Светлана Жарникова – The Distaff and the phallic cult (страница 4)

The connection with Khorezm is not accidental. As shown by the fundamental research of S. P. Tolstov, this region from ancient times had trade and cultural relations with the peoples of Siberia and Eastern Europe, including the Russian people. Going back to the Neolithic and Bronze Age, these ties stretch back to the formation of the main ethnic complexes of Asia and Europe. "The Hittite-Hurrian, Thracian, Tocharian, Scythian-Sarmatian problems are equally at the sources of Central Asian and East European ethnogenesis"⁴⁹. The influence of the Khorezm culture on these tribes, according to the researcher, was especially strong in the period between the 4th century BC and 1 AD, having affected, in particular, the history of the development of the surviving complexes of folk clothing in Eastern Europe. These ties stretch over the next centuries, "manifested either in Slavic carols among the Khorezm Christians of the 11th century, then in the existence of the Russian-Khazar-Alan colony in Urgench in the 13th century, or in Russian tales about the Khvalyn kingdom." ⁵⁰

In turn, S. P. Tolstov and other researchers noted the undoubted connection between the culture of the Danube, Black Sea, Caspian and Aralian tribes with more eastern, in particular the Baikal, tribes. A. P. Okladnikov, who studied the culture of the latter from rock paintings, noted the undoubted similarities with culture of Neolithic and Eneolithic farmers of Central Asia, Iran and neighboring countries ⁵¹. Moreover, the researcher sees a common stylistic style in the Neolithic art of the forest tribes of hunters and fishermen of the European Subarctic, as well as the Baltic States and Finland. The similarity of the rock carvings found in such distant spaces from each other is so great that it suggests not only close contacts of the western and eastern tribes, but also the penetration of representatives of western tribes from west to east at the end of the Neolithic, apparently, the ancestors of the later Samoyed tribes Sayan region ⁵².

The petroglyphs of the Baikal region of the Bronze and Early Iron Age show no less similarity with the rock carvings of Europe ⁵³. Attributed to an even later time (6-10 centuries), the so-called Kurykan scribes left by the Turkic tribes of the Kurykans, have undoubted analogies in the culture of the Sayan-Altai Turks and the Turkic tribes of Eastern Europe, who settled in the 1st millennium AD. e. steppe regions of Siberia and Eastern Europe from the Yenisei and Altai to the Danube and the Black Sea ⁵⁴. Of particular interest for our research are the Kurykan scribble-drawings on the Shishkinsky rocks of the Baikal region. The Kurykans, who roamed the northern side of Lake Baikal, were among the Uighur tribes, which, according to written sources of their time, were descendants of the Huns ⁵⁵. Their main occupation was horse breeding, hence the predominance of horses and riders in the above drawings). “At the same time, the horses of the Shishkin writings have a special, peculiar appearance, which testifies to the fact that before the eyes of the ancient artist there was a certain model with sharply outlined characteristic features. The artist strove to convey the peculiarities of the horse breed: a tall horse with a narrow long body, a small hunchbacked head set on a sharply arched swan neck; horse with a strong muscular chest and thin dry legs".⁵⁶ According to A. P. Okladnikov, the horses depicted by the kurykans correspond to a specific type of southern Central Asian breeds, which have long been valued in the East and West. A similar horse is reflected in the art of ancient Khorezm. S. P. Tolstov wrote about the sharply expressed difference between these tall and thin-legged, "stream" horses from the undersized Scythian horses ⁵⁷. The Kurykan horses described by A. P. Okladnikov are very similar, in our opinion, to the Mezen horses: the same long body, tall thin legs and a small head. It should be noted that, according to the testimony of the same author, in the late Baikal scribes, the figure of a horse acquires geometrized outlines, approaching a rectangle: the legs become straight, elongated and thin, like sticks ⁵⁸. Such geometrization, as we have already noted, is also characteristic of the Mezen paintings. The fact that this similarity is not accidental is evidenced by the following fact: the horses on the Mezen paintings are fundamentally different from the short and stocky horses of the local Mezen breed.

The question arises of how the image of the Kurykan, or Central Asian, horse in question got to the far Russian North. Above, it was said about the Dacian-Sarmatian and Scythian elements in the folk art of the North, explained by the participation of the Scythians and Sarmatians in the ethnogenesis of the Slavic, including the North Russian, population. In the first half of the 1st millennium AD the mentioned tribes came into contact with the Turkic tribes. A. P. Okladnikov, noting the similarity of the Kurykan scribbles with the drawings of the Turkic tribes of the Caucasus, the Don Steppes and Bulgaria of the 9-10 centuries, expressed an opinion about the possibility of the penetration of the Turks of the Baikal region from east to west - to the Don, the Caucasus and Danube Bulgaria.⁵⁹

S. P. Tolstoy wrote about the Türkization of the ancient Saka-Massaget population of the Amu Darya and Syr Darya deltas in the 4th-7th centuries, noting a particularly strong admixture of Hunno-Türkic elements. The descendants of these Turkicized tribes appeared in the 7-9th century under the collective name of the Oguzes ⁶⁰. The name "Oguzes", according to the same researcher, has another form - "Ogor", attested by the Byzantine sources of the 7th century, which suggests the presence of the Ugrians in the Oguzes - tribes of the eastern branch of the Finno-Ugric group, whose modern representatives are in the Urals and in Trans-Urals are Khanty and Mansi (Ostyaks and Voguls) ⁶¹. The origin of the other northeastern neighbors of the Russian Mezen, the Nenets, is associated with the Altai Turks. The cultural and economic contacts of these peoples with the Komi and the Russians were recorded by a considerable number of historical documents, as well as anthropological and ethnographic research ⁶². Obviously, thanks to these ethnic ties, it is in the folklore of the Russians of Mezen that Turkic elements can be traced, which have analogies in the culture of the Altai Turks⁶³.

In this regard, the similarity of some plot paintings on Mezen spinning wheels with drawings on shaman tambourines among Altai peoples will not seem so surprising ⁶⁴. Two-horned hats on men in compositions on the Mezen spinning wheels deserve special attention. Let me remind you that two-horned headdresses are characteristic of shamanic clothing. A similar headdress can be seen on many male figures depicted on the Mezen spinning wheels. There is nothing of the kind on any other Russian spinning wheels, which, in our opinion, only confirms the influence of Eastern cultures on the creation of the Mezen painting.

The art of Mezen allows us to trace ethnocultural ties not only with the eastern regions. We paid special attention to eastern ties because they turned out to be the least studied in the culture of the northeastern regions of the European part of Russia, which includes the Mezen basin of interest to us. In the Mezen painting, there are many elements connecting it with the culture of the western regions, primarily with the Severodvinsk regions of the Arkhangelsk region, as well as with the regions of the former Olonets province. Thus, the S-shaped figures of birds, characteristic of the Mezen painting, are often found on the products of masters from Belozerye and Podvina. In the paintings of the Severodvinsk spinning wheels, there is a motive similar to the Mezen motive of riding in a sleigh on two horses, one of the horses being dark and the other light in color. Some of the motives of the Mezen painting, for example, a characteristic ornamental motive defined by N. I. Tolstoy as the image of the "eyes of the dead"⁶⁵, connects the painting we are considering not only with the West Russian, but also with the West Finnish population. It is especially often found in the art of the Vepsians and the Russian regions adjacent to the area of their settlement ⁶⁶. This motive is not uncommon in the art of the population of the Dnieper region, as well as among the southern Slavs. Similar parallels are found in other areas of the material and spiritual life of the Russian Mezen. For example, in the Leshukonsky region, where the Mezen painting of interest to us is especially widespread, women wore original warriors decorated with beads; the ornament on them has undoubted analogies in the applied art of the Vepsians ⁶⁷. In the same villages, a complex of dwellings with winter ground huts is widespread, in many ways similar to peasant buildings in the southwestern regions of the Russian North (in villages along the Vaga, in the adjacent parts of the former Totemsk, Velsk and Shenkursk districts ⁶⁸). The same connections are found in the distribution of the characteristic decoration - the ridge on the roofs of houses, as well as some types of applied art: wood chips, figured cookies, some ornamental motifs on woven and embroidered items. The researchers associate the appearance of a sundress in the form of a skirt with a bodice on Vaga, Northern Dvina and Pinega, as well as on Vashka and Mezen, with the movement of the population from Western Russian regions. In the clothing of the Baltic Finns, such an unusual element of women's clothing in some villages of Leshukonya, as the "sleeves" that existed on sweaters, has analogies ⁶⁹. The antiquity of the Leshukonya's ties with Vaga, Kokshenga and Belozerie is evidenced by historical documents indicating the colonization routes from Kargopol district to the east, to the banks of the Northern Dvina and its tributaries Vaga, Sia, Emtsa, Vaimuga, and Pinega. Pinega was connected with the middle Mezen by a system of drags. The data of Toponymy testify to the antiquity of these paths. In this regard, the similarity in many elements of the geometric ornament of the Mezen painting with the paintings on the objects of folk art of Kargopol becomes clear. 70. In all likelihood, the Polkan-bogatyr mentioned by us, depicted on one of the Mezen spinning wheels, is associated with the eponymous character of clay toys by the famous craftswoman from Kargopol U. I. Babkina. Researchers see in Polkan a once revered local pagan hero - a deity like Yarila ⁷¹.