UDMURT FOLKLORE

UDMURT FOLKLORE of the Republic of Bashkortostan is represented by various genres. The most popular of them are historical lore and legends about the history of migration and foundation of villages; bylichkas about nature and yard spirits (see Host‑spirits). Prayers are connected with religious beliefs; they are performed by priests when maclang a sacrifice (see Feast of sacrifice). Fairytales, riddles, proverbs, idioms are very diverse. Ceremonial songs, which are included in cycles performed at the spring calendar holiday Badzynal have a special place among musical genres. (see Great day) Each stage of the holiday had its own chant. Spring festivities included oshorok kyrdzan chants. People would perform voyey kelyan kyuy during Maslenitsa. Family-household ceremonial folklore of Udmurts shows great diversity in wedding chants (see Laments). Recited prayers and healing spells are also ritual.

One of the first registrations of Bashkortostan Udmurt folklore text (an extract of an ethnic prayer) was made by Russian traveller N.P. Rychkov. Further samples of U.f. were registered in the late 19th – early 20th c by local researchers and scientists. Fairytales registered by the teacher G.A. Aptiyev and published by I.N. Smirnov in “Votyaks. Historical and ethnographic essay” book (Kazan, 1890). “Spring games and round dances of votyak youth” (1915) by the teacher M.I. Ilyin shows the samples of Udmurt songs for round dances from Kupcheneyevo village, Belebeyevskiy district (Yermekeyevskiy district, RB). Y. Wichmann registered folklore texts from the Udmurts from B.Kachak village, Birskiy district (Kaltasinskiy district, RB) in 1894 and published them in “Samples of Udmurt speech” (2nd part) and “Udmurt chrestomathy with dictionary” books (both in 1901, in German). B. Munkacsi registered a pagan prayer and several songs in 1885 in Mozhga village, the same district (Yanaulskiy district, RB). They were published in the “Oral traditional ethnic Udmurt poetry” book (1887; in Hungarian); folklore texts that he had collected during the First World war from Udmurt prisoners of war, among whom he had met natives from Ufimskaya region, were included into “Udmurt ethnic customs and ethnic poetry” collection (1952, in German). Several songs with notes were included in the 1st volume of “Songs of Russian prisoners of war” collection (1926, in German), they were recorded by phonograph together with R. Lach. Researchers L.Vikar and G. Bereczki collected the lyrics of Udmurt songs in 1974–75. They published the “Udmurt ethnic songs” book (1989, in English). It included the samples of Bashkortostan Udmurt folklore songs with notes. Vikar released the records of the song registered from people from the Ural and Volga regions in 1984. One of them contains Udmurt and Bashkir ethnic songs. Students of Udmurt university (Izhevsk) have been collecting folklore materials since the 1970’s. Local historians G.D. Farshatov and A.V. Gilmayev made a great contribution to the collections and publications; part of the folklore texts collected by them is in archives, some are published in different compilations, etc. U.f. is collected and published by R.S. Nasibullin, T.G. Minniyakhmetova, R.R. Sadikov, A.T. Baydullina, etc.

R.R. Sadikov