Kukotay and Bok Murun: a comparison of two related heroic poems of the kirgiz—I

Abstract

The Smert' Kukotay-khana i ego pominki (henceforth K) recorded by Chokan Valikhanov in 1856 and translated by him Russian Between 1861 and 1865, and Bok Murun (BM) recorded by V.V. Radlov in 1862 are two poems of remarkably ‘heroic’ temper that derive from a common source. The deal with the funeral feast of Kökötöy-kan, which is proverbial in Kirgiz as Kökötöydün aši, than which there was no greater funeral repast. Of the two poems, the former is apparently the more archaic, yet the latter too has archaic features. Regrettably, the Kirgiz original of K is lost but for some three couplets cited by Valikhanov in separate essays. Nevertheless, Valikanov evidently translated closely, since it is possible to recognize not only the ‘parallelistic’ structure of lines in various passages but also traditional epic formulae, including epithets, that occur in other Kirgiz heroic poems, including BM. The translation seems to be so close that if a Kirgiz bard, a good scholar, and a cryptographer could ever be brought together, it should prove possible to reconstruct much of the text of the lost K. Even this translation, alas, is unfinished. To supplement it very barely indeed there is in Valikhanov's published works a prose résumé of the Manas cycle, including the Kukotay (Kökötöy) episode. The latter does not entirely agree with K. It will be referred to here below as ‘the Résumé’. Radlov's Kirgiz text of BM is accompanied by a German verse-translation in another volume. Both require a word of assessment.