The Mari ethnic group was formed on the basis of the Finno-Ugric tribes that lived in the Volga-Vyatka interfluve in the 1st millennium AD. e. as a result of contacts with the Bulgars and other Turkic-speaking peoples, ancestors of modern, Tatars,.
The Russians used to call the Mari Cheremis. Mari are divided into three main sub-ethnic groups: mountain, meadow and eastern Mari. From the 15th century mountain Mari fell under Russian influence. The Meadow Mari, who were part of the Kazan Khanate, for a long time offered fierce resistance to the Russians, during the Kazan campaign of 1551-1552. they were on the side of the Tatars. Part of the Mari moved to Bashkiria, not wanting to be baptized (Eastern), the rest were baptized in the XVI-XVIII centuries.
In 1920, the Mari Autonomous Region was created, in 1936 - the Mari ASSR, in 1992 - the Republic of Mari El. At present, the mountain Mari inhabit the right bank of the Volga, the meadow ones live in the Vetluzhsko-Vyatka interfluve, the eastern ones - east of the river. Vyatka, mainly in the territory of Bashkiria. Most of the Mari live in the Republic of Mari El, about a quarter - in Bashkiria, the rest - in Tataria, Udmurtia, Nizhny Novgorod, Kirov, Sverdlovsk, Perm regions. According to the 2002 census, more than 604,000 Mari lived in the Russian Federation.
The basis of the economy of the Mari was arable. They have long grown rye, oats, barley, millet, buckwheat, hemp, flax, and turnips. Horticulture was also developed, they planted mainly onions, cabbage, radishes, carrots, hops, from the 19th century. potatoes are widely used.
The Mari cultivated the soil with a plow (step), a hoe (katman), a Tatar plow (saban). Cattle breeding was not very developed, as evidenced by the fact that manure was only enough for 3-10% of arable land. If possible, they kept horses, cattle, and sheep. By 1917, 38.7% of the Mari households were arable, beekeeping (then apiary beekeeping), fishing, as well as hunting and various forestry activities: tar smoking, logging and timber rafting, and hunting played an important role.
During the hunt, the Mari up to mid-nineteenth V. used bows, horns, wooden traps, flintlock guns. On a large scale, otkhodnichestvo was developed for woodworking enterprises. Of the crafts, the Mari were engaged in embroidery, wood carving, the production of women's silver jewelry. The main means of transportation in summer were four-wheeled carts (oryava), tarantasses and wagons, in winter - sledges, firewood and skis.
In the second half of the XIX century. Mari settlements were of the street type; a log hut with a gable roof, built according to the Great Russian scheme, served as a dwelling: hut-canopy, hut-canopy-hut or hut-canopy-cage. The house had a Russian stove, the kitchen was separated by a partition.
Along the front and side walls of the house there were benches, in the front corner there was a table and a chair especially for the owner of the house, shelves for icons and dishes, there was a bed or bunks to the side of the door. In the summer, the Mari could live in a summer house, which was a log building without a ceiling with a gable or single-pitched roof and an earthen floor. There was a hole in the roof for smoke to escape. A summer kitchen was set up here. In the middle of the building was placed a hearth with a hanging cauldron. To the outbuildings of an ordinary Mari estate there were a cage, a cellar, a barn, a barn, a chicken coop, a bathhouse. Wealthy Mari built two-story storerooms with a gallery-balcony. Food was stored on the first floor, utensils on the second.
The traditional dishes of the Mari were soup with dumplings, dumplings with meat or cottage cheese, boiled sausage from bacon or blood with cereals, dried sausage from horse meat, puff pancakes, cheesecakes, boiled flat cakes, baked flat cakes, dumplings, pies stuffed with fish, eggs, potatoes , hemp seed. Bread was prepared by the Mari as unleavened. The national cuisine is also characterized by specific dishes from squirrel meat, hawk, owl, hedgehog, snake, viper, dried fish flour, hemp seed. From drinks, the Mari preferred beer, buttermilk (eran), mead, they knew how to drive vodka from potatoes and grain.
The traditional clothing of the Mari is considered to be a tunic-shaped shirt, trousers, an open summer caftan, a waist towel made of hemp canvas, a belt. In ancient times, the Mari sewed clothes from homespun linen and hemp fabrics, then from purchased fabrics.
The men wore small-brimmed felt hats and caps; for hunting, work in the forest, they used a mosquito net-type headgear. On their feet they wore bast shoes, leather boots, felt boots. For work in marshy places, wooden platforms were attached to the shoes. The distinctive features of the women's national costume were an apron, belt pendants, chest, neck, ear decorations made of beads, cowrie shells, sequins, coins, silver clasps, bracelets, rings.
Married women wore various headdresses:
- shymaksh - a cone-shaped cap with an occipital lobe, put on a birch bark frame;
- magpie, borrowed from the Russians;
- tarpan - a head towel with an overcoat.
Until the 19th century The most common female headdress was shurka, a high headdress on a birch bark frame, reminiscent of Mordovian and headdresses. Outerwear was straight and detachable caftans made of black or white cloth and fur coats. traditional views clothes are still worn by the older generation of Mari, national costumes are often used in wedding rituals. Modernized species are now widespread national clothes- a shirt made of white and an apron made of multi-colored fabric, decorated with embroidery and mites, belts woven from multi-colored threads, caftans made of black and green fabric.
Mari communities consisted of several villages. At the same time, there were mixed Mari-Russian, Mari-Chuvash communities. The Mari lived mostly in small monogamous families; large families were quite rare.
In the old days, the Mari had small (urmat) and larger (nasyl) tribal divisions, the latter were part of the rural community (mer). At the time of marriage, the bride's parents were paid a ransom, and they gave a dowry (including cattle) for their daughter. The bride was often older than the groom. Everyone was invited to the wedding, and it took on the character of a general holiday. Traditional features of the ancient customs of the Mari are still present in wedding rituals: songs, national costumes with decorations, a wedding train, the presence of everyone.
The Mari had a highly developed traditional medicine based on ideas about space vitality, the will of the gods, damage, the evil eye, evil spirits, the souls of the dead. Before the adoption of Christianity, the Mari adhered to the cult of ancestors and gods: the supreme god Kugu Yumo, the gods of heaven, the mother of life, the mother of water and others. An echo of these beliefs was the custom of burying the dead in winter clothes (in a winter hat and mittens) and taking the bodies to the cemetery in a sleigh even in the summer.
According to tradition, nails collected during life, rosehip branches, a piece of canvas were buried with the deceased. The Mari believed that in the next world, nails would be needed in order to overcome mountains, clinging to rocks, rose hips would help drive away a snake and a dog guarding the entrance to realm of the dead, but on a piece of canvas, like on a bridge, souls of the dead will go to afterworld.
In ancient times, the Mari were pagans. They adopted the Christian faith in the 16th-18th centuries, but, despite all the efforts of the church, religious beliefs Mari remained syncretic: a small part of the Eastern Mari converted to Islam, and the rest to this day remain faithful to pagan rites.
The mythology of the Mari is characterized by the presence of a large number of female gods. There are at least 14 deities denoting mother (ava), which indicates strong remnants of matriarchy. The Mari performed pagan collective prayers in sacred groves under the guidance of priests (karts). In 1870, the Kugu Sorta sect of a modernist-pagan persuasion arose among the Mari. Until the beginning of the twentieth century. ancient customs were strong among the Mari, for example, when a husband and wife who wanted to get a divorce divorced, they were first tied with a rope, which was then cut. This was the whole rite of divorce.
In recent years, the Mari have made attempts to revive the ancient national traditions and customs are united in social organizations. The largest of them are "Oshmari-Chimari", "Mari Ushem", the Kugu Sorta (Big Candle) sect.
Mari people speak Mari language Finno-Ugric group of the Ural family. In the Mari language, mountain, meadow, eastern and northwestern dialects are distinguished. The first attempts to create writing were made as early as the middle of the 16th century, in 1775 the first grammar in Cyrillic was published. In 1932-34. an attempt was made to switch to Latin graphics. Since 1938, a single graphics in Cyrillic has been established. Literary language based on the language of the meadow and mountain Mari.
The folklore of the Mari is characterized mainly by fairy tales and songs. There is no single epic. Musical instruments are represented by a drum, a harp, a flute, a wooden pipe (puch) and some others.
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Origin question Mari people is still controversial. For the first time, a scientifically substantiated theory of the ethnogenesis of the Mari was expressed in 1845 by the famous Finnish linguist M. Kastren. He tried to identify the Mari with the annalistic measure. This point of view was supported and developed by T.S. Semenov, I.N. Smirnov, S.K. Kuznetsov, A.A. Spitsyn, D.K. Zelenin, M.N. Yantemir, F.E. Egorov and many others. researchers of the II half of the XIX - I half of the XX centuries. A prominent Soviet archaeologist A.P. Smirnov came up with a new hypothesis in 1949, who came to the conclusion about the Gorodets (close to Mordovian) basis, other archaeologists O.N. Bader and V.F. Gening at the same time defended the thesis about Dyakovo (close to the measure) origin of the Mari. Nevertheless, even then archaeologists were able to convincingly prove that Merya and Mari, although related to each other, are not the same people. In the late 1950s, when the permanent Mari archaeological expedition began to operate, its leaders A.Kh. Khalikov and G.A. Arkhipov developed a theory about the mixed Gorodets-Azelin (Volga-Finnish-Permian) basis of the Mari people. Subsequently, G.A. Arkhipov, developing this hypothesis further, during the discovery and study of new archaeological sites, proved that the Gorodets-Dyakovo (Volga-Finnish) component prevailed in the mixed basis of the Mari. Mari ethnos, which began in the first half of the 1st millennium AD, as a whole ended in the 9th - 11th centuries, while even then the Mari ethnos began to be divided into two main groups - mountain and meadow Mari (the latter, in comparison with the former, had a stronger influence Azelian (Permo-speaking) tribes). This theory as a whole is now supported by the majority of archaeologists dealing with this problem. The Mari archaeologist V.S. Patrushev put forward a different assumption, according to which the formation of the ethnic foundations of the Mari, as well as the Meri and Murom, took place on the basis of the Akhmylov population. Linguists (I.S. Galkin, D.E. Kazantsev), who rely on the data of the language, believe that the territory of the formation of the Mari people should not be sought in the Vetluzh-Vyatka interfluve, as archaeologists believe, but to the southwest, between the Oka and Sura. Archaeologist T.B. Nikitina, taking into account the data not only of archeology, but also of linguistics, came to the conclusion that the ancestral home of the Mari is located in the Volga part of the Oka-Sura interfluve and in the Povetluzhye, and the movement to the east, to Vyatka, occurred in VIII - XI centuries, during which contact and mixing with the Azelin (Permo-speaking) tribes took place.
The origin of the ethnonyms "Mari" and "Cheremis"
The question of the origin of the ethnonyms "Mari" and "Cheremis" also remains complex and unclear. The meaning of the word "Mari", the self-name of the Mari people, many linguists deduce from the Indo-European term "Mar", "Mer" in various sound variations (translated as "man", "husband"). The word "Cheremis" (as the Russians called the Mari, and in a slightly different, but phonetically similar vowel - many other peoples) has big number various interpretations. The first written mention of this ethnonym (in the original "ts-r-mis") is found in a letter from the Khazar Khagan Joseph to the dignitary of the Caliph of Cordoba Hasdai ibn-Shaprut (960s). D.E. Kazantsev following the historian of the XIX century. G.I. Peretyatkovich came to the conclusion that the name "Cheremis" was given to the Mari Mordovian tribes, and in translation this word means "a person living on the sunny side, in the east." According to I.G. Ivanov, “Cheremis” is “a person from the Chera or Chora tribe”, in other words, the name of one of the Mari tribes neighboring nations subsequently extended to the entire ethnic group. The version of the Mari local historians of the 1920s - early 1930s F.E. Egorov and M.N. Yantemir, who suggested that this ethnonym goes back to the Turkic term "warlike person", is widely popular. F.I. Gordeev, as well as I.S. Galkin, who supported his version, defend the hypothesis of the origin of the word "Cheremis" from the ethnonym "Sarmat" through Turkic languages. A number of other versions were also expressed. The problem of the etymology of the word "Cheremis" is further complicated by the fact that in the Middle Ages (until the 17th - 18th centuries) not only the Maris, but also their neighbors, the Chuvashs and Udmurts, were called so in a number of cases.
Literature
For more details, see: Svechnikov S.K. Toolkit"History of the Mari people of the IX-XVI centuries" Yoshkar-Ola: GOU DPO (PC) C "Mari Institute of Education", 2005
Mari is a Finno-Ugric people, which is important to be called with an accent on the letter "i", since the word "Mari" with an emphasis on the first vowel is the name of an ancient ruined city. Plunging into the history of the people, it is important to learn the correct pronunciation of their name, traditions and customs.
The legend about the origin of the mountain Mari
Mari believe that their people come from another planet. Somewhere in the constellation of the Nest lived a bird. It was a duck that flew to the ground. Here she laid two eggs. Of these, the first two people were born, who were brothers, as they descended from the same duck mother. One of them turned out to be good, and the other - evil. It was from them that life on earth began, good and evil people were born.
The Mari know space well. They are familiar with the celestial bodies that are known to modern astronomy. This people still retain their specific names for the components of the cosmos. The Big Dipper is called the Elk, and the galaxy is called the Nest. The Milky Way among the Mari is the Star Road along which God travels.
Language and writing
The Mari have their own language, which is part of the Finno-Ugric group. It has four adverbs:
- eastern;
- northwestern;
- mountain;
- meadow.
Until the 16th century, the mountain Mari did not have an alphabet. The first alphabet in which their language could be written was Cyrillic. Its final creation took place in 1938, thanks to which the Mari received a written language.
Thanks to the appearance of the alphabet, it became possible to record the folklore of the Mari, represented by fairy tales and songs.
Mountain Mari Religion
Mari's faith was pagan before getting to know Christianity. Among the gods there were many female deities left over from the time of matriarchy. There were only 14 mother goddesses (ava) in their religion. They did not build temples and altars to the Mari, they prayed in the groves under the guidance of their priests (karts). Having become acquainted with Christianity, the people switched to it, retaining syncretism, that is, combining Christian rites with pagan ones. Some of the Mari converted to Islam.
Once upon a time in a Mari village lived a stubborn girl of extraordinary beauty. Having provoked God's wrath, she was turned into a terrible creature with huge breasts, coal-black hair and feet turned out the other way around - Ovda. Many avoided her, fearing that she would curse them. It was said that Ovda settled on the edge of villages near dense forests or deep ravines. In the old days, our ancestors met her more than once, but we are unlikely to ever see this frightening-looking girl. According to legend, she hid in dark caves, where she lives alone to this day.
The name of this place is Odo-Kuryk, and it is translated as Mount Ovda. An endless forest, in the depths of which megaliths are hidden. Boulders of gigantic size and perfect rectangular shape, stacked to form a battlemented wall. But you will not immediately notice them, it seems that someone deliberately hid them from the human eye.
However, scientists believe that this is not a cave, but a fortress built by the mountain Mari specifically for defense against hostile tribes - the Udmurts. The location of the defensive structure - the mountain - played an important role. A steep descent, followed by a sharp ascent, was at the same time the main obstacle to the rapid movement of enemies and the main advantage for the Mari, since they, knowing the secret paths, could move unnoticed and shoot back.
But it remains unknown how the Mari managed to build such a monumental structure from megaliths, because for this you need to have remarkable strength. Perhaps only creatures from myths are able to create something like this. Hence the belief appeared that the fortress was built by Ovda in order to hide his cave from human eyes.
In this regard, Odo-Kuryk is surrounded by a special energy. People with psychic abilities come here to find the source of this energy - Ovda's cave. But locals they try once again not to pass by this mountain, fearing to disturb the peace of this wayward and recalcitrant woman. After all, the consequences can be unpredictable, like her character.
The famous artist Ivan Yamberdov, whose paintings express the main cultural values and the traditions of the Mari people, considers Ovda not a terrible and evil monster, but sees in it the beginning of nature itself. Ovda is a powerful, constantly changing, cosmic energy. Rewriting paintings depicting this creature, the artist never makes a copy, each time it is a unique original, which once again confirms the words of Ivan Mikhailovich about the variability of this feminine natural principle.
To this day, the mountain Mari believe in the existence of Ovda, despite the fact that no one has seen her for a long time. Currently, local healers, sorcerers and herbalists are most often named after her. They are respected and feared because they are the conductors of natural energy into our world. They are able to feel it and control its flows, which distinguishes them from ordinary people.
Life cycle and rites
The Mari family is monogamous. Life cycle divided into specific parts. A big event was the wedding, which acquired the character of a universal holiday. A ransom was paid for the bride. In addition, she was sure to receive a dowry, even pets. Weddings were noisy and crowded - with songs, dances, a wedding train and in festive national costumes.
Funerals were distinguished by special rites. The cult of ancestors left an imprint not only on the history of the mountain Mari people, but also on funeral clothes. The deceased Mari was always dressed in a winter hat and mittens and taken to the cemetery in a sleigh, even if it was warm outside. Together with the deceased, objects were placed in the grave that can help in afterlife: cut nails, prickly rosehip branches, a piece of canvas. Nails were needed to climb the rocks in world of the dead, thorny branches to drive away evil snakes and dogs, and on the canvas to go to the afterlife.
This people has musical instruments that accompany various events in life. This is a wooden pipe, flute, harp and drum. Folk medicine is developed, the recipes of which are associated with positive and negative concepts of the world order - the life force originating from space, the will of the gods, the evil eye, and damage.
Tradition and modernity
It is natural for the Mari to adhere to the traditions and customs of the mountain Mari to this day. They greatly honor nature, which provides them with everything they need. When adopting Christianity, they retained many folk customs from pagan life. They were used to regulate life until the early 20th century. For example, a divorce was formalized by tying a couple with a rope and then cutting it.
At the end of the 19th century, the Mari had a sect that tried to modernize paganism. The religious sect Kugu Sort ("Big Candle") is still active. IN Lately public organizations were formed that set themselves the goal of returning to modern life traditions and customs of the ancient way of life of the Mari.
Mountain Mari economy
The basis for the food of the Mari was agriculture. This people grew various grains, hemp and flax. Root crops and hops were planted in the gardens. Since the 19th century, potatoes have been massively cultivated. In addition to the vegetable garden and the field, animals were kept, but this was not the main direction of agriculture. The animals on the farm were different - small and large cattle, horses.
Slightly more than a third of the mountain Mari had no land at all. The main source of their income was the production of honey, first in the form of beekeeping, then independent breeding of hives. Also, landless representatives were engaged in fishing, hunting, logging and rafting of timber. When logging enterprises appeared, many representatives of the Mari went there to work.
Until the beginning of the 20th century, the Mari made most tools of labor and hunting at home. agriculture were engaged with the help of a plow, a hoe and a Tatar plow. For hunting they used wooden traps, horns, bows and flintlock guns. At home, they were engaged in wood carving, casting of handicraft silver jewelry, women embroidered. Means of transportation were also homegrown - covered wagons and carts in summer, sledges and skis in winter.
Mari life
These people lived in large communities. Each such community consisted of several villages. In ancient times, small (urmat) and large (nasyl) tribal formations could be part of one community. The Mari lived in small families, crowded were very rare. Most often they preferred to live among representatives of their people, although sometimes they came across mixed communities with Chuvashs and Russians. The appearance of the mountain Mari is not much different from the Russians.
IN XIX century Mari villages were street structures. Plots standing in two rows along one line (street). The house is a log house with a gable roof, consisting of a cage, a vestibule and a hut. Each hut necessarily had a large Russian stove and a kitchen, fenced off from the residential part. There were benches against three walls, in one corner - a table and a master's chair, a "red corner", shelves with dishes, in the other - a bed and bunks. This is how the winter house of the Mari basically looked.
In the summer they lived in log cabins without a ceiling with a gable, sometimes single-pitched roof and an earthen floor. A hearth was arranged in the center, over which a boiler hung, a hole was made in the roof to remove smoke from the hut.
In addition to the master's hut, a cage used as a pantry, a cellar, a barn, a barn, a chicken coop and a bathhouse were built in the yard. Wealthy Mari built cages on two floors with a gallery and a balcony. The lower floor was used as a cellar, storing food in it, and the upper floor was used as a shed for utensils.
National cuisine
A characteristic feature of the Mari in the kitchen is soup with dumplings, dumplings, sausage cooked from cereals with blood, dried horse meat, puff pancakes, pies with fish, eggs, potatoes or hemp seed and traditional unleavened bread. There are also such specific dishes as fried squirrel meat, baked hedgehog, fishmeal cakes. Beer, mead, buttermilk (skimmed cream) were frequent drinks on the tables. Who knew how, he drove potato or grain vodka at home.
Mari clothing
The national costume of the mountain Mari is trousers, an open caftan, a waist towel and a belt. For tailoring, they took homespun fabric from linen and hemp. Men's suit included several hats: hats, felt hats with small brim, hats resembling modern mosquito nets for the forest. Bast shoes, boots made of leather, felt boots were put on their feet so that the shoes would not get wet, high wooden soles were nailed to it.
The ethnic women's costume was distinguished from the men's by the presence of an apron, belt pendants and all kinds of jewelry made of beads, shells, coins, silver clasps. There were also various headdresses worn only by married women:
- shymaksh - a kind of cap in the shape of a cone on a frame made of birch bark with a blade on the back of the head;
- magpie - resembles a kitchka worn by Russian girls, but with high sides and a low front hanging on the forehead;
- tarpan - a head towel with an ochel.
The national outfit can be seen on the mountain Mari, photos of which are presented above. Today it is an integral attribute of the wedding ceremony. Of course, the traditional costume has been somewhat modified. Details have appeared that distinguish it from what the ancestors wore. For example, now a white shirt is combined with a colorful apron, outerwear is decorated with embroidery and ribbons, belts are woven from multi-colored threads, and kaftans are sewn from green or black fabric.
Faces of Russia. "Living Together, Being Different"
The multimedia project "Faces of Russia" exists since 2006, talking about Russian civilization, the most important feature which is the ability to live together, remaining different - such a motto is especially relevant for the countries of the entire post-Soviet space. From 2006 to 2012, within the framework of the project, we created 60 documentaries about representatives of different Russian ethnic groups. Also, 2 cycles of radio programs "Music and songs of the peoples of Russia" were created - more than 40 programs. Illustrated almanacs have been released to support the first series of films. Now we are halfway to creating a unique multimedia encyclopedia of the peoples of our country, a picture that will allow the inhabitants of Russia to recognize themselves and leave a picture of what they were like for posterity.
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"Faces of Russia". Mari. "Mari El Republic. From Shorunzhi with love", 2011
General information
MARIANS, Mari, Mari (self-name - "man", "man", "husband"), Cheremis (obsolete Russian name), people in Russia. The number of 644 thousand people. The Mari are the indigenous population of the Republic of Mari El (324.4 thousand people (290.8 thousand people according to the 2010 census)). The Mari also live in the neighboring regions of the Volga region and the Urals. They live compactly in Bashkiria (105.7 thousand people), Tataria (19.5 thousand people), Udmurtia (9.5 thousand people), Nizhny Novgorod, Kirov, Sverdlovsk and Perm regions. They also live in Kazakhstan (12 thousand), Ukraine (7 thousand), Uzbekistan (3 thousand). The total number is 671 thousand people.
According to the 2002 population census, the number of Mari living in Russia is 605 thousand people, according to the 2010 census. - 547 thousand 605 people.
They are divided into 3 main sub-ethnic groups: mountain, meadow and eastern. Mountain Mari inhabit the right bank of the Volga, meadow - Vetluzhsko-Vyatka interfluve, eastern Mari live east of the Vyatka River, mainly in the territory of Bashkiria, where they moved in the 16-18 centuries. They speak the Mari language of the Finno-Ugric group of the Ural family. Adverbs stand out: mountain, meadow, eastern and northwestern. Writing based on the Russian alphabet. About 464 thousand (or 77%) Mari speak the Mari language, the majority (97%) speak Russian. Mari-Russian bilingualism is widespread. The writing of the Mari is based on the Cyrillic alphabet.
Believers are predominantly Orthodox and adherents of the "Mari faith" (marla faith), combining Christianity with traditional beliefs. Eastern Mari mostly adhere to traditional beliefs.
The first written mention of the Mari (Cheremis) is found in the Gothic historian Jordanes in the 6th century. They are also mentioned in The Tale of Bygone Years. The core of the ancient Mari ethnos that was formed in the 1st millennium AD in the Volga-Vyatka interfluve was the Finno-Ugric tribes. An important role in the formation and development of the ethnos was played by close ethno-cultural ties with the Turkic peoples (Volga-Kama Bulgarians, Chuvashs, Tatars). The cultural and everyday similarities with the Chuvash are especially noticeable.
The formation of the ancient Mari people took place in V-X centuries. Intensive ties with the Russians, especially after the entry of the Mari into the Russian state (1551-52), had a significant impact on material culture Mariytsev. The mass Christianization of the Mari in the 18th and 19th centuries influenced the assimilation of certain forms of spiritual culture and festive and family rituals that are characteristic of Orthodoxy and the Russian population. However, the Eastern and part of the Meadow Mari did not accept Christianity, and to this day they have preserved pre-Christian beliefs, especially the cult of ancestors. In 1920, the Mari Autonomous Oblast (since 1936, the Mari Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic) was created. Since 1992 the Republic of Mari El.
The main traditional occupation is arable farming. The main field crops are rye, oats, barley, millet, spelt, buckwheat, hemp, flax; garden - onions, cabbage, radish, carrots, hops, potatoes. Turnips were sown in the field. Of secondary importance were the breeding of horses, cattle and sheep, hunting, forestry (logging and rafting of timber, tar smoking, etc.), beekeeping (later apiary beekeeping), and fishing. Artistic crafts- embroidery, wood carving, jewelry (silver women's jewelry). There was otkhodnichestvo for enterprises of the timber industry.
The scattered planning of villages in the 2nd half of the 19th century began to be replaced by street planning: the northern Great Russian type of planning began to prevail. Dwelling - a log hut with a gable roof, two-part (hut-canopy) or three-part (hut-canopy-cage, hut-canopy-hut). A small stove with a smeared cauldron was often arranged near the Russian stove, the kitchen was separated by partitions, benches were placed along the front and side walls, in the front corner there was a table with a wooden chair for the head of the family, shelves for icons and dishes, on the side of front door- a wooden bed or bunks, above the windows - embroidered towels. Among the Eastern Mari, especially in the Kama region, the interior was close to the Tatar one (wide bunks near the front wall, curtains instead of partitions, etc.).
In the summer, the Mari moved to live in a summer kitchen (kudo) - a log building with an earthen floor, without a ceiling, with a gable or single-pitched roof, in which gaps were left for smoke to escape. In the middle of the kudo was an open hearth with a hanging cauldron. The estate also included a barn, a cellar, a barn, a barn, a carriage house, and a bathhouse. Two-story storerooms with a gallery-balcony on the second floor are characteristic.
Traditional clothing - a tunic-shaped shirt, trousers, an open summer caftan, a hemp linen waist towel, a belt. Men's hats - a felt hat with small brim and a cap; for hunting, work in the forest, a mosquito net was used. Shoes - bast shoes, leather boots, felt boots. For work in marshy places, wooden platforms were attached to the shoes.
The women's costume is characterized by an apron, belt pendants, chest, neck, ear decorations made of beads, cowrie shells, sequins, coins, silver clasps, bracelets, rings. There were 3 types of headdresses for married women: shymaksh - a cone-shaped cap with an occipital lobe, put on a birch bark frame; magpie, borrowed from the Russians, and sharpan - a head towel with an overcoat. The high women's headdress - shurka (on a birch bark frame, reminiscent of Mordovian and Udmurt headdresses) went out of use in the 19th century. Outerwear was straight and detachable caftans made of black or white cloth and fur coats.
Traditional types of clothing partially exist among the older generation, are used in wedding rituals. Modernized types of national clothes are widespread - a shirt made of white and an apron made of multi-colored fabric, decorated with embroidery and ribbons, belts woven from multi-colored threads, caftans made of black and green fabric.
The main traditional food is soup with dumplings, dumplings stuffed with meat or cottage cheese, boiled sausage from bacon or blood with cereals, dried sausage from horse meat, puff pancakes, cheesecakes, boiled cakes, baked cakes. They drank beer, buttermilk, a strong honey drink. The national cuisine is also characterized by specific dishes from squirrel meat, hawk, owl, hedgehog, snake, viper, dried fish flour, hemp seed. There was a ban on hunting wild geese, swans and pigeons, in some areas - on cranes.
Rural communities usually included several villages. There were ethnically mixed, mainly Mari-Russian, Mari-Chuvash communities. Families were mostly small, monogamous. There were also large undivided families. Marriage is patrilocal. At the time of marriage, the bride's parents were paid a ransom, and they gave a dowry (including cattle) for their daughter. The modern family is small. Traditional features come to life in wedding rituals (songs, national costumes with decorations, a wedding train, the presence of everyone).
The Maris developed traditional medicine based on ideas about the cosmic life force, the will of the gods, corruption, the evil eye, evil spirits, the souls of the dead. In the "Mari faith" and paganism, there are cults of ancestors and gods (the supreme god Kugu Yumo, the gods of heaven, the mother of life, the mother of water, etc.).
The archaic features of the ancestral cult were burial in winter clothes (in a winter hat and mittens), taking the body to the cemetery in a sleigh (even in summer). The traditional burial reflected ideas about the afterlife: nails collected during life were buried with the deceased (during the transition to the next world, they are needed in order to overcome mountains, clinging to rocks), rosehip branches (to drive away snakes and a dog guarding the entrance to the realm of the dead), a piece of canvas (on which, like a bridge, the soul enters the afterlife through the abyss), etc.
The Mari have many holidays, like any nation that has centuries of history. There is, for example, an ancient ritual holiday called "Sheep's Leg" (Shorykyol). It begins to be celebrated on the day of the winter solstice (December 22) after the birth new moon. During the holiday, a magical action is performed: pulling the sheep by the legs so that more sheep are born in the new year. By the first day of this holiday, a whole set of signs and beliefs was timed. According to the weather of the first day, they judged what the spring and summer would be like, and made predictions about the harvest.
The "Mari faith" and traditional beliefs have been revived in recent years. Within the framework of the public organization "Oshmari-Chimari", which claims to be the Mari national religious association, prayers began to be held in the groves, in the city of Yoshkar-Ola it belongs to " Oak Grove". The Kugu Sorta (Big Candle) sect, which was active in the 19th and early 20th centuries, has now merged with the "Mari faith".
The Mari National public organization"Mari Ushem" (was created as the Mari Union in 1917, banned in 1918, resumed activity in 1990).
V.N. Petrov
Essays
Expensive ax of the lost ax
How do people become wise? Through life experience. Well, it's very long. And if you need to quickly, quickly gain mind-mind? Well, then you need to listen, read some folk proverbs. For example, Mari.
But first brief information. The Mari are a people living in Russia. Indigenous people Republic of Mari El - 312 thousand people. The Mari also live in the neighboring regions of the Volga region and the Urals. In total, there are 604 thousand Maris in the Russian Federation (2002 census data). The Mari are divided into three territorial groups: mountain, meadow (forest) and eastern. Mountain Mari live on the right bank of the Volga, meadow - on the left, eastern - in Bashkiria and Sverdlovsk region. They speak the Mari language, which is part of the Volga subgroup of the Finnish group of the Finno-Ugric family of languages. The Mari have a written language based on the Cyrillic alphabet. The faith is Orthodox, but there is also its own, Mari, faith (marla faith) - this is a combination of Christianity with traditional beliefs.
As for the Mari folk wisdom, it is carefully collected in proverbs and sayings.
Expensive ax handle of a lost axe.
At first sight strange proverb. If you really regret the lost ax, then in its entirety, and not about it. separate parts. But folk wisdom- matter is thin, not always immediately perceptible. Yes, of course, the ax is also a pity, but the ax is pitiful. Because it is something dearer, we take it by hand. The hand gets used to it. That's why it's more expensive. And it is easy to draw conclusions from this proverb. And better on your own.
Here are some more interesting Mari proverbs, backed up by centuries of folk experience.
A young tree cannot grow under an old tree.
The word will give birth to the word, the song will give birth to tears.
There is a forest - there is a bear, there is a village - evil person There is.
You will talk a lot, the thought will spread. (Very helpful tip!)
And now, having gathered a little Mari wisdom, let's listen to a Mari fairy tale. More precisely, a fairy tale-fiction. It is called:
Forty-one tales
Three brothers were chopping wood in the forest. It's time for lunch. The brothers began to cook dinner: they took water into the pot, built a fire, but there was nothing to light the fire with. As a sin, not one of them took with him from the house either flint or matches. They looked around and saw: a fire was burning behind the trees and an old man was sitting near the fire.
The older brother went to the old man and asked:
- Grandpa, give me a light!
“Tell forty-one fables, ladies,” the old man replied.
He stood, the elder brother stood, he did not come up with a single fable. So he came back with nothing. The middle brother went to the old man.
- Give me a light, grandfather!
“Lady, if you tell forty-one stories,” the old man replied.
The middle brother scratched his head - he did not invent a single fable and also returned to the brothers without fire. went to the old man younger brother.
“Grandfather,” the younger brother says to the old man, “my brothers and I gathered to cook dinner, but there is no fire. Give us fire.
“If you tell forty-one tales,” says the old man, “I will give you a fire and, in addition, a cauldron and a fat duck that is boiled in a cauldron.
“All right,” the younger brother agreed, “I’ll tell you forty-one fables. Just don't get angry.
“But who is angry at fables!”
- All right, listen. We were born to our father-mother three brothers. We died one by one, and there were only seven of us left. Of the seven brothers, one was deaf, the other was blind, the third was lame, the fourth was armless. And the fifth one was naked, not a piece of clothing was on him.
Once we got together and went to catch hares. They entangled one grove with threads, and the deaf brother already heard.
“Out, out, there rustles!” shouted the deaf man.
And then the blind hare saw: “Catch! He ran into the ravine!
The lame man ran after the hare - he was about to catch it ... Only the armless man had already grabbed the hare.
The naked brother of the hare put it in the hem and brought it home.
We slaughtered a hare and heated a pood of fat out of it.
We all had one pair of father's boots. And I began to lubricate my father's boots with that fat. Smeared-smeared - there was only enough fat for one boot. The unoiled boot got angry and ran away from me. The boot runs, I follow him. He jumped into a hole in the ground. I twisted a rope out of chaff and went down to fetch my boot. Here he caught up with him!
I began to climb back out, but the rope broke, and I fell again under the ground. I sit, I sit in a hole, and then spring has come. The crane made a nest for himself, brought out the cranes. The fox got into the habit of climbing after the cranes: today it will drag one, tomorrow another, the day after tomorrow it comes for the third. Once I crept up to a fox - and grab it by the tail!
The fox ran and dragged me along. At the exit, I got stuck, and the fox rushed - and the tail came off.
I brought home a fox tail, ripped it open, and inside was a piece of paper. I unfolded the piece of paper, and it says: “The old man who is now cooking fat duck and listening to fables owes your father ten pounds of rye.”
- Lies! the old man got angry. - Fiction!
“And you asked fables,” answered the younger brother.
There was nothing for the old man to do, he had to give both the boiler and the duck.
Wonderful fiction! And mind you, not a lie, not a lie, but a story about what was not.
And now about what happened, but in the depths of history.
The first written mention of the Mari (Cheremis) is found in the Gothic historian Jordanes in the century. They are also mentioned in The Tale of Bygone Years. Close ties with the Turkic peoples played an important role in the development of the Mari ethnos.
The formation of the ancient Mari people takes place in - centuries.
For centuries, the Mari were under the economic and cultural influence of the Volga-Kama Bulgaria. In the 1230s, their territory was captured by the Mongol-Tatars. Since the century, the Volga Mari were part of the Kazan Khanate, the northwestern - the Povetluzh Mari - were part of the northeastern Russian principalities.
The cult of ancestors is preserved
In 1551-52, after the defeat of the Kazan Khanate, the Mari became part of the Russian state. In the century, the Christianization of the Mari began. However, the eastern and part of the meadow Mari did not accept Christianity; they retained pre-Christian beliefs until the century, especially the cult of ancestors. From the end of the century, the resettlement of the Mari in the Cis-Urals began, which intensified in -XVIII centuries. The Mari participated in the peasant wars led by Stepan Razin and Emelyan Pugachev.
The main occupation of the Mari was arable farming. Horticulture, livestock breeding, hunting, forestry, beekeeping, and fishing were of secondary importance.
Mari traditional clothing: a richly embroidered shirt, an open summer caftan, a hemp canvas waist towel, a belt, a felt hat, bast shoes with onuchs, leather boots, felt boots. The women's costume is characterized by an apron, cloth caftans, fur coats, headdresses - cone-shaped caps and an abundance of jewelry made of beads, sequins, coins, silver clasps - sulgans.
Traditional Mari cuisine - dumplings stuffed with meat or cottage cheese, puff pancakes, cheesecakes, drinks - beer, buttermilk, strong mead. Mari families are mostly small. The woman in the family enjoyed economic and legal independence.
IN folk art wood carving, embroidery, patterned weaving, birch bark weaving are practiced.
Mari music is distinguished by the richness of forms and melodiousness. Folk instruments include: kusle (harp), shuvyr (bagpipe), tumyr (drum), shiyaltysh (pipe), kovyzh (two-stringed violin), shushpyk (whistle). Mainly dance tunes are performed on folk instruments. Songs stand out from the folklore genres, especially “songs of sadness”, as well as fairy tales and legends.
It's time to tell another Mari tale. If I may say so, magically musical.
Piper at a wedding
One cheerful piper was walking at the festival. Yes, he went on a walk so much that he did not reach the house - his frisky legs knocked down the hops. He fell under a birch and fell asleep. So I slept until midnight.
Suddenly he hears through a dream, someone wakes him up: - Get up, get up, Toidemar! The wedding is in full swing, and there is no one to play. Save me, dove.
The piper rubbed his eyes: in front of him was a man in a rich caftan, in a hat, soft goat boots. And next to it is a brown stallion harnessed to a black lacquered carriage.
Sat down. The man whistled, hissed, and off they went. And here is the wedding: big, rich, the guests are apparently invisible. Yes, the guests are all frisky, cheerful - just play, piper!
Toidemar sweated from such a game, asked his friend: - Give me, savush, that towel that hangs on the wall, my face will be in the morning.
And the friend replies:
- Don't take it, I'd rather give you something else.
“Why doesn’t he allow him to wipe himself with this? the bagpiper thinks. - Well, I'll try. At least wipe one eye.
He wiped his eyes - and what does he see? He sits on a stump in the middle of a swamp, and all around the tailed ones and the horned ones jump.
“So that’s what kind of wedding I got to! - thinks. “We need to get out of the way.”
“Hey, dear,” he addresses the main devil. “I need to get home before the roosters. From the morning to the holiday neighboring village invited.
“Don’t worry,” the devil replies. - We'll deliver it right away. You play perfectly, the guests are happy, the hosts too. Now let's go.
The devil whistled - a trio of buckskins, a lacquered carriage, rolled up. So the drugged eye sees, but the pure one sees something else: three black crows and a gnarled stump.
Sat down - flew. We did not have time to look back - here is the house. The piper at the door quickly, and the roosters just crowed - the tailed ones fled.
Relatives to him:
— Where was-disappeared?
- At the wedding.
What are the weddings like now? There was none in the area. You were hiding somewhere. They just looked out into the street, you were not there, but now you showed up.
- I came in a wheelchair.
- Well, show me!
- It's on the street.
We went out into the street - and there was a huge spruce stump.
Since then, the Mari have been saying: a drunk man will drive home on a stump.
We pull the sheep by the legs!
The Mari have many holidays. Like any nation with a long history. There is, for example, an ancient ritual holiday called "Sheep's Leg" (Shorykyol). It begins to be celebrated on the day of the winter solstice (from December 22) after the birth of a new moon. Why is this strange name- "Sheep leg"? But the fact is that during the holiday a magical action is performed: pulling the sheep by the legs. So that more sheep are born in the new year.
In the past, the Mari associated the well-being of their household and family, changes in life with this day. Especially great importance had the first day of the holiday. Getting up early in the morning, the whole family went out to the winter field and made small piles of snow, resembling stacks and stacks of bread. They tried to make as many as possible, but always in an odd number. Rye ears were stuck on stacks, and some peasants buried pancakes in them. Branches and trunks of fruit trees and shrubs were shaking in the garden in order to gather a rich harvest of fruits and berries in the new year.
On this day, the girls went from house to house, they always went into the sheepfolds and pulled the sheep by the legs. Such actions associated with the “magic of the first day” were supposed to ensure fertility and well-being in the household and family.
A whole set of signs and beliefs was timed to coincide with the first day of the holiday. According to the weather of the first day, they judged what the spring and summer would be like, predicted the harvest: “If the snow heap swept in Shorykyol is covered with snow, there will be a harvest.” "There will be snow in Shorykyol - there will be vegetables."
A large place was occupied by divination, which the peasants attached great importance to. Fortune-telling was mainly associated with the prediction of fate. Marriageable girls wondered about marriage - whether they would get married in the new year, what kind of life awaits them in marriage. Older generation tried to find out about the future of the family, sought to determine the fertility of the crop, how prosperous their economy would be.
An integral part of the Shorykyol holiday is the procession of mummers led by the main characters - Old Man Vasily and the Old Woman (Vasli kuva-kugyza, Shorykyol kuva-kugyza). They are perceived by the Mari as harbingers of the future, as the mummers foretell the householders a good harvest, an increase in the livestock in the courtyard, a happy family life. Old man Vasily and the Old Woman communicate with good and evil gods and can tell people that how the harvest will turn out, such will be the life for every person. The owners of the house try to welcome the mummers as best as possible. They are treated to beer, nuts, so that there are no complaints about stinginess.
To demonstrate their skill and diligence, the Mari hang out their work - woven bast shoes, embroidered towels and spun threads. Having treated themselves, Old Man Vasily and his Old Woman scatter grains of rye or oats on the floor, wishing the generous owner an abundance of bread. Among the mummers, there are often a Bear, a Horse, a Goose, a Crane, a Goat and other animals. It is interesting that in the past there were other characters depicting a soldier with an accordion, government officials and priests - a priest and a deacon.
Especially for the holiday, hazelnuts are cherished, which are treated to mummers. Often they cook dumplings with meat. According to custom, some of them put a coin, pieces of bast and coal. Depending on who and what comes across while eating, they predict fate for a year. During the holiday, some prohibitions are observed: you can’t wash clothes, sew and embroider, perform heavy types works.
Ritual food plays a significant role on this day. A hearty lunch on Shorykyol should provide food sufficiency for the coming year. Lamb's head is considered a must. In addition to it, traditional drinks and dishes are prepared: beer (pura) made from rye malt and hops, pancakes (melna), oatmeal unleavened bread (sherginde), cheesecakes stuffed with hemp seeds (katlama), pies with hare or bear meat (merang ale mask shyl kogylyo), baked from rye or oatmeal unleavened dough “nuts” (shorykyol paksh).
The Mari have many holidays, they are celebrated throughout the year. Let's mention one more original Mari holiday: Konta Payrem (stove holiday). It is celebrated on January 12th. The hostesses prepare national dishes, invite guests to large plentiful feasts. The feast is on the rise.
It seems to us that the expression "to dance from the stove" came into the Russian language from the Mari! From the holiday of the stove!
1. HistoryThe distant ancestors of the Mari came to the Middle Volga around the 6th century. These were tribes belonging to the Finno-Ugric language group. In anthropological terms, the Udmurts, Komi-Permyaks, Mordvins, and Saami are closest to the Mari. These peoples belong to the Ural race - transitional between Caucasians and Mongoloids. The Mari among the named peoples are the most Mongoloid, with dark color hair and eyes.
The neighboring peoples called the Mari "Cheremis". The etymology of this name is not clear. The self-name of the Mari - "Mari" - is translated as "man", "man".
The Mari are among the peoples who have never had their own state. Starting from the 8th-9th centuries, they were conquered by the Khazars, the Volga Bulgars, and the Mongols.
In the 15th century, the Mari became part of the Kazan Khanate. From that time on, their devastating raids on the lands of the Russian Volga region began. Prince Kurbsky in his "Tales" noted that "Cheremi people are extremely blood-drinking." Even women took part in these campaigns, who, according to contemporaries, were not inferior to men in courage and courage. The upbringing of the younger generation was also relevant. Sigismund Herberstein in his Notes on Muscovy (XVI century) indicates that the Cheremis are “very experienced archers, and they never let go of the bow; they find such pleasure in it that they do not even give their sons food, unless they first pierce the intended target with an arrow.
The accession of the Mari to the Russian state began in 1551 and ended a year later, after the capture of Kazan. However, for several more years, uprisings of conquered peoples flared in the Middle Volga region - the so-called "Cheremis wars". The Mari were the most active in them.
The formation of the Mari people was completed only in the XVIII century. At the same time, the Mari alphabet was created on the basis of the Russian alphabet.
Before October revolution the Mari were scattered as part of the Kazan, Vyatka, Nizhny Novgorod, Ufa and Yekaterinburg provinces. An important role in the ethnic consolidation of the Mari was played by the formation in 1920 of the Mari Autonomous Region, which was then transformed into autonomous republic. However, today only half of the 670 thousand Mari live in the Republic of Mari El. The rest are scattered outside.
2. Religion, culture
The traditional religion of the Mari is characterized by the idea of the supreme god - Kugu Yumo, who is opposed by the bearer of evil - Keremet. Both deities were sacrificed in special groves. The leaders of the prayers were priests - carts.
The conversion of the Mari to Christianity began immediately after the fall of the Kazan Khanate and acquired a special scope in XVIII-XIX centuries. The traditional faith of the Mari people was severely persecuted. By order of the secular and ecclesiastical authorities, sacred groves were cut down, prayers were dispersed, and stubborn pagans were punished. Conversely, those who converted to Christianity were given certain benefits.
As a result, most of the Mari were baptized. However, there are still many adherents of the so-called "Mari faith", which combines Christianity and traditional religion. Paganism remained almost untouched among the Eastern Mari. In the 70s of the 19th century, the Kugu Sorta (“big candle”) sect appeared, which tried to reform the old beliefs.
Adherence to traditional beliefs contributed to the establishment of the national identity of the Mari. Of all the peoples of the Finno-Ugric family, they have preserved their language, national traditions, and culture to the greatest extent. At the same time, Mari paganism carries elements of national alienation, self-isolation, which, however, do not have aggressive, hostile tendencies. On the contrary, in the traditional Mari pagan appeals to the Great God, along with a prayer for the happiness and well-being of the Mari people, there is a request to give good life Russians, Tatars and all other peoples.
Supreme moral rule the Mari had a respectful attitude towards any person. “Respect the elders, pity the younger ones,” says a folk proverb. It was considered a holy rule to feed the hungry, to help the one who asks, to provide shelter to the traveler.
The Mari family strictly monitored the behavior of its members. It was considered dishonor for a husband if his son was caught in some bad deed. the gravest crimes mutilation and theft were considered, and the massacre of the people punished for them in the strictest way.
Traditional performances still have a huge impact on the life of the Mari society. If you ask a Mari what is the meaning of life, he will answer something like this: remain optimistic, believe in your happiness and good luck, do good deeds, for the salvation of the soul is in kindness.
