Калмыцкая этиологическая сказка «Почему у Совы нет ноздрей»

Abstract

In this article we present a mythological text from Kalmyk folklore. Better known as folk tale, this text has appeared in various publications both in the original language (Kalmyk) and in Russian. As this text explains the origin of certain phenomena in bird life, it is scientifically more appropriate to classify it as an etiological folk tale or an etiological myth. The story is short and mostly consists of a dialogue between the Eagle, the king of birds, and the savvy Owl. Thanks to its resourcefulness, the Owl gets out of a difficult situa‑ tion and helps to set other birds free. Unlike them, the Owl’s beak is not perforated, therefore the future generations of owls do not have nostrils (in fact, owls do have nostrils, but they are non-perforated). The text is presented in the original Kalmyk form, accompanied by the translation into Russian and interlinear glossing. The Abbrevia‑ tions section provides two systems for designating Kalmyk morphemes: the modern one and the traditional one (according to G. Sanzheyev). In this way, the text can be used not only by Kalmyk language specialists, but also by experts in other Mongolian languages, by linguistic typologists, and by researchers in the fields of folklore, anthropology and ethnology.