Dynasties of Russian Storytellers in Yakutia and the Features of Their Repertoire ( Bylinas and Historical Songs as a Case-Study )

The article studies the traditional family features of Russian folklore in Yakutia of the Russian people living in an area near the mouth of the Kolyma River, the Indigirka River and the midstream of the Lena River. Within the scope of research on the general outline of Russian folklore distribution in Yakutia during its period of flourishment, we also overview the local features which were established in the course of an extended time-period; a number of example will be presented from epic texts created in the following areas: Biryuk of the Olyokminsky region, Pohodsk and Russkoye Ustye located on the shore of the Arctic Ocean. Written records by V.G. Bogoraz compiled at the end of the 19th century, the written records compiled by S.I. Bolo, N.A. Gabyshev at the early 1940s, and written records created by Y.I. Smirnov in the early 1980s. We will also refer to our own written records collected in the indicated northern areas where Russian folklore developed in the 1990s. These texts contain the same storytelling traditions which manifested themselves earlier in the bylinas about Ilia Muromets and the historical song entitled A Brave Man Beckons a Young Woman to Come to Kazan; each of these folklore texts were created in different time-periods: the end of 19th century and the middle/end of the 20th century correspondingly. The article also specifies the features represented in the folklore texts by M.F. Sokovikov, S.P. Kiselyov, E.S. Kiselyov, F.E. Sedyh. The study represents a comparative analysis of genres and plots along with some epic text motifs recorded in the written text in the midstream area of the Lena River, and the areas of the Kolyma and the Indigirka Rivers. There is a clear dynasty type of the epic texts inheritance visible in throughout the texts. The Sokovikovs (living in the 19th century in the Kolyma region) have practically lost their family traditions, whereas the Kiselyovs (a father and son) living in the 20th century in the Russkoye Ustye managed to remember a large collection of bylinas that they wrote down. The Sedyh family living in the midstream Lena River area managed to preserve an insignificant amount of epic texts due to the fact that this folklore genre was not wide-spread in the area.


Introduction
The article gives an overview of some features of Russian folklore which developed in the Allaikhovsky and Nizhnekolymsky regions located in the north-east of Yakutia and in the midstream part of the Lena River.
The significance of this research topic is justified by the fact that the author of the article is making an attempt of tracing the consecutive process of collecting works of oral folklore art in specific areas of Yakutia where the Russians resided on a permanent basis; this research fits the general framework of the Institute for Humanities Research and Indigenous Studies of the North Studies aimed at analyzing the folklore materials gathered by the researchers of the Institute during the expedition in the 20 th century.Records of Russian folklore created at the end of the 19 th century.Thus, the goal of the present research is to observe the connections between the style of performance of folklore in Yakutian areas of long-term residence by the Russians and singling out the local features of such folklore.
In the theoretical part of the article, the author quotes the theoretical findings of the following scholars: Y.I.Smirnov (1991) and Y.A. Novikov (Novikov, 2000;2007;2013).
Therefore, the goal of the given research is to specify the local features of folklore texts which were created and existed in areas of long-term residence of the Russian in the midstream area of the Lena River and the Kolyma and the Indigirka River areas.

Methodology
In order to study the features of Russian folklore in the areas of the native Russians long-term place of residence, we also referred to the Russian folklore publications in Yakutia.One such example is a collection of texts compiled and published by V.G.Bogoraz (1901).
In addition, the Folklore of the Russkoye Ustye and Russian Folklore Poetry of Siberia and Far East academic collections, special focus is given to the research articles by S.N.Azbelev and G.L. Venediktov (FRU, 1986, pp.24-29;13-24), Y.I.Smirnov (REP, 1991, pp.21-37) and previous research papers of the author of this article (FRNYA, 1994;Charina 2013;2015;2017b).Our research is based on the recordings and documented samples collected during the expeditions held by the institute.See also T.A. Shub (1956, p.159).The author refers to fieldwork materials gathered during the expedition in 1991.
The article conducts a comparative description of the folklore repertoire among the folklore storytellers in the place in Yakutia where the Russian people lived for an extensive period of time; the repertoire includes the texts and plots of bylinas and historical songs recorded in various areas of Yakutia.We also carried out a comparative analysis based on the study of texts dating back to different time-periods of the 19 th -20 th centuries in a number of areas of Russian traditions foundation in Yakutia.

The history of Russian settlement in the village areas of Yakutia
Two places of Russian folklore establishment in Yakutia are located near the lower streams of the Kolyma and the Indigirka Rivers.They were populated in the approximately the same time-period -the 17 th -18 th centuries.The Russkoye Ustye village is located near the Indigirka River inflow into the Arctic Ocean and it is a place which was populated by the Russians for an extensive period of time and, thus, it was exposed to the Russian traditional culture due to the fact that it remained a localized and unique phenomenon among other the cultures of other ethnicities.
Another place of long-term residence for the Russian old-timers in the North of Yakutia was the Pokhodsk village, which is located at the inflow of the Indigirka River into the Arctic Ocean.Located further upstream, Nizhnekolymsk (now it is a nearly deserted settlement), a number of villages built on the foundation of land properties and residential areas of the Russian old-timers.
The Yukaghirs and the Chukchees are the aboriginal nations of these areas.Later, the area was populated by the Evens and approximately in the mid-17 th century, Russians settled in the one area -the Russkoye Ustye; the Yakut people populated this area significantly later.
Bylinas were being told in these areas during an extensive time period and nowadays there are visible traces of fairytales, legends, fables, bylichkas and oral stories.Y.U.Smirnov writes that in the lower Indigirka area, Russians settled as "single individuals and in groups of people.This explains the fact that the general folklore materials were developing gradually, as the family connections established themselves, expanded and became firmer among the people.Undoubtedly, their repertoire also expanded owing to the short-term contacts with the people who came to visit them" (REP, 1991, p.27).
The midstream area of the Lena River, which is the third location of Russian folklore expansion as a result of long-term residence of Russian old-timers in a foreign language environment; this time-period also dates back to the middle of the 18 th century.
Another point worth mentioning here is that the Russian folklore created by the descendants of coachmen and crop growers was quite diverse.The majority of Russian folklore created by the old-timer living in the specified Lena River area are written in the genre of round dance songs.This formed the basic part of traditional Russian folklore, which has preserved itself and is passed on from one generation to another.We know of 20 round dance, game and hopping dance songs (FRNYA, 1994, pp.28-41, 95-102).
Scientific research records provide a thorough description of the time when the bylinas were recorded in the Kolyma and Indigirka area and name indications of the folklore compilers.Folklore records collected in the Indigirka area date back to the end of the 19 th -the beginning of the 20 th century; they were gathered by I.A. Khudyakov, V.M. Zenzinov, N.D. and D.D. Travins, and M.A. Krotov.
The first records in the midstream Lena River area were created by G.V. Ksenofontov in 1923 andin 1925 in the Khangalassky region (the Tit-Ary and the Bestyakhskaya stations); the folklore pieces were told by Alexander Golokov and Innokentiy Kozlov in those areas respectively.These folklore records include 13 songs, which include variations of the songs "In the round dance we were" and "Through the fir-wood we go" (FRNYA, 1994, pp.95-102).
At the end of the 20 th century, there was a number of expeditions held by the Institute of the Institute for Humanities Research and Indigenous Studies of the North (former Institute of Language, Literature and History Studies) in which E.E.Alekseev and Z.Z.Alekseeva also took part (private archives, 1991).
In 1977, a large co-joint expedition was also held by the former Institute of Language, Literature and History Studies of the Yakutian affiliated branch of the Siberian Division of the USSR Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Russian Literature (the Pushkin House) of the USSR Academic of Sciences; it was held during the compilation of an academic edition of the Folklore of the Russkoye Ustye.Y.N.Dyakonova noted that "the extinction of traditional folklore <…> nowadays is no less intensive than in the north of the European part of Russia" (FRU, 1986, p.13).
There are valuable text records remaining in the Russkoye Ustye, which were written down by L.N. Skrybykina (1995).There were two bylina-based stories about Ilia Muromets written down on paper in the Lena River area.Y.A. Novikov refers to the bylina images and plots established in Yakutia mainly in his monograph on The world of epic literature and ways of putting it into creative form (2013, pp.7-11).
At present, with the growing necessity to compile a large scope of texts collected in the Russian villages of Yakutia and to give their thorough description, when studying the Viluy expedition held by A.A. Savvin and S.I.Bolo and assessing its practical value, N.V. Pokatilova suggests to look into such aspects as: aspects in the format of the expedition and the importance of selecting the appropriate methodology in collecting folklore works of art (Pokatilova, 2017, pp.133-138).

Discussion
On the basis of the folklore text records, we revealed that there were lists of famous folklore storytellers.

Folklore art of the Sokovikov family.
We will give a brief description of the following dynasties of folklore storytellers.
In the 19 th century, in the Pokhodsk township, there lived the Sokovikov dynasty.Thus, we know that V.G.Bogoraz recorded folklore songs performed by the father of the family, his son and daughter.
We have written about Mikhail Fyodorovich Sokovikov in our previous article about folklore storytellers.In that article, we give an overview of the text materials complied by V.G.Bogoraz, D.I. Melikov and later records by Y.I.Smirnov (Charina, 2018, pp.53-61).
These are notes from the memoires of V.G.Bogoraz about Sokovikov: "he is the only living folklore storyteller, Mikhailo Sokovikov who goes by the nickname Kuldar, is seventy-year-old man, who comes from the former cossack family, who are now petit bourgeois.˂…˃ According to the people, both -he and his grandfather were known in the area for their folklore storytelling and singing skills.Mikhailo says that he does not know nearly a tenth portion of stories that his father knew.Nevertheless, it is clear that he must have a phenomenal memory starting from his early childhood.˂…˃ Mikhailo had two daughters and one son from his new Russian wife.His daughters have pleasant voices and inherited a few songs from their father; these songs were not previously heard in the Kolyma region.The son was the best storyteller of satirical street songs which were very common in Kolyma.However, in 1896, the son of the old Kudar, Vanka Kuldaryonok, disappeared without a trace in the ice-covered sea; apparently, he must have fallen through the ice together with the dogs and his travelling companion.After this tragic event, the old man went insane, and, by the way, forgot the remains of folklore pieces that he had remembered before" (Bogoraz, 1901, p.169).
"Finally," V.G.Bogoraz concludes: "I wrote down a bylina about Dobryna and Marina told by Arina Chetverikova, the daughter of Kuldar, which is, in fact, a very well-know bylina, unlike the others and it is even sung like an ordinary song during small evening gatherings.˂…˃ I will also note that the prose text insertions which interchange with the poem verses, according to Kuldar, were told in such manner a very long time ago by the fathers and grandfathers of the family" (ibid., p.170).Thus, it becomes clear that a portion of the folklore texts were recorded directly from M.F.Sokovikov; his children and other villagers who were personally acquainted with Sokovikov knew some of the folklore stories as well.
Y.I.Smirnov wrote that the last name Sokovikov is Chuvan by its origin; the scholar supports his findings with a survey data collected from the local population: "The author of these verses has heard the same recently, shortly after T.S. Shentalinskya heard them.The old-timers of the Kolyma region are fully convinced that the last name Sokovikov is of a Chuvan origin" (REP, 1991, p.377).The Chuvans are a national group, closely related to the Yukaghirs.
Unfortunately, the son was the last family representative who carried with him the tradition of folkloretelling.Perhaps, the daughter of M.F.Sokovikov continued his tradition; one of them is known by the last name of Chetverikova, the last name of the other daughter remains unknown.

Folklore art of the Kiselyov family
Records about the art of Semyon Petrovich Kiselyov were created by D.D. Travin, who wrote down a bylina titled A Pilgrim Reads the Book of Deep Knowledge2 (REP, 1991, p.173).
Semyon Petrovich Kiselyov is the most widely-known storyteller of different genres of the north-east of Yakutia (1885Yakutia ( -1947)).G.L. Venediktov mentioned the following: "his parents, Pyotr Miheyevich and Agrafena Semyonovna, told fairytales.Working as salesperson at merchant shop, his father was especially famous for his storytelling; he could expand his repertoire continuously.S.P. Kiselyov himself told stories since the age of twelve, as stated by S.I.Bolo" (ibid., p.304).E.S. Kiselyov (also known as Snegiryok3 ) was born in 1923.This is a description of him given by R.V. Kamenetskaya: "he is average in height and quite well-built ˂…˃ he has short blond hair with bits of graying hairs, his face has no clear sign of Mongoloid origin, his skin is white.His face would have seemed typical if it weren't for the blue eyes and his gaze, which, at first, seemed to be suspiciously attentive and then smart and sly" (ibid., p.309).

Repertoire features of folklore pieces by S.P. Kiselyov and E.S. Kiselyov
The folklore repertoire and the forms of art created specifically in the Russkoye Ustye area were recorded in much later time-period -in the 1940s.In his notes, T.A. Shub wrote that "they were able to record the main portion of oral folk art samples existing of the genres existing today, these include: 11 bylina plots in different versions, partly or fully preserved in their original form among the folklore storytellers; 62 fairytales (only 6 of them devoted to local themes, which were clearly adopted from the neighboring communities of Yukaghirized Evens of the Dudkay tribe); over 100 of various songs, with many historical ones among them (Skopin, Ermak, The Son of Stenka Razin, Miloslavsky, etc.), a large number of riddles, proverbs and sayings and all kinds of chastushkas4 " (Shub, 1956, p.210).
In his opening article to the Folklore of the Russkoye Ustye fairytales collection, G.L. Venediktov notes the following: "The majority of texts from the collection are written records made by N.A. Gabyshev in 1946 ˂…˃ N.A. Gabyshev listened to S.P. Kiselyov and wrote down 11 bylinas, 65 fairytales, 68 songs, many riddles, proverbs and sayings" (FRU, 1986, pp.7, 11).This collection includes the following bylina plots: Dobrynya Nikitich, the Bladus; About Tugarin Zhmeyevich5 ; Illya6 Muromets; A Contagious Pilgrim («Калига перехожая»); historical songs, such as: The Terrible Tsar, Ivan Vashilyevich; On the rising and the setting sun; Skopin jumped here from one mountain to another; A pipe not made of gold sounded in the field; For three years the Azov city stands closed; Here appeared a child of unknown descent; Oh, my talent and my bitter fate; The Swedish King writes and writes to you; A non-magnificent falcon is flying overhead; and Aleksandr promised to be back home by Christmas.Apart from the well-known fairytale plots, a rare fairytale plot was written down -Three barns of needles (FRU, 1986, pp.219-220, 225-227;229;245-251;279-80).
The folklore records show that they were recorded with regard to the location to the author and his age where possible.The records also include indications of the origin of the folklore piece.Thus, it is clear that Egor Semyonovich Kiselyov is the son of S.P. Kiselyov.M.F.Druzhinina created a written record of the historical song called Skopin hopped from one mountain to another from this storyteller (FRU, 1986, pp.321-322).
Every individual who had written down his stories, noted that E.S. Kiselyov tried to reproduce the text with outstanding precision and was very artistic while doing so."He can easily turn a description into a dialog".G.L. Venediktov writes: "He clearly tells the story with an interest, often accompanying his speech with ironic smiles, he frequently chuckles suddenly and heartily when finishing another verse" (ibid., pp.308-309).
It is difficult to add anything else regarding this family of storytellers, due to the fact that the entire epic tradition in the Russkoye Ustye seized to exist at the end of the 1980s.

Folklore repertoire of F. E. Sedykh
It was well-known that there lived a Sedykh family in the midstream Lena River area, in the Biryuk village of the Olekminsky region.Filimon Egorovich Sedykh was (1898(?)-1986) the father of the family.Y.I.Smirnov wrote: "He told the stories clearly and without stumbling, clearly pronouncing every word ˂…˃.He claims to be Russian" (REP, 1991, p.373).
The author of the article visited the Biryuk village in the 1990s.Unfortunately, Filimon Egorovich had passed away by that time, however, there remained copybooks with his own handwritten folklore texts.Filimon Egorovich had three daughters (Lyubov Filimonovna, Agrafena Filimonovna, and Maria Filimonovna), which at the time (the 1990s) were already elderly women.They all inherited their father's talent and sang bothtogether and individually.
When we asked them "What father's song did they enjoy the most?" they replied that it is the song called Along the dirty and dusty street there goes a miserable tailor (personal archives, 1991).
Undoubtedly, it can be assumed that their father sang songs in everyday life, which were mainly a part of the bourgeois romance songs collection; however, his copy books contain written records in which he states that he loves wartime songs, soldier service songs, and round dance songs which were exceptionally popular in that region.Y.I.Smirnov was able to record two bylinas told by F.E. Sedykh in prose form.Both plots are connected with the image of Ilia Muromets, where the first bylina tells about the healing of Ilia Muromets and the second one is a compilation of stories about his healing, his meeting with Svyatogor and his catching the Solovei Razboinik7 (REP, 1991, pp.61;288-289).
In addition, Y.I.Smirnov added that "the Fairytale about Ilia Muromets was chosen by the storyteller himself; in doing so, he gave himself some rest after singing so many songs.He told the fairytale confidently without stopping for pauses, pronouncing every word clearly.He had heard this fairytale from an old coachman on an old post station of the Biryuk village shortly before World War I" (ibid., p.373).
Thus, it can be concluded that the folklore storytelling tradition in the Indigirka River region was established in the Kiselyov family.At the same time, it is worth mentioning that during the period of recording folklore texts in the Indigirka area, there was no goal to display the family traditions which attempted to support the existence of oral storytelling traditions in one family.

On the folklore texts recorded from family generations
It should be noted that there were no bylina and historical song plots which were performed all the same time-period in all the regions under study -the Kolyma, the Indigirka and the midstream of the Lena River area.The most popular ones among them are fairytales about bogatyrs, which can be found in the story collections by Sokovikov, Kiselyov and Sedykh; they all have folklore stories telling about Ilia Muromets.M.F.Sokovikov was widely known for his version of the bylina about Ilia Muromets and the Pagan Monster (Bogoraz, 1901, pp.179-180).The text comprises of 44 verses.In this fairytale, Ilia Muromets talks to a contagious pilgrim and finds out about a pagan monster which took hold of the city of Nova-Grad; Ilia Muromets battles the monster using only his hat (REP, 1991, pp.103-104).Y.I.Smirnov writes that in this version of the fairytale, we can already see traces of forgetfulness, and "summarizations", "it has gaps, that is why it is still yet to prove why the crosses cling to the ground and the tops open up" (ibid, p.381).
S.E.Kiselyov told the bylina titled Illya Murovets (FRU, 1986, p.229).The texts consists of 23 verses.As the title suggests, the bylina tells about Ilia Muromets, who rides the falcon-ship; this story has an additional plot with the pagan monster which was beaten by Ilia Muromets (ibid., p.120).Unfortunately, this text is also not very large in length.
Folklore texts devoted to Ilia Muromets and recorded from F.E. Sedykh in prose form (REP, 1991, pp.61, 288-289).In these records we can see the pronunciation and lack of word agreement in the speech, which were typical features of F.E. Sedykh performance style: "Ilia Muromets took this beater, took a hit -and in the place of the hit there was a rim, an iron rim formed out of it" (ibid., p.288).
There were also well-known historical songs.The most popular one among them was recorded in the Russkoye Ustye and it was called A Brave Young Man Beckons a Young Woman to Come to Kazan (ibid.,, in the Biryuk area it was called A Brave Young Man Beckons a Young Woman to Come to Kazan (ibid., p.308).F.E. Sedykh spoke in the Yakut language in his household; for this reason, the lack of the gender category in the Yakut language manifested itself in his individual storytelling style.
The first version of the fairytale was recorded from F.E. Sedykh.It consisted of 13 verses and it had visible features typical of historical songs: Oh, you are, you are lying to me, boy, you are lying, laying8 to me; The magnificent Kazan city, stands there, under the mountain, Along Kazan the Volga River flows there (ibid., p.308).
In variant of the Russkoye Ustye (which consists of 19 verses) performed by S.P. Kiselyov, the historical motif of the song is even more evident; it contains the following verses: You are lying to me, young man, lying, you are laying 9 to me, The pretty girl herself, was in Kazan, The Kazan river is flooded with blood, Small streams are burning with tears, The impetuous heads of the young men, Of the young men and the soldiers (ibid., pp.308-309).
The same song was performed by E.S. Kiselyov (containing 11 verses); his performance is practically the same as the version of his father.For example, in the ending: You are lying to me, lying, laying to me, you were in Kazan: The small city of Kazan, it stands on bones, The Kazan river is overfilled with blood.
Small rivers are burning with tears, Along the pebble river bank different colored -Different vandals, all dressed like soldiers can be seen.
It is known that Egor Semenovich inherited his stories from his father; the insignificant pronunciation features are reflected in the written form: goryachyimi slezami 'burning with tears' (father's version) and garachmi slezmi 'burning with tears' (son's version).
It can be seen that the Russkoye Ustye versions of the song have no visible traces of grammatical changes in the folklore text, however, individual pronunciation features manifest themselves quite vividly.

Conclusion
Thus, it should be noted that the folklore legacy remaining in different places of the Russian people's permanent residence on the territory of Yakutia has its features.Until a particular time-period (in the 1980-1990s), Russian folklore was very wide-spread: bylinas, historical songs, fairytales and lyrical folklore.A number of significant expeditions held at the end of the 19th and in the middle of the 20th century, allowed recording these folklore samples.During the time of the first recordings of oral folklore, the pieces were recorded from people who were generally unknown to the public as storytellers; in the middle of the 20th century, folklore compilers observed the presence of such important features as the storyteller, place of residence, age and family relations.It is not accidental that in the middle of the 20th century, the folklore compilers strived to record as many folklore texts as possible and if they failed to do so, they recorded the titles of the folklore art piece performed by a particular storyteller.At the same time, there is a tendency to inherit the storytelling traditions.This phenomenon is especially visible in the family of the father and son Kiselyov who lived in the Russkoye Ustye.In the Sokovikov family living in the Kolyma area and the Sedykh family living in the Olekminsky area, there were specific changes taking place, which were took place for a number of objective reasons: the breaking off of the tradition due to the death of the inheritor (in the Sokovikov family); a general loss of the folklore traditions due to social and generally historical changes in the life of the village.Thus, the historical events taking place in this area lead to significant changes in the plots and the images in the stories.A closer insight into the topic shows that the effect of another language and folklore in the Indigirka area is more connected with the lexical borrowings (though insignificant ones).In general, this topic requires a further study.