ethnography of arctic eurasia 197 



Spiritual Culture: Folklore and Religious Ideas 



In the domain of spiritual culture, owing to the lack of material, 

 it is much more difficult to establish similarity and uniformity. We 

 may, however, point out the similarity of Lapp drawings in "Muit- 

 talus Samid Birra" (Book of Lapp Life) by the Swedish Lapp, Johan 

 Turi, with drawings of the Chukchis and Eskimos to be found in 

 various publications. 



The same similarity can be noted also in the realm of folklore, 

 in the fairy tales of the Samoyeds and the Chukchis and Koryaks. 

 For instance, the Samoyed story about the reindeer owner Vilka 

 related by Zhitkov is quite similar to Chukchi stories in character and 

 style. The hero starts to search for unknown lands and visits various 

 countries, described realistically and at the same time fantastically. 

 The manner of description itself and the main details are similar. 



We may note, too, the similarity of ideas and tales about spirits, 

 apparently relating to the same degree of animism. There are many 

 coincidences even in the scarce material known to us. Thus with the 

 Lapps and Chukchis the constellation Orion is a powerful hunter, 

 and Cassiope is the reindeer which he pursues. Rites connected with 

 bear hunting coincide among the Lapps with those of the Tunguses, 

 Yukagirs, and Gilyaks. With the Lapps the bear is a powerful, 

 mysterious being. In the center of the Lapp bear rites is the festival 

 of the resurrection of the killed bear. Similar animal resurrection 

 festivals are practiced by the above-mentioned tribes of northeastern 

 Asia and by the Chukchis, Koryaks, and Eskimos. 



Shamanism 



The same similarity may be traced in the ideas connected with 

 shamanism. The Lapp tales, for instance, about deceased shamans 

 who rise from the dead and attack living persons and strive to lacerate 

 them with their iron teeth are similar to the tales of the Russianized 

 natives in the Kolyma and Anadyr regions about the heretics with 

 iron teeth, i.e. wizards who rise from the dead. Here perhaps we 

 have some Finnish religious elements carried over by the Russians 

 from the west to the east. 



Social Organization 



It is probable that in ancient times before the advent of the 

 conquerors from the south the northern tribes were living in small 

 separate groups. Tribal connections were comparatively weak. 

 Even family connections were not particularly strong and were broken 

 easily. The fundamental unit was really the individual. As the fairy 

 tales have it, "There lived in the tundr.a a man without family or 

 tribe. He grew in loneliness, hunted, ate, seeing no men." Bound- 



