“Individual status” of the characters from the Oirat monument “The Tale of the Nectar Teaching”

Abstract

For the first time, this article has presented the experience of describing the internal and external features of the characters in the Oirat monument “The Tale of the Nectar Teaching” from the point of view of their individual qualities, based on the well-known work “The System of Characters of the Russian Fairy Tale” (2001) by the Russian folklorist E. S. Novik. The analysis is based on three unpublished copies of the monument, stored in the Scientific Library of the Oriental Faculty of St. Petersburg State University, the Manuscript Fund of the Institute of Oriental Manuscripts of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the State Archives of the Republic of Tatarstan. Lexicographic works and dictionaries were used as additional materials for interpreting the names of the Buddhist characters. As a result of the analysis, we have come to the conclusion that for the intra-plot functioning of the characters, it is important to take into account not only the role they play in the given plot (episode), but also the individual characteristics they are endowed with, since they correspond to those actions (conflict situations) in which the characters take part. The individual features of the character not only determine the nature of the plot, but they can also change in the course of its development, since each character is a bundle of characteristics that can easily disintegrate or be completed. We believe that the results obtained will serve as the basis for further research into the family, class and local states of the characters in the Oirat monument “The Legend of the Nectar Teaching.”