Воскрешение Перуна. К реконструкции восточнославянского язычества

Logically speaking, Perun's attributes in people's imagination were gradually formed on the basis of his functions as a Thunderer. This process must date back to the time of the existence of the Indo-European community, and it continued after its dissolution. Such Perun's attributes as his mighty force and bellicosity obviously go back to the earliest stage in his evolution, and from these attributes come his connection with the oak, the hammer-axe, and the arrows, as well as in his impact on yield and fertility, and his general connection to women. However, establishing Thursday as Perun's day must have occurred already under the influence of Christian calendar.

That was the image elaborated in myths that got into the Vainakh folklore. Let us now consider the data presented by the Vainakh folklore and their correspondence to the East Slavic ethnography and folklore.

\ In Vainakh folklore there are stories about women sent by Perun to the neaven for pouring water and making rain. These stories express most likely th,e Slavic notions of witches and sorceresses — the rain-makers, or the «Blitzhexes» ('witches of lightning') as they were called by the Germans. It was believed in the 19th century Ukraine that the witches could steal the rain from heaven and hold it in buckets. In Afanasyev's collection of tales one can see witches flying in the heaven and rolling the barrels there (completely like in the Chechen stories of Pir"on's women), while the clang of these barrels created thunderstorms. In Russia, a related custom of breaking the barrels was used in order to call forth a rain.

What was originally contained in the barrels having been broken? In Russian fairy-tales it was the unusual or specially blessed children that are imprisoned-in a barrel. Such children (often the twins) were thought of as conceived by other-world spirits. The barrel with the children was left adrift in the sea. Upon landing, the wonderful children would break out of the barrel and be released to the freedom where the great future awaited them. This motif was frequently used as a legal device by usurpers on a throne in order to create a tie to a traditional royal dynasty (Sargon, Perseus). A similar idea was present in the custom of the trial by drowning (if she was really a witch, she wouldn't drown). The presence of «god's children» probably eventually led to the substitution of drowning by exile. Indeed, according to the old Russian custom, the worned out sacral objects were floated in the river. The women marked by god were believed to have drowned or have been driven out by waterways. They were those who become mermaids (in Russian «rusalki»).

Mermaids in the 19th century peasant Russia were understood as drowned women or children who died before christening. They were believed to have been offended, not having lived the term granted to them by god. Therefore, they could be evil-doers, but on occasion some help could be coaxed from them as well since these characters were recently diseased relatives or neighbours. They were believed to have power over weather (calling forth the rain) and were linked to the oak, the Perun's tree. In the custom of «sending off (or driving) the rusalka away» human sacrifices were reflected: a witch or some other woman was sent to the god as an advocate for her home-folks.Some other characters were sent off too: in the early spring (on Shrovetide, in Russian «Maslenitsa») Maslenitsa was sent; in the Midsummer (on the summer solstice, or St. John the Baptist's day, in Russian Ivan Krestitel's day, or its eve, Kupalo) Ivan Kupalo was thrown into the river; among the Southern Slavs, Mara, or Marena, was seen off. As observed by Vladimir Propp, the similarity of the major components of the ritual pertaining to different festivals is striking. However, his contention that it may be explained by the similarity of peasant working operations is suspect: indeed, the seasons of the festivals are quite different.

Most likely the unity of the ritual components should be explained by homology — by common origin. The custom of erecting a fire-wheel oil a pole and then rolling it down may be connected to the magical granting of the sun descending from the highest point on the ecliptic, that is, to the St. John the Baptist's day, rather than to the spring sun still rising to the high point. Yet in fact, in Russia this ritual is seen in the Shrovetide, in the spring. However, the St. John the Baptist's feast preserved in the Ukraine and Belorussia, had disappeared in Russia proper where it was ousted by the Christian fast. Before the fast, Russia has the Shrovetide festival «Maslenitsa» that is absent in Ukraine and Belorussia. So, the ritual with its concomitant features had moved from St John the Baptist's day to the early spring where it makes the Russian Shrovetide, «Maslenitsa».