when he was mustering troops against other uluses. Thus living and growing rich, Tygyn constantly occupied himself with war, and gathered together warriors and troops" (Bobo 1929-36). The consequences which threatened his fellow tribesmen if they disobeyed Tygyn's command when he turned to them for help are clear from the story of the fate of the Khodoro clan. In a legend related by the descendants of the Khodoro, it is told: The Khodoro Yakuts made up, at that time, a clan aymak, and lived in thirty-three tents in the eastern Kangalasy country, on the summer pasture of Köbede, which is not far from what is now the creek of Myla. Their chief was an old man whom everyone obeyed, and whose word was law. One day, in the summer, Tvgvn-baay appeared from the western side of that river (the Lena) with a detachment of people—a large military company. Having come, he began to live with his people and cattle in an urasa on the hillside of the alas [grassed valley]. Living thus, after some time, he asked the old man of the Khodoro to let him have three champions in armor who would help him in battle. It turned out that he was going to fight against the Abagas, who lived at that time on the river Amga. Then the old man called the three best champions in armor and said to them: "Now is come to us the chief of the Yakuts, the wealthy Tygyn-toyon. He is going to the Amga to meet the enemy with his breast, to shed their blood for his own blood, to fight with them for honor and glory. He has arrived here to our great glory. Go with him to help him." To this, those people objected: "If we could, we would ask him to be our helper, rather than ourselves to be his," and refused outright to go and fight with Tygyn. After this, Tygyn held a lavish ysyakh, at which many people gathered. The ysyakh lasted seven days. All the Khodoro people were at the ysyakh. There were most varied games, and plentiful food. At the end of the seventh day, the Khodoro people could hold out no longer, and when night came they fell asleep. This was all Tygyn needed. As soon as they were asleep, he killed all the inhabitants of the thirty-three tents, including the three champions, sparing no one—old men, women, children. And when all of them had been finished off, he and his people hid all the corpses in a common pit (Bolo n.d., f). The legend says that even one small boy, who hid at the bottom of a lake among the water weeds, was mercilessly destroyed. Tygyn's people took an arrow, spat on its tip, said a spell over it, and shot it into the air; falling down, the enchanted arrow struck the head of the child, who immediately appeared on the surface of the lake. To this day, in the Khodoro nasleg on the hillside of the Köbede alas, there are visible the stakes of a pallisade 431

YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

sunk deep into the ground, like a toothed prison fence; the outline of the pit into which the corpses were thrown is still visible. The present Khodoro nasleg was formed from the descendants of one person who survived by chance, and who was joined by people from the Yessyuy-Khangalas [Kangalasy] clan (Bolo n.d., f). This story is decorated with such standard motifs of Yakut historical folklore as the plot element of the killing of the child with an enchanted arrow, or of the ysyakh held with the hidden aim of overcoming the enemy's watchfulness. Its basic design is, nevertheless, filled with tragic reality, and one can hardly doubt that Tygyn's cruel reprisal against the disobedient Khodoro people actually took place. Having attained such might and power, Tygyn, according to Lindenau, was still not satisfied. He decided that now, at last, the moment had come when all his previous strivings for complete dominance over the Yakut clans could be fully effected. As Lindenau says, victory over his enemies gave Tygyn still greater boldness. He began to command the conquered people, and "once more desired passionately to bring into subjection to his power his own clansmen." However, in answer to this demand expressed by Tygyn in conversation with his elder brother Kadzhaga, the latter became so enraged that he struck Tygyn in the face, and Tygyn went home bleeding. Leaving Kadzhaga's dwelling, where this event took place, Tygyn ordered that Kadzhaga be informed that, as soon as he was well, he would take revenge for the humiliation. Kadzhaga and "the others" (his clansmen) knew well that they could not offer any resistance to Tygyn, and therefore hastened to flee from him, taking their wives and children. They were joined by some people from Namy volost. All these refugees went up the Lena to the Olekma, where they afterwards settled. After a long time, they received word that Tygyn was preparing to pursue them there as well. A certain Tungus named Chalanga, however, gave them good advice on how to escape this calamity. He was from the Ninegan clan, and knew that on the Vilyuy there were good places for pasturing livestock. The refugees followed the advice of the Tungus, and went from the Olekma to the Vilyuy, Chalanga being their guide on the way, and bringing them safely to the place. However, those refugees who had come from the Namy volost remained on the Olekma. When the others finally reached the Vilyuy, they were met there by the Tungus of the Dzhurumdzhal and Mamagir clans, who owned the land in this region. The Tungus, however, voluntarily agreed to give up a part of their land, and the Yakuts bought in perpetuity the land around Lake Toibskoi (Boybokhoy?—Author). The Yakuts gave for the land they purchased one woman in full holiday dress and twenty mares. The Chona River, which falls into the Vilyuy from the right, was retained by the Tungus for themselves, "and they possess it and the adjoining lands to this day" [Lindenau n.d., a]. The accuracy of Lindenau's account, recorded from fresh memories in central Yakutia, and without doubt from the Kangalasy, is confirmed by later folklore sources in the form of the traditions quoted above. A legend recorded on the Vilyuy by M. N. Timofeyev-Tereshkin relates that the clever Dzhardakh, having heard the things which were said 432

Historical Events of the 16th and i7th Centuries against her and her sons by the senior wives of Tygyn, ordered her sons to prepare secretly for flight, as soon as the spring freshets were gone and the land had dried out. Taking advantage of the customary move to the summer pastures (sayylyk), the clan of Dzhardakh then fled up the Lena with its livestock and property. When, after a long time, Tygyn learned of their flight, he went after them in the direction from which Dzhardakh had [originally] come, toward the Far Western Land (Arga Kyyaar), but, after wandering for many days, could find no trace of the fugitives. On her part, Dzhardakh reached the place which she called Yuchyugey alas, which is now the Olekma Valley, in the second half of August, at the beginning of the haying. In the winter, Tygyn learned from hunters the whereabouts of Dzhardakh, and as soon as the days grew a little longer, sent his troops there. Having discovered the approach of Tygyn's troops, Dzhardakh's son Byrkynga-botur warned his mother and brothers. Tygyn's plan to catch them unawares did not succeed 98 In the spring, Dzhardakh said to her sons: "I know Tygyn and his vengefulness well enough. He will again send troops, or will come here himself," and she advised that they go farther north, to her homeland, supposing that they could reach those places by the beginning of haying. Coming out on the Vilyuy, in the region of Suntar, the fugitives encountered the Tungus. The most intelligent of the sons of Dzardakh, ToyukBulgudakh, suggested to the Tungus that they not war with them on account of the land, but send a champion from each side, who should decide the matter by single combat. During the single combat, Byrkyngabotur immediately knocked the lance from the hands of the giant Tungus warrior, and then, with the words, "I do not wish to kill an unarmed man," lifted him up and knocked his head on the ground with such force that it broke like an egg, spraying him with the brains and blood of the killed man. The terrified Tungus went away to distant rivers. Beside this, adds the storyteller, "the Tungus faithfully keep the promise they gave." Yrya-Tyrylyk and Boskhong-Belgedi remained in the locality of Khocho; their descendants, the Khochins, are distinguished for their skill in singing, hot temper, and litigiousness. In Suntar settled Toyuk-Bulgudakh, Suorkhad-Bergen, and Dzhardakh herself, for whom the Dzhardan clan is named. Therefore, the Suntar people are capable, voluble, and careful. Byrkynga-botur went away to Lake Nyurba, where the Tungus lived. Having learned that the newcomer demanded, according to an agreement, that the land around the lake be cleared, the Tungus went away to the Markha [River], except for a part of the bold people who had decided to fight. They were, however, killed by Byrkynga-botur. His descendants are distinguished by height, and by a desperate, stubborn character ss The single important difference of this tale, which in thematic scheme repeats, although in somewhat different form, Lindenau's information, consists in the fact that here the acquisition of the Vilyuy lands is explained by the valor of the Yakut champion and not simply as a commercial transaction—a purchase of them from the Tungus for a girl with rich clothes and cattle as a trousseau. This departure from reality was apparently 433

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a concession to the egocentrism of the Vilyuy dweller, and an attempt to color the past. Probably for the same reason, the role of guide and wise counsellor was given not to the Tungus but to the mother of the fugitives, Dzhardakh, and to her son Toyuk-Bulgudakh, who divided these functions between themselves. The role of the Tungus Chalanga as a counsellor and guide who gave aid to Tygyn's enemies is reflected in the legends of the struggle of the latter with some "Tungus" bogatyr, connected with the well-known lllyun-khay Mountain, on the Lena above Olekminsk. Perhaps the same legend entered into the well-known tradition of the origin of the Yakuts, published by Gmelin, in which we find mixed plots of various kinds Gmelin 1751-52] 100 The real circumstances which called for the flight of Tygyn's relatives are veiled by the same motives in the Vilyuy legend. The cause of the flight here is Tygyn's greed, or the intrigues of his father's elder wives, who envied the youngest wife and fed on hate for her. But in another variant of the legend of N'yrbakaan, recorded in the loth century, these reasons come to surface in the same form as in Lindenau's tale. When Tygyn insolently seized the skin of the big bird and tried to ride away V+'ith it (this legend tells), N'yrbakaan's children seized the horse by the bridle and began to take away the skin: "Tygyn, sitting on the horse, waved his club to chase them away. Then the youths, becoming angry, flaming up, began to press harder. One of the youths casually hit Tygyn about the face, causing him to bleed. Then Tygyn said to his brothers: 'Until today, there was yet no one who would dare to raise a hand to me. Well, on this memorable day, my own brothers took my blood! Since it has come to that, in four days I will come, and we will seriously take up each other's blood-letting. Take care, prepare!' Having said this, he threw down the skin and galloped away. Tygyn had many armed people; they, however, had none. 'Insolent Tygyn deprives us of the sun,' said N'yrbakaan to her sons, and she decided to go with them to the west."0' In other variants, even the name of the son of N'yrbakaan, or Dzharkhan, who hit Tygyn and bloodied his face is mentioned. This is ToyukBulugdakh who, consequently, corresponds to Kadzhaga in Lindenau's transcription (Lindenau n.d., a: leaves t -to). Evidently, Kadzhaga was a personal name which became forbidden after its bearer's death, and ToyukBulgudakh was a sobriquet, or a later formation. From what has been said, it is clear that the contemporary legends in all essentials correspond to the text of Lindenau's transcriptions, and, besides, supplement them with a number of new details which allow us to imagine more fully and profoundly the course of events described in them, and also to imagine the general spirit of this epoch. Among the details which are lacking in Lindenau's transcription, but which are revealed in the later legends, is information about the struggle of the newcomers on the Vilyuy with its native inhabitants, but this time not the Tungus but the Yakuts, perhaps the descendants of Omogoy, or of his people who remained there (according to the tradition) during Omogoy's journey from the Vilyuy to the Lena. It is told in the legend that "Tygyn had a warrior by the name of Tuoka-baatyr, to whom a 434

Historical Events of the i6th and 17th Centuries number of people were subject. Once Tuoka-baatyr stole from Tygyn a horse by the name of Kyyl-Ogoto, and slaughtered it for meat. Informed by his wife, Tygyn searched out Tuoka-baatyr with the horse meat. In punishment for this, and in payment for his horse, they took from Tuoka-baatyr a hundred horses. Harboring malice, Tuoka-baatyr, at the head of forty men, sped to the Vilyuy. They arrived at a time when a Vilyuy rich man, Kelyuye-bay, was holding an ysyakh. When Kelyuyebay's people began to pour kumiss for treating these forty men, Kelyuye-bay, coming up, said: "Who are these people; where have they come from to eat food, to exhaust the supply of milk food? Don't pour, don't give to them!" And he gave orders to pour back the kumiss from the beakers. Thus Tuoka-baatyr remained without his share. It was summertime, and they strongly hungered, and suffered from heat and thirst. Insulted by this, Tuoka-baatyr cut with his palma the earth in Kelyuye-bay's spacious balagan—such a threatening deed he left for them to remember" (Bolo 1929-36). Further, the legend tells in detail of the attack by Tuoka-baatyr's people on Kelyuye-bay's people. They began to shoot from bows cut with the sword; they killed many of Kelyuye-bay's people, as well as the boy himself. After this victory, they returned to the river Kenkeme, where they spent the night. Tuoka-baatyr, arising in the morning, saw that one of his people had brought Kelyuye-bay's beautiful daughter, and had slept with her. Having seen this, Tuoka-baatyr said: "Not a single soul of Kelyuye-bay's should remain alive!" With these words, he killed the girl with a sword. The Vilyuychans were a numerous people. From grief and pity for the killed people, they invited a famous shaman to shamanize. With his sorcerer's power, the shaman made bloodlust attack on the warriors of Tuoka-baatyr, whence they fought among themselves and many were killed.

Thus, if we believe the legends, which in complete agreement confirm one and the same thing, after a severe blood-letting struggle, all that Tygyn strove for was achieved. He really, in some measure, became the leader of a majority of the Yakut clans and tribes. Echoes of Tygyn's "fame" when he had reached the zenith of his power are preserved in folklore, both in the central and in the most distant northern regions, in particular the Verkhoyansk, where I. A. Khudyakov recorded almost the succinct characterization of the "Yakut tsar," "the Lord Tygyn." "In a place called Saysara lived a man by the name of Tygyn-lord, considering himself the Yakut tsar. All near people he both kills and does not kill; he takes for himself what he sees, both property and cattle; and if live (people) remain, he puts them under fear of death. Thus, he got very rich, and did not himself know the number of his cattle. In today's terms, his people constituted half the present ulus, and his wealth as much. He lives, growing famous, this Tygyn-lord. There is not a man who could measure up to him. He considers himself an independent tsar. The Yakuts of that day called him wen (lord)" (Khudyakov 1890: 47, 48). S. A. Tokarev, not inclined to exaggerate Tygyn's power, writes that, among the Yakut toyons having great powers and wide influence at the 435

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beginning of the 17th century, is distinguished "the famous Tygyn, the toyon of the Kangalasy, the sphere of power and rule of whom, judging by the traditions, stretched beyond the bounds of his own Kangalasy tribe" (Tokarev 1945: 165). Traces of Tygyn's former influence were still preserved at the arrival of the Russians, when, according to the Yakut traditions, his own powers came to an end. We have already seen that Ivan Galkin wrote of Tygyn's sons (of the "Kangalasy toyons of Tygyn's house," as S. A. Tokarev expressed it) that "they rule the whole land, and many other princes fear them." When Tygyn's children Otkuray and Bozeko undertook to rise against the Yakutsk fortress, with the aim of liberating their father from prison, as Lindenau indicates, they collected "their many Kangalasy people and other alien river princes; they gathered from the Motma (Botoma? [Botomoyu?]) and from the Sina and the Lena, and the Nyuryuptey prince from the Kiriney with all the ulus people, six hundred and more" (Tokarev 1945: 146). The people of other clans and tribes, forced into submission by Tygyn, of course, not only feared but also hated him. Thus arose the legends, saturated with the bitterness of defeat, mortification, and resentment of the Namy, Borogons, Vilyuychans, and other tribes, of Tygyn's bloodthirsty cruelty and lust for power. But, on the other hand, among his own clansmen, Tygyn attained extreme honor, which even had a tinge of religious veneration and worship. Mikhail Neustroyev, one of those best acquainted with the Kangalasy traditions, who lived in Tygyn's native place, in the Maltanskiy [Maltaninskiy, Maaltaany] nasleg (where, in the 18th century, there lived the famous grandson of Tygyn, Masary Bozekuyev, and probably the latter's father, Bedzheke) has preserved interesting information on the attitude of the Kangalasy toward Tygyn. "When Tygyn was six years old, while playing, he picked up a spear and, pointing it upward, cried out: 'Khara Suorun Uluu-toyon, my father and creator! The Tungus have offended us innocent people, and have erased our clan from the face of the earth. If it is given to me to avenge myself on all my enemies, send down from above the bloody symbol of the spirit of war and murder—the khannaakh ilbis!'" In answer, a clot of blood appeared on the end of the spear. The child swallowed it, and from that moment began to grow rapidly, and was transformed into a terrible warrior. Even at ten years of age he surpassed everyone in strength, intelligence, and knowledge. "Descendant highly honored by men, offspring of a noble clan, Tygyn (ytyk uon yallara, töröt uon töryteekhtere Tygyn)," so he was called by the old woman who nursed him. "When Tygyn became feeble, and when he reached the age of three hundred, they placed him on a high platformseat, arauas oro130. All those who came from far away went to him, and did obeissance, and spoke to him as though he were a deity Tarjara kurduk)" (Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR 1921). This attitude toward Tygyn on the part of the people surrounding him is vividly expressed in the words of some warriors who left Tygyn in his old age. Going away, they said that they were bored with the "eternal worship of the black shadow of Tygyn." 436

Historical Events of the i6th and r7th Centuries In order to understand and to conceive concretely of the circumstances surrounding the aging Tygyn, it is necessary first of all to take into account the entire force of the patriarchal clan traditions and ties to which the r6th and 17th century Yakuts were subject. Tygyn's closest clansmen saw in him the spokesman of their clan and tribal interests, and evaluated his activities precisely from this viewpoint. Tygyn, of course, like any other toyon, used the influence of these traditions for his own ends, in order to exploit the poor under pretext of kin ties, and to carry out his ambitious schemes. The origin of those legends in which the figure of Tygyn is surrounded by a supernatural aura becomes clear if we consider the peculiar atmosphere of the ancient pagan religion and epos of the Yakuts, fragments of which reached even to the loth century, despite the disintegrating influence of Christianity and of new cultural currents. The figure of Tygyn, the wise old man, the ruler and terrible warrior, the chosen one of Uluu-toyon himself, as his clansmen conceived him, against this background, even during his lifetime, merged with the majestic figures of the epic champions and deities. His birth and young manhood are couched in mythological metaphors. Fragments of the same mythological metaphors and plot elements are generously worked into the simple plot fabric of the stories about Tygyn's struggle with his enemies. Finally, even in itself, Tygyn's downfall was connected with the greatest historical turning-point in the life of the Yakuts—the appearance of the Russians in the north—and was depicted in the imposing outlines of epic drama. Such is the personality of Tygyn as it remained in the legends still told in the loth century, legends which connected his ancient history with the new epoch in the history of the north, when Yakutia became part of the mighty Russian state. Actually, the time of the legendary Tygyn did not end with such dramatic effect. He left the historical scene silently, and unnoticed. The Russian documents did not even mention the death of the terrible Yakut "tsar" of the traditions, who so recently had shaken his forest country, and who had kept its small population in fear for decades. The oral chronicles of his fellow-clansmen, on the other hand, say only that in old age Tygyn became completely enfeebled, and fell ill with a skin disease, so that his body was covered with ulcers. He began to speak at random, lost reason and memory, and, having attained advanced years, died. His relatives buried him, and built a monument at the place of interment (Bolo 1929-36). As to where and how Tygyn died, the Kangalasy legends are silent—probably intentionally, in order to conceal his grave. Lindenau, on the other hand, writes that Tygyn was captured as a hostage by the Cossacks, and died as a prisoner before the arrival of the first military governor in Yakutsk fortress. His younger son, Bedzheke, took his place as a hostage, and Okurey (Ökyrey) succeeded him as tribal head of the Yakuts, with the title of toyon-usa (Lindenau n.d., a: 16)102 With Tygyn's death, a whole historical epoch went into oblivion, and the time of new people and events—the time of written history—began. The historical Tygyn, the father of Bedzheke, Ökyrey, and Challayy, 437

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and of other Yakut princelings of the 17th century, is really entitled to his place in the pre-Russian history of Yakutia, not only because of his personal energy and undoubted military and organizing abilities, but also because of his general role in the socio-political history of the Yakut people. Of what did this role consist? Not, of course, in the fact that this was a monarch, the unifier of the Yakut people, and the head of a feudal state. In 16th and 17th century Yakutia, there was no developed feudalism, and consequently there could be no feudal rulers. The events connected in folklore with the name of Tygyn are interesting precisely because they permit a deeper understanding of the character of Yakut social structure before the arrival of the Russians, and a more detailed exposition of it. For this reason, we must consider the general character of these events against a broader historical background. They depict Yakut society at the end of the 16th and beginning of the 17th centuries as a society still at the patriarchal-clan stage, but one which had attained a point where the dissolution of the primitive-communal order had already gone quite far. One can, therefore, apply to it, to a considerable degree, that general characterization which Engels gave of "the period during which all civilized peoples experience their heroic age—the epoch of the iron sword, and, along with it, the iron plow and axe" (Engels 1951 [edition] : 25-26). Following Morgan's terminology, Engels names this epoch one of "the higher stages of barbarism." This was the "most highly developed administrative organization which could in general develop under the clan order.... Once the society went outside the limits within which this organization fulfills its function, the clan order came to an end; it broke down, and in its place came the state" (Engels 1951 [edition] : 15o). The social order of peoples who have reached this stage is characterized by the presence of alliances of related tribes. The social organization within the tribe is defined by Engels as follows: "Popular assemblies appear where there were none before. The war chief, the council, and the popular assembly form the organs which develop military democracy out of the clan structure" (Engels 1951 [edition] : 169). At the same time, "the organs of the clan structure gradually tear themselves away from their roots in the people, in the clan, in the phratry, in the tribe, and the whole clan structure is transformed into its opposite: from an organization of tribes for the free regulation of their own affairs, it is transformed into an organization for the robbing and oppression of its neighbors, and consequently, its organs are transformed from tools of the popular will into autonomous organs of rule and oppression, directed against the people itself" (Engels 1951 [edition] : 17o). This transformation of the organs of clan power into their own opposites is expressed first of all in the fact that "wars of pillage reinforce the authority of the supreme war chief, as of the leaders subject to him; the customary election of their successors from the same families passes over little by little, particularly by the time of the establishment of the patrilineal principle, into an hereditary power which is at first tolerated, then required, and finally usurped; the foundations for an hereditary royal power and an hereditary nobility are laid" (Engels 1951 [edition]: 17o). 438

Historical Events of the r6th and 17th Centuries The Yakuts of the 16th and 17th centuries were certainly very, very far from the peoples who constituted the classical models for this social order, such as, for example, the ancient Germans. They had, however, long since entered upon a path of development which led to the transformation of the organs of clan self-rule into their own opposites. As with other tribes of whom Engels wrote, we see among the 16th and 17th century Yakuts an aristocratic house, the toyon-usa, which includes only the direct descendants of the mythical culture-hero Elley. The singling out of such houses, which constituted the ancient clan nobility, in Engels's words, furthered the development of patriarchal-clan relationships, and the establishment of the patrilineal principle: "the transition to the patrilineal principle favors, as in Greece and Rome, the transformation of the elective principle into a hereditary right, and thereby the establishment of a noble family in each clan" (Engels 1951 [edition]: 148). From the noble houses, there came hereditary chieftains, whose entire activity was determined by the fact that "war and the organization for war now become regular functions of popular life" (Engels 1951 [edition]: 169). A band of henchmen, consisting of the warriors devoted to the chief, gathered around him. "The military chief, having acquired a reputation, gathered around himself a group of young people thirsting for booty, and obligated to personal fidelity to him, as he was to them" (Engels 1951 [edition] : 149). In a number of cases, "the supreme war chief, as among the Greeks and Romans, sought tyrannical power, and sometimes attained it" (Engels 1951 [edition]: 149). "Such fortunate usurpers," Engels emphasizes, "were, however, by no means unlimited rulers, but they had already begun to strike off the chains of the clan order" (Engels 1951 [edition]: 149). Yakut folklore depicts its Tygyn with the characteristic features of just such an hereditary military chief, arising from an aristocratic house of the clan nobility. He is surrounded by a company of the best champions, who are devoted to him, and prepared to carry out any of his commands. A description of the relationship between Tygyn and his warriorretainers is well expressed in a story about Tygyn and the hero Ann'yysarbootur. Having heard that, in the North, in the Betyun clan, there was a strong man, Ann'yysar-bootur, the son of a poor blind old woman, Tygyn sent his sons after him. Having come to the house of the old woman, the sons of Tygyn said to Ann'yysar-bootur: "Our old man calls you to him to be part of his company (kergen-khara)." The hero answers them: "When the ruler calls, shall I sit at home? I will come!" Afterwards, he abducts for Tygyn the daughter of an old Khoro man living in the locality of Oyuu-Khatyn, near Tabaga, and helps to destroy the Khoro people. In just the same way, Tygyn, according to the legends, calls to himself the hero Begyuyel-Bege, who becomes his son-in-law and joins his company of retainers, his khara (kelen kytyöt buolan khara buolan olorbut). (Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR 1921.) Like other military chiefs of the same type, Tygyn, with his company and clansmen, wages uninterrupted war, and robs and kills the disobedient. 439

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Like them, Tygyn strives for tyrannical power, and finally is on the point of achieving it by usurpation, passionately seeking personal dominance over his fellow-tribesmen. But even among incomparably more highly developed and more numerous peoples, the supreme chiefs only "sometimes" achieved the goal of their strivings, and, as we have already noted, were by no means unlimited rulers. At best, they only "began to strike off the chains of the clan order." It is therefore not surprising that Tygyn finally, despite his achievements, met with failure. The significance of the events, consequently, lies in the fact that Tygyn inherited from his grandfather and his father a particular social status as the head of an organization of patriarchal-clan character and intertribal scope—an alliance of Yakut tribes. At the same time, he was, obviously, the head of the dominant clan among them, which was the chief bearer of the idea of tribal unity, the el. This organization certainly arose long before Tygyn's time; it was undoubtedly brought, in completely mature form, together with other elements of the ancient steppe culture of the Yakuts, by their ancestors, who fled to the north from the Cis-Baykal, about two centuries before that time. In the Cis-Baykal, it goes back far into the first millennium A.U. The epoch of the first severe struggle of the Yakuts for existence in the new conditions of constant war with the aborigines demanded a stable tribal unity, and the constant support of one clan or tribe by all the others, and vice versa. Under these conditions, the maintenance of an all-tribal organization, and of the authority of its head, presented no great difficulty. With the course of time, however, the Yakuts not only took firm possession of the new land, but also spread out widely to the north and the northwest. They assimilated many native tribes, multiplied themselves, and became a considerably more imposing force than previously. The necessity in terms of foreign policy for agreedupon unified action by all the Yakut clans and tribes virtually ceased to exist. There was also no internal economic basis for it in the form of any widely developed exchange and unified market which could attach the unity of the tribal alliance to a new and firmer foundation. On the contrary, scattering ever further along the taiga creeks and valleys, and branching into numerous separate tribes and still more numerous "matrilineal" clans, acquiring special local interests and converging with their bearers, the aborigines, the Yakuts more and more lost the consciousness of tribal unity. Under these conditions, a slight unbalance was enough to shake and disintegrate the fragile structure of the tribal organization. This unbalance was furnished by the replacement of Munn'an by Tygyn in the role of supreme chief, carried out contrary to custom and to the desires of Munn'an's other sons. The energetic and determined Tygyn, even after quarrelling with his brothers and other relatives, did not wish to yield his title to anyone else. With astonishing patience and stubbornness, over the course of a number of years, he carried out a broadly thought-out plan, which, it seems, should have brought him complete power over all the Yakut clans and tribes, 440

Historical Events of the 16th and 17th Centuries such as his nearest predecessors had not had, except perhaps for his grandfather Doydusa-darkhan, that is, Badzhey. Without sparing his own efforts, or those of his people, Tygyn conducted campaigns to all the corners of the Yakut land where dwelled clans disobedient to him, scattered and destroyed the rebels, held lavish ysyakhs, and increased his wealth and power. Thanks to his stubbornness, Tygyn finally achieved, in part, the goal he had set for himself, although at the cost of the loss of some of his closest relatives, who fled from his vengeance to the far Vilyuy—"the edge of the world," as the Yakuts then understood it. A large part of Tygyn's long life had gone into carrying out these tasks. He approached his goal only in its very twilight, when he was already nearing the end. As his strength gradually left him, and ulcers of a tormenting disease covered his enfeebled body, the will and judgment of the aged Tygyn weakened. It is then revealed, with full clarity, how hopeless was the labor of his whole life, and on what a shaky foundation he built the structure of his power. As if by agreement, all the traditions relate that clan after clan slipped away from him, and that the heroes and warriors who seemed most faithful left. Enemies arose right next to him—Mymak among the Namy and Legoy-toyon among the Borogons could not forget the old tribal enmities. They preferred the Russians to Tygyn. And more than this, as the facts indicate, they turned to the newcomers with complaints of Tygyn's oppression, and with appeals for help against him. Even deeper was the blind hostility toward their oppressors, the toyons of the numerous khamnachit, Tygyn's slaves and workmen, who milked his cattle and cut his hay—the people on whose labors all their lord's power rested. The people themselves condemned Tygyn as an ambitious person, a despot and oppressor, and condemned his activity, which brought so much grief, blood, and tears to the Yakut people. Certainly if the unification of the Yakut clans and tribes had proved a historical reality, it would have been in itself a large step forward, and a progressive phenomenon for that time, regardless of Tygyn's personal goals and ambition. Unification would have limited the bloody internecine wars and restrained particularly ferocious robbers and toyons, and later it would have promoted the consolidation of the forces of the people, and the recognition of interests common to the whole people and of inter-tribal ties. Such a unification could have taken place in two ways. One of these might have signified a return to the past, the consolidation of old tribal groups, and the strengthening of ties among them; that is, the restoration of the ancient tribal alliance, like those which constituted the highest achievement of social organization of the primitive-communal epoch; such an alliance apparently did exist at one time. However, as we know, such an alliance of tribes signified at the same time the beginning of its downfall; "... an alliance of tribes," wrote Engels, "already marks the beginning of its destruction" (Engels 1951 [edition]: too). And, in fact, as we have already seen, there could be no return to the old, 441

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since the previous conditions which guaranteed the stability of the old tribal union had disappeared. The second path lay in the replacement of the disintegrated tribal alliance by a fundamentally different, new, and more stable unity in the form of a state union of the feudal type. However, this path also was impossible for the Yakuts of the late r6th and early i7th centuries, since the necessary socio-economic basis for the transition to this higher phase of the Yakuts remained primitive in character and technologically backward. Crafts, with the partial exception of blacksmithing, had not become separate as a special branch of production; the time of the second great social division of labor had not arrived for the Yakuts. Trade had the character of chance exchange, primitive in form; there was no trace yet of a true market. Purely economic and productive ties were, in consequence, too weak and negligible to furnish long-standing and profound unity of various tribes. The centrifugal strivings, on the other hand, were too strongly rooted, both in the economy and in the patriarchal-clan way of life, with its jungle law of the vendetta and of enmity toward aliens. To liquidate all these obstacles from within probably would have taken more than a century. Even at that it remains uncertain how soon the Yakutian tribes, in isolation from other, more advanced peoples and cultures, could have raised themselves to the higher level by their own forces alone. For, as we know, the Yakuts were surrounded on all sides by taiga and tundra tribes still more backward than themselves. These profound internal causes led, in the end, to the complete collapse of Tygyn's unifying efforts, which were founded on dying, old traditions and not on contemporary and future reality. In their time, nationalists, seeking to tear the people away from their brothers-in-arms, the Russian people, tried to use "old man Dygyn" as their banner. These new data put an end to the nationalistic legends about Tygyn. For the first time, they revealed this personality in its true form, interesting in many respects, wrapped in romantic fantas; and nationalistic inventions, and showed the genuine tragedy of Tygyn. The tragedy of Tygyn was the tragedy not only of his personal life and fate but of the whole Yakut patriarchal-clan society, which was receding into the past. The real tragedy consisted not in the fact that Tygyn was broken by the power of conquerors and that he fell in an unequal struggle for the independence of his people, but that in his personal aims he attempted to accomplish a reactionay task, doomed by the course of history. Tygyn's tragedy was his attempt, in a bloody and hopeless struggle with his own people, to revert to an already past historical stage, and his futile desire to restore the ruined tribal alliance undermined by the development of the economy and class relationships. In fact, Tygyn was going backward, not forward. With all his energy, he could not turn the wheel of history backward, because history was being made, not by him, as it may have appeared to him, but by the people, and because the people did not wish to support, did not support, and could not support him. The people were hostile to Tygyn and hated him. Even in the first genealogical legend of the Yakuts, the social motif 442

Historical Events of the 16th and 17th Centuries revealing social inequality stands out sharply and definitely under the covering of the myth. One of the two progenitors of the Yakuts appears in the legend as an exploiter, a haughty rich man, taking advantage of the labor of his fellow-tribesmen. When the second "Adam" of the Yakuts, Elley, appears on the historical scene, he finds himself immediately in the position of a laborer, exploited by the wealthy Omogoy. Thus, in the folkloric and historical consciousness of the Yakuts, the very beginning of their history was, at the same time, the beginning of the struggle of the poor against the rich. And, from the very beginning, all the sympathy of the storytellers is on the side of the oppressed and against the oppressors. This characteristic stands out even more vividly, appearing as the major leitmotif of the traditions, in the cycle of legends devoted to the events of the 16th and 17th centuries. In these are involved the predatory and fierce Yakut toyons whose names have come down to us in the 17thcentury Russian official documents: Tygyn-toyon and Legoy-toyon. Their activity is depicted vividly and in bold relief. Speaking of Tygyn, the storyteller begins his account with a compressed but extremely expressive characterization: "Here was a man who, in the best days of his life, rode out with his many warriors to the uluses, overcame and killed mighty and strong people, took away their wealth, and made them his knamnachit (workmen)" (Bolo 1929-36). The Tygyn and Legoy of these traditions are living figures, reflecting the repulsive and terrifying aspects of an entire social group—the patriarchalfeudal aristocracy of the Yakut clans and tribes. To them, to these oppressors, despots, greedy for human blood and the property of others, there stand in sharp contrast the strong, clever, bold champions—the true sons of the working people. Such is Bert-khara; such are Tisikeen-Bege and other popular heroes, whose figures are depicted with love in the legends. The traditions portray the relations between the toyons and the popular champions clearly and without reservations. Tygyn exploits their strength and valor, but at the same time fears and hates the simple-hearted mighty champions. He nourishes evil plans in secret, and strives to kill them by craft, but unfailingly puts his foot in it. The heroes beloved by the people save themselves from the threatening danger, and get the best of Tygyn. As for Tygyn himself, he finds the retribution sent by fate for all his misdeeds. The predator falls into the pit he himself has dug. Thus, truth and justice triumph. Certainly, in actuality, matters were more complex. But in this case, what is important is not the actual fabric of events as such; it is not important whether or not Bert-khara or some other legendary champion really existed in the 16th and 17th centuries. What is important is something else—the reflection in the legends of the views and hopes of the people, the hatred and contempt of the working masses for the toyon oppressors, and their ineradicable faith in the victory of good over evil, of the oppressed over the oppressors. The legend of Tygyn's downfall, in which the views of the people on the fate of the cause to which Tygyn devoted all his strength and his entire 443

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life appear with extreme clarity and force, takes on special significance in this connection. In the days of the greatest development of Tygyn's power, there appear in his lands unheard-of-people, grey-eyed, tall and broadshouldered, with strong and clever hands. Tygyn, according to the tradition, immediately prized these qualities. "With noses sticking out in front, with deep-set eyes, they must be clever and sensible people; they are poor, very strong, industrious and capable"—so said Tygyn, and immediately seized the newcomers, in order to make workmen of them (Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR, n.d., c). The children of Tygyn, Challayy and Mecheke (Bedzheke) later acted similarly. Having seized the Cossacks, they decided: "`These are people who are fit for work; they will be workmen for us; we will make them cut hay.' In order to reduce their strength, they cut through their muscles and sinews. In the summer, having furnished the workers with supplies, the carcass of an ox, and two vessels (symiryakh) of kumiss, they sent them to the island of Kharyyalakh to cut hay" (Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR 1921). Tygyn's misdeed proved of no benefit to him. The newcomers built a vessel and sailed up the Lena. This is how the legend depicts the first encounter of the Yakuts with the Russians, whose strength, industriousness, and high culture immediately impressed the inhabitants of the Far North. No less characteristic is the fact that the unsophisticated and industrious Russian people are sharply contrasted in the legend to the grasping, crafty toyon despot and his sons, whose only striving is the oppression of the working people. After the first appearance of the Russians, the sons of Tygyn, as the legend says, turned for the prediction of fate to the shamaness Taalay, who lived by what is now "Talyi Lake," in the city of Yakutsk. Fearing the sons of Tygyn, the shamaness always transformed herself, on their arrival, into a great flame. But on this occasion she agreed to the request of the sons of Tygyn, extinguished her flame, and, having shamanized, told them: "The runaways have already sailed to the headwaters of the river (the Lena). Sitting in the clouds, I see how they cut logs with broadbladed axes,103 and say: 'We will go to old Tygyn, the son of Munn'an; he does not let people live, but kills and oppresses everyone' " (Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR 1921). The Russians were the real liberators from the oppression of Tygyn, and this applies not to the Russian tsar, yraktaarjyta, who lived far away, but to the Russian people, mighty, industrious, and many millions strong; it was they who helped the Yakut people start on a truly new life. This is the essence of the complex events of the Yakut past, properly speaking, in the late i6th and early 17th centuries, and also, in part, of those still more important events in the history of the North which took place here in the 163os, before the eyes of the aged Tygyn himself, his champion-contemporaries, comrades-in-arms, and opponents. In order to understand the significance of the latter, one must remember that, until that time, the Yakut clans and tribes, and their more backward northern neighbors of the i6th and 17th centuries, lived within the narrow confines of their own small history, which was exhausted by the internal affairs 444

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Middle World

Lower World

of separate clans and by inter-tribal encounters. Economic ties of any breadth were lacking. Primitive subsistence economy prevailed, only partially supplemented by episodic trade with neighbors. The geographical and political horizon of the forest tribes was limited to their immediate surroundings. Even for the most developed and widelytravelled Yakut at the beginning of the 17th century, the neighboring Vilyuy remains the "unattainable, limitless distance," the very rim of the inhabited world—kyyaar. The prominent Yakut folklorist S. I. Bolo in 1942 compiled a "map" of remarkable clarity, in which the ideas of the ancient Yakuts about the universe, as it was conceived by them before the arrival of the Russians, are summed up according to descriptions in the epic "Duguya-Bege" (Fig. 83) .

Fig. 83. Map of the world according to the olonkho "Duguya-Bege" (after S. I. Bolo). r–shore of Arctic Ocean; 2–Yurengey people; 3–residence of Duguy-bogo; 4–Khangayy people; 5–country of the eight clans of the abaasy [evil ogre] of the lower world (the Ad'aray tribe) and uluses of the kestibyat (invisible ones); residence of Arsan-Duolai; 6–happy plain of the Middle World; 7–eight-channelled river Arylya-dalay; 8–the eastern warm sea, which has become a sharkir; 9–Buolak, the Paved Field, the country of the Khoro, skilled in song; to–the country of Uluu-kydaat; 11–the three high ones of the clan who are solicited in time of calamity; the heavenly house with three supports; 12–the country of the Terrible Uluu-(Suorang)-toyon; 13–TuryungAyyy-Toyon, living in heaven with eight supports; 14–"the deep sea with capes, which has become the center" (Lake Baykal). The map is divided into three horizontal bands. One edge of the map depicts the Lower World, with the Northern Frozen Ocean (Khotugu mustaakh muora tula buolbut). On it, the Yuryungeys (yreljey omuk) 445

YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

and Khangays (Khaijaayy omuk), that is, the tundra Yukagirs, wander from west to east; and, in the extreme northeast, there is the grim Allaradoydu (Allaraa-daydy), the underworld, the dwelling of the monstrous eight-legged Ad'arays and the ruler of the underworld Arsan-Duolanoloyo. Bolo's map does not show other and now purely mythical tundra tribes. But the old Yakuts were just as sure of the existence of these as they were of their own. On the ice of the Arctic Ocean, on unknown islands, there dwelt, according to their concepts, "bearded" giant men, covered all over with shaggy hair, of a height equal "to the shadow of a larch tree on a moonlit night," who ride around with polar bears instead of dogs. In the tundra, hunters were supposed to have met with half-men, half-demons or halfanimals—chuchuna. Somewhere in the tundra, there was supposed to be a tribe of cannibals, who hunted wild, naked people with the help of stockades, as the Yukagirs hunted the wild reindeer. On the Yana lived a tribe which hibernated during the winter. Sitting around the extinguished fire, they became coated with a crust of frost, and the icicles hanging from their noses froze to the floor. One had only to break the icicles for the sleepers to die. The monstrous figures of mythical inhabitants of the Far North vividly recall the stories of the medieval cosmographies about northern countries, inhabited by people with dogs' heads (cynocephali), one-legged and one-armed inhabitants of the tundra, and like monsters. In the final analysis, all these stories go back to the same source—to the fantastic legends of the northern tribes themselves, like those cited above, or those which served as the basis for the Russian tale of the t4th and t5th centuries, 0 chelovetsekh, neznayemykh v vostochnoy strane ("About unknown people in the eastern country"). These are all the beginnings of geography, but are just as naïve and infantile as were the alchemy and astrology of the Middle Ages in comparison with the chemistry and astronomy of our own time. In the middle of the map based on the epic "Duguya-Bege is located the Middle World (orto doydu oloyo), where the sun shines, the Yakuts dwell, and the "eight-channelled Arylyk-dalay," which corresponds to the wide Lena, flows. In its middle course is the "happy plain of the Middle World," a poeticized version of the Yakut country. To the south of it lies Lake Baykal, "the deep sea with capes which have become the center." Besides it is Buolak Muosta, the Paved Field, where the champions of the Middle and Lower Worlds fight to the death. In the southeast, by the "eastern warm sea, which has become sharkir," is situated the "country of the Khoro skilled in song," and Uluu KydatChina, or perhaps the country of the medieval Kidaneans, Liao. Further, Fig. 84. Summary table of archaeological relics in Yakutia [along left-hand margin, reading upward:] Early Paleolithic/Late Paleolithic/Neolithic/ Early Bronze Age/Mature Bronze Age/Early Iron Age/Ancient Yakut culture. 446

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YAKUTS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS

already entirely within the Upper World, are located the "three high ones of the clan, from whom (shamans) solicit calamities, who have a house in a heaven with three supports," the region of the terrible Uluu (Suoran)toyon, and the radiant sunny country of "Yuryun-Ayyy-toyon, living in a heaven with eight supports." On this map, we can see how easily and simply the real world which surrounded the ancient Yakut passed over into the fantastic world of shamanistic mythology, and at the same time how limited was the realm of his geographical ideas, and how crowded and narrow was the universe, in his eyes. Meanwhile, great events were taking place in the neighborhood which could not help but touch the middle Lena, the Vilyuy, and other still more distant northern territories. At last came that moment when this history, in the persons of V. Penda, P. Beketov, V. Bugor, I. Galkin, and other 17th-century Russian pathfinders, knocked on the doors of the distant country of the forest pastoralists, isolated from other peoples by limitless forest expanses and tundras. The ancestors and predecessors of the Yakutian tribes had already gone through, at this time, a number of cultural-historical stages on their own territory (Fig. 84), and a large number of different events had occurred in their history. But only now, a picture of the real world surrounding them, unexpected in scale and not at all similar to the mythological geography of the olonkhosut, with its Middle World (country of the diabolical champions and region of the good heavenly forces), opened itself before the inhabitants of the North. Under the new conditions, the task of uniting the tribes of the North, which were now part of one of the mightiest states of that time, headed by the Russian people, was resolved in a new way. The evolution of the economy and of social relationships developed differently than before, and at an incomparably more rapid pace, under the conditions of the feudal-serf state structure, along the basic feudal channel. Thus, the northern tribes now stood before a multitude of new events. The history of the North entered upon a new stage, crucial in all respects, to which the following second volume of the History of Yakutia will be dedicated.

448

Notes and References PART I: 1: BEGINNINGS OF HUMAN LIFE IN YAKUTIA i. Cf. I. D. Cherskiy's old report of remains of Mastodon tapiroides Cuv. near the village of Lezhanka in the Irtysh Valley, 6o km downstream from Omsk (Cherskiy 1889). 2. A very useful and thorough, although far from exhaustive, bibliographical survey of Russian literary sources on the mammoth is the work of V. G. Illarionov (194o). Cf. also I. V. Arembovskiy (1946). 3. The Berezovka mammoth is on exhibit in the Zoological Museum of the Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R. in Leningrad. 4. On this peculiar feature of the mammoth's body structure, reproduced with remarkable exactness in sculptures and drawings, see Garutt (1946). 5. About the saiga in the Quaternary deposits of Yakutia, see I. D. Cherskiy 1889: 141. 6. Sbornik trudov professorov i preposdavateley itkutsk. Gos. univ. V, 1923, pp. 24-25; Vestnik prosveshcheniya 110. 2, Chita, 1922, pp. 1-13; Sibirskiy paleolit. Atlas, Irkutsk, 1927. PART I: 2: THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD 7. All the basic literature on the subject is listed in this survey. 8. lzvestiya obshchestva arkheologii, istorii i etnografii pri imp. Kazansk. univ., Vol. 9, No. 3, p. 244• 9. The fullest description of the urasa, with excellent illustrations, may be found in A. A. Popov ( 19496). to. Ovchinnikov refers to a report by K. A. Antonov given 27 August 1868 at a meeting of the committee of IVSORGO, which considered pieces of nephrite from the Vitim River (ZSORGO, Vol. t, 1868, p. 85), and to the minutes of the ZSORGO committee, dated 16 September 1868, which mentioned the nephrite found on the Kevakhte. t1. The Baykal Neolithic is divided into the following stages: Isakovo, Serovo, Kitoy, and Glazkovo. In this last stage, metal artifacts of copper and bronze first appear in quantity. I2. The text of the legend is kept in the Siberian Department of the Institute of Ethnography, Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R. Cf. analogous themes about reindeer-people hunted by cannibals in Dolgan folklore (A. A. Popov 449

NOTES AND REFERENCES

1 935) and the materials collected by Zhitkov among the Yamal Nentsy (Zhitkov 1913: 243, 246). 13. Cf. the "reindeer-game" among the Lapps, in which the young men represent stags and the girls does (Kharuzin 1890: 383). 14. Compare the drawing at Aglakhtinsk (Plate VII, Fig. 2) and at Potroshilov (Plate II, Fig. 19).

PART II: 1:

TRIBES OF THE LENA REGION IN THE BRONZE AGE

15. This reference includes a bibliography and a map of the copper deposits.

PART II: 2:

SPREAD OF IRON ON THE MIDDLE LENA

16. Psalii are bone or metal rods [curb bits] attached to the sides of bits to facilitate the guiding of the horse. 17. Figure II of this reference depicts typical slab graves in the locality of Ime-Kutul on Olkhon Island, after Khoroshkikh's drawings. 18. It is worth noting that the Evenkis have their own terminology for the forging and casting trade, and their own names for the various metals: khulange men gun, gold; chirim, red copper; gegan, yellow copper; tadzh, tin; kurge, smith's bellows; tavachak, smithy, forge; urun, funnel for lead. See V. Levin 1936: 5o, 56, 70, 73, 92, 93, 108. 19. Communicated by I. Ye. Vinokurov in Yakutsk on 4 February 1944. 20. Sovetskiy sever, 1930, No. 5, p. 36. 21. The idea that the Turkic runic script originated from clan brands was first expressed by N. I. Aristov (1894). 22. In the drawings on the holy cliff "Shaman-Kamnya" at the top of the spring of Onen, which falls into the Urkima River, the first tributary of the Nyukzha, there are depicted animals, hunting scenes, the sun, moon, and stars, the sun being given the features of the human face. This is obviously the sirkaartata, about which the Tungus told Vitashevskii (1897).

PART III: 1:

ORIGIN OF THE YAKUT PEOPLE

23. The same is noted for Buryat and Tuvin. Among the northern Altayans, this term designates the handle of the shaman's drum, as the "master" of the drum, in the form of some animal whose aspect the contemporary Altayans do not recall (see Potanin 1883: 158). 24. This word is found in the language of the southern Altayans (Telengits [Telengets, Telenets]) and refers to the wild boar. 25. From Ye. I. Ubryatova's review of the manuscript of the first volume of the History of Yakutia, kindly loaned to the author for his use. 26. Personal communication of S. I. Bolo is to the same effect. Among the Altayans the male wild goat is called kuran. The skin of the kuran is used for the shaman's drums. It is possible that in their southern homeland, the Yakuts covered their shamans' drums with the skin of the kuran, whose Altayan name can be discerned in the Yakut term kuraakhtaakh. 27. In E. K. Pekarskiy's more exact translation, the name of the month of April means "month of moving ice," "month of ice-floes" (art. 309o). 450

Notes and References 28. Among the Altayans, talon means "plain," "steppe"; also the steppe is called chöl. 29. Among the Altayans (Northern and Southern) the terms taskyl and tayka signify "high mountain peaks" (bare or covered with snow patches). 30. According to A. A. Popov's explanation, the word yör is more precisely translated as "drove," "herd of horses." 31. Middendorf was of the same opinion, holding that the Yakuts had brought the Tatar horse with them from the south (Middendorf 1838: 638). 32. The newspaper Avtonomnaya Yakutiya, 1927, No. 185. A. A. Popov proposes a somewhat different, more literal translation of this expression: "it dispersed like taraan, scattered like yereen." 33. Pekarskiy 1907-1930: art. 1860; Safyanov quoted by Kaftanov 1903: 407; Ritter 1879: 259 (according to Timkovskiy). 34. Maak's original drawing is in the Irkutsk Museum. 35. Arkhiv AN SSSR, Collection 24, List 431, leaf 164 (first half of the 17th century), Yakutsk 1 949. 36. One may judge how this shoulder decoration looked by the drawing in Maak's book. It is reminiscent of a soaring bird with outstretched wings and is made from the fur of a beaver or an otter (Maak 1887: 67). 37. Lindenau noted the same similarity of the Yakut women's fur coats with the Buryat ones (Lindenau, MS, n.d., a, leaf 34). 38. Nosov, MS, n.d., leaves 15, 23 and the accompanying text. Concerning Marina Dyachkovskaya, see Pekarskiy 1907-1930: art. 2468. 39. Compare with Altayan chegedek, the married woman's sleeveless garment. 40. Arha bergehe, chompoy bergehe (see Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 434-35). According to P. P. Barashkov, the chompoy hat survived until relatively recent times in Ust-Aldan rayon. "In my childhood, the chompoy hat was worn by the very old man Innokentiy Mestnikov, nicknamed Nyykan, from the first Kurbusakh nasleg." (Personal communication, 1942.) It was also worn at that time, according to him, by a few other very old men. 41. Magazine Lyubitel slovesnosti 1806, Part 1, pp. 139-40; Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 434, 764, 1761; Khudyakov 1890: 222; Strelov 19270: loo (a story about the shaman princeling Minday Bergeselyakh, who, during the ceremony of the first disbursement of kumiss "wore a hat with horns"). 42. Cf. the horned hats of the Trans-Baykal Horse Tungus in the 18th century (Pallas 1773: 331). 43. Kept in the Museum of the Republic in Yakutsk. 44. MAE, Vol. 5, No. r, 1918, p. 221. 45. Lyubitel slovesnosti 1806, Part I, p. 139. 46. As elsewhere, in subsequent passages where linguistic materials are used, they are taken for the most part from Slovar yakutskogo yazyka of E. K. Pekarskiy, whose compilation was collaborated by the most prominent Turkologists and also by specialists in Mongolic and Tungusic-Manchu languages. The figures represent the respective columns of Pekarskiy's dictionary. 47. Finds of remains of several composite bows of this construction are known in Mongol r2th-14th century graves in Tunka. See Okladnikov 1937: 284• 48. According to another tradition, recorded by S. I. Bolo, after the murder by Chugun Bodoye of his enemy, the shaman Tereney, the latter's fellowclansmen, the Borogons, gathered the scattered fragments of Tereney's body, wrapped them in a skin and dried them in a form which was then called baraan. 451

NOTES AND REFERENCES

Having placed the baraan in the front niche, they worshipped it for a long time thereafter. This tradition, recorded by S. Baishev, a native of the Melzhakhsinsk nasleg, is very close to the story which has been cited above. According to the report of N. D. Novgorodov, this tradition concerns, not a mere shaman, but the son of the powerful toyon Loguy, who is known from i7th century archival documents, and who was actually murdered on i August 1672 by the Melzhakhsinsk toyon Chugung Bodoyev, who afterwards went to Moscow to Tsar Aleksey Mikhaylovich. 49. Ye. 1. Ubryatova directed my attention to this fact.

PART HI: 2: EARLY HISTORY OF THE YAKUT NATIONALITY 5o. The first information on the Unga cliff drawings comes from I. D. Cherskiy: "On a cliff in the Balagansk okrug of Irkutsk guberniya, not far from the Balagansk Steppe Duma, at the junction of the Unga and Zalara rivers, one may see several very clear representations of the two-humped camel, with warriors armed with bows and arrows vaulting upon them in a standing position" (Cherskiy 1891: 19). 51. The heads of the Uygur clans were also called Ssükins. In the T'ang chronicle it is related that Oykhor united with Pugu, Tunlo, Baegu, made himself sykin and called himself Hui-Ho, i.e., Uygur (Bichurin 195o-53; I, 374). 52. The Kurtukhay inscription first published by me from a sketch made in the field; see Okladnikov 1943: 59, Fig. 16. 53. The similarity of these pictures to the banner-emblems of the northern Siberian tribes of the 17th century is striking (compare the Yakut banner of the Meginsk volost of 1670 in Alkor, Ya. P. [editor] 1936, Plate 5). 54. Originally the author considered these drawings to be of late Kurykan origin. However, in style they pass beyond the bounds of Kurykan art. 55. No less interesting in this connection is the archaic term ilgin, which in the olonkho represents the "divine moisture" which oozes and drops from the world-tree and takes the place of the "living water" of Russian folklore. 56. See also, Buryatiyevedeniye, Nos. 1-3, 1928, p. 279; Yakutskiy folklor, 1938, p. 16. 57. See also, Buryatiyevedeniye, Nos. 3-4, 1928, p. 279; Avtonomnaya Yakutiya [newspaper], 1927, No. 186. 58. Cited from A. N. Bernshtam's translation; see Bernshtam 1939 (from the manuscript 525-26); see also Bernshtam 1947: 645. 59. There is a Sortol clan on the Vilyuy to this day (Patkanov 1912: 793). 6o. Yakutskaya zhizn [newspaper] 1908, No. r. Translation [from the Yakut] by I. D. Novgorodov. 61. In the northern legends recorded by S. I. Bolo, the Khorolors are depicted as a half-mythical people who fell asleep for the winter, and, while they slept, icicles grew from their noses to the floor. They were, according to the legends, cannibals, and feasted their guests on the meat of their daughters and wives, specially slaughtered for this. The Yakuts exterminated them, breaking up the icicles, and the Khorolor wives passed over to the Yakuts. 62. Lindenau avers that the Khorins considered the crow their deity. 63. Recorded by S. I. Bolo. Other storytellers introduce variants of the genealogical traditions. In the variant by the Bayagantay expert on the past, P. B. Gotovtsev (1893), it is said that before Ellty and Omogoy, when their ancestors "lived together with the Kirgiz and Buryats," they replaced in direct

452

Notes and References line the following clans: Eksyukyu (Öksyky) Meyerem, Syuppyu, Kharakhoy, Argyn, Ayaal, Eres-Kuel, Dzhuldzhugyn, Tyüer-tyugyul' (Työrtygyl), Khayarang, from whom two sons were born—Omogoy and Elley. From Omogoy came Aan-Frese-oyuun and his son Nam, the ancestors of the Namy u/us. Tobosor-uus and his son Ayyy-Taybyyr and grandson Baay-aga are the ancestors of the Bayagantay. tile), had four sons: Dekhsi-darkhan, whose sons were Khangalas and Tygyn, the ancestors of the two Kangalasy uluses: BolotoyOkhkh and his son Menge are the ancestors of Megin u/us; Khatallamay-Bergen and his son Batyr are the ancestors of the Baturus ulus; Khordoy-Khoyogos and his son Borogon from whom the Borogons are descended. Gotovtsev is the only one who introduced the names of the ancestors of Elley and Omogoy, and in this respect his variant remains isolated. V. V. Radlov noted that two of these names, Argyn and Ayaal, are similar to ethnic designations among the southern Turkic tribes. Argyn is a tribal designation among the Kazakhs of the Middle Horde, Ayaly is the name of a tribe among the Irtysh Tatars. 64. Near Yakutskoy Vzvoz ["Ascent"] on the maps of the 18th century, there is shown the village of Vzvoznaya; as was detected [only] in 1947, this village later received the name of Makarovaya (situated 5 km below Kachug, on the right bank of the Lena). 65. Antantyuik in Lindenau's transcription perhaps corresponds to the contemporary Yakut word tatyyyk (blue titmouse) in combination with aan (majestic, dignified); i.e., as a complete name, Aan-Tatyyyk. 66. Our attention is drawn by the striking similarity of the names of the sons of Elley, Bargutay and Kordoy, with the names of the mythical ancestors of the Buryats—Bargut and Khoridoy (Khoridoy Mergen). Furthermore, the presence among them of the twins Khoridoy and Kugosuk also recalls the twins who were the progenitors of the Ekhirit-Bulagats, Ikhirit and Bulagat. 67. As will be shown later, one of the ancestors of the Vilyuy Yakuts bears the name Toyuk-Bulgudakh, or Belgedi. 68. Compare the Buryat Bazhey and the Yakut Bad'aayy. 69. Mundzhan corresponds to Munn'an of the later transcriptions of Yakut traditions. In the Russian documents of the 17th century, this person is mentioned as Myndyak, the great-grandfather of the well-known Kangalasy toyon Mazara Bozekov (Bakhrushin and Tokarev, eds. 1 953: 145-46). 70. The Batulu naslegs and clans were in the 19th-2oth centuries in the West-Kangalasy nasleg (Batulu clan of Kil'dem nasleg), in the Ust-Yana and Zhigansk uluses, in the Verkhoyansk Native uprava, and also in the VerkhneVilyuysk u/us (Batulu nasleg) (Patkanov 1912: 718, 764, 765). 71. An analogous tradition was published also by N. F. Ostolopov (in the journal Lyubatel' slovestnosti, x806, Part r, pp. 118-47) and by N. Shchukin 1844: 273). 72. Pekarskiy 1907-30: arts. 2365-66. In the Yakut language the word surt is regularly pronounced as hurt. For example, un-hurt or otogor hurda huokh, "there are no remains of the campsite." The same regular relationship of s and h is characteristic of the Buryat language. The Russians could easily have altered the word hurt into kurt. 73. In the genealogical table of the toyons of Kangalasy volost, compiled by A. S. Tokarev from archival data (1945: table 59), [there is a] Chemchon [who] was also listed as a son of Tygyn, with the note that he died before 1648; his son was called Selbug. 74. Shadrin's monument, which was on his grave in the locality of Kullaty, 453

NOTES AND REFERENCES

in the Shadrin clan cemetery near the Yakutsk-Pokrovskoye highway, was placed by me in the summer of 1946 in the Museum of the Yakutsk Republic in Yakutsk. 75. The same story of the division of their ancestors from the khan of the Kyrgyz, whom they served as the front ranks in battles, existed in the beginning of the 19th century among the Kazakhs (Levshin 1832: 27). The custom of driving detachments of dependent tribes into the front lines existed in deep antiquity among the ancient Uygurs. In the words of the Chinese chronicle, when Oykhor subjugated the Basimi [Pa-hsi-mi?] and Kelolu, "from this time the two mentioned foreign clans always went ahead in battles" (Bichurin 1 950-53: I, 383). PART III: 3: YAKUTS BEFORE ARRIVAL OF THE RUSSIANS 76. Yakutskiy folklor (Yakut folklore). Collection [of articles] from Sovetskiy pisatel, Leningrad ( 1936), p. 54. 77. The decorative pendants, cast of copper, on the 17th-century Yakut woman's dress costume, have precisely the same shape. The latter are also apparently amulets, stylized renderings of cows and bulls. The form of these amulets is strikingly close to the "lyre" figure, well known and widespread in Yakut decoration, which may also derive from the stylized representation of cows. 78. These finds are described from photographs in the Museum of the Yakutsk Republic, and from information received from I. D. Novgorodov. 79. It is remarkable that in the runic inscription at Sudzha in honor of a noble Kyrgyz, it is written that he also "gave his daughter with kalym." The author of the inscription considers this so important an act that he compares it to the favor done for the deceased's teacher, who was given one hundred people and a camping place (see Bernshtam 1946: 52). 80. IAN, Otd. obshchestr'. nauk, No. 4, 1936, pp. 22, 65. 81. Related by Timofeyev (Vachyuyer), seventy-eight years of age, from the Orosu nasleg of the upper Vilyuy, locality of Arnylaakh. 82. The social position of these fishermen in the 18th century is well described in the manuscript of Everst and Gorlovskiy: "the despised class balyksyt, i.e., those who take to fishing out of poverty" ([Pavlinov 1929: 44]). 83. The word bokan, which is known from the Russian written sources of the 17th century, but which has not been registered in the contemporary Yakut vocabulary, stands out especially among the terms denoting servile status. The derivation of this word, as well as its specific meaning, has not yet been reliably established. 84. Arkhiv AN SSSR, Collection 21, List 5, Reports Nos. 149, 411, and notes. 85. V. S. Semenov, personal communication. According to him, the local inhabitant S. Grigoryev can point out both graves. 86. TNIIYaK No. 1, 1937, p. 5. 87. According to the sources of M. E. Masson, the term shakir persisted in Central Asia until the 19th century, when a group of the Bukharan infantry was called "shagir-nesha." (M. E. Masson, personal communication, 3 February 1947.) 88. Tutuk (tutun in the Chinese transcription) was a deputy designated by the kagan of the Turks for ruling subjugated tribes and collecting tribute from them. 89. For a discourse on the social structure of the Yakuts in ancient times, see 454

Notes and References a separate article by the author [Okladnikov] in Sovetskaya etnografiya, No. 2, 1947, pp. 95-121. 9o. Arkhiv AN SSSR, Collection 21, Catalog 4, No. 22 and No. 96, leaf 176. Compare Ionova 1945: 20. 91. Within the territory of the city of Yakutsk, not far from Lake Saysara, I studied remains of a Yakut dwelling of the 17th and 18th centuries, confirming that here from ancient times was a large center of Yakut settlement. 92. Severnyy arkhiv. Zhurnal istorii, statistiki i puteshestviy, Part 3, St. Petersburg, June 1822, No. 13, p. 204. 93. This part of the legend is an ancient myth about the woman encountered in the forest and brought by the hunter into his house; from their union descends in the future this or that clan. 94. In another, Ust-Aldan variant, the sons of N'yrbakaan (Tygyn's brothers) quarrelled with him because of the skin of an elk they had killed (Bolo, n.d., h). 95. According to Yakut customary law, "the children of elder wives enjoy greater rights than the children of younger wives." The breaking of this rule in the given case, apparently, explains the conflict (Vitashevskiy 1929: 179). 96. According to a third variant of the legend, the enmity flared up because the chief of the Nakhara, the shaman Byyang, who lived on the [river] Khotuya-Yurege, gave his beautiful daughter in marriage to a Betyun. During the wedding festivities, the Nakhar Bedeke wrestled with the Betyun Chokhunay-bootur, during which the latter tore off the former's trouser thongs and dragged him along the snow, not allowing him to get up. Besides that, after the wedding, the shaman Byyang shamed the grandson born of the daughter given to the Betyun, who in revenge led off his favorite horse and then killed the shaman. 97. The preceding account tells of the quarrel of Challayy with Tygyn over the wife whom his father did not give him, and of Challayy's departure beyond the Vilyuy. For subsequent events, see below. 98. There follows an account, in style of the usual formulaic passages, of the battle of Tygyn's warriors with the fugitives, and of how the cripple Boskhong-Belgedi miraculously stood on his legs and frightened the enemy by his heroic feats. Tygyn's people, having seen that among Dzhardakh's people even "a legless man began to jump around like a deer," hastened to turn back. 99. "The legend of the settlement by the Yakuts of the Vilyuy region." Transcription by M. N. Timofeyev-Tereshkin from Vasiliy Nakataa, eighty years of age, from the Kugdarskiy [Kugdaar] nasleg of Suntar ulus (from the MS of Timofeyev-Tereshkin 1930: sheet 33. too. Gmelin had to do, apparently, with a prejudiced storyteller, most probably a Tungus, since in the legend one senses an evaluation of events from the Tungus point of view. tot. N'yrbakaan. Rasskaz iz vremen Tygyna (N'yrbakaan. A tale from the time of Tygyn). Vasilev 1945, MS. 102. The rebellion of 1642, during which Osip Galkin was killed, is explained by Lindenau as an effort of Tygyn's sons to free their father and take revenge for the humiliation which he suffered while in prison. The detailed traditions recorded from the Kangalasy storytellers in general confirm Lindenau's version, but as the main motive animating the children of Tygyn during the rebellion, they advance vengeance on Osip Galkin for the offense to their father, and for the latter's death, which ensued as a result. Consequently, Tygyn died before the rebellion of 1642 being, according to the traditions, extremely advanced 455

NOTES AND REFERENCES

in years. Lindenau dates the rebellion, during which Osip Galkin ("Osip Chulkov") was killed, to 1634, and then declares that Golovin and Glebov left Moscow in 1639. Tygyn then died before the voyevod's [military governor's] arrival in Yakutsk; that is, apparently before 1639 or 1640. 103. In olden times, the Yakuts had narrow-bladed axes.—Author.

456

Bibliography Abramzon, S. M. 1946 Ocherk kultury kirgizkogo naroda (Sketch of Kyrkyz culture). Frunze. Adrianov, A. V. 1909 Ayran v zhizni minusinskogo inorodtsa (Ayran [fermented milk drink] in the life of the Minusinsk Basin native), ZRGO po otdeleniyu etnografii, Vol. 34, Sbornik v chest 7o-letiya G. N. Potanina (Collection in honor of the seventieth year of G. N. Potanin), pp. 489-524. 1913 Pisanitsy na r. Mane (Cliff drawings on the Mana River), ZORSA RAO, Vol. 9. Agapitov, N. N. 1881 Arkheologicheskiye issledovaniya v Irkutskoy gubernii (Archaeological investigations in Irkutsk guberniya), Trudy 5-go arkheologicheskogo syezda v Tiflise. Moscow. 1882 PribaykaIskiye drevnosti: izobrazheniya na utesakh Baykala; gorodishcha Irkutskoy gubernii (Antiquities of the Cis-Baykal region: cliff drawings on Lake Baykal; town sites in Irkutsk guberniya), IVSORGO, Vol. 12, No. 4-5, pp. 1-23. Agapitov, N. N. and M. N. Khangalov 1883 Materialy po shamanstvu u buryat Irkutskoy gubernii (Materials on shamanism of the Buryats of Irkutsk guberniya), IVSORGO, Vol. 14, No. 1-2. Alekseyev, M. P. 1941 Sibir v izvestiyakh zapadnoyevropeyskikh puteshestvennikov i pisateley (Siberia in the reports of West European travelers and writers) . 2nd ed. Irkutsk. Alkor, Ya. P. (ed.) 1935 Kolonialnaya politika tsarizma na Kamchatke i Chukotke v r8 v.; sbornik arkhivnykh materialov (Colonial policy of tsarism in Kamchatka and Chukotka in the 18th century; collection of archival materials) . Leningrad. 457

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1936

Kolonialnaya politika Moskovskogo gosudarstva v Yakutii 17 v.; sbornik dokumentov (Colonial policy of the Moscow government in Yakutia in the 17th century; collection of documents). Leningrad. Anisimov, A. F. 1949 Predstavleniya evenkov o shingkenakh i problema proiskhozhdeniya pervobytnoy religii (Evenki concepts of the shingkeny and the problem of the origin of primitive religion), SMAE, Vol. 12, pp. 160-44. Anonymous 1 793 Delo Yakutskoy voyevodskoy kantselyarii ot 4 yanvarya 1785 g. Yakutskiy respublikanskiy arkhiv, fond Yakutskoy voyevodskoy kantselyarii (Dossier of the Military Chancery of Yakutsk dated 4 January 1785. The Yakut Republican Archives, collection of the Military Chancery of Yakutsk), in Rossiyskiy magazin, pub. by Tumanskiy, Part i. St. Petersburg. 1806 0 proiskhozhdenii, vere i obryadakh yakutov (On the origin, religion and rites of the Yakuts), Lyubitel slovesnosti, Part I, pp. 118-47. 1822a Opisaniye yakutov, ikh proiskhozhdeniye, naseleniye strany Lenskoy, vnutrenneye ikh upravleniye, pokoreniye pod vlast Rossii, blagosostoyaniye, nravy i obychai (Description of the Yakuts, their origin, settlement of the Lena River region, aboriginal structure, subjugation by Russia, prosperity, mores and customs), Severnyy arkhiv, Part 3, pp. 204-21, 273-300, 367-80. 1822b Puteshestviye geodezista Pshenitsyna i promyshlennika Sannikova po ostrovam Ledovitogo morya v 1811-12 gg. (Travels of the geodesist Pshenitsyn and the trapper Sannikov among the islands of the Polar Sea in 1811-12), Sibirskiy vestnik, izdavayemyy G. Spasskim, Vol. 20, pp. 281-94. St. Petersburg. 1858 Bogatyrskiye poemy minusinskikh tatar (Heroic poems of the Minusinsk Tatars), Etnograficheskiy sbornik, No. 4, pp. 83-1 54. 1893 Letopis Sottinskoy-Pokrovskoy tserkvi (Chronicle of the Sottinskaya-Pokrovskaya Church), Yakutskiye yeparkhialnyye vedomosti, No. 2o. 1908 Predaniye "Predki yakutov" (The ancestors of the Yakuts: a legend), [newspaper] Yakutskaya zhizn, No. I. 1927 Sibirskiy paleolit. Atlas (The Siberian Paleolithic Atlas). Irkutsk. 1937 Altayskiye skazki (Altayan tales). Novosibirsk. 1948 Sbornik materialov po etnografii yakutov (Collection of materials on Yakut ethnography). Yakutsk. Anuchin, D. N. 1879 Doklad po povodu restavratsii mamonta dlya antropologi458

Bibliography cheskoy vystavki 1879 g. (Report on the restoration of the mammoth for the Anthropological Exhibit of 1879), IOLYeAE, Vol. 35, Part r, No. 1-3, pp. 35-53. 1887 Luk i strely. Arkheologo-etnograficheskiy ocherk (Bow and arrows. An archaeological and ethnographic essay). Moscow. Arembovskiy, I. V. 1946 Mamont (The Mammoth). Irkutsk. Aristov, N. I. 1894 Opyt vyyasneniya etnicheskogo sostava kirgiz-kazakov Bolshoy ordy i kara-kirigizov na osnovanii rodoslovnykh skazaniy i svedeniy o sushchestvuyushchikt rodovykh deleniyakh i rodovykh tamgakh (An attempt at an explanation of the ethnic composition of the Kyrgyz-Kazakhs of the Great Horde and of the Kara-Kyrgyz on the basis of genealogical tales and information on existing clan divisions and clan brands), ZhS, No. 3-4, pp. 391-486. 1896 Zametki ob etnicheskom sostave tyurkskikh plemen i narodnostey i svedeniya o ikh chislennosti (Remarks on the ethnic composition of Turkic tribes and information on their numbers), ZhS, No. 3-4. Arkhiv MVD YaASSR 1785 0 izbranii sposobnogo cheloveka dlya sobraniya izvestiy o mere i priyemakh raznykh plemen inorodtsev, naselyayushchikh uyezdy Yakutskoy oblasti. Opisaniye obitayushchikh v Yakutskoy oblasti yakutov, o nachale ikh proishkhozhdeniya i o dostopamyatnostyakh, proisshestviy, ravnomerno o vere, zakone, obryadakh i protchem (On the selection of an able person to gather information on the spread and customs of the various aboriginal tribes living in different parts of Yakut Province. Description of the Yakuts inhabiting Yakut Province, their early ethnogenesis and noteworthy remains, events, likewise beliefs, custdmary law, rites, etc.) Fond Yakutskoy voyevodskoy kantselyarii, delo 1785 g. (Collection of the Military Chancery of Yakutsk, dossier of of 1785). Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR 1921 Legendy yakutov Kangalasskogo :dusa o svoikh predkakh (Legends of the Yakuts of Kangalasy ules about their ancestors). Recorded from Mikhail Neustroyev, seventy-one years old, of the Third Maltan nasleg, Zapadno-Kangalasskiy thus. MS. n.d., a Lenskiye pesni (Songs from the Lena River), Fond Folklornogo sektora; zapisi bylin i predaniy. MS. n.d., b Olonkho Saaryn-baay-toyon (Olonkho epos about the toyon Saaryn-baay). MS. n.d., c Tygyn-Munnyan, ego synovya i russkiye kazaki (TygynMunnyan, his sons, and the Russian Cossacks). Recorded 459

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from N. A. Mikhaylov of Nemyugan [Nemyukan] nasleg, Third Kangalasy clan, patrilineal clan Etteni. MS. Auerbakh, N. K. 1930 Paleoliticheskaya stoyanka Afontova III (The Paleolithic site Afontova Mt. III), Trudy Obshchestva izucheniya Sibiri i yeye proizvoditelnykh sil, No. 7. Novosibirsk. Bader, O. N. 1947 Pervichnoye zaseleniye Urala i Volgo-karrya chelovekom (The initial settlement of the Urals and the Volga-Kama area), UZMo1GU, Vol. 5, No. 2. 1948 Kamennyy vek na Urale (The stone age in the Urals), Doklady nauchnykh konferentsiy Molotovskogo Gos. universiteta, Nos. 1-4. Bakhrushin, S. V. 1926 Ocherki po istorii kolonizatsii Sibiri (Essays on the history of the colonization of Siberia). Moscow. 1927 Istoricheskiye Budby Yakutii (Historical fate of Yakutia). Leningrad. Bakhrushin, S. V. and S. A. Tokarev (eds.) 1953 Yakutiya v 17 v.: Ocherki (Yakutia in the 17th century: essays). Yakutsk. Baldunnikov, A. I. 1928 K voprosu o zadachakh istoriko-etnograficheskogo issledovaniya buryat (The aims of a historic and ethnographic study of the Buryats), Buryatiyevedeniye, No. 1-3. VerkhneUdinsk [Ulan-Ude]. Barashkov, I. I. 1942 Srednelenskiye naskalnyye nadpisi (Cliff inscriptions of the middle Lena River region), in Drevnyaya pismennost yakutov (Ancient Yakut writing). Yakutsk. Bartold, V. V. 1900 Turkestan v epokhu mongolskogo nashestviya (Turkestan during the Mongol invasion), Part 2: Issledovaniye (Investigations). St. Petersburg. Benua, K. A. 1927 Predvaritelnyy obzor mikologicheskikh i fitopatologicheskikh issledovaniy v Yakutii letom 1925 g. (A preliminary survey of the mycological and phytopathological investigations in Yakutia in the summer of 1925), Materialy Komissii po izucheniyu, YaASSR, AN SSSR, No. 6. Berg, L. S. 1935 Otkrytiye Kamchatki i ekspeditsii Beringa 1725-42 gg. (The discovery of Kamchatka and Bering's expeditions in 1725-42) . Leningrad. Bernshtam, A. N. 1 935 K voprosu o sotsialnom stroye vostochnykh gunnov (On the question of the social structure of the eastern Huns), PIDO, No. 9-Io. 460

Bibliography 1939 Tyurkskiye plemena v kontse 7 i pervoy polovine 8 v. (Turkic tribes at the end of the 7th and the first half of the 8th centuries), in Istoriya SSSR s drevneyshikh vremen do obrazovaniya drevnerusskogo gosudarstva (History of the USSR from earliest times to the formation of the ancient Russian State), Parts 3-4. Moscow—Leningrad. 1946 Sotsialno-ekonomicheskiy stroy orkhono-yeniseyskikh tyurkov. Kaganat i kyrgyzy (Social and economic structure of the Orkhon-Yenisey Turkic tribes. The kaganate [khanate] and the Kyrgyz). Moscow—Leningrad. 1947 Zametki po etnogenezu narodov severnoy Azii (Notes on the ethnogenesis of the peoples of northern Asia), SE, No. 2, pp. 6o-66. 1951 Drevnetyurkskoye pismo na r. Lene (Ancient Turkic writing on the Lena River), Epigrafika Vostoka, Vol. 4, pp. 76-86. Bertagayev, T. 1933 Zapadnoburyatskiy dialekt na materialakh leksiki (The west Buryat dialect, based on lexical materials). Leningrad. Betling, 0., see Böhtlingk, 0. von Bichurin, I. Ya. (Iakinf) 1950-1953 Sobraniye svedeniy o narodakh, obitayshikh v Sredney Azii v drevniye vremena (Collection of information on the peoples who inhabited Central Asia in ancient times). Moscow. Bilibin, N. N. 1 934 Formy materialnogo proizvodstva beregovykh koryakov Penzhinskoy guby; po materialam Koryatskoy kultbazy Komiteta Severa (Forms of material production of coastal Koryaks of the Penzhinskaya Bay; based on materials of the Koryak cultural base of the Committee of the North), PIDO, No. 6, pp. 46-54. Bogoraz, V. G. 1899 Kratkiy otchet ob issledovanii chukochey Kolymskogo kraya (Brief report on a study of the Chukchis of the Kolyma district), IVSORGO, Vol. 30, No. 1, pp. 1-51. 5908 Religioznyye idei pervobytnogo cheloveka; po materialam, sobrannym sredi plemen severo-vostochnoy Azii, glavnym obrazom sredi chukoch (Religious ideas of primitive man; based on materials collected among tribes of northeastern Asia, mainly among Chukchis), Zemlevedeniye, Book 1. St. Petersburg. 1919 Narodnaya literatura paleoaziatov (Folk literature of PaleoAsiatics), in Vsemirnaya literatura; literatura Vostoka, sbornik statey. Petrograd, No. 1, pp. 5o-68. 1936 Sotsialnyy stroy amerikanskikh eskimosov (Social structure of the American Eskimos), TIAAE, Vol. 4, pp. 195-256. 461

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1937 0 rabote Ye. D. Strelova: Odezhda i ukrasheniya yakutki v polovine 18 v. (On Ye. D. Strelov's paper: Clothing and ornaments of the Yakut woman in the mid-18th century), SE, No. 2-3, pp. 73-74. 1939 Chukchi (The Chukchis), Part 2: Religiya (Religion). Leningrad. Böhtlingk, O. von 1851 Ober die Sprache der ]akuten. Grammatik, Text und Wörterbuch. Besonderer Abdruck des dritten Bandes von Dr. A. Th. v. Middendorf's Reise in den äussersten Norden und Osten Sibiriens. St. Petersburg. 1853 0 yazyke yakutov; opyt issledovaniya otdelnogo yazyka v svyazi s sovremennym sostoyaniyem vseobshchego yazykoznaniya (On the Yakut language; experimental study of an individual language in connection with the present state of general linguistics), Uchenyye zapiski Akademii Nauk, Vol. 1, No. 4, pp. 377-446. Bolo, S. I. 1929-1936 Gospodin Tygyn (Lord Tygyn). Collection of legends told by storytellers of the former Yakutsk okrug, recorded by S. I. Bolo. MSS in Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR. n.d., a Batas-Menduken i Tygyn-toyon (Batas-Menduken and Tygyn-toyon). Recorded in 1933 from G. Dyachkovskiy, seventy-eight years old, of Teleyskiy nasleg, Churapcha rayon. n.d., b Bere-betyuntsy (The Wolf-betyun brothers). Recorded from M. A. Filippov of Chakyr nasleg, Churapcha rayon, and A. N. Nesterova of Betyun nasleg, Amga rayon. n.d., c Bert-khara i Tygyn-bay (Bert-khara and Tygyn-bay). Recorded from D. S. Krylov, eighty-one years old, of Sygatskiy nasleg, Ust-Aldan rayon. n.d., d Bert-khara i Tygyn-toyon (Bert-khara and Tygyn-toyon). Recorded in 1934 from D. M. Govorov, eighty-eight years old, of the Second Oltekskiy nasleg, Ust-Aldan rayon. n.d., e Dygyn-bogach (Dygyn-the-rich). Recorded in 1933 from Ye. M. Yegorov, eighty-two years old, of Zhuleyskiy nasleg, Tatta rayon. n.d., f Khodoro-uusa i Tygyn-toyon (Khodoro-uusa and Tygyntoyon). Recorded from I. N. Savvin, forty years old, of Khodorinskiy nasleg, Megino-Kangalasy rayon. n.d., g Starukha Muogan, starik Kedogoy i Tygyn-toyon (Old woman Muogan, old man Kedogoy and Tygyn-toyon). Recorded in 1935 from Ye. P. Isakov, seventy-seven years old, of the First Khomustakh nasleg, Namy rayon. n.d., h Tungusskiy toyon Khokhuun i Dygyn-bator (The Tungus toyon Khokhuun and Dygyn-bator). Recorded in 1936 from Kh. V. Gogolev, seventy-two years old, of Nayakhan nasleg, Ust-Aldan rayon. 462

Bibliography n.d., i Tygyn i ego predki (Tygyn and his ancestors). Recorded in Nemyugan nasleg, Ust-Aldan rayon. n.d., j Uraanay-bootur i tygyn-toyon (Uraanay-bootur and Tygyntoyon). Recorded in 1932 from P. N. Okoneshnikov of Alagarskiy nasleg, Churapcha rayon. n.d., k Uraanay-bootur i voyska Tygyna (Uraanay-bootur and the soldiers of Tygyn). Recorded in 1936 from O. A. Ammosov of Silan nasleg, Churapcha rayon. n.d., l Bogach Onogoy, Tatar-Tayma. Odinokiy muzh Llley (The rich man Onogoy, Tatar-Tayma. The lonely man Elley). Recorded from N. P. Timofeyev of Orosutskiy nasleg, Verkhne-Vilyuysk rayon. MS. Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR. n.d., m Predaniya ob Uluu-khoro (Legends about Uluu-khoro). Recorded from the story-tellers Ye. M. Yegorov of Tatta rayon, D. S. Byastinov (Byytygyy Uus) of Soguyskiy nasleg, Tatta rayon, and D. S. Nikolayev of Khakhsytskiy nasleg, Yakutsk rayon. MS. Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR. n.d., n Prichiny razdeleniya na ulusy, naslegi i rody (Reasons for the division into ulus, nasleg, and clans). MS. Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR. 1934a Omogoy-bay, they baatyr. Recorded from L. A. Pestryakov, sixty-five years old, of the Second Kurbusakh nasleg, UstAldan rayon. MS. Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR. 1934b Omogoy-bay, tiley-bootur. Recorded from D. M. Govorov, eighty-eight years old, of the Second Oltekskiy nasleg, UstAldan rayon. MS. Arkiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR. Sakhalar. Recorded from A. A. Pestryakov, sixty-two years 1934c old, of the Second Kurbusakh nasleg, Ust-Aldan rayon. MS. Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR. 1936 Plemya khara-sagylov (The Khara-Sagyl tribe). Recorded from S. N. Tatarinova, sixty-one years old, of the Second Oltekskiy nasleg, Ust-Aldan rayon. MS. Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR. 1937 Proshloye yakutov do prikhoda russkikh na Lenu; po predaniyam yakutov byvshego Yakutskogo okruga (The history of the Yakuts before Russian advance to the Lena River; according to the legends of Yakuts of the former Yakutsk okrug), TNIIYaK, Vol. 4. 1938a 0 predkakh yakutov. Omogoy-bay i Khara-Tymen (About the ancestors of the Yakuts. Omogoy-bay and KharaTymen). Recorded from F. N. Timofeyev, seventy-eight years old, from Orosutskiy nasleg, Verkhne-Vilyuysk rayon. MS. Arkhiv Yakutskogo filiala AN SSSR. 1938b Ob Orkhon-Bolodoye i Khara-Tymene (About OrkhonBolodoy and Khara-Tymen). Recorded from V. S. Dmitriyev, sixty-nine years old, of the Second Khorin nasleg, 463

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Bibliography Yefimenko, P. P. 1938 Pervobytnoye obshchestvo (Primitive society). Leningrad. Yefimenko, P. P. and N. A. Beregovaya 1941 Paleoliticheskiye mestonakhozhdeniya SSSR (Paleolithic sites of the U.S.S.R.), MIA, No. 2. Yermolayev, A. 1914 Ishimskaya kollektsiya. Opisaniye kollektsjy Krasnoyarskogo muzeya (The Ishim collection. Description of the Krasnoyarsk Museum collection), Krasnoyarsk. Yevtyukhova, L. A. 1941 Kamennyye izvayaniya Severnogo Altaya (Stone statues of the northern Altay), TGIM, No. 16, pp. 119-33. Yokhelson, see Jochelson Yutkanov, M. 1935 Altayskiy epos. Kogutey (Altayan epos. Kogutey). Moscow— Leningrad. Zalenskiy, V. 1903a Osteologicheskiye i odontograficheskiye issledovaniya nad mamontom, Elephas primigenius Blum., i slonami, E. indices L. i E. africanus Blum. (Osteological odontographic studies of the mammoth, Elephas primigenius Blum., and elephants, E. indices L. and E. africanus Blum.), Nauchnyye rezultaty ekspeditsii, snaryazhennoy Akademiyey Nattk dlya raskopki mamonta, naydennogo na r. Berezovke v 1901 g., Vol. 1. St. Petersburg. i9o3b Vidovyye zoologicheskiye priznaki mamonta (Species characteristics of the mammoth), ibid., Vol. 2, pp. 36-40. Zamyatnin, S. N. 1935 Raskopki u s. Gagarina (Excavations at Gagarino village), IGAIMK, No. 118, Paleolit SSSR (Paleolithic of the U.S.S.R.), pp. 26-77. Zhamtsarano, Ts. Zh. 1918 Proizvedeniya narodnoy slovesnosti buryat (Literary productions from Buryat folklore), No. 3, in Obraztsy narodnoy slovesnosti mongolskik/i plemen; teksty (Examples of the folk literature of Mongolian tribes; texts), Vol. 1. Petrograd. Zhirov, Ye. V 1940 Zametki o skeletakh iz neoliticheskogo mogilnika Yuzhnogo Olenyego ostrova (Notes on the skeletons from the Neolithic burial ground on Yuzhnyy Oleniy Island), KSIIMK, Vol. 6, pp. 51-54. Zhitkov, B. M 1913 Poluostrov Yamal (Yamal Peninsula), ZRGO po obshchey geografii, Vol. 49. Zolotarev, A. M. 1938 Iz istorii etnicheskikh vzaimootnosheniy na severo-vostoke Azii (From the history of ethnic interrelations in northeast Asia), Izvestiya Voronezhskogo Gos. pedagogicheskogo instituta, Vol. 4, pp. 73-87. 491

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Zolotarev, A. M. and M. G. Levin 1940 K voprosu o drevnosti i proiskhozhdenii olenevodstva (On the question of the antiquity and origin of reindeer-breeding), in Problemy proiskhozhdeniya, evolyutsii i porodoobrazovaniya domashnikh zhivotnykh (Problems of the origin, evolution and speciation of domestic animals), Vol. 1. Moscow—Leningrad. Zverev, V. N. 1914 Geologicheskiye issledovaniya po Maye i Aldanu (Geological researches on the Maya and Aldan rivers), IGK, Vol, 33, No. 9.

492

Index

Afontova Gora (mountain) site: located, 26; Mongoloid elements in, 61 afterbirth, burial of, among Kurykans and Yakuts, 330 agricultural tools, linguistic evidence supporting southern origins of, 238-39 agriculture: names of plants derived from southern steppe practices of, 246-47; irrigation practiced by Kurykans, 308 animal husbandry, linguistic evidence supporting southern steppe origin of, 237-51 passim animal transport, linguistic evidence of southern steppe practices of, 244 arangas (aboveground burial), as practiced among Yakuts, 389-90, Fig. 8o archaeological relics in Yakutia, summary table, 447, Fig. 84 archaeology: recent investigations in the Soviet Far East, xxxiii-xxxv; as indicator of economy of Yakutia prior to arrival of Russians, 382-90 passim archaeology of the Lena Basin, recent work done in the Aldan and Vilyuy River valleys, xxivxxviii armor: linguistic evidence for southern origins of, 250-51; evidence of use among Yakuts, 389, Fig. 8o arrival of Russians, historical events described, 444-45

arrowheads, from Kullaty, Fig. 12 arrows, "singing," 248-49, Fig. 58 Art Bronze Age: connections between southern steppes and Lake Baykal region, 155-56; distinctiveness in portraying northern animals, 156-58, Figs. 38 and 39; stylistic correlation between metal objects and cliff-drawings, 158, Fig. 39 Neolithic: esthetic value correlated with that of present-day tribes of Siberia, 102-4 Paleolithic: drawing of animals, 39-46 passim; Figs. 6 and 7 Ayyysyt (Yakut goddess) correlated: with hunting rites, 38; with cult of dead, 38-39; with matriclan, 36-37 banners, importance of, in socialpolitical relationships of Kurimchuk people, 315-17 Belkachi I and other Aldan River sites, contents of, summarized and interpreted, xxviii-xxxiii Belousovo: Iron Age burial at, 186188; glass beads from, correlated with China, 187-88 Beregovka mammoth, correlation of plants from stomach of, and climatic changes, 66 Besteekh, pictographic writing at, 209 Birnirk period, appearance of iron

493

INDEX

on Indigirka in, 205 blacksmithing during 18th and 19th centuries among Tungus and other Siberian tribes, 205-6 Borogon clan, origin of, 361-62 Bronze Age in Yakutia: first evidence in North, 134, Map 3; finds on lower Lena, 136-37, Figs. 30 and 31; correlation between Yakutian and Lake Baykal finds, 13845, Figs. 34 and 35; types of artifacts from various sites described and correlated, 147-53 passim, Fig. 36; distinctive traits of, 15253; influence on Bering Strait cultures, 219 bronze casting shops, locations of, in Yakutia, 148-49 passim bugady, sacred rock or tree. and hunting ceremony of Evenkis, 97-98 Bulun, site and contents, 113 Buret, Paleolithic site of, located, 51, 53; compared with Afontova Gora, 61-62 burials: as evidence of Mongol replacement of Turkic-speaking Kurumchinsk people, 333; on O1khon Island, 309-10; in crevices near cliff-drawings, 341-42, Fig. 74 Buryats, historical conflicts of, with Yakuts, 376-78 cannibalism: related in khosun epic, 87-88; among Yukagirs, 88 celts, iron, presence of, in upper Lena Valley, 191 Chastinskaya site: described, 26, hand-choppers of, compared with Eastern ones, 59 Chokurovka, Neolithic site of, located and contents described, III-12

Chukchis, art element analyzed and correlated, 216-19 passim clans of Yakutia, inter-relationship of, through descendance, 360-62 passim cliff-drawings: religious significance, 212, Fig. 55; as evidence of decline of Kurykan art and its replace494

ment by Mongolian art, 334-36; with runic script, 339-41, Fig. 73; at Petrovskoye, 348-49; of Kurumchinsk culture, 310-16 passim, Fig. 65; as expression of art, 391-94, Fig. 8r clothing: Paleolithic, 3o; compared with recent Yakut clothing, 30-31; linguistic evidence of southern origins of, 253-61 passim; distinguishing characteristics of male and female, 253-55, Fig. 59; Yakutian "padded" jacket, 25556; breastpiece, 257; similarity of, with Tungus and Yukagir clothing, 293-95, Fig. 63 connections of Yakut cultures: with Lake Baykal region, 123-24; with eastern Asia, 124-25; with North America, 125-27 passim; Karelia, 127, 129, Fig, 29 copper ore deposits, locations of, in Yakutia, 148-50 cultural contacts of Bronze Age Yakutia: with Cis-Baykal, 167-68; with northern Europe, 168-70, Fig. 43; with northeast Asia and Arctic America, 171-73; with southern steppes, 173-77, Figs. 45 and 46; with China, 178-82. Figs. 47, 48, 49 dairying, terms indicating southern origin of, 2 41-43 Davydovo village, cliff-drawings at, described, 339-41, Fig. 73 domesticated animals depicted on cliff-drawings of Kurumchinsk (Kurykan) culture, 312-13 dwellings: terms indicating connections with former steppe economy, 244-45; of Kurykans, 309; type occupied by Yakuts prior to Russian arrival, 383, 384 economy, Bronze Age, advances due to changes in social structure, 164-65 elk, religious significance of, in cliffdrawings, 160-62, Fig. 40 Elley: as ancestor of Yakuts, 305;

INDEX

ancestral relationship to Omogoy, 353-80 passim; descendant clans of, 359-60 embassies of Kurykans to China: in A.D. 630, 324; later embassies, 325 embroidery: similarity of Yakut and Paleo-Asiatic designs, 297-98 epic poetry. See olonkho Eskimos: economy described, 21617; art elements connected to Amur region, 218; artifacts correlated with Late Bronze Age of Yakutia, 219 ethnographic distributions in southern Siberia prior to Yakut northward movement, 332-33 "eye" ornament: among Eskimos, 218; among Northwest coast American Indians, 218

fauna, Paleolithic, compared in Manchurian and Siberian sites, 59-60 fertility rite: described for 18-19th century Yakuts, 36-37; correlated with Paleolithic, 37 fisherman, Neolithic, widespread migrations of, 117-19 fishing, importance of, for presentday and Neolithic tribes, 109-II forest spirit-masters of Yakuts and other tribes, 345-46 fortified settlements of Kurykans, 309 Genghis Khan, cause of migration of Yakuts, 379 Glazkovo (Bronze Age) period, evidence on Angara and Lake Baykal of, 134, Map 3 hair styles and ornaments of Yakut women, 259-60 headgear, steppe origin of, 258-59 hearths, Paleolithic, described, 53-54 historical: analysis of Tygyn's role and achievements, from paracontemporary sources, 437-38, from Marxist point of view, 438-42; materials on the Yakuts, Kam-

chatka Expedition (Lindenau, 1740's), 370-72; pictography among North American Indians, 213 horse and horse-riding, significance of, in Yakutian cultural contacts with southern regions, 191 horses, Kulykan, mentioned in Chinese sources, 321, 323, Fig. 70 horse trappings, linguistic evidence indicating southern origins of, 239-41 Huns, role of, in tribal movements in Siberia, 222-23 hunting economy of Upper Paleolithic, 32, Figs. 3 and 34 ideographic writing. See pictographic writing Iron Age in Yakutia: indications from various sites, 195-97; Yuyuke River, 195-97, Fig. 52; linguistic evidence, 196; Sikteekh pottery and stone artifacts, 202-3, Fig. 54; working of iron ore on middle Lena, 197 iron, antiquity of use of, in Yakutia, 186 Iron artifacts in Yakutia: arrowheads, 198, Fig. 53; pig iron, 198; found on lower Kolyma, 22021; correlated with Iron Age, 221

ore mining in upper Lena Valley, 191 smelting at Yuyuke River and other localities, 195-97 Kachug, Iron Age burial at, 186 Kamchatka, recent archaeological investigations at, xxxiii-xxxiv Kangalasy as a major component of Yakut nation, 376-80 passim Karasuk culture, Yakutian connections with, 173-77, Figs. 45 and 46 Khara-sagyl as predecessors of Yakuts in central Yakutia, 353-54 Khorins (Khoro, Khorolors): their influence in Yakut culture, 36869; as ethnic component of Yakuts, 373-74

495

INDEX

khosun (ancient Yakut hero): correlated with type of urasa, 76; defined, 266-67 kinship and slavery as revealed by olonkho, 396-416 passim Kullaty, site: Neolithic artifacts illustrated, Figs. 11, 12, 15, r6, 17; ornamentation of pottery, 84; art work, 84, Fig. 18; Bronze Age artifacts, 136, Fig. 32 kumiss, origin of word, traced, 242 Kurumchinsk culture: as representative of southern ancestors of Yakuts, 306; economy described, 306-8; evidence of hunting practices, 307-8 Kurykans: recent addenda clarifying their origin, xxiv; as ancestors of Yakuts, 305; archaeological remains of, on upper Lena, 306; mentioned in Chinese chronicles, 317-19, Fig. 69; affiliations of, with Turkic-speaking peoples, 320-24 passim; campaign of, against Orkhon Turks, 324; subjugated by Chinese, 325-26; relationships of, with western tribes (Dubo), 326, 328, Fig. 71; relationships of, with Central Asiatic Kyrgyz, 328-29 kyrdal (burial mound), 105 Kyrgyz: as legendary forefathers of Yakuts, 355-56; as tribe of origin for Elie), and Omogoy, 373 Late Bronze Age in Yakutia: correlation with Cis-Baykal (Shivera) and southern steppe (Karasuk) cultures, 1 45-46 Late Paleolithic of Siberia: changes in artifacts, 55, 56; Fig. 50; connections with China and Tibet, 58; European and Siberian striking tools compared, 59 Lena River Valley, early settlement of, during Paleolithic, 63 Lindenau, his account of Tygyn, 418, 419, 422, 430, 432, 433-34 passim linguistics: evidence for southern connections during Iron Age of Yakutia, 196; correlations of 496

Yakut and Chinese words, 582-83; as evidence of Yakut origins, 287-88; as evidence of agriculture borrowings from Kurykans by Buryat Mongols, 336-37 "lower world" (underworld) population described, 278

Makarovo, Paleolithic site, located and described, 52-54 passim, Figs. 5 and 6 Malaya Munku, Neolithic site: material culture, 76, 79, pottery, 82, 84 Malta, Paleolithic site: described, 51, 53; compared with Afontova Gora, 61-62 Mankhay Mountain, slab graves, 592-94, Fig. 51 map of world as depicted in traditional olonkho, 445-48, Fig. 83 matrilineal clan: development of, during Paleolithic, 33; compared with present-day remnants, 33-39 passim Mayats (mythical tribe), cruelty of, and punishment for it, 116-17 metallurgy. Yakutian practice of, related to Scythian, 222 "middle world" (earth) described in olonkho, 270-72, 274-76 passim migration and settlement, eastward movement of, from Yakutia, 57273 Mongolic terms in the Yakut language as evidence of southern origins, 289 passim Namy clan, origin of, 365 nationalism, Tygyn as rallying point for Yakut, 44 2-43 Neolithic cliff-drawings of elks, various sites of, 89-90, Fig. 19 sites in Yakutia: distribution of, 67 (Map 2); changes in tools from those of Paleolithic described, 68-71 passim; representative sites and material contents described, 72-74; techniques of tool production, 86

INDEX

nicknames, given by Yakuts to remnants of aboriginal populations, 360 nobility: role of, in Yakut society, 404-6 ; linguistic evidence of social stratification, 406-I I; untoward behavior of, 411-14 northern elements in Yakut culture, Tungus, 291-92 northern tribes, influence of, on Yakut new-corners, 365-69, Fig. 77

olonkho: contents pointing to southern origins of Yakuts, 229-35, Fig. 56; as vehicle of preservation of ancient cultures, 263-64; northern elements in, 264-67 passim; basic southern stratum of, documented, 267-86 passim; Buryat-Mongol connections of, 267, 272-73, 27677, 283; correspondence of, with Oyrot-Mongol and Altayan epic forms, 272-73; manner of presentation, 281-82; hyperbole and metaphors used in describing hero of, 282-83; basic plot of, 283286 passim; compared with epos of other peoples, 284-85; evidence of Yakut script in former times in, 349-50; accounts of Tygyn's exploits in, 421-35 passim; as source of Yakut "map of world," 445-48, Fig. 83 olonkhosut, defined, 263 Omogoy: travels of, to escape Buryats, 356-58; relationship to Elley, 353-80 passim

Paleolithic period in Yakutia: material culture described, 24-33; social structure and religion projected and correlated with other cultures, 33-39 passim; ties with Europe, 45-47; locations of sites, 49; artifacts described, 51-54 passim; physical aspects of Paleolithic man, 6o-61 patrilineality as revealed in olonkho, 395-96

Petrovskoye cliff-drawings, 348-49 physical anthropology: Baykal and Paleo-Siberian types among Yakuts, 301; as evidence of mixture of Buryats and ancestors of Yakuts, 337 pictographic writing: introduction, 207, Fig. 55; at Yelanka village, 207; at Besteekh, 209; among present-day tribes, 209; explanation of sympols, 210-II; among North American Indians, 213 pine tree, significance of, in Yakut economy, 385 place-names, significance of, in migration of Yakuts, 346-47 pokolka defined, 116n Pokrovskoye site described, 134-35 post-glacial period in Yakutia, climatic, faunal, and floral changes in, 65-68 pottery, differentiation between Yakut, and earlier archaeological potteries, 365, 385-86 predecessors of Yakuts: on middle Lena, 353.54; on Vilyuy, 354 Punuk period, appearance of iron on Indigirka in, 205

Quaternary period in Yakutia: flora and fauna differentiated from that of Tertiary, 12-16; preserved remnants of mammoth located and described, 16-zo passim radiocarbon dating of Belkachi I, xxx, xxx n reindeer husbandry, word borrowings for: from Altay region, 302; from Mongols, 302 Sakhalars as predecessors of Yakuts on middle Lena, 354 script lost by Elley, 382 Scytho-Sarmatian art motifs, correlation of, with upper Lena Valley, 188-89, Fig. 50 servants and dependent peoples: derivation of terms, 402-4 passim; duties described, 403-4 passim 497

INDEX

shamanism: depicted in cliff-drawings, Fig. 42; religious significance of, 162-64; invocations concerning the elk hunt, 344-45 sharing of remnants of deceased derived from Yukagirs, 295-96 Shishkino cliff-drawings: Paleolithic 40-43; compared with European cliff-drawings, 43-44; Neolithic, 89 Sikhteekh, evidence of artifacts worked wth iron tools at, 202-3 slab graves as indicators of Iron Age contacts, 192-94, Fig. 51 slavery: as revealed by olonkho, 39798; 400-404 passim slaves and indentured people, tasks performed by, 400-402 smelting techniques for iron ore: at Mukhtuya, 198; for iron artifacts, 198, Fig. 53 smith, role of, among Yakuts, 388 social structure: of Paleolithic population of Siberia compared with present-day survivals, 33-39 passim; change from matri-clan to patri-clan during Bronze Age, 164-65; as reflected in settlements, 363, Figs. 75 and 76; as revealed in olonkho, 395-96 Sortols, legends concerning distribution and customs of, as predecessors of Yakuts, 354-55 statuettes, female Paleolithic, 31 Surutaakh-khaya inscriptions and drawings: site located, 92; drawings described, 92-93 and Fig. 2o; artifacts described and illustrated, 94-96 and Fig. 21

tattooing as expression of Tungus influence on Yakut culture, 292, Fig. 62 teke (mountain goat), 31 Tertiary period in Yakutia, flora of, 10-12

toyon, role of, in Yakut society, 404-5 "tree of life": described in Yakut olonkho, 268-70; illustrated, Fig. 61

tribal movements in Siberia: causal 498

relationship of Huns and their aggressive policies, 222-23; on basis of Arab sources of 12th and 13th centuries A.D., 333-34 Turkic-speaking tribes, penetration of, to the Lena Valley, 223-24 Turkic terms in the Yakut language as evidence of southern origins, 288-90 passim Tuvins (Uryankhays) as component of Yakut nation, 374-76 Tygyn: his Kangalasy origin, 376; conflicting stories of his origin, 417; his special place in Yakut folklore, 418; his family background, 418-19; early youth, 419420; campaigns against other clans and tribes, 420-35 passim, Map 4; historical analysis of his deeds from paracontemporary sources, 437-38; from Marxist point of view, 438-42 unification of Yakuts partly achieved by Tygyn, 435-36 Uolba: Neolithic sites described, 105-9 passim, Fig. 24; correlated with Neolithic sites elsewhere in Siberia and in northern Europe, 105-9 passim "upper world" population described, 278 urasa, 36, 74, 76, Fig. 14 Uryankhays as southern component of Yakut nation, 374 wealth as defined among Yakuts, 396-400 workshops for stone artifacts: at Bulun and other northern localities, 113; at Khayyrgas, 113, 115, Fig. 26 "world-tree." See "tree of life" writing among Yakuts: archaeological and olonkho evidence, 349-51 "writing," presence of, among Kurumchinsk people, 313-14

Yakut language: elements pointing to southern origins, 229-35 passim;

INDEX

words borrowed from northern tribes, 233-34 Yakuts: location in relation to other Siberian tribes, 227; economy differentiated from that of surrounding tribes, 227-28; southern origins postulated, 228; historical conflicts with Buryats, 376-78 Yelanka village, pictographic writing at, 207

Yukagirs: economy, 120-21; spearing of deer, 120; conventional symbols in writing, 212-13; reasons for their influence on Yakut culture, 298-99

Zhigansk, Neolithic sites of, described, 105

499