Mansi(mans. mendsi, moans; obsolete - voguly, vogulichi)

A look from the past

"Peoples of Russia. Ethnographic essays" (publication of the journal "Nature and People"), 1879-1880:

The laziness of the Voguls is the main cause of their poverty, and the indifference to their position is amazing. It often happens that the family has nothing to eat, and the Vogul smokes his pipe and plays cards.

- With all the shortcomings, the Vogul also has good features: compassion and hospitality. Before the authorities, the Voguls are timid, quiet among themselves, and even cunning with industrialists who come to them for furs and fish. So, the Vogul will not immediately show all its goods, but will do it gradually in order to provoke the buyer. But on the other hand, as soon as he tastes vodka, then all his cunning immediately disappears, his hardness disappears, he becomes soft and accommodating.

Vogul is silent, and on his face one can rarely notice signs of pleasure. Even during dances and excitement with tobacco and vodka, his physiognomy retains its usual calm and sullenness. At the same time, the Vogul, in contrast to the Ostyak and the Samoyed, almost never complains about anything. His compressed lips, deep and gloomy look sharply express an uncompromising character.


- The clothes of the Voguls almost do not differ from the dress of the Russian peasant, and the food is extremely undemanding. Some of the Voguls still eat horsemeat. The food is prepared extremely untidy. Fish, for example, are boiled with their entrails and scales in cauldrons that are never washed. First they eat broth, and then with dirty hands and fish. The dwellings are also extremely untidy.

The Voguls have neither arable land nor vegetable gardens, and only a few of them are engaged in cattle breeding. They engage in animal catching with passion, using guns, bows, arrows and horns for hunting.

- Voguls living along the river. Conde in Siberia, lead a completely sedentary life and become so Russified that they cannot be distinguished from Russian peasants: the same houses, the same clothes and speech, and the only difference is noticeable only in the fact that, being able to speak Russian, these Voguls do not forgot their native language. In the Perm province, the Voguls are also accustomed to settled life and agriculture, but they are not successful: dense forests and hunting attract the Voguls much more than arable farming.

K. Nosilov, "At the Voguls", 1900:

Voguls live under the eastern slope of the northern Urals, where they are bordered by the lower reaches of the Ob from the west.


- Until recently, warlike, vigorous, who knew how to drown, extract iron, copper, silver from the ores of the Urals, who had trade relations with neighbors, wars - this people has now completely fallen, completely turned into a primitive savage and has gone so far from civilization into its own impenetrable forests, so huddled in the wilderness of his taiga, so isolated that, it seems, he will no longer appear on the world stage, but, quietly dying out, will completely disappear from the face of our planet. From where he came to this taiga, what great movements of peoples pushed him here, he does not say, he even forgot his recent past; but its typical features - although the Voguls have long merged with the Mongol tribes, borrowed customs and beliefs from them - still resemble the south, another sun: curly, black hair, a Roman face profile, a thin, prominent nose, noble, open face, posture, swarthy complexion, hot, bold look - they clearly say that their homeland is not here, that they are only squeezed in here by necessity, historical events, movements of peoples.


- Such faces are more reminiscent of a Hungarian, a gypsy, a Bulgarian than an Ostyak, whose type is increasingly beginning to prevail due to incest.

The closest relatives of the Ostyak Khanty are Mansi, in the 19th century they were called Voguls or Vogulis. Mansi were divided into two groups of clans (phratries) - "por" and "mos". Marriages were concluded only between representatives of different phratries: Mos men married Poor women and vice versa. The main occupations of the Voguls were hunting and fishing. Therefore, they led, for the most part, a settled way of life and were more prone to assimilation than the Ostyaks.

Contemporary sources

Mansi is a small people in Russia, the indigenous population of the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug - Yugra.

The closest relatives of the Khanty and original Hungarians (Magyars)

population

A total of 12,500, of which in the Russian Federation (according to the 2010 census) 12,269 people.

Tyumen region 11614 hours, including Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug 10917 hours, Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug 171 hours, Tyumen region (beh KhMAO and YNAO) 496 people.

Sverdlovsk region 251 people.

Several people - in the north-east of the Perm Territory (statereserve "Vishersky").

The number of Mansi in settlements in 2002

Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug:

Urban-type settlement Kondinskoye - 876

City of Khanty-Mansiysk - 785

City of Nizhnevartovsk - 705

Urban-type settlement Igrim - 592

Urban-type settlement Mezhdurechensky - 585

Saranpaul village - 558

Sosva settlement - 440

Beryozovo urban-type settlement - 374

Shugur village - 343

Polovinka village - 269

Hulimsunt village - 255

Leushi village - 240

Vanzetur village - 235

Lombovozh village - 203

City of Surgut - 199

Nyzhniye Narykary village - 198

Nyaksimvol village - 179

Yumas village - 171

Aneeva village - 128

Village Yagodny - 125

Peregrebnoe village - 118

Settlement Listvenichny - 112

Lugovoy urban-type settlement - 105

Kimkyasui village - 104

Tyumen region:

City of Tyumen - 340

Self-name (endo-ethnonym)

Mansi means man and goes back to the Proto-Ugric word *mańćɜ "man, man".

It has parallels in other Ugric languages: the Khanty name of one of the phratries is mant (mańt́) (B), mont (mońt́) (I), mas (maś) (O), as well as the self-name of the Hungarians magyar.

In different Mansi dialects, it has different forms: Sosva Mansi (mańśi), Pelymsky Mansi (māńś), Lower Kondinsky Mӧ̄ns (mɔ̄̈ńś), Tavda Mansi (mäńćī), Lower Lozvinsky Mans (måńś).

The name of the Mansi phratry Mos is borrowed from the Khanty mas (mɔś) (О), however, it has the same passage from the common Ugric word *mańćɜ.

In Russian, there are words to designate representatives of the people: in pl. h. Mansi (indeclinable) Imansi; in units h. Mansi and Mansi, as well as Mansi (indeclinable) to refer to a man or woman. Adjectives Mansi and (invariant) Mansi.

Until the 1920s and 30s, the Mansi were called in Russian the word Voguls, which comes from Khanty. u̯oɣaĺ, u̯oɣat.

This name is still sometimes used in other languages, for example, German. Wogul, wogulisch.

To the ethnonym "Mansi" they usually add the name of the area where this group comes from (Sakv Mansit - Sagvin Mansi).

Correlating with other peoples, Mansi call themselves "Mansi mahum" - Mansi people

Language and writing

They speak the Mansi language, but due to active assimilation, about 60% use the Russian language in everyday life.

The Mansi language belongs to the Ob-Ugric group of the Ural (according to another classification - the Ural-Yukagir) language family.

Dialects: Sosvinsky, Upper Lozvinsky, Tavdinsky, One Kondinsky, Pelymsky, Vagilsky, Middle Lozvinsky, Lower Lozvinsky.

Mansi writing has existed since 1931 - based on Latin,

since 1937 - based on the Russian alphabet.

The literary language is based on the Sosva dialect.

Ethnogenesis

It is believed that as an ethnic group, the Mansi formed as a result of the merger of local tribes of the Ural Neolithic culture and Ugric tribes moving from the south through the steppes and forest-steppes of Western Siberia and Northern Kazakhstan.

Two-component nature (a combination of cultures of taiga hunters and fishermen and steppe nomadic cattle breeders) in the culture of the people is preserved to this day.

Mansi are divided into two exogamous phratries: Por and Mos, historically differing in origin, as well as customs.

Marriages were concluded only between representatives of opposite phratries: Mos men married Por women and vice versa.

The Por phratry was made up of the descendants of the aboriginal Urals, and the Mos phratry was made up of the descendants of the Ugric peoples.

The ancestor of the phratry Por is considered to be a bear, and the phratry Mos is a woman Kaltash, who could appear in the form of a goose, a hare or a butterfly.

Anthropological characteristic

Mansi (like the Khanty) are characterized by the following set of features:

Low stature (less than 160 cm on average for men),

General gracility (miniature structure),

Narrow head, meso- or dolichocephalic in shape and low in height,

Straight soft black or blond hair,

Dark or mixed eyes

The percentage of the Mongolian fold of the eyelid, which covers the lacrimal tubercle (epicanthus), varies markedly by groups,

A face of medium height, different in shape, with a noticeable flattening and high cheekbones,

- nose slightly or medium protruding, mostly medium in width, mostly with a straight or concave nasal bridge, with a raised tip and base,

Weakened beard growth

Relatively wide mouth

Small lip thickness

Moderately protruding or escaping chin.

Traditional activities

Hunting, fishing, reindeer breeding, agriculture, cattle breeding.

In ancient times, dugout boats, skis, sleds (with a dog, reindeer or horse team) were used to move the Mansi.

Various traps (chirkans) and crossbows were used for hunting.

Fishing is common on the Ob and Northern Sosva.

Fishing tools: spears, nets, they fished by blocking streams with dams.

In the upper reaches of the Lozva, Lyapina, Severnaya Sosva - reindeer breeding, it was borrowed from the Khanty in the XIII-XIV centuries.

The most developed areas of animal husbandry include the breeding of horses, cattle and small cattle.

In addition, poultry farming is developed.

The Siberian cedar was of great importance in everyday life, from which a huge crop of pine nuts was collected.

In addition, household items, dishes, boxes, boxes, baskets (the so-called rootstocks) were made from woven cedar root.

Products from birch bark, boxes, tuesas, wooden utensils, spoons, troughs, ladles, and also the simplest furniture were widespread.

Pottery was used.

Of the weapons, bows and arrows, spears, spears, various types of blades were used, armor was also known.

Mansi and neighboring peoples also achieved some success in iron processing, but their greatest skill was manifested in wood processing.

In folk art, the main place is occupied by ornament, the motives of which are similar to those of the related Khanty and Selkups.

These are geometric figures in the form of deer antlers, rhombuses, wavy lines, a Greek-type meander, zigzag lines, often located in the form of a strip.

In bronze casting, images of animals, an eagle, a bear are more often found.

Of the archaeological finds, silver dishes of Iranian and Byzantine origin are of great interest.

dwelling

Settlements are permanent (winter) and seasonal (spring, summer, autumn) on the fishing grounds.

The settlement was usually inhabited by several large or small, mostly related families.

The traditional dwelling in winter is rectangular log houses, often with an earthen roof, among the southern groups - Russian-type huts.

In summer - conical birch bark tents or quadrangular frame buildings made of poles covered with birch bark, for reindeer breeders - tents covered with reindeer skins.

The dwelling was heated and illuminated by a chuval - an open hearth made of poles coated with clay.

Bread was baked in separate ovens.

During the period of menstruation, Mansi women lived in special houses.

traditional clothing

For the manufacture of outerwear used the skins of deer - owls.

Travel clothes were sewn from skins taken in winter, women's fur coats were sewn from summer ones.

Kamus - the skin from the legs of deer - was used to make shoes and mittens.

Clothes were sewn together with tendons and threads from nettle fibers.

They decorated clothes with fur mosaic ornaments, beads, beads, metal pendants, pewter plaques.

The men's costume consisted of short fur trousers tucked into stockings, lower and upper shoulder clothing - a shirt made of linen, or nettle, a malitsa made of reindeer skin taken off in autumn, turned inside with fur, with a hood; parkas of a deaf cut with fur outward, which was worn over a malitsa.

A goose fur coat, similar in cut to a parka, but longer and sewn from winter reindeer skins, served as road clothes.

They also wore a goose made of multi-colored cloth with sewn-on sleeves.

Cloth cape - luzan was sleeveless, with unsewn sides, a hood, inside pockets in front and behind.

A similar luzan, but without a hood, was used by many Ural peoples as hunting clothing.

For skiing, the Mansi put on boots - oledi, sewn from dressed skins, and nyars from skins with fur outside.

Oledi and nyars were worn with long stockings made of cloth or soft leather - rovduga.

Summer shoes everywhere were leather pistons with high tops made of rovduga.

The lower part of the piston was made from a piece of leather, with gathers at the toe and heel.

The clothes were girdled with braided and leather belts.

Leather ones were necessarily decorated with openwork metal or bone linings.

A knife in a sheath and fangs of a bear were hung from the belt - to protect against misfortunes.

There were cases when during the hunt the belt was sacrificed - for example, it was thrown into the water to avoid danger.

Men wore hats made of sheep or dog skins on their heads, but often managed only with hoods.

Of interest is the man's Mansi hairstyle.

Hair was not cut and braided into two braids, the ends of which were connected with a bundle with chains or buttons.

They wore earrings in their ears.

The male hairstyle in the form of braids has an ancient origin. E

mnographers recognize it as one of the ethnic features of the Turkic-speaking peoples from South-Eastern Europe to Central Asia.

The North American Indians also had this.

It is noted in the literature that such a Mansi custom dates back to the era when their ancestors lived in the southern steppe regions.

It is also a long tradition to wear rings on one or more fingers.

Often the ring appears in folklore plots: with its help, treasures are found, and belonging to a tribal group is recognized.

Since the end of the 18th century, as noted by many authors of memoirs of meetings with the Ural Mansi, women wore long shirts made of cotton fabrics.

They were sewn with gathers at the collar, cuffs on the sleeves, and a bright ribbon was sewn along the hem.

Later, they began to wear a soup dress similar in cut to the Russian one: on a yoke, with sewn-in and narrowed sleeves, a turn-down or standing collar, with folds laid at the place where the yoke was sewn to the panels that form the camp.

A strip of fabric was sewn along the breast cut, which was decorated with beads.

The collar of the shirt was also decorated with beads.

The conclusions of ethnographers about the embroidery of women's shirts are curious.

It is characterized by pronounced polychromy with the use of threads of dark colors: red, brown, blue, black.

The motives of the embroidered ornament find direct analogies with the patterns on the fabrics of the Eastern and Volga peoples.

Researcher Z.P. Sokolova believes that such a similarity comes from the Bronze Age, when there was a unity of tribes, from which not only the Finno-Ugric peoples of Western Siberia, the Urals, but also the Middle Volga region subsequently descended.

Fur coats made of reindeer fur or cloth were worn over the shirt.
- Sahi.

The white fur coat was considered the most elegant.

The hem and stripes were distinguished by stripes of fur that differed from the main color.

Such fur coats were necessarily decorated with mosaic ornaments.

Each locality had its own ornament.

For example, among the Sosvinsky Mansi, he was associated with the image of a frog, and among the Lozvinsky - a sable.

Women also wore open caftans - nui sakhi - made of blue, green, red cloth. They were decorated with narrow strips of multi-colored fabric.

The Verkhoturye Mansi borrowed sundresses from the Russians very early, they called them tops.

On weekdays, women wore sundresses made of unbleached canvas, and on holidays - from purchased silk fabrics, most often from Chinese.

In the middle of the XIX century. young women and girls from the Lozva Mansi began to wear cotton skirts with jackets - shugay.

Women's shoes were nyars, which were worn with stockings knitted from sheep or dog wool.

Festive stockings were necessarily ornamented.

The leather surface of the nyars was embroidered with beads.

Every day they wore pistons, which differed from men's ones only in smaller sizes.

A common headdress was a scarf, which was decorated with a sewn-on fringe of threads.

Researchers suggest that once there was a custom among Mansi women to cover their faces.

This, in particular, is indicated by such examples: during a wedding, a woman covered her face from her husband's relatives, during the so-called bear festival - from images of spirits. For a long time there was a belief that walking without a headscarf meant bringing misfortune upon oneself.

There is folklore about this.

Mansi women did not wear fur hats, since fur was the subject of an offering to gods and spirits.

The girls wore headbands - panjos.

They were pulled together with ties at the back, and the front side was decorated with large beads, coins, and sometimes, as E. Pavlov, a correspondent of the Russian Geographical Society, noted in 1851, “something like snake heads, quite skillfully made of bone and approved in a close proximity to each other distance."

Beads for jewelry are recognized as a material borrowed from the southern peoples.

All Mansi groups had a breast decoration - tourlaps.

It consisted of an openwork beaded mesh sewn to canvas.

Sometimes the breastplate was made of red or blue cloth and decorated with pewter plaques.

The hairstyle consisted of two braids and numerous beaded ornaments strung on woven braids; sometimes metal and bone zoomorphic pendants were used.

In general, Mansi clothes are typical clothes of the taiga hunting and fishing population, with the preservation of some elements of the attire of their steppe ancestors.

National cuisine

The traditional food of the Mansi was fish and meat.

Fish was eaten raw, boiled, frozen, dried, smoked, dried.

From the insides of the fish, fat was rendered, which was consumed in its pure form or mixed with berries.

The meat of game animals (mainly elk), upland and waterfowl were cured and smoked.

Domestic deer were slaughtered mainly on holidays.

Blueberries, black currants, bird cherry, cloudberries, lingonberries and cranberries were harvested for future use.

squirrel stomachs

With the opening of the hunting winter season, hunters get a lot of squirrels.

In the harvest years of the cedar, the stomachs of the extracted squirrels, as a rule, are stuffed with pine nuts.

Hunters squirrel stomachs, along with the contents, are fried and eaten. B

people belong to the category of delicacies.

Birch juice

Mansi love birch sap.

It is collected during the period of sap flow, harvested in various containers.

Mansi style caviar

Mansi caviar is rarely eaten lightly salted.

Usually they boil it in fish oil.

It turns out a high-calorie and tasty meal.

Fish on the face

Mansi prefer to fry small fish on the go.

Usually they put 10-15 fish on a willow skewer, salt and fry near the fire.

Berries with fish oil

A lot of different berries grow in the taiga: cloudberries, blueberries, shiksha, lingonberries, princesses, etc.

Mansi actively collect berries and use them widely in their diet. Most often they consume berries with fish oil and herbs.

Religion

Formal Orthodoxy, however, traditional Pantheism, the cult of patron spirits, ancestors, and the bear (bear holidays) are preserved.

According to the myth, a loon named Luli got the earth from the bottom of the ocean during the creation of the world.

According to another version, Kul-Otyr himself got the earth from the bottom.

The world is divided into three spheres: air, water and earth.

That is why the waterfowl is the most suitable in this situation - all three spheres are available to it.

The highest gods in the pantheon are Numi-Torum and his son, Kors-Torum.

The evil spirit Kul-Otyr (Kyn-Lung) is in charge of the underworld.

The main gods: the eldest of the sons of Numi-Torum, Polum-Torum, is in charge of all the fish and animals of the surrounding places.

Mir-susne-khum, another son of Numi-Torum, is an intermediary between the gods and the world (“Heavenly Overseer”), his horse is Tovlyng-luv, Mykh-imi is “Old-Earth”.

The goddess who prevents diseases, Kaltash-ekva is the goddess of the earth, the mother of Mir-Susne-khum, Hotal-ekva is the goddess of the sun.

Etpos-oika is the god of the moon, Nai-ekva is the goddess of fire, Syahyl-torum is the god of thunder, Kosyar-Torum is the grandson of Numi-Torum.

The third son of Numi-Torum, Autya-otyr, looks like a pike and lives in the mouth of the Ob. Another son of Numi-Torum, Nyor-oyka is the patron of deer herds.

The place of residence was also assigned to the gods: Polum-Torum lived on the Pelym (Polum) River, Ner-oyka - on the lake Yalpyn-tur.

Khont-Torum - god of war, his wife - Sui-ur-ekva, assistants - Husi, Enki.

The epithet of Koltash (Kaltash)-ekva is Sorni-ekva (“Golden Woman”), this was taken literally by Europeans, and they believed that there was an image of her made of gold.

Characters of lower mythology: pupyg - a good spirit (guardian), kul - an evil spirit, menkv - a cannibal giant, uchi (ochi) - a forest monster, cape (mis) - a good giant.

One of the characters, Mis ne - "Forest Maiden", brings good luck to the hunter and marries him.

They have a son, but the people in the village offend her, and she goes back to the forest.

In the village of Khurum-paul, Yiby-oyka (“Old Owl”) was revered, who was considered by the inhabitants of this village to be their ancestor, that is, a totem.

Dragonfly, wagtail, eagle owl were also totems among the peoples of the Ob north. The totem could not be an object of hunting.

According to Mansi beliefs, men have 5 or 7 souls, women have 4 or 6. Of these, two are the most important, one reincarnated into a child of the same sex, the other went to the kingdom of Kul-Otyr.

In essence, "spirits" are personifications of the forces and phenomena of nature.

Note: the words "oyka" and "ekva" mean respectively "old man" and "old woman, woman, woman", "ne" - "woman, maiden", "otyr" - "hero".

Story

The history of Mansi is extremely poorly understood!

From the obvious...:

In the Chanvenskaya (Vogulskaya) cave, located near the village of Vsevolodo-Vilva in the Perm Territory, traces of the Voguls were found.

According to local historians, the cave was a temple (pagan sanctuary) of the Mansi, where ritual ceremonies were held.

Bear skulls with traces of stone axes and spears, shards of ceramic vessels, bone and iron arrowheads, bronze plaques of the Perm animal style depicting an elk man standing on a lizard, silver and bronze jewelry were found in the cave.

It is assumed that the Mansi originally lived in the Urals and its western slopes, but the Komi and Russians forced them out in the Trans-Urals in the 11th-14th centuries.

Mansi distinguished the estates of princes (governor), heroes, combatants.

By the 10th century, writing, metallurgy and metalworking, jewelry and pottery, medicine, weaving were known, and international trade was developed.

The earliest contacts with the Russians, primarily with the Novgorodians, date back to the 11th century.

With the annexation of Siberia to the Russian state at the end of the 16th century, Russian colonization intensified, and by the end of the 17th century, the number of Russians exceeded the number of the indigenous population.

The Mansi were gradually forced out to the north and east, and in the 18th century they were converted to Christianity.

(10.9 thousand people, 2010) Tyumen region (11.6 thousand). The Mansi are settled in the Ob River basin (mainly along its left tributaries - the Konda, Northern Sosva rivers, as well as in the area of ​​\u200b\u200bthe city of Berezov); part of the Mansi lives among the Russian population in the Sverdlovsk region. In total, there are 12.2 thousand people in the Russian Federation (2010). Mansi speak the Mansi language (Finno-Ugric group of the Ural-Yukaghir family of languages), many speak only Russian. The Mansi language is considered native by about 60% of the Mansi.

Mansi writing has existed since 1931 on the basis of Latin, and since 1937 on the basis of the Cyrillic alphabet, the literary language has developed on the basis of the Sosva dialect. There are several ethnographic groups: the northern one with the Sosvinsky, Upper Lozvinsky and Tavda dialects, the eastern one with the Kondinsky dialect and the western one with the Pelymsky, Vagilsky, Middle Lozvinsky and Lower Lozvinsky dialects. The language and traditional culture are preserved among the northern (Sosva-Lyapinsky) and eastern (Konda) Mansi.

As an ethnic community, the Mansi formed, probably, in the first millennium of our era in the process of merging the Ugric peoples who came from the south with the ancient tribes of hunters and fishermen of the taiga Trans-Urals. The Mansi are related to the Khanty. They are united with the Khanty by a common name - the Ob Ugrians (in contrast to the Hungarians - the Danube Ugrians). In written sources, they have been known since the 11th century under the name "Ugra" (together with the Khanty), and since the 14th century - under the name "Voguls". From the beginning of the 17th century, the Mansi were considered Orthodox, but they retained various pre-Christian beliefs (including a tribal cult, shamanism). Main occupations: fishing, hunting, partly reindeer breeding, as well as agriculture, cattle breeding and fur farming.

Traces of the merger of the cultures of taiga hunters and fishermen and steppe nomadic pastoralists in the culture of the people have survived until the 21st century. Once the Mansi lived in the Urals and its western slopes, but with the advent of Komi and Russians in those places, in the 11-14 centuries they moved to the Trans-Urals. In the 18th century, the Mansi were formally converted to Christianity.

The traditional culture has a typical taiga appearance. The main occupations were hunting and fishing, partly reindeer herding. On the Ob and in the lower reaches of the Northern Sosva, fishing was the predominant occupation. The inhabitants of the upper reaches of the rivers were mainly engaged in hunting, went to the Ob for seasonal fishing. Hunting was fur and meat. Fur hunting (squirrel, sable) was commercial. Beavers, deer, elks, upland and waterfowl were caught on Konda. In addition to guns, which became widespread in the 18th century, bows and arrows were used for a long time.

Fish were caught using various traps, barriers, nets. In the upper reaches of the Lozva, Severnaya Sosva and Lyapin, where in the summer it was possible to graze deer in the mountains, the Mansi were engaged in reindeer herding. There were few deer, and they were used mainly for transport purposes. The Mansi (Paul) settlements were permanent (winter) and temporary seasonal (spring, summer, autumn). They usually numbered up to ten houses with buildings located along the river bank. As a rule, the villages were at a distance of a day's journey from each other. The main type of dwelling is a log house with a gable roof, often without a foundation.

Traditional women's clothing - a dress with a yoke, a cotton or cloth robe, in winter sakhi - a double fur coat. The clothes were richly ornamented with beads, appliqué, colored cloth and fur mosaics. A large scarf with a wide border and fringe, folded in an unequal triangle, was worn thrown over the head and shoulders, with the ends hanging loosely on the chest. With the end of a scarf, a woman covered her face in the presence of men - older relatives of her husband or son-in-law (the custom of avoidance). Men wore shirts similar in cut to women's dresses, pants and belts, from which they hung bags and cases with hunting equipment. Hooded outer clothing (malitsa, goose) was sewn from cloth or deer skins.

The usual Mansi food is fish and meat. Fish was eaten raw, boiled, frozen, dried, smoked, dried. From the insides of the fish, fat was rendered, which was consumed in its pure form or mixed with berries. The meat of game animals (mainly elk), upland and waterfowl were cured and smoked. Domestic deer were slaughtered mainly on holidays. Blueberries, black currants, bird cherry, cloudberries, lingonberries and cranberries were harvested for future use.

Families were large (from several married couples) and small (from one couple), the marriage was patrilocal (the wife went to the husband's family), and the phenomena of remnant matrilocality also persisted (for some time the husband could live in the wife's family). According to traditional religious beliefs, the Mansi believe in the existence of several souls in a person: five for men, four for women. The soul as a vital substance is presented in different ways: as a shadow, breath, ghost-double or human spirit. The sacred meaning of the numbers five and four (according to the number of souls) was manifested in many rituals.

The mythological picture of the world is divided into three tiers. On the top is Torum, the personification of the sky, the root cause of good. On the middle tier - the Earth - people live. The lower tier is the underground world of dark and evil forces. The most significant Mansi holiday is the bear holiday. Many celebrations are timed to the dates of the Orthodox calendar. Of the spring holidays, Urine Hotel Ekva is significant - Crow's Day, celebrated on the Annunciation (April 7). It was believed that on this day the crow brings spring, acts as the patroness of women and children. In late May - early June, the fishermen's holiday was celebrated, which included competitions on boats, kindling a fire, sacrifices, joint meals, shamanistic rituals. Autumn holidays are associated with hunting, especially with the beginning of fur hunting, first of all Pokrov (October 14). Reindeer breeders honored Ilyin's Day (August 2), coinciding with the end of the molting of deer.

Sacred and everyday genres stand out in the Mansi song folklore. Sacred songs were sung after sunset, mainly in late autumn and winter, their performance was timed to coincide with holidays and rituals. The music is represented by ritual chants and instrumental tunes of the bear festival, shamanic rituals. Shaman melodies were accompanied by beats on a tambourine.

Epic musical folklore includes mythological songs about the origin of the world, gods, people and heroic songs about the exploits of heroes, song inserts in fairy tales. Epic songs may be accompanied by playing the zither, harp, and bowed lute. Lyrical music is represented by song improvisations, dance genres and tunes.

The Mansi people are not as numerous as the Khanty. According to the 2010 census, only 12,269 people live in Russia (for comparison, the Khanty - 30,943 people). Mansi live in the Perm Territory, in the Sverdlovsk Region and in the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug. Basically, representatives of this people are assimilated and live in cities. But there are those who keep the culture and history of their ancestors and are proud of it.

I was teased "Chukchi"

Among this small northern people there are representatives who brought him fame. Ask any resident of Ugra who Ruslan Provodnikov is - every second person will answer with confidence - the world boxing champion.

Photo: AiF / Ekaterina Losetskaya

Ruslan Provodnikov is one of the representatives of the Mansi people. He was born in the Berezovsky district in the small village of Igrim. His name rang around the world after a crushing victory for the world title in boxing with Mike Alvorado.

Ruslan himself is very kind to his people and is proud that he is a Mansi. But it was not always so. The athlete told the correspondent that he used to be embarrassed to recognize himself as part of the Mansi people: “As a child, I was ashamed of this. At school, they teased me with “Chukchi” and Khanty, made it clear that I was a second-class person. I looked at myself in the mirror and thought: “Why am I not like everyone else?”. Complexed, fought. My mother is indigenous, fluent in the language, I am not. But that doesn't stop me from being Mansi. I don’t know the language, but I grew up on this land, I glorify it.”

How Brezhnev assessed the poem of the Mansi poet

Yuvan Shestalov - poet, thinker, representative of the Mansi people. In the 1970s, his “Pagan Poem” was published - the epic of the Mansi people. It was then that Yuvan Shestalov was talked about as a world-class poet. In 1981, for this book, the poet was awarded the State Prize of the RSFSR. Gorky. From the memoirs of Yuvan Shestalov: “On that day, the award was presented in the Kremlin to three laureates - the architect, composer Rodion Shchedrin and me. At a banquet, two women come up to me, one says: “I am Galina Brezhneva. I have read your poem. Even Leonid Ilyich himself read the poem, he liked it too!

All the poet's works are imbued with love for his people. The publicist and public figure Svetlana Dinislamova writes that it was Yuvan Shestalov who was responsible for the revival of the main holiday of the Ob Ugrians - Bear games: “In 1985, in the village of Sosva, Berezovsky district, for the first time after the ban, he organized Tulyglap ​​(Bear games). At present, the Tulyglap ​​rite is carried out everywhere on the territory of Yugra.

Language keeper - Kotilagi Rombandeeva

Evdokia Rombandeeva is a Finno-Ugric scholar, specialist in the Mansi language, compiler of the first Mansi-Russian and Russian-Mansi dictionary, Doctor of Philology and author of more than 200 research papers, one of the most fundamental is the Mansi Heroic Epos. It was she who compiled the first Russian-Mansi dictionary and proved that the Mansi language has not six, but twelve vowel sounds. Evdokia Ivanovna Rombandeeva was born on April 22, 1928 in the village of Khoshlog (Berezovsky district) in the family of a Mansi hunter. The surname comes from the Mansi word "rampanti" and means "hurrying, hurrying." As a child, she was called the beautiful name Kotilagi (in Russian - the middle daughter).

The great artist Wassily Kandinsky from the Mansi clan

Who would have thought that the outstanding Russian painter, graphic artist and fine art theorist, one of the founders of abstractionism, Wassily Kandinsky is related to the small northern people. It turns out it has...

Wassily Kandinsky Photo: AiF Collage

Kandinsky came from a family of Nerchinsk merchants, descendants of convicts. His great-grandmother was the Tungus princess Gantimurova, and his father was a representative of the ancient Transbaikal (Kyakhta) Kandinsky family, deriving themselves from the family name of the princes of the Mansi Kondinsky principality.

There are many worthy representatives of the Mansi people. But all of them are distinguished by one thing - love for their brothers, love for nature and culture.

Mansi is a small ethnic group living in Russia in the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug. It is the "brothers" of the Magyars and Khanty. The Mansi even have their own, Mansi language, but most of the people currently speak Russian.
The Mansi population is about 11 thousand. At the same time, it was revealed that several hundred people settled in the Sverdlovsk region. In the Perm Territory, you can also meet single representatives.
The word "Mansi" in the Mansi language means "man". Also, this word comes from the name of the area "Sagvinskie Mansi". Since it was there that the first Mansi lived.

A little about the Mansi language

This language belongs to the Ob-Ugric group. Mansi writing arose in 1931, based on Latin. Merging with the Russian language happened a little later - in 1937. The Mansi literary language takes the Sosva dialect as its basis.

History reference

The development of the ethnos was strongly influenced by interaction with other ethnic groups. Namely, with the Ugric tribes, the indigenous tribes of the Kama region, the Urals and the Southern Trans-Urals. In the second millennium BC. e. all these peoples moved from Northern Kazakhstan and Western Siberia.
A feature of the ethnic group is that the culture of the Mansi people includes the culture of fishermen and hunters, along with the culture of nomads and cattle breeders. These cultures coexist with each other to this day.
At first, the Mansi settled in the Urals, but were gradually forced out in the Trans-Urals. From the 11th century, the Mansi began to communicate with the Russians, mainly with the inhabitants of Novgorod. After the merger of the Russians with Siberia, the nationality began to be more and more forced out to the North. In the 18th century, the Mansi officially recognized Christianity as their faith.

Mansi culture

The Mansi accepted Orthodoxy formally, but in reality shamanism has not gone anywhere from their lives. The culture of the Mansi people continues to include the cult of patron spirits, as well as bear holidays.
The traditions of the Mansi peoples are divided into two groups - Por and Mos. An interesting fact is that the Mansi were allowed to marry only with people who belonged to another group. For example, a man Mos could only choose a woman Por as his wife. Por descended from people from the Urals. The tales of the Mansi people say that the bear was the ancestor of the Por people. About the Mos people, it is said that they were born by a woman who can turn into a butterfly, a goose and a hare. Mos are descendants of the Ugric tribes. Everything indicates that the Mansi were good warriors and regularly participated in hostilities. As in Russia, they had heroes, combatants and governors.
In art, ornament was the leading element. As a rule, rhombuses, deer antlers, and zigzags were inscribed in it. And also often there were drawings with images of animals. Mostly bear or eagle.

Traditions and life of the Mansi people

The traditions of the Mansi people included fishing, deer breeding, raising livestock, hunting for wild animals, and farming.
Mansi women's clothing consisted of fur coats, dresses and robes. Mansi women liked to put on a lot of jewelry at the same time. Men preferred to wear wide shirts with trousers, and also often chose things with hoods.
The Mansi ate mainly fish and meat products. Mushrooms they categorically rejected and did not eat.

Legends and myths

Tales of the Mansi people say that the earth was originally in the water and the Luli bird pulled it out of there. Some myths do not agree with this and claim that the evil spirit Kul-Otyr did it. For reference: Kul-Otyr was considered the owner of the entire dungeon. The Mansi called the main gods Polum-Torum (the patron of all animals and fish), Mir-susne-khum (connecting between people and the divine world), Tovlyng-luva (his horse), Mykh-imi (the goddess who gives health), Kaltash-ekva (patron of the earth), Hotal-ekwu (patron of the sun), Nai-ekwu (patron of fire).
Men have at least 5 souls, and women are smaller, at least four. The most important of them are two. One disappeared in the underworld, and the other moved into a child. It was about this that all the tales of the Mansi people repeated.

MANSI (obsolete - Voguls), people in the Russian Federation (8.3 thousand people), in the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug (6.6 thousand people). Mansi language of the Ob-Ugric branch of the Finno-Ugric languages. Believers are Orthodox.

Origin and history

As an ethnic group, the Mansi formed as a result of the merger of local tribes of the Ural Neolithic culture and Ugric tribes moving from the south through the steppes and forest-steppes of Western Siberia and Northern Kazakhstan. Two-component nature (a combination of cultures of taiga hunters and fishermen and steppe nomadic cattle breeders) in the culture of the people is preserved to this day.

Initially, the Mansi lived in the Urals and its western slopes, but the Komi and Russians forced them out in the Trans-Urals in the 11th-14th centuries. The earliest contacts with the Russians, primarily with the Novgorodians, date back to the 11th century. With the annexation of Siberia to the Russian state at the end of the 16th century, Russian colonization intensified, and by the end of the 17th century, the number of Russians exceeded the number of the indigenous population. Mansi were gradually forced out to the north and east, partially assimilated [source not specified 390 days], in the 18th century they were converted to Christianity. The ethnic formation of the Mansi was influenced by various peoples.

In the Chanvenskaya (Vogulskaya) cave, located near the village of Vsevolodo-Vilva in the Perm Territory, traces of the Voguls were found. According to local historians, the cave was a temple (pagan sanctuary) of the Mansi, where ritual ceremonies were held. Bear skulls with traces of stone axes and spears, shards of ceramic vessels, bone and iron arrowheads, bronze plaques of the Perm animal style depicting an elk man standing on a lizard, silver and bronze jewelry were found in the cave.

Culture and traditions

Believers are Orthodox, but traditional shamanism, the cult of patron spirits, ancestors, and the bear (bear holidays) are preserved. Rich folklore, developed mythology.

Mansi are divided into two exogamous phratries: Por and Mos, historically differing in origin, as well as customs. Marriages were concluded only between representatives of opposite phratries: Mos men married Por women and vice versa. The Por phratry was made up of the descendants of the aboriginal Urals, and the Mos phratry was made up of the descendants of the Ugric peoples. The ancestor of the phratry Por is considered to be a bear, and the phratry Mos is a woman Kaltash, who could appear in the form of a goose, a hare or a butterfly. Judging by the archaeological finds, which will be discussed below, the Mansi actively participated in hostilities along with neighboring peoples, they knew tactics. They also distinguished the estates of princes (governor), heroes, combatants. All this is reflected in folklore.

In folk art, the main place is occupied by ornament, the motives of which are similar to those of the related Khanty and Selkups. These are geometric figures in the form of deer antlers, rhombuses, wavy lines, a Greek-type meander, zigzag lines, often located in the form of a strip. Among the bronze castings, images of animals, an eagle, a bear are more common.

Life

Traditional activities -hunting, fishing, reindeer herding, agriculture, cattle breeding. Fishing is spread overObi and on Northern Sosva. In the upper reaches Lozva, Lyapina, Severnaya Sosva - reindeer breeding, it is borrowed from the Khanty inXIII- XIV centuries. Agriculture was borrowed from the Russians inXVI- XVII centuries. Horses, cows, sheep, birds are bred from livestock. From commercial fish caughtgrayling, ide, pike, roach, burbot, carp, sturgeon, sterlet, white salmon, whitefish, shokura, pizhyana, cheese, and in Northern Sosva there was also freshwaterherring, exquisite delicacy. Fishing equipment: spears, nets. They fished by blocking the streams with dams. important in everyday lifeSiberian cedarfrom which a huge crop of pine nuts was collected. In addition, household items were made from woven cedar root,tableware, boxes, boxes, baskets (the so-calledrhizomes). Products frombirch bark, boxes, tuesas, wooden utensils, spoons, troughs,buckets, as well as the simplestfurniture. Pottery was used. In the Ob region, archaeologists also discovered a large number of arrowheads, spears,swords, axes, helmets, bronze casting. Armor was also known to them. The Mansi and neighboring peoples also achieved some success in the processing of iron, but their greatest skill was manifested in the processing of wood. Of the archaeological finds, silver dishes are of great interest.Iranian and Byzantineorigin. For the movement of the Mansi already in ancient times they used dugout boats,skis, sled(with a dog, reindeer or horse team). From the weapons they knew bows and arrows, spears, various types of blades. For hunting, various traps (chirkans) were used andcrossbows.

Settlements are permanent (winter) and seasonal (spring, summer, autumn) on the fishing grounds. The settlement was usually inhabited by several large or small, mostly related families. The traditional dwelling in winter is rectangular log houses, often with an earthen roof, among the southern groups - Russian-type huts, in summer - conical birch bark tents or quadrangular frame buildings made of poles covered with birch bark, among reindeer breeders - tents covered with deer skins. The dwelling was heated and illuminated by a chuval - an open hearth made of poles coated with clay. Bread was baked in separate ovens.

Women's clothing consisted of a dress, a swinging robe, cloth or satin, a double reindeer coat (yagushka, sakh), a scarf and a large number of jewelry (rings, beaded beads, etc.). Men wore trousers and a shirt, blind clothes with a hood made of cloth, for reindeer herders - from deer skin (malitsa, goose), or cloth clothes with a hood and unsewn sides (luzan).

Food - fish, meat (cured, dried, fried, ice cream), berries. Mushrooms were not consumed, considering them unclean.

Mansi life has changed markedly during the years of Soviet power, 45% live in cities.

Cloth

Traditional women's clothing - a dress, a swing robe (satin or cloth) and a double reindeer coat (yagushka, sakh), on the head - a scarf, a large number of jewelry (rings, beaded necklaces, etc.); men's clothing - a shirt, trousers, deaf clothes with a hood made of cloth, for reindeer breeders - from deer skins (malitsa, goose), hunting cloth clothes with a hood and unsewn sides (luzan). Nettle and hemp fiber weaving was widespread.