Stepan P. Krasheninnikov, Explorations of Kamchatka 1735-1741,
translated from the
pp. 244-245
The Shamans
The Kamchadals have no specific shaman, as their
neighbors do; but women, particularly the old ones, and the koekhchuchei [kinds of servants of unspecified sex but of female
social gender. This site contains a chapter, ‘Sex and Shamanism’, drawn from
Czaplicka’s book Aboriginal Siberia.
She gathered all we know about these mysterious koekhchuch], are
regarded as sorcerers; it is believed that they know how to interpret dreams.
When they make their magic they do not beat on any kind of drum, nor do they
any longer dress in special ceremonial robes, as is customary among the Iakuts,
Tungus, Buriats and all the other idolatrous Siberian nations. They murmur
words in a low voice over the gills or fins of fish, over sweet grass or sarana
and tonshich; this is how they claim to cure illness, prevent misfortune, and
foretell the future. I have not been able to learn what words they use in their
ceremonies, nor the incantations, nor from which God they ask assistance. It
was kept from me as a great mystery.
Their principal magic is made in the following manner.
The women sit in a corner and continually intone words in a low voice. One of
them ties to her foot a cord made of nettles twisted with red wool, and taps
her foot. If it seems that she can easily raise her foot, it is a favorable
omen, and a sign that whatever one has undertaken will meet with success; if it
appears that she shakes her foot heavily, it is a bad portent. Meanwhile she
invokes the spirits with the words, while
grinding her teeth. When she has some vision, she cries out, as she bursts into
laughter, khai, khai. After half an
hour the spirits vanish, and the sorceress wails unceasingly, ishki, they are no longer here. The other woman who assists her
mutters some words over her, and exhorts one to fear nothing, but to pay
careful attention to the apparitions and to remember the reason for which she
made the magic. Some say that when there is thunder and lightning, Biliukae [a God, called by this name by Steller. Krasheninnikov
calls this God Piliachuche in the chapter devoted to the Kamchadal Gods. He
lives in the clouds, he “makes the lightning flash and hurls thunderbolts and
makes the rain fall.”] descends
into these magicians, and that by taking possession of their senses he helps
them read the future.
If a misfortune befalls someone, or if he is unlucky at
hunting, he likewise sets out to find one of these old women, or even his wife.
She casts a spell and considers the reason for his ill luck; then she
prescribes the ways of averting it. She attributes the major cause to his
having neglected certain superstitious practices; to remedy this fault, the one
who has failed to perform these observances must carve a small idol, carry it
into the woods, and put it on a tree.
The shamans also make their magic
at feast time or when they are purified of their sins. They then mutter certain
words, perfume themselves, wave their arms about, and work themselves into a
state of violent agitation. They rub themselves with tonshich, wrap thongs
around their bodies, and try to recall to reason those who have lost their
minds. They put on other elaborate ceremonies, which will be more fully
described in the following chapter.
If a child is born during a
tempest or a hurricane, they make magic over him when he begins to talk, and reconcile him with the
spirits; this is how it is done.
He is stripped completely naked during a violent storm; into his hands is
placed a sea shell; he must hold this shell up in the air and run around the
iurt, the balagan, and
the dog kennel, all the while addressing these words to Biliukae and the other evil spirits: “The
shell is made for salt water, not for fresh water, you have made me soaking wet; the wet will make me perish. You see that I am completely naked and that I shiver in
every limb.” When this is over, the
child is considered to be reconciled with the spirits; otherwise they believe that he is the cause of tempests and hurricanes.
The Kamchadals are so curious
about their dreams and place such faith in them that the first thing they do in the morning upon
awakening is to recount them to each other; and by these dreams they decide what is going to befall
them. They have hard and fast rules for interpreting them, as, for example, if
they have dreamed of vermin, they fully expect to see the Cossacks come the next day. When they dream that they have everything they need,
they feel this is a sign they are to be the
hosts for their people. When they dream they are revelling with a woman, it is an omen of a lucky hunt.
In addition to magic and incantations, they are greatly
given to palmistry; they believe it is
possible to predict the good or evil that will befall a man by examining the lines in his hand; but they cloak
the rules of this art in great mystery.
If a line or mark suddenly appears on someone’s hand, or if a blemish suddenly disappears, they immediately consult an
old sorceress about it.
The Koriaks (chap. XXI)
(pp. 287-289)
[Krasheninnikov evokes Koryak and Chukchee shamanism as
follows.]
As
for religion, the Koriaks are as ignorant as the Kamchadals; at any rate the
Koriak chief or prince with whom I had a chance to talk had no idea about a divinity. They
have great respect for demons or evil spirits because they fear them; they believe they live in the rivers and
mountains. The settled Koriaks acknowledge as their god the Kut of the
Kamchadals [With all respect to Krasheninninkov, he was not a very good logician to
state non-A for the set S and A for the set S’ included in S in a nearby sentence!
Anyhow, this God Kut is the one he calls Kutkhu in chapter XI, devoted to the Kamchadals
Gods. He is the God who creates earth, who lived some time in
“This is for You, but send us
something else.”
[The American edition attributes this photograph to
George Kennan, Tent Life in Siberia,
Putnam, 1910. The original edition of 1870 did not contain this picture.]
When they have to pass certain rivers or mountains they believe to be inhabited by evil spirits, they think
about making sacrifices. Shortly before they come to such places, they kill a reindeer, eat the
meat, and put the head on a stake, turned
toward the place they imagine the spirits live. When they are taken with an
illness they consider dangerous, they kill a dog, stretch his intestines over two stakes and walk between them.
When their shamans make sacrifices, they beat on little
drums which are made in the same way as those
of the Iakuts and other pagan natives of this country; but the Koriak shamans wear no special costume as the others do.
Among the settled Koriaks there are
shamans who are considered doctors and who, these superstitious people believe,
can cure illnesses by beating on these little drums. It is a very interesting
fact that there is no nation, no matter how wild and barbaric, whose shamans
are not cleverer, more adroit and shrewder than the rest of the people.
In
When one of these shamans
treats a sick person, he tells him, according to the rules of his craft, how he can be cured. Sometimes he orders the sick
person to kill a dog, sometimes to place
little branches outside his iurt, or to perform other trivial tasks of
this nature. In the situation in which they kill a dog, this is
how it is done. While two men hold the animal, one by the head and the other by
the tail, its side is pierced with a lance or a knife; when the animal is dead, it is placed on a stake with its muzzle
turned toward a volcano.
The reindeer Koriaks have no
festivals. The settled Koriaks celebrate one at the same time as the
Kamchadals, but in honor of whom and for what purpose, they do not know any more than the Kamchadals. They give
no other reason for it than that their ancestors did the
same thing. This festival lasts four weeks. During
this time they admit no visitors and none of them leaves the settlement. They stop all work and do nothing but eat a great
deal and make merry. They toss a bit
of the food they serve into the fire as an offering to some volcano.
Their civil institutions are as crude and backward as
their religion. They do not know how to
divide time into years and months …