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Ilya of Murom
NO one of the heroes has left so many proofs of
his existence, no one is so popular or so firmly
believed in, as the great peasant hero Ilya of
Murom. A race of peasants called Ilya's peasants
(krestyanye Iliushini) regard themselves as direct
descendants of the renowned bogatyr; and it is a noteworthy
fact, that, according to local testimony, the
people who inhabit the primeval forests of Murom
are celebrated for their great stature and strength.
To this day, the peasants of the village of Karacharof,
Ilya's birthplace, point out a chapel built upon the
spot where a fountain burst forth beneath the hoofs
of Ilya's good steed Cloudfall, as did the springs at
a blow from the hoof of Pegasus. The chapel is
dedicated to Ilya the Prophet; and "to the fountain
fierce bears still come to quaff the waters and gain
heroic strength," so the legend runs.
He is bound up with the religious legends of Kief.
Erich Lassota of Steblau, who made a trip to Kief in
1594, states in his diary that he saw in a chapel of
St. Sophia the tomb, now destroyed, of "Elia Morowlin,
a distinguished hero and bohater," and of another
hero; and Kalnoforsky, a Pole, in a book published in
1638, says that Ilya lived about 1188. His portrait was
published in the seventeenth century among the saints
of Kief, with an inscription to the effect that his body
was still uncorrupted—which corresponds to the statement
in the epic poems, that he was turned to stone.
In this portrait he appears as a gaunt ascetic, with
masses of hair and beard, barely covered with his
rhapsodists who sang the lay of the heroes' end to
Hilferding in 1870, said that he knew Ilya was turned
to stone in Kief, because some people had once made
a pilgrimage thither to see how his fingers were placed
for the sign of the cross—great importance being
attached to this point. They saw Ilya, but his hand
was broken, and the question remained unsettled.
The antiquity of the legends about Ilya is shown by
the mention of his name in the cycle of Dietrich of Berne,
which was compiled in the thirteenth century from
songs already existing. He appears as the brother of
the Russian King Voldemar, Ilya the Greek, referring
to his religion, or in the Russian form of Ilias von
Riuzen; the German would be Elias. His exploits in
Dietrich of Berne have, however, nothing to do with
those attributed to Ilya in the epic songs.
Notwithstanding all this tolerably strong evidence of
his actual existence, Ilya is a purely mythical personage,
an incarnation of the Thunder-god, the successor
of heathen Perun. In the Christian mythology of the
peasants, he appears as "Ilya (Elijah) the Prophet,"
probably on account of the fiery chariot in which
Elijah was translated to heaven. The mythical allusions
are confined to a very restricted circle of natural
phenomena—the clear heaven, the lightning, the rain,
the thunder-clouds, and the powers of darkness in
general. Like Thor and Indra, he wages incessant
battle against the evil powers, and there are few episodes
in his career to which a parallel does not exist
among the various Indo-European races.
One of the most widely disseminated of traditions is
that concerning the tardy development of the hero's
strength, his late entrance upon active life, or long
obscurity under persecution or in exile. Cinderella
(Slavic Popeliuga), and the youngest of three Princes
who carries everything before him at last, after years
of ridicule or ill-treatment from his brothers, are some
of the best known. It is hinted that the renowned
Siegfried passed his youth in obscurity, as Ilya sat for
to the absence of the Thunder-deity in winter.
The wandering psalm-singers who heal Ilya, and
bestow upon him his vast strength, are the rain-bearing
clouds, and their miraculous draught the life-giving
dew. The hero and his horse are but two myths of
the same phenomenon, originally independent, and only
combined at a much later epoch.
In the riddles of which the people are so fond, the
horse signifies the wind, and his neigh is the thunder.
Another embodiment of the whirlwind is Nightingale
the Robber, whose historical prototype is supposed to
be the Mogut, pardoned by Vladimir. The whirlwind
chases the dark clouds through the heavens, and
obscures the sunlight, i.e. bars the road to Fair Sun
Vladimir,—troubles the sea with its whistle and roar,
and uproots century-old oaks, like the giant Hraesvelgr
in the Elder Edda, who sits on the border of heaven in
eagle's plumage, and by the flapping of his wings
produces the tempest.
The supernatural birds with iron feathers which
Hercules drove from the Stymphalian swamp, one of
whom was named Aella (the whirlwind), and the two
storm-birds of the Ramayana, who by waving their
wings shake the mountains, raise great billows in the
sea, and overthrow trees, are also forms of the same
myth. In Latin also, aquila and vultur furnish names
for stormy winds, aquilo and vulturnus. The Smorodina
is a mythical river—the rain; and the bridge built by
Ilya is the rainbow.
In his contest with Falcon the Hunter, Ilya represents
the heavens, Falcon being the lightning which
turns its sharp blade against its mother from the
realms of darkness, the clouds. To this lightning Ilya
opposes his own, and having conquered shines forth
again clear and radiant. Falcon's mace cast heavenward,
and returning always to his hand, is the lightning
flash.
The Russian examples of the very common legend
concerning the conflict of father and son are remarkable
substitute Ilya's daughter,[1] a "bold polyanitza," for
Falcon; most of them have preserved their tragic
ending.
Idol, like the robbers and the Tatars who effaced, in
course of time, the memory of the tribes who really
warred against Vladimir, must be accepted as another
embodiment of the dark and hostile principle. The
gluttony ascribed to him constitutes a sort of distinction
in a great number of legends. In ancient Hindoo
myths, it appears to be the special attribute of the evil
powers. Thor in the Edda and Indra in the Rig-Veda
are credited with a great capacity for drinking, and Ilya
is represented as intoxicated. Owing to his connection
with the rain, drunkenness is the special attribute of
the Thunder-god.
Ilya's conduct in his quarrels with Vladimir is much
more moderate than that of many epic heroes in
disputes with their sovereigns. The paladins of
Charlemagne's court pulled the Emperor's beard, beat
him, and called him a fool, with the same readiness which
they displayed in humiliating themselves before him
and kissing his footsteps when circumstances rendered
it advisable.
Many epic personages disappear from the scene in
a mysterious manner which renders their death uncertain,
their return probable at any moment. Then
arises the legend of their return on the fulfilment of
certain conditions, as in the case of Frederic Barbarossa.
As the Russian heroes were known to have been killed
in battle or turned to stone, with Ilya's tomb in two or
three places in Kief to prove his death in particular,
this legend has become the special property of Stenka
Razin, the famous Cossack chief of the seventeenth
century, and his return is still awaited by the peasants.
A fragmentary bylina represents Ilya, Dobrynya,
and other heroes as sailing in the "Falcon ship," to
some unknown region, whence they do not return.
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