On the 1st day of Easter in a Kalmyk tent

The fate of the Kalmyks, who have languished for centuries in the darkness of paganism, is the subject of concern and care of the spiritual and secular authorities, and therefore everything that relates to their everyday life and way of life cannot but be of particular interest. In these views, I think it would not be out of place to tell a story about my first visit to a Kalmyk tent, several years ago. It was on the 1st day of Easter. The Volga has just broken up. After Vespers, I and four of my comrades decided to cross to outpost 1 to breathe clean air and admire the awakening nature, after that cruel winter that happened in 1875–76 and which should be memorable for the people of Astrakhan. The so-called government transportation “didn’t work”, so we had to hire a private boat and pay 5 kopecks each. per person. The walk along the outpost rampart and the adjacent steppe did not last long; At the suggestion of A.I., we all went to the tent of a Kalmyk he knew, K. In the tent they found the owner with her daughter, about 12 years old, and her little son, fussing in the sand with a piece of raw lamb fat in his mouth. A dirty shirt, an unwashed face and long unkempt hair eloquently spoke of the kind of hole in which this steppe chick was being raised. There was a fire burning in the middle of the tent; the hostess was busy cleaning legs of lamb, in all likelihood preparing them for the upcoming dinner. And, as a friend of the hostess asked her to make us Kalmyk tea. Without saying a word, the steppe girl left her work, put the tagan on the fire, and on it a rather voluminous cauldron of water and crumbled tea into it. The cauldron had not been cleaned before she filled it with water. The other comrades sat down Kalmyk style on the floor; and G. and I wanted to sit on the bed, but our comrades advised us to follow their example, so as not to accumulate those parasites that are so abundant in almost every tent 2. We formed a small circle at the front of the tent. B. and I., as students of the Kalmyk language, asked the hostess the name in Kalmyk of those things that accidentally came across their eyes, and their use in Kalmyk life. Kalmyk first; didn’t say anything, getting away with grins; and then through her daughter she directly announced that she could not speak Russian. They laughed and asked her: “How do you say that you don’t know how to speak Russian, but you understand what others are telling you?!” The Kalmyk woman was apparently embarrassed by such an unexpected question, especially since she noticed that she was not being asked for fun, but seriously; and therefore abandoned her stubborn silence and began to speak in broken Russian; willingly and even helpfully answer all the questions asked of her by B. and I. Meanwhile, at this time I managed to examine the inside of the dwellings of the steppe inhabitants. To the right and left at the entrance lay a pile of sticks, chips and dung; 3 There were (kitchen) dishes and buckets of water right there. Further, on both sides there were wooden beds covered with felts, winter clothes lay in disarray at the heads, and pillows with greasy pillowcases on them. Behind the beds there were chests piled on top of each other, and opposite the very entrance to the tent there was a rather tall chest on which stood a prayer machine (kyurdu) with a rosary (eripe) thrown over it, several small wooden cups (deezhin tsektse) and a piece of flatbread (tselvek) baked in ash. Above this chest, on a blue silk cloth, hung a burkhan painted with various colors. (I was told that the Kalmyks hang burkhans only on their holidays; the rest of the time, carefully rolled up, they are stored in chests; but this time they were outside of them). Next to the burkhan hung portraits of the Sovereign Emperor Alexander Nikolaevich, His heir Alexander Alexandrovich and the late Empress Maria Alexandrovna - an Amazon on a white horse. When the tea had boiled two or three times, the Kalmyk woman pulled out a long stick with a bag attached to it from the lattice of the tent; it contained the so-called “sleeping tea” among the common people (among the Kalmyks this “sleeping tea” is called a ball), which she poured into the cauldron and began to filter the liquid contained in it through this bag; Thus, the tea leaves went back into the bag, and the liquid alone remained in the cauldron. So that part of this expensive drink would not go to waste, the Kalmyk woman, twisting the bag around a stick, began to squeeze; black dirty liquid poured into the cauldron... I could not look at this straining of tea without disgust, especially when I imagined that I would have to drink this liquid... Having strained it, she added milk, let it boil again, added oil and began to pour it into wooden cups. There weren’t enough cups for everyone, so the hostess sent her daughter to a nearby tent to fetch a few cups from there. The order was carried out. Instead of rinsing, as we do, the Kalmyk woman raked away the hot coals from under the cauldron, fried the cups on them, turning them upside down, and filled them with tea. Before serving us the cups, the Kalmyk woman took one of the vessels that stood on the chest in front of the Burkhan, filled it with tea and, after standing in a prayerful position for about three minutes in front of the Burkhan, she put it in its original place and then handed out the cups to us. I had already decided not to drink tea, and therefore, when the Kalmyk woman handed me a cup, I began to refuse, but my comrades convinced me to accept it, since the good-natured hostess might be offended by my refusal. I accepted the cup, but drinking all the cloudy liquid it contained was beyond my strength. I poured some of this liquid into my neighbor’s cup, but I could hardly bring myself to swallow only a few drops... For tea, cakes made with lamb fat were served on a wooden mug. Over tea the hostess became even more talkative and cheeky; we talked and laughed especially a lot when B. called his daughter her babga (elderly woman). “What a bobga she is,” the hostess remarked with heart, she’s young!” Our extraordinary visit attracted curious Kalmyk women from adjacent tents to the hospitable tent. Having crossed its threshold, they silently sat in a circle, and some stood at a respectful distance. One of them is over 40 years old; smarter than others, noticing that we easily communicated with the hostess and her household (I was amusing the little one), she decided to start a conversation with us. Rising from the floor, she turned to us: “Hello, kids! Happy holiday!” “Thank you,” we replied. The Kalmyk woman walked around us, shaking our hands. “Can I share Christ with you?” The Kalmyk woman turned to us again, “After all, they are celebrating Christ today.” I hastened to answer: “no, you can’t,” but B. interrupted me: “you can,” and kissed her. She came up to me. I kissed her once and wanted to step aside. “What?!” “We need more, because you celebrate Christ three times,” the Kalmyk woman turned to me. I kissed two more times. Other comrades did the same. This incident amazed me. An unbaptized Kalmyk woman, without any reason on our part, was the first to turn to us with an offer to celebrate Christ... “Well, kids, (this Kalmyk woman spoke Russian well) excuse me: there are no chairs, there were no chairs; do not disdain; the more you are happy, the richer you are,” (she flaunted a Russian proverb, distorting it) – the same Kalmyk woman continued to jabber, sitting down in her previous place. “Nothing, nothing, we are not arrogant people, we don’t need anything,” we said. All this time, the rest of the Kalmyks laughed and looked at each other. On the occasion of the Christening, B. began to briefly tell the story of the present holiday. The Kalmyks listened to him with attention. At 7 ½ o'clock in the evening we said goodbye to the hospitable hostess, promising to visit her soon and bring gifts for her children. The sun had already set when we approached the carriage. Here, by the way, we had to make sure that the Kalmyks were not averse to taking an extra penny from a Russian on occasion. We began to hire Kalmyks to transport us to the other side, but they asked for 10 kopecks per person; We did not have such a sum, and therefore we were forced to wait for another boat in the hope of hiring it for a lower fee. Fortunately, another boat soon came from that side, on which the rowers agreed to transport us for the offered amount. We entered this boat, but then a quarrel broke out between the Kalmyks of this boat and the one we had hired before. The previous carriers did not let us in on the grounds that now it was their turn to carry. We stood up: “Why didn’t you take us before, but made us wait for a whole 15 minutes, now we don’t want to go with you!” But the Kalmyks insistently demanded that we get into their boat under the threat of not letting us leave this shore. There was nothing to do, we boarded the first boat and at 8 o’clock we were on the Astrakhan shore. On the third day of Easter, I. and I decided to visit the hospitable tent for the second time in order to fulfill the promise we made when leaving. After buying pretzels and treats, we boarded the ferry. In the tent there was the owner's daughter, already familiar to us - a girl with little children, collected here from neighboring tents. Women and men worked on the raft - at this time the fish began to flow heavily, but the Russians did not go to work on the occasion of the holiday. We handed over the gifts to the owner's daughter and left the tent. As I was leaving it, I noticed the pot from which we drank tea two days ago; dogs were licking it... Bones of boiled fish were visible on the sides of the pot - traces of a recent dinner. I silently pointed to I. at the bowler hat, but he only smiled. You need to have special nerves and a strong nature to then decide to share a meal offered by hospitable Kalmyks from one cauldron in which tea and fish are boiled, and one after the other without any washing or rinsing.... And everyone who has to deal with them is convinced of the courtesy and hospitality of the Kalmyks. True, at first, to a person unfamiliar with them, they may seem uncommunicative and even suspicious, but after taking a closer look at what kind of person they are, Kalmyks become affectionate, kind and even helpful. Under a particularly cheerful hand, a Kalmyk is not averse to even joking or playing around. Talking about the war of the twelfth year and singing a song 4 composed for this occasion is the greatest pleasure for a Kalmyk, but, I repeat, he will decide to do this only when he finds out what kind of person he is dealing with. Kalmyks are no strangers to being curious about what new things are happening in this world... The reason for explaining this fact must be sought not in the character of the Kalmyk, but in his environment. Kalmyks live for the most part among Russian peasants, from whom they rarely hear a kind word; nokho (dog) - a name often used by Kalmyk peasants, makes the latter distrustful, suspicious and secretive. Those who have and have to deal with Kalmyks, especially missionaries, need, in addition to familiarity with the book Kalmyk language, to be familiar with their way of life, character, morals and customs, and this can be acquired not from books, but from real life, from personal dealings with Kalmyks. For those students of the local theological seminary who wish to devote themselves to missionary service, it would therefore not be a bad idea to go during vacation time to the Kalmyk headquarters, where they can get acquainted with the spoken language of the Kalmyks and their way of life. A. D. (formerly educated at Astrakh. Seminar.) Suburb of the city of Astrakhan on the right bank of the Volga The abundance of insects that feed on the human body is a consequence of extreme untidiness, so common in Kalmyk life, and therefore, if a Kalmyk catches an insect on his clothes, he does not kill it, but carries it safely beyond the threshold of the tent and throws it on the sand. Some explain this leniency towards parasites by the fact that they are born from the human body; Or maybe this custom has a basis in the Kalmyk belief in the transmigration of the souls of dead people? A type of fuel prepared from cattle dung. The melodies of this song are quite pleasant; it is sung in a low voice. The content of this song is very interesting: it glorifies the exploits of the Kalmyk Cossacks during the war of the twelfth year, and especially their leader, the prince. Among the Kalmyks you can very rarely meet singers who know this song, and even those who can sing do not decide to do it right away, but after intense requests and promises of reward for their work. During the entire singing, the Kalmyk holds his head in an inclined position, thereby expressing special reverence. You might be interested in: