Brown bear importance in Russo-Siberian cultures

[Montezuma]

"Two of the Indo-European world’s most ancient collections of stories, Aesop’s Fables and the Sanskrit Panchatantra, are mostly made up of animal tales. There is thus no denying the general antiquity of this type of tale, although opinions differ as to the precise age of the Russian animal tales. Most folklorists would admit the pre-Christian origins of many tales featuring the bear, whose complicated role in popular life is increasingly recognized (Uspenskii 1982)."

"By far the most widespread group consists of forest animals, including the bear, the wolf, the fox, and the hare." (In Russian Folk tales)


"Perhaps the serpent as a manifestation of Veles is nothing more than an alternative to the bear. The bear is often featured as demanding a maiden in sacrifice and is not uncommonly a potential bridegroom, who never appears in wondertales as a villain. In fact, it is curious that the bear’s role in tales that feature male heroes is limited to that animal’s being a progenitor."

"("The Peasant, the Bear, and the Fox”), the chief protagonists are the peasant and the bear, while in many versions of this tale the devil replaces the bear. In tales involving the devil, the peasant usually proves to be the more clever of the two. In many tales, the attempts of the devil to maim or kill the peasant completely backfire, frequently with no help from the peasant at all."


books.google.com.pk/books?id=ApheqkwHE-IC&printsec=frontcover&dq=An+Introduction+to+the+Russian+Folktale&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&source=gb_mobile_search&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=An%20Introduction%20to%20the%20Russian%20Folktale&f=false

[Montezuma]

"Uspenski (1982) traces the complex process through which the bear becomes identified with the god, then with the forest spirit or leshii, and finally, with the Christianization of the countryside in Muscovite times, with St. Nicholas. Dal’ states in his lexicon that in the north of Russia the bear is regarded as the forest spirit’s brother (Dal’ 1955: vol. 2, 311)."


"A certain miler took too large a fee for miling some grain, and when they grabbed him, he turned into a bear” (Nekrylova 1984:36). Another Carpathian tradition, that of the Huzul, is that the bear, rabbits (hares), and deer are the livestock of the leshii, the forest spirit (Gura 1978). In the north-central Carpathians, it was said that “a bear has a soul, and that soul comes from a man, particularly from a miler.”


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[Montezuma]

"Bear Cult among the Slav tribes and their neighbours, said to have been known since the Neolithic and Bronze Ages."



books.google.com.pk/books?id=fce0AAAAIAAJ&q=bear+worship+in+slav&dq=bear+worship+in+slav&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&source=gb_mobile_search&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjy7-W9y_qHAxVXXvEDHRoJAwUQ6AF6BAgKEAM#bear%20worship%20in%20slav

[Montezuma]

The Bear cult is not found in pre Christian Russian culture only but among all Slavic nations, including Poles for example.




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[Montezuma]

Bear coat-of-arms in various Russian areas.



Mythological Roots

The mythological roots of the image of the Russian bear descend to the times when there was yet no state or unanimous nation, but a number of tribes populating the territory of modern Russia. At that point the tribes had a variety of pagan beliefs; each was unique, but certain features repeated in many. In her article about the image of the bear created by Permic tribes, J. Koshkarova talks about the place that the bear held in their model of the Universe. As in many other cultures, the Permic model of the Universe was divided into three vertical layers: the upper world (heaven), the middle world and the lower world (earth). The middle world in its turn was horizontally divided into three spheres: the sphere of man (society), the sphere of the forest (nature), and the sphere of spirits. All of these worlds were populated by different creatures: men, animals, fish, birds, spirits etc.; but the multitude of roles that some of them fulfilled did not allow to fit certain archetypal creatures in one precise category – they either dwelled in the middle or crossed the borders and appeared in different places, revealing a variety of correlating qualities. Already in pagan times, the bear was a powerful image and a mediator, appearing in all spheres and levels of the Universe and linking them together. J. Koshkarova describes the whole fourteen motifs of the archetypal image of the Permic bear. Let's take a look at some of them:

→ A bear as a descendant of the god of sun and heaven, Yen. In this quality the bear itself becomes the symbol of warmth and active sun of spring and summer tide, and also with fertility cult.

→ A bear as a descendant of the god of the lower world, Omul. The bear was traditionally worshiped by the Permic tribes as the creator of landscape, especially mountains and swamps. As a result, this image of the bear also has traits of a lizard or a dragon, and that is why the descendant of this bear, Kudym-Osh, obtained his ability to grow back his limbs lost in battles.

→ A bear could also be a representative of the afterworld. The black bear was used by Permic tribes as an image of Death. Surprisingly, in this quality a bear could have some traits of a cow, because the bears were called “the cows” of the mistress of the lower world, Yoma.

→ One of the strongest motifs connected to bears was the motif of a human-looking bear or even a superhuman bear, which ascended from the common beliefs that bears and people are related.  

The superhuman bear was able not only to grow back his severed limbs, but also to resurrect from the dead, to understand human speech, and of course, to demonstrate incredible strength in battles. This image of the bear resulted in a multitude of protective, healing and cleansing rites, and this was one of the ancient instances when the bear was first viewed as a protector, which lead to making him a totem animal. It was believed that the first man from the knyaz (prince) family was a descendant of a bear, and thus the dynasty name was “Osh,” which meant “bear” in KomiPermic language.

→ The idea of the bear-human later developed in many beliefs about were-bears, shapeshifters who were able to transform into humans, most often to steal a wife. A union of a bear and a human, according to ancient Permic beliefs, alike in many other similar cases in world mythology, would result in a birth of a magical, miraculous child, who, most likely would become a bogatyr or a wizard. That is how two of the most important Komi-Permic bogatyrs, Kudym-Osh and Oshpel, appeared. As Koshkarova writes, all bear-related bogatyrs were impervious to weapons, incredibly strong, cunning, resourceful and merciless to the enemies. However, in times of peace they were friendly and hospitable. 

→ Besides the “strength” thread in the bearrelated culture, there was also a “wisdom” thread. It was believed that the bear was the first to teach humans different crafts: mining, smiting, carpentry and many others. According to the legends, the bear was also the one to introduce farming, to build fortresses and to establish trade connections with neighbors.

→ The most well-known belief that was later developed in folk tales, was of the bear being the king of the forest. In regards to this, the bear was frequently compared or equal to “leshii” – the traditional spirit-host of the Russian forest. The bear in Komi-Permic legends was the one to rule over the wild animals, but later he became the patron of all the domestic animals too. The image of the bear-patron was replaced by several Saints after ancient Russia was baptized.

→ Another “wisdom” thread of the bear influence is revealed through the tradition of wizardry. Shaman rites were not common for Komi-Permic tribes, but there were legends about wizards originating from the bear father. The most well-known one was a bear-wizard Oshlapei. He could travel between the worlds and turn into a bear. The Komi-Permic knyazia (princes) and the famous bogatyr Kudym-Osh all fulfilled functions of ancient priests because they too possessed “bear” wisdom (Koshkarova, 9-13). Summarizing the components of the bear archetype in the Komi-Permic culture one can see the basic functions of the modern Russian bear: firstly, he is a protector of his people, possessing incredible strength; secondly, he is a knowledgeable and resourceful carrier of basic leadership qualities; thirdly, he is a creative and hospitable craftsman, a “master of the house” at the times of peace; and, fourthly, he is close to people and is treated not as an alien, but as a fellow-companion.  

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[Montezuma]

The bear cult in medieval Novgorod, based on archaeological finds

By Elena A. Tianina

Abstract: The bear cult belongs to the oldest layers of religious beliefs in bear-human relations. It reflects the mutual influence of Finno-Ugric and Slavic cultural traditions. These religious beliefs were also present in medieval Novgorod. The article examines Novgorod’s collection of amulets made of bear fangs, other teeth, and claws along with their chronology, topography and semantic significance. As the study shows, bear worship emerged in Novgorod at the turn from the 10th to the 11th century, based on interactions with the multi-ethnic rural environment, where it has been documented since ancient times. Amulets made of bear teeth played a role as apotropaic objects, connected with the cult of Veles and, probably, also with “bear feast” rituals known from the ethnography of the Finno-Ugrics and other peoples of northern Eurasia.

Keywords: Russia, medieval Novgorod, archaeology, paganism, zoolatry, bear cult, amulets, chronology, topography 

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[Montezuma]

"The bear cult represents one of the oldest, most widespread and most enduring forms of zoolatry. Bear worship arose and developed from the Stone Age onwards throughout practically the whole habitat of this animal. At the same time, this cult reveals a number of common features among various peoples who lived in different periods in the forest zone of northern Eurasia. Among them are the empowerment of the bear by attributing anthropomorphic features and other mediative functions to it (mediation between the worlds), connection with the cult of ancestors, representations of the bear as the forest master, the patron of all other animals, the mating symbolism of the bear, its connection with “werewolfism” (shapeshifting), shamanism, and witchcraft. In the culture of many peoples, including the eastern Slavs, there is a taboo attached to the bear’s name."




"When speaking about the continuity of the tradition, we can trace the transformation of the bear cult in cultures at different stages of socio-economic development. Thus, researchers identified the most ancient, “classical” variant of the bear cult, characteristic for the peoples of the Far North, which is best presented and studied in the case of the Ob’-Ugrians. The Finno-Ugric peoples of the Ural and Volga region followed a “transitional type” of bear cult, in which some of the most ancient totemistic representations had died out/disappeared, while such mythologemes as “bear – descendant of a deity”, “bear – ancestor” (in which classical totemism is replaced by the cult of human ancestors), “bear – man” (i.e. shapeshifter), “bear – forest master” and “bear – epic/cultural hero” came to the fore. Similar features of bear worship among the Baltic-Finnish peoples are recorded in the Kalevala. In the context of Slavic agrarian culture, the bear cult did not dissolve and disappear as a relic of the primitive epoch, but instead developed and acquired new features. For example, the totemistic component in the cult of the bear as a primary ancestor transformed into a general idea about the kinship of man and bear, while the bear as the “master of the forest” and the patron of all other animals then became the patron and protector of livestock."



"Novgorod (Fig. 1) was undoubtedly part of the geographical area of bear worship. A group of apotropaic objects associated with bear worship stands out among the finds of pagan antiquities in the cultural layers of Novgorod. These are amulets made of bear fangs (canine teeth) and other teeth. This type of the Novgorod pagan amulets is the most widespread in time and space. “Bear amulets” are part of a large group of apotropaic objects, made of the fangs, other teeth, or bones of various animals. The Novgorod collection of these items is unique not only in its number – 239 amulets were found so far – but also in terms of the dynamics in the distribution of amulets associated with different animals, which allows us to identify the chronology as well as the topographic pattern of their occurrence. All this is possible due to the well-developed stratigraphy of the cultural layers of Novgorod and the large-scale excavations of entire farmsteads or even farmstead complexes instead of only parts of the settlement."



"So far, 89 amulets associated with the bear cult have been found in Novgorod’s cultural layers. Among them, the vast majority (82 findings) is represented by objects made of bear fangs (Fig. 2). In addition to these, three amulets were made of bear molars (Fig. 3.1), three of claws (Fig. 3.3–4), and one of a bear incisor (Fig. 3.2). One more item is described by the excavators as a bear’s tooth, but with no further details provided. It is obvious that such rare types as amulets made of incisors and molars were not traditional for the Novgorod population. Possibly, such objects were included in a necklace, with a fang for the enhancement of protective or benevolent effects. All amulets made out of fangs or other teeth show a hole for suspension that has been drilled in the middle section or at the base; they do not differ in appearance from similar amulets known in other cultures. Three amulet-fangs are, in fact, blanks, as their holes are not drilled all the way through, while, in case of a further amulet, the hole is replaced by small grooves in the fang. It should be noted that, in reality, there should have been many more amulets made of bear fangs and other teeth, as they could have been carried not only by hanging, but also by being placed in a leather pouch or sewn onto clothes. It is extremely difficult to identify such amulets with archaeological methods because they do not have a hole and thus do not differ in any way from common stray finds of bear teeth or claws, which belonged to hunting prey at the farmstead. The same can be said concerning the possible use of “bear amulets” in Novgorod, not only as personal apotropaic objects, but also for other magical purposes. For example, according to ethnographic data, parts of bears (claws, teeth, bones, skin) were used as amulets in stables for cattle or at children’s cradles (S•Ž’‚¥ Žƒ§‚¨•‚§‚ © 2004, 214). In such cases, the amulet was placed next to the protected object. It is possible that the above-mentioned amulet without a hole but with grooves for a string or rope was used in such a manner. An object fastened that way could have certainly slipped and got lost if worn by a person."



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[Montezuma]

"In general, the chronology and topography of “bear amulets” in Novgorod demonstrate that the bear cult, at least in the form that has been discussed, was not characteristic for the first settlers in the city. Its emergence and rather rapid spread in the urban environment from the beginning of the 11th century onwards was caused by the intensification of the socio-cultural relationship between Novgorod and its surroundings. The traditional character of the bear cult in the districts around Novgorod since the most ancient times is evidenced not only by finds in burials, but also by most ancient toponyms connected with bears in the area of Novgorod Poozer’e. Another piece of evidence is the co-called “She-Bear Stone” (Novgorod Poozer’e, near the village of Verchovje, 20 km from Novgorod), a cult object, named after its shape, which resembles a sleeping bear. The veneration of this cult stone persisted until modern times."

"In the uniform, multicomponent culture of Novgorod and its surroundings in the period from the 10th century to the first half of the 13th century, the tradition of wearing “bear amulets” was established in the urban culture and was reflected in the worldview of the Novgorodians. The adoption of Christianity did not stop bear-worship in Novgorod. On the contrary, the tradition of wearing “bear amulets” coincided in time with the beginning of Christianisation or a little later. This observation vividly illustrates the complex processes of the spiritual interaction and intertwining of different cultural traditions in the medieval town. Religious syncretism was not limited to the incorporation of Christian beliefs into the existing pagan environment, but had a much more multifaceted and multidirectional character, which reflected the peculiarities of the region."

"E. E. Levkievskaja, while developing a typology of the Slavic amulets, attributed the semantics of animal teeth and claws to the category of amulets with warding-off magic, which was believed to be based on inflicting a magical blow to the enemy. Such properties were attributed, first of all, to the fangs of predators, which served as basic tools for attacking and destroying an opponent. This meaning of an amulet made of a bear’s fang (as well as of that of any other predator) is certainly universal for all forms of zoolatric cults. The use of bear fangs and claws as the strongest warding-off amulets against evil spirits is documented for many peoples in bear cult areas. This also corresponds with the worship of the bear in so-called “folk orthodoxy”. According to north Russian and Belarussian beliefs, the bear was able to ward-off evil spirits, acting as an animal that could detect and disarm and/or remove the so-called spoilage and evil eye. The same properties were allocated to parts of the bear’s body, first and foremost to its teeth and claws or paws. The worshipping of the bear as a guardian of cattle in herding magic also has a protective character. The Novgorod material is thus not an exception. The vast popularity of fangs among the “bear amulets” of Novgorod stresses the warding-off function of the amulet as its basic characteristic, reflecting the desire of its owner not just to acquire the strength and agility of the beast, but also to receive its magical protection against evil powers. However, the semantic meaning of the amulet made out of a bear fang was definitely not restricted to general protective representations. The study of the chronology and topography of the Novgorod collection of amulets made out of animal teeth and bones shows that the bear cult was much more widespread and characteristic for the Novgorodians than any other zoolatrous cult with warding-off semantics. For example, amulets made out of bear fangs are three times more common than those made out of wolf fangs, and their popularity is not limited to a narrow early period, as is the case with the amulets made out of wild boar tusks."


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[Montezuma]

"The discussion above shows that the bear cult, introduced into the urban environment in the late 10th/early 11th centuries, superimposed its own mythological picture of the world onto the religious views of Novgorodians and organically blended into them. In this regard, we should keep in mind that, in studies of eastern Slavic paganism, the connection of the bear cult with one of the main deities of the Slavic pantheon, the god Veles, has been repeatedly mentioned. The image of this deity is multifaceted and, in many respects, overlaps with the elements of the worldview that characterise the bear cults of other peoples of northeastern Europe. In Slavic tradition, Veles was considered to be a patron of animals, including cattle, had mediatory functions, and was associated with the cult of ancestors as well as with the priestly class of the Old Rus’ – the volhvs. Exactly these features were assigned to the bear in folk tradition. Also remarkable is the connection of Veles with the calendar holidays, during which dressing up or “walking” like a bear took place (Koljada, Maslenitsa), as well as the manifestation of the bear cult in the veneration of Christian saints such as St Blaise and St Nicolas, who replaced the pagan Veles in the Christian epoch."

"The form of bear veneration expressed in the wearing of a bear (tooth) amulet correlates with one more aspect. Amulets made out of bear fangs, claws and other body parts could not have been just accidentally found or taken from hunted animals. Their manufacture and wearing is directly related to one of the most important rituals associated with the veneration of the bear – the so-called “bear feasts”. These rituals, complex in execution and semantics, were connected with bear sacrifice or bear hunting and are well known among the different peoples of northern Eurasia, including the FinnoUgrics, who had great influence on the culture of medieval Novgorod this volume, for Finland;" Bear feasts” included either the sacrifice of a bear bred in captivity (periodic feasts), or rituals performed over a bear that had been killed in a hunt (sporadic feasts). In some cases, the fangs, other teeth, and claws of the bear killed during these “bear feasts” were preserved and used by the participants as apotropaic objects. Therefore, it cannot be excluded that Novgorodians were participants in such rituals and subsequently kept the worshipped objects near or on themselves, or in their homesteads. This assumption is well established concerning, on the one hand, the stability of the tradition of wearing the bear’ amulets and, on the other hand, on single finds in homesteads."

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[Montezuma]

"Bear claw amulets need to be addressed as such. The rarity of such finds in Novgorod can be explained by the significance of this type of amulet, which reflects the mythological beliefs of the population in the north of eastern Europe. At the end of 19th century, researchers mentioned bear bones in Slavic burial mounds (kurgans) of northwestern Rus’, dating to the period from the 8th to the 10th centuries, as well as in the kurgans of the southern Ladoga region. That being said, terminal phalanges are the only bear bones found in this context. Thus, we can say that bear paws with claws were added to the pyre of a human as a funerary offering and had a special mythological meaning. In this context, bear claw amulets form a semantic unity with another category of objects – clay “bear claws”, which are found both in Finno-Ugric and Slavic burials of the 9th to 11th centuries in northeastern Rus’. N. N. Voronin attributed these exclusively to the funeral cult, rightly noting that such items could hardly have been worn during the lifetime of the buried. According to A. S. Uvarov, the semantics of clay and bear claws in the burial cult of the Meryans reflected the idea of the “world mountain”, to which the soul was taken after death with their help. Similar beliefs are recorded for Lithuanian paganism, in which bear claws were put on the funeral pyre for the same purpose, but this is recorded only in later sources. In the area of the Balts, bronze-mounted bear claws, which functioned as amulets, are often found in burials of the 13th–15th centuries, while such findings are almost unknown in settlements of the same period. Thus, the bear claws of the Middle Ages were an attribute of the funeral cult, linked to mythological beliefs about the path of the soul of the deceased to the afterlife. This explains well the exclusivity of such finds at the Novgorod residential estates. It should also be noted that bear fangs (neither drilled or untreated) do not occur in the funerary monuments of the region."


"Amulets made out of bear fangs are well known, not only in Novgorod but also in other medieval cities of the northwestern and northeastern Rus’. These items are dated to the pre-Mongolian period, which correlates quite well with the chronology of the Novgorod archaeological material. It can be thus assumed that in the urban environment of the northern part of medieval Rus’ this type of pagan belief was part of the cultural tradition."

"Finally, the collection of “bear amulets” confirms that Novgorod was part of the cultural space of the northern Eurasian forest zone in which the bear cult existed. The traditions of bear worship, which emerged in the Novgorod region in ancient times, survived the totemic era and still existed in the medieval period. A bear amulet was multifunctional in its purpose, playing the role of an apotropaic and protective object against evil (“unclean”) spirits, spoilage, and the evil eye. It was associated with some aspects of the pagan cult of Veles and possibly with the ritual of “bear feasts”. The bear cult in the form of wearing amulets made of bear fangs and other teeth correlates with a number of traditional mythological beliefs and ritual practices documented for the Finno-Ugric and Slavic populations of the region in question. This tradition arose in the urban environment at the turn of the 10th to the 11th century on the basis of connections of the urban population with the multi-ethnic inhabitants of the Novgorod surroundings, in which it existed from ancient times and remained in use, as is testified by a number of features."


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[Montezuma]

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[Montezuma]

Veles - The Slavonic paganism Bear god

Though other animals i.e. the wolf, serpent and bull was also associated with the deity, he was specially and mostly linked to the Bear. Veles (or sometimes velos) was an important deity among all Slavic people including western Slavs (Poles, Czechs), Southern Slavs (Bulgarians, Romanians, Balkans) and especially in Eastern Slavs (Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusian); as a supreme deity apparent in various mythological themes and almost as powerful as Perun. The cult of Veles, Bear, and St. Nicholas is interconnected, but before st. Nicholas, bear-veles cult was connected giving bears a special image in Slavic mythology apart from its other roles in Slavic myth and culture. 



Image:
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[Montezuma]

The bear cult's connection with Veles already shown earlier, here is some more proof:

"A bear cult with that of Volos/Veles in Slavic - particularly in East Slavic is the folk-etymological connection between Common Slavic".



books.google.com.pk/books?id=Q_8ZAAAAIAAJ&q=veles+bear+cult&dq=veles+bear+cult&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&source=gb_mobile_search&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwit2934sv-HAxUgcfEDHQBFBRcQ6AF6BAgMEAM#veles%20bear%20cult


"Haney presents evidence for associating bears with the cult of Veles".

[Montezuma]

Sacred Species and Sites: Advances in Biocultural Conservation



books.google.com.pk/books/about/Sacred_Species_and_Sites.html?id=14MhAwAAQBAJ&source=kp_book_description&redir_esc=y

"Forest extended from end to end in northern Eurasia in ancient times; the bear dominated it. The bear has remained important in some Siberian cultures; and among the remnant Ainu in Hokkaido and in the Ryukyu, now Okinawa, islands into modern times. The Ainu refer to the bear as the ‘spirit of the mountains’ (kimun-kamui). Their bear cult is well known from eighteenth-century travellers’ accounts and later ethnographic reports (Batchelor, 1901, p. 484). In Japan it has been claimed that shamanesses are still remarkably active in Japan as in southern Korea, among the Ainu of Hokkaido, and the Ryukyu Islands (Hori, 1974, p. 185). From the distant pre-Russian and Russian past, there are traces of an early bear cult on the Upper and Mid-Volga from the late Fat’yanovo culture after 1500 Bc: at the Volosovo site animal teeth in necklaces were often found; there were teeth from all domestic animals, but the only wild animals were dog, bear and pig (Krainov, 1964, p. 81; Gorodtsov, 1851-1918, V, 1, p. 158, ill. xxv). These were, it seems, regarded as holy, the dog and pig for their economic value, the bear for its power. Other Neolithic finds occur along the Kama and as far north as Lake Ilmen. In a ninth- to eleventh-century ap burial ground of the Mordva-Moksha, a Finno-Ugrian group on the River Tsna, several bear claws with a bronze mounting were found attached to a plait ornament. Many peoples of the Urals venerated the bear: the Komi, another Finno-Ugrian group, had a cult of the bear, known as osha, and one of their heroes was called Kudym-Osh. A common custom among the TransUral tribes was ‘to skin the pelt with its paws and head from the dead bear, place it on a table in the sacred comer of the house with its face between its paws; then the magic ritual of venerating the bear began, the bear festival’ (Oborin, 1976, p. 23)."



"Metal plaques from north-east European Russia depicting bears show the same situation (Nos. 25-31, third to fourth centuries) (Figure 19.1); one (No. 30, sixth to seventh century), shows six bears (Oborin, 1976, p. 23). A modern Ainu illustration shows the bear ‘at the head of the hearth’ and closely resembles the bronze images, but the head is circled with a necklace and an inau is in its mouth".



"(Nakamoto, 1999, pp. 63-80, 189-210, 211). The illustration and the plaques are separated by more than 6000 miles and 1500 years."



books.google.com.pk/books/about/Sacred_Species_and_Sites.html?id=14MhAwAAQBAJ&source=kp_book_description&redir_esc=y

[Montezuma]

"The conversion of Rus’ to Christianity occurred in the late 980s, but traces of pagan cults did not fade away. Veneration of the bear has survived even into recent times. Barrow burials of the ninth to tenth centuries in the Vladimir and Rostov regions show unfired or poorly fired rough clay models of what are taken to be bear paws, sometimes associated with clay rings; these ‘are not perforated and so are not amulets, but were probably made for the burial ritual’ (Figure 19.2) (Voronin, 1941, pp. 164-6; Lavrov, 1951, p. 65). They may have been fired in the funeral pyre. The paws, claws and rings have been interpreted as climbing gear for the soul to climb to the heavenly world; this seems to imply a close association between the human and the bear: like the shaman, both travel between the three worlds: this one, heaven and the underworld. Squirrels or water-fowl, creatures which can reach up into the tree or fly into the sky, burrow into the earth or below the water, are often associated with the shaman and convey the same implication. Slav barrow burials on the tributaries of the upper Oka also had bear claws and bones, often accompanied by bones of birds and small animals on pieces of limestone. However, in the Ladoga area only bear claws were found, and then only in the earliest barrow burials, and had not been drilled, so are not regarded as amulets. The bear here may have been sacrificed or consumed at feasts (Voronin, 1941, pp. 162, 165-6)."



Page 382 - 388 explain how the bear cult fared in the times of imperial Russian period (17th - 19th century) and in early Rus' (10th - 13th century).

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[Montezuma]

"The animal most frequently associated with Russian identity is, of course, the bear. A brief consideration of that animal’s role as metonym for Russia suggests how broadly, and to what various uses, the association has been put. The rhetorical association of Russia and the bear has existed for centuries and is alternately ominous and sentimental: Macbeth’s “rugged Russian bear” is a figure for the epitome of wildness (Act III, scene IV); to eighteenth-century French travelers, Russians were the “ours du Nord”; Rud yard Kipling’s “The Truce of the Bear” (1898) admonishes his countrymen against political dealings with Russia, “the Bear that walks like a man!”10 The classical scholar Jane Harrison, on the other hand, articulated her considerable affection for Russia as a nation of bears."


Cartoon from London showing Russia breaking itself from the Bolshevik government.



For the bear to come to your threshold,
to summon the pike at your call
you must capture raven-disquiet
in a snare of sun-filled verse.
[. . .]
It will smell of honey by the window
of spidery lime bark and hollow trees;
And covered in the spider’s filament web
Toptigyn will growl beneath the window.

— Nikolai Kliuev

www.google.com.pk/books/edition/Other_Animals/cXv2S34HKGwC?hl=en

[Montezuma]

"Countless cultures have regarded the bear as a transitional or “threshold” creature, including within their repertoire of bear stories accounts of origin and/or mating that involve correspondence between humans and bears.4 The bear’s stature in archaic cultures rests both on its uncanny anatomical likeness to humans and on its apparent ability to “die”—descending into deathlike hibernation—and return to life. The bear’s purported ability to understand human language led to the creation of taboos surrounding the animal’s name in Russian as in other cultures: Vladimir Dal’,



compiler of the most comprehensive Russian dictionary of the nineteenth century, lists at least twenty-seven nicknames or terms of indirection to use for the “one who knows where honey is.” Jack Haney has argued that various Russian folktales in which the bear appears are relics of ancient bear rituals; B. A. Uspenskii’s exhaustive work on medieval texts undergirded his argument that the Russian cult of Saint Nicholas was a transposition of pre-Christian cults of the bear.6 N. Yadrintsev, an early ethnographer of Russia’s indigenous peoples, collected extensive materials on bear rituals among northern natives of Siberia; the editor of his 1890 article noted that “remnants of the bear cult, a belief in his human origin, are alive to this day not only among native peoples, but within the Russian people”—with evidence from the north of European Russia.7 Late imperial writings about the bear track a passage into modernity (scientific, rationalistic, humane) within the context of this older culture, which has its own complex form of kinship with the bear."



www.google.com.pk/books/edition/Other_Animals/cXv2S34HKGwC?hl=en

[Montezuma]

Page 77 - 94 tells of Bears in Russian society in pre-modern and modern times. 

www.google.com.pk/books/edition/Other_Animals/cXv2S34HKGwC?hl=en

[Montezuma]

"the prevalence of shamanism, bear cult, sun cult, and ancestor worship reveals the link with the cultures of Central Asia, Siberia, and Manchuria".



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[kille]

ف

Public opinion polls
VTsIOM: More than half of Russians consider the bear a symbol of the Russian Federation

Every tenth respondent additionally named the Amur/Ussuri tiger (11%) and the double-headed eagle (9%)
MOSCOW, February 25. /TASS/. Almost two-thirds (62%) of Russians surveyed consider the bear to be a symbol of Russia, according to data published on Thursday by the All-Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VTsIOM).

"More than half of Russians agreed that the bear/brown bear represents Russia and can serve as its national symbol (62%). Every tenth additionally named the Amur/Ussuri tiger (11%) and the double-headed eagle (9%). Russians also named the wolf, dog, lion, cat and horse," the report says.

Among the animals listed in the Red Book of Russia, almost half (48%) of Russians mentioned the tiger, while another 6% of respondents named the snow leopard and the leopard.

The survey is timed to coincide with International Polar Bear Day, which is celebrated on February 27. When asked about the Arctic, 41% of respondents expressed a desire to travel there, while more than half (55%) of those surveyed would not go there.

The initiative all-Russian poll "VTsIOM-Sputnik" was conducted on February 21. The sample size was 1,600 respondents, the maximum error with a probability of 95% does not exceed 2.5%.

tass.ru/obschestvo/10779011